Bill Moyers had Conservatives Mickey Edwards and Ross Douthat on his show last Friday "to discuss why they believe their movement has gone off track during the last 8 years and what it means for the Republican Party." Everything Mickey Edwards said made him sound like a Democrat, in the traditional sense. In fact Moyers asked him a few times why he didn't switch his party and become a Democrat.

Hearing staunch Republicans such as Mickey Edwards speak out against the current Republican party and speak up for the values I hold and believe in is far more comforting, and gives me a lot more hope for the future, than just thinking Democrats, with a majority in the House and Senate and the presidency is going to make everything right as rain, which appears to be the progressive point of view. At least this is their justification for abandoning the anti-war movement and refusing to support impeachment, even back when it was first evident Bush and Cheney committed impeachable offenses.

I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the Democrats to bring back ethics and Constitutionality to this country. The passage of the new FISA law, the ease with which Bush receives money to continue an illegal and immoral war, the fact that we are even debating if waterboarding is torture (Nancy Pelosi was appraised of and agreed to our use of torture back in 2002), the ease (and complicity) with which this administration has lived above the rule of law (the list is endless) doesn’t exactly make the case this next Congress is going to be much different from the one we have now.

Put on my editor hat too late...

I meant to say that the fact that the government's policies amount to war against me and mine no longer surprises me.

As a student of environmental science, a farmer, a builder, and a long-time follower of the curve of the oil supply, I have often doubted whether the government of the US can survive teh era after peak oil is reached (i.e. the era that is starting right now).

Oil is central to the power-grabbing and corruption that's going on at the highest levels of our government. Oil fuels the military machine; if it weren't for the fantastic efficiency of oil, "free trade," a la Friedman would not be possible or even thinkable.

In my visions of the future I see the federal government dissolved into a series of states, a loose confederacy of sovereign bioregional states, centered around major metropolitan areas, with a compatible framework of laws to allow trade and free movement.

This vision means the destruction of the bureaucratic edifice that calls itself my government. Once I realized that, the fact that most of the "policies" my supposed representatives advocate are indeed a form of warfare, part of a war declared on me and people like me, to preserve their hold on power at all costs.

Though many of my friends have concluded that the best thing to do is retreat to the hills and concentrate on getting off the grid, I see a need for an institutional framework to make sure the transition to the post-oil economy isn't violent. In order to put that framework in place, like-minded folks need to use existing governmental structure. Personally I think state and municipal governments are where we can have the biggest impact. However, it's also clear that with an authoritarian regime that does not hesitate to spy on and imprison its own citizens at will, these efforts will be greatly hindered.

Of course, if we can manage this transition without dissolving the federal government, that's fine... I'm just mad skeptical about the prospect. Mostly because I'm looking at things with an ecologist's eyes. This country is just too big.

but I am very troubled by his constant flogging of the Salon column to raise money for a PAC and to sink so low as to tout an endorsement by Bob Barr. Glenn, you have been raising this money at least back to February and March and I have come to the conclusion that your primary goal is simply to raise a lot of money. I know because I gave you $50 and, really, I would like it back. If you go to Open Secrets, you will see that the Blue America PAC ( which is the operative PAC) keeps most of the money they raise, they are late with their reporting, they have already been fined by the FEC and they give so little money to candidates that it makes me weep. Really Glenn, I expected better from you. If you look around at the people jumping into this cesspool, you will see some very shady characters, Bob Barr being only the latest. This whole thing is starting to stink and remind me of the Abrahamoff, Norquist, Reid cabal. I already see the cross-flogging and the payments to each other. You are fast losing all credibility.

I'll welcome him. I just would not vote for him unless he moved heaven and earth to demonstrate a true commitment to the full panoply of civil liberties.

-- -Mona-

I'll welcome him only for the purpose of fooling the "rubes" and helping to alter the outcome in the election. If that means money and information put out by Strange Bedfellows, that's a good thing. But Bob Barr is a lying sack. Always has been and always will be. I don't know how Jane Hamsher stomached him for 35 minutes. I also don't know if he took her up on exposing himself to Firedoglake for a conversation with the posters, as she invited him to do so on the link that Glenn posted, or if Jane and Barr have made specific arrangements for him to do so.

I find it nearly impossible to believe that a person could lie as much as Bob Barr did about Clinton on TV and every where else and then suddenly become an honest person just a few years later. Especially since I've never heard him really account for himself. Jane put it to him at the end of the interview, but his answer was totally inadequate. He should have said and admitted that he had been one of the biggest assholes on the face of the earth for several years, and then begged Jane for forgiveness...over time.

Bob Barr still turns my stomach.