I also can understand your need to "check out," but when you check back in again, please answer the questions I put to you in my last post about how I am a believer in Manchurian candidates and right wing talking points.

Otherwise, you are merely practicing the online version of smear and run when you accuse me of saying things I never even came close to saying.

the fudge...

Of course, no one can say that because for those now just becoming eligible to vote and way back to FDR WJC HAS BEEN the only two-term Democratic president! And this election, as it was with Dukakis, Gore, and Kerry, proves why. Dems cut off their nose to spite their face. The powers that be in the media and the DNC had a bug up their butt about the Clintons, so they demonized them and made a first-term senator--who vowed that he wouldn't run for the presidency right away--a saint fighting off the devil Clintons; and he got a few more votes than she. We see what's already happening in the polls.

Don't be surprised if Democratic presidential history repeats itself.

I wish you could see how this paragraph looks to a 20-something kid who has never paid any attention to politics until they noticed their college tuition doubling or their dad losing yet another job--it reads like nonsense....nonsense and madness.

Indeed, I must be a little mad myself for even contributing another letter to this incestuous mudpit of privileged politicos. It's not like a single person in here could possibly be actually keeping up with all the name-dropping spitefulness and name-calling childishness of this "insider" gossip.

Obama is quite far from the perfect candidate, but he does indeed symbolize a sort of "cry for help" from people who are sick of the exact type of insular and exclusionary "politics" occurring in this thread.

The scary part is that there's a good chance Obama won't be elected--or won't be allowed to win even if he receives more votes--and I shudder to think what the next wake-up call might be from a restless and economically depressed citizenry.

Any luck finding those Protocals of the Elders of Obamanation? Surely you must be close. Don't let the Agents of Darkness deter you (especially doloresflower!)

did any of the i love obama and hate everyone that doesnt crowd ever think that bill clinton brought up the fact that jackson won the s.c. primary because he beat clinton there. he had some personal reason to mention that. but they you would have to listen to the whole interview and not just a clip. something you all claim to hate except when it favors your lord and savior, barack obama

they shouldn't have used racist tactics. Did or did not Hillary Clinton equate "hard-working Americans" with "white Americans"?

I don't care if it's not a sincerely-held belief. She was willing to throw that out into the public sphere.

I'm just starting to look into this astroturfing business and get a sense of how and who is using it.

Don't you think it is possible that accusations that Axelrod is astroturfing might in of itself be astroturfing? All you have shown is a general definition of astroturfing, which is useful, and an article that shows that Axelrod most likely has the knowledge and capability to astroturf.

But I don't see any smoking guns claiming actual astroturfing like this article: Clinton Staffers "CAUGHT" Astroturfing at Blue Hampshire

(http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/12/13/123715/95/418/421631). It may or may not be true (for whatever reason, I'm leery of Kos), but it has a fair amount of gory details. This other kos post is also interesting, if true:

http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:fIL8sGPdR38J:www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/24/163437/416/562/522170+sidney+blumenthal+astroturfing&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=32&gl=us

Google searches like 'obama astroturfing' 'clinton astroturfing' 'sidney blumenthal astroturfing' return interesting results.

On a more general note, I think crowds (or sub groups of certain people) often have instinctive, rapid responses. The initial response to Obama's bitter remarks were not astroturfed in my opinion. So I'm leery of deciding that astroturfing is to blame when a group of people have a negative response to words spoken by my candidate, even when I think the words are misunderstood or taken out of context.

Was a visit to the Astrodome in Houston.

to recommend a book I just read and enjoyed. It's called THE WRITING CLASS by Jincy Willet. The protagonist is a decidedly unsexy, unsympathetic, unheroic character, a recluse whose only foray out into the world is a writing class she teaches. The class is filled with eclectic adults, one of whom turns out to be a sadist and killer. But the group continues to meet anyway, and it's a fascinating psychodrama trying to figure out which of these characters is the nut. It's funny and sly and genuinely scary at times, and the best thing is that it's filled with very good writing advice as a backdrop.

I won't tell you whodunit, but let me know if you do end up reading it, as I'd like to know if you appreciated it as much as I thought you might. Don't get me wrong; it's not earth-shattering literature, but it's a clever summer read.

Hmmm, I found myself wondering, does she also post on Salon?

that there is a serial killer on the loose at salon. But how would we know when someone was offed? Quite seriously, it has occurred to me that if a regular poster died--you, me, AKA, jeb, dolores, anyone--the rest of us really wouldn't know. We would just think that the person got sick of this place as so many of us have. But they'd never come back (as so many of us have). It shows how ethereal or tenuous the connections here are, but, really, isn't it a weird thought? If Weeping for Brunnhilde was killed in a car crash yesterday, we would not now know that. It shouldn't matter, but it does. (That was just an example. I happen to know WFB is not dead as he just emailed me today).