I'm on the verge of turning into Cato Senior and posting something like the following, whether it's immediately germane or not, to every online discussion -- like this one -- bearing even remotely on the Cold Civil War. Ahem:

"In the wake of what I have now concluded will be the inevitable 1% loss by Obama in November, the only rational thing for the center-left and left of the Democratic Party to do will be: to destroy that party as we currently know it. What's the point of endless triangulating if your only reward is stasis through false compromise and a gradual erosion of every human good? It's not working! And it will never work!

"So start now! Form social democratic caucuses within your state parties and start harassing them; make it clear that if this they don't start hewing as an adamantine, immovable article of core political faith in all they say and do to this axiom -- 'The history of social democracy can be expressed as the struggle to set limits to the market and to define those areas where priorities should be set by social policy rather than commercial forces' (enunciated not long before his death by the late, great Labourite Robin Cook, who had the stones to walk out of Blair's cabinet over this damnable war) -- then we are gone. En masse. And not to some sorry little fringe party, either. Greens, MoveOn'ers, Kos-ites, etc,. etc., can unite through assiduous Web-based organizing and fundraising to get actual candidates on actual ballots at every level of political contest and take urban America away from these lily-livered corporate stooges wearing the jackass logo, making it impossible for their inaction-that-is-action ever to inflect governance again -- and putting us in the right place against the day that the right time arrives. And that time will arrive, because the cretins and savages who have conflated not only the interests but the mechanisms of unbridled private enterprise with those of the public weal are doomed through prideful nescience and sociopathic cupidity to failure.

"The loss of nerve stops here! Away with cowardice! Embrace the wasteland -- 40 years in no wise daunted Moses, so why should it us? Aux baricades, mes enfants!"

If I were to turn into Cato Senior, that is. Which I'm, like, not.

watching some Fox News guy in early 2003 reading part of an anti-war letter on the air, his lip curled into a sneer, his voice dripping with contempt, his voice rising after reading it as he criticized the "anti-American" letter. Yup, we sure had a lot of "non-partisan" types back then! Truly arful how them libruls wanna have a voice as well!

By my count, "we've" now got four liberals on the air, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Keith Olbermann and now Rachel Maddow. Yup, I guess the right wing now has to "compensate" by adding two dozen more angry screamers.

I do and so do many others as long as M$M shows still affect the judgment and voting decisions of far too many people. Glenn’s voice would be much more influential if he had such a platform. Rachel and KO are the best voices against tyranny and for the constitution. To have and keep their M$M platform, they have to put on a show so that their facts and logic can prevail. Just ask Dan Abrams if you don’t want to believe me.

Help us find a way to build our own communication system beyond the Internet. Any suggestions? In the meantime, we need KO and Rachel or we have hardly any voice on TV.

I'm NOT wishing, I believe he's demonstrating repeated moments of incoherence that I (using a truly Fristian skill set)would attribute to the onset of Alzheimer's.

I'm sorry to hear about your Mom. Apologies that I come across as so insensitive.

There was a time when TNR placed value on well written and intellectually honest pieces. Since this Peretz character took over it has become a shrill rag providing employment for a collection of scribblers who cannot distinguish between journalism and stenography.

The Peretz line is reflected in the output.

Who reads the TNR any longer? What are its circulation figures? Where is it in the spectrum?

Not nearly the question that should have been asked.

-- Avit187

Glenn had already stated and asked earlier in the interview that he was of the opinion that the Democratic congress had failed to provide oversight of the Republican administration.

Glenn Greenwald: A lot of the controversies over the last seven years have been very similar in nature - that the executive branch has done things in secret, refused to really account to the legislative branch for what they've been doing, and both and Republicans and Democrats have seemed to have gone along with that.

Do you agree that over the last seven years there's been a significant increase in executive power and executive secrecy at the expense of Congress, and isn't that part of why the FBI feels like it can just ignore inquiries from Congress, and keep such important matters to itself?

My guess is that the right feels threatened by even the thought of an intelligent person, god forbid a woman, god forbid a lesbian, who is a public liberal who might succeed in television. They've had a monopoly on television for at least two decades, possibly back to the first Reagan term. The presence of a liberal might help people realize that the policies conservatives push are strongly rejected by most Americans and have been for decades.

Maddow may fail like Tucker Carlson did. Who knows? For my taste, she seems pleasant and thoughtful but I've not seen her do much on the Countdown show except agree with Olbermann. My hope is that Maddow will succeed at least long enough that we get to hear from 2-4 other liberals who then get their shows.

My suggestion to Maddow is to invite on her show all the right wing nuts, including Karl Rove, and ask them all the inconvenient questions the media never asks. Really research these people, find the inconsistencies, then bring them on the air and grill them. For example, ask Rove detailed questions about caging and judicial rulings that say caging is illegal. Then ask him if it is fair to steal votes, if the ends justifies the means. That would be fun to watch.