Why else did people overturn the majorities in the House and the Senate? The problem is that we couldn't vote directly on the Commander in Chief.

I was out on the street with a candle last Thursday night. But I don't pretend to think this does a thing to stop the war. I did it out of my own desire to express how I feel about the escalation of the war in the face of almost universal disfavor.

Hitting the streets won't help. That's been done. We need to keep telling Congress to stop the funding, stop everything they can about this war so we can choke it off. That's a real antiwar movement.

Lay off the middle class, Kamiya. The middle class is everyone's favorite punching bag, but I've got news for you: the middle class represents, in general, a pro-Demcracy, pro-human rights, pro-decent and compassionate behavior, and everything else that fucking self-righteous windbags like you claim to represent.

So which class' values do you purport to champion, the rich or the poor? If the rich, then you're championing a class which in general causes most of the political and financial misery in the world; if the poor, hold on to your fair trade latte: they give us most of the physical cruelty, to people, to animals, to the Earth. No class is all good or all bad, but if I had to choose a class to belong to, it would be the middle class, no doubt about it.

So why isn't the middle class out in the streets? Maybe because even though we hate this war, and vote accordingly, and find time to write letters to our representative AND attend anti-war rallies, we're GODDAMNED BUSY AND STRESSED OUT TRYING TO LIVE OUR LIVES, ATTEND TO OUR OWN PROBLEMS, AND TRY TO BE GOOD PEOPLE EVEN IF WE CAN'T RUN AROUND IN THE STREETS LIKE FAUX-WORKERS LIKE YOU, KAMIYA! A Salon Journalist as Revolutionary? Puh-lease!

Let young people run around in the streets, like they always do. They have the time and energy and do not have to worry about mortgages and jobs and keeping a roof over their family's heads (that's real-world responsibility, Gary: look it up). That is the privilege and blessings of youth. Middle class adults will do what we can, including what the youth can't, which is by and large giving money for their campaigns.

Now go and get arrested, Gary. Take all that vacation leave which is apparently flowing out of your ass and show us all that you care more than us. As for myself, I'll spend what free time I have attending to my responsibilities to my family, and if I have a little free time left over, maybe I'll relax, if that's okay with you.

Much of what you write here rings true Gary. But I do take a bit of exception with you giving slight recognition to those who now come out against Bush and his damned war (both Democrats and Republicans).

There is no new found bravery. There is no new hardened resolve. These politicians did not, in these final hours, summon up some lost courage. No, rather they are playing it by the political book as they always do. The mark left by the last election in the end will not be some new accountability for our leaders. It will not bring us better representation or provide us with better leadership. In the end all it really provided us with is a new short list of talking points and another wedge issue that can be carted out every election and then stowed neatly away until the next.

These politicians do not want to be caught in Bush's shadow because they want to get reelected. The people have indeed spoken and those are exactly the words these politicians will recite back to us from now until the elections. And as our bleak political history proves time and again...words are not action and rarely lead to it. You can ask the people in New Orleans about that one.

it's true that many have been kept in in what amounts to a draft, but they all originally volunteered, unlike in Vietnam. Another thing that can't be emphasized enough: a great many of the current soldier "victims" of Bush were enthusiastic supporters of his imperial religious crusade, and were looking forward to leveraging their Iraqi success into a crusade at home against "San Francisco" democrats and were shouting down "traitors" with the loudest of the neo-con "intellectuals" and media babblers. A lot of us know what they right wing would do to us if they got the chance.

I was thinking the same thing today while watching Chris Mathews's segment on "The Human Toll of War." The background music is a 1966 song called "buffalo springfield/for what it's worth. Check it out yourself:

http://video.msn.com/v/us/msnbc.htm?g=60a0211b-60c2-436a-b821-def844ffeecf&f=00&fg=email

It's a tune everybody knows. Here are the lyrics...

There's something happening here

What it is ain't exactly clear

There's a man with a gun over there

Telling me I got to beware

I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

There's battle lines being drawn

Nobody's right if everybody's wrong

Young people speaking their minds

Getting so much resistance from behind

I think it's time we stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

What a field-day for the heat

A thousand people in the street

Singing songs and carrying signs

Mostly say, hooray for our side

It's time we stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Paranoia strikes deep

Into your life it will creep

It starts when you're always afraid

You step out of line, the man come and take you away

We better stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Stop, now, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

Stop, children, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

For me, it raised the question-- where is the antiwar MUSIC this time around. Did the Dixie Chicks thing scare everybody away?