OK, now no question, I'd vote for Hillary in the general, no reservations

[© tweed]

barring a massive change in worldview on my own part, I can't envision supporting the Democratic nominee in November.  Clinton or otherwise.  although she more obviously represents the worst of the political system than does Obama...

look BRTD...  McCain's a dick.  not a difficult conclusion.  he's an opportunistic egomaniac, but they all are...  I challenge you to find the sliver of policy difference as president between McCain and Clinton.  one wants to be in Iraq for 50 years, the other for 100...  one wants to raise the SS earnings cap, one doesn't...  both want to run the healthcare industry through corporate thugs (except Hillary's probably more corporatist and fascistic about it, reading their platforms, not that it matters)...

stop choosing between evils.  the day you do that is the day you will be free.  if we had done this in 1968, maybe it would have mattered.  it'd be a late start, I know.  but I really hope every goddamn Obama voter, and every black, sits on his ass on November fourth and lets McCain win 42 states...  that's the only way to teach the Democratic Party to care about US...

or maybe I'm a dreamer...  keep embracing your hacks...

[© tweed]

barring a massive change in worldview on my own part, I can't envision supporting the Democratic nominee in November.  Clinton or otherwise.  although she more obviously represents the worst of the political system than does Obama...

look BRTD...  McCain's a dick.  not a difficult conclusion.  he's an opportunistic egomaniac, but they all are...  I challenge you to find the sliver of policy difference as president between McCain and Clinton.  one wants to be in Iraq for 50 years, the other for 100...  one wants to raise the SS earnings cap, one doesn't...  both want to run the healthcare industry through corporate thugs (except Hillary's probably more corporatist and fascistic about it, reading their platforms, not that it matters)...

stop choosing between evils.  the day you do that is the day you will be free.  if we had done this in 1968, maybe it would have mattered.  it'd be a late start, I know.  but I really hope every goddamn Obama voter, and every black, sits on his ass on November fourth and lets McCain win 42 states...  that's the only way to teach the Democratic Party to care about US...

or maybe I'm a dreamer...  keep embracing your hacks...

We've been trying that for 40 years.... Look at us now. We will be in a REAL dystopia long before your strategy bears fruit.

No kidding. Letting Reagan and W both win was really good for us in the long run, right?

Well maybe W was politically, although that will probably only be fleeting at best if we can't come up with a true positive agenda.

how different would our lives be with Presidents Mondale and Kerry and Gore?

[© tweed]

barring a massive change in worldview on my own part, I can't envision supporting the Democratic nominee in November.  Clinton or otherwise.  although she more obviously represents the worst of the political system than does Obama...

look BRTD...  McCain's a dick.  not a difficult conclusion.  he's an opportunistic egomaniac, but they all are...  I challenge you to find the sliver of policy difference as president between McCain and Clinton.  one wants to be in Iraq for 50 years, the other for 100...  one wants to raise the SS earnings cap, one doesn't...  both want to run the healthcare industry through corporate thugs (except Hillary's probably more corporatist and fascistic about it, reading their platforms, not that it matters)...

stop choosing between evils.  the day you do that is the day you will be free.  if we had done this in 1968, maybe it would have mattered.  it'd be a late start, I know.  but I really hope every goddamn Obama voter, and every black, sits on his ass on November fourth and lets McCain win 42 states...  that's the only way to teach the Democratic Party to care about US...

or maybe I'm a dreamer...  keep embracing your hacks...

We've been trying that for 40 years.... Look at us now. We will be in a REAL dystopia long before your strategy bears fruit.

No kidding. Letting Reagan and W both win was really good for us in the long run, right?

Well maybe W was politically, although that will probably only be fleeting at best if we can't come up with a true positive agenda.

how different would our lives be with Presidents Mondale and Kerry and Gore?

Much better in my opinion. But obviously we need candidates who can actually win, too (and the Clintons, bad as they are in many ways, are still far better than the Republicans). It's just disappointing that when we get a progressive who can win in Obama, we seem intent on denying him the nomination.

I said "how"

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Well as others have said, impossible to know for sure. They might have all been failures who would've set progressive ideals back as a result of their defeats.

But I think in terms of energy independence, universal health care, rational foreign policy, progress on global warming, civil rights and liberties, etc. we'd all be a lot further along, I think. The men listed all would've been competent Presidents, though they made rotten candidates.

Bill Clinton was a motherfucking God in all of those areas...

[© tweed]

1-We wouldn't be freaking out about losing our doctors

I don't know that many people that are... and 39% of UK doctors are Nigerian imports or some sh**t...

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we were an 'empire' long before Bush...  he is a product of the problem, not the problem itself

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what, red state-blue state?  hardly a war....  a media creation...

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vague...

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why

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trivial

[© tweed]

Reagan was the right man for the times and so was W.  For example, Reagan really precipitated the fall of the Soviet communism and precipitated the end of the Cold War (though it was H.W. who ended both). 

then you know absolutely nothing about the history of the Soviet Union from Brezhnev on and how thoroughly raped they were post-1975, maybe earlier...

as for the rest of your post, thank your God that I just don't care

[© tweed]

At least I can trust Hillary's judicial nominations a lot more than McCain's, that's for sure.

stop enslaving yourself to Roe vs Wade and see the big picture...  it's a silly argument...  keep having more and more corporatism shoved down your throat so you can protect a "right to choose," that the Republican party never would get rid of anyway because of the backlash that would ensue

[© tweed]

Sorry, sounds like Ralph Nader bullsh!t, and I'll never listen to anything of that type ever again after 2000. Ever.

nice to see you have an open mind.  you only have 50 years left to live, after all...  there's every chance you can get through it all without doing any thinking on your own.  keep up the good work bro

[© tweed]

At least I can trust Hillary's judicial nominations a lot more than McCain's, that's for sure.

stop enslaving yourself to Roe vs Wade and see the big picture...  it's a silly argument...  keep having more and more corporatism shoved down your throat so you can protect a "right to choose," that the Republican party never would get rid of anyway because of the backlash that would ensue

Not to mention, it would probably eliminate the biggest wedge issue the GOP has socially.

included in the "backlash"

[© tweed]

Why judicial nominations matter: The Clean Air and Water Acts could be weakened. The Endangered Species Act could be overturned. Gun control laws could be overturned. Workplace protections of women and minorities will be further weakened.  Much of the precedent from the Warren Court is at stake. SCOTUS does matter.

yawn...  just deckchairs on the Titanic to use a cliche.  it's not about the little issues like "weakening" some Act, or if "gun control" (what a joke) is overturned.  it's not about that.  and nobody understands, except for an enlightened few.  enjoy your Nixon and your Mondale and your Christ and your Clinton and your McCain and your God and all of that sh**t, but one day, you'll wish you didn't...

[© tweed]

free will is infinite responsibility...  we all know BushClintonOklahoma and his ilk could never ever handle that!   (and doesn't it prove my point, in a weird way, that he's changed his username from BushOklahoma to ClintonOklahoma without any major persona swing?)

[© tweed]

Ok, well, please tell us who would make a difference as President, then. I do truly feel Obama can move us into a new era in politics unlike anyone else we've ever seen; is that what you are getting at as well? Or is there something else I'm missing.

I don't like being half-hearted in my support of candidates anymore than the next guy, but the Clintons are still a hell of a lot better than any Republicans we've had. It does matter who wins, maybe not as much as it should, I'll agree with you there, and I'm sick of supporting candidates out of fear as much as anyone else. But I'm not just going to drop out of the process if my guy doesn't win, out of some sense of teaching a lesson. My conscience dictates I must still choose the best possible candidate among those available.

Mike Gravel, David Duke, Ron Paul, Ralph Nader, to name a few, for better or for worse...

and please stop the love affair with the Clintons, they're just as evil as the "Republicans" (gasp)...  I know they're the only grasp of power you've had in your lifetime, and the emotional connection to that is oh so pervasive, but please, tell me the difference between John McCain's world and Hillary Clinton's...

and obviously individually "dropping out of the process" isn't going to matter, but if tens of millions of people did it, well, we'd have something...  of course your value currently to the "process" is infinitesimally close to zero, considering about 9 elections in the USA in the past 100 years have been decided by <1 vote...

[© tweed]

free will is infinite responsibility...  we all know BushClintonOklahoma and his ilk could never ever handle that!   (and doesn't it prove my point, in a weird way, that he's changed his username from BushOklahoma to ClintonOklahoma without any major persona swing?)

Why are you all of the sudden attacking me?  I'm baffled.

if you don't believe in free will, what's the point in living?  why don't you just kill yourself?  serious question.

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Judicial nominations effect the entire spectrum of issues, including corporate issues. People who focus only on Roe v. Wade don't recognize that the courts are basically an entirely separate branch of government, who do the governing in an entire area of law that effects almost all government policies. And after the past 28 years, they are already dominated by Republicans. Another 4-8 years will only make that far worse.

Very true. It does affect economics and also civil liberties issues a lot. Roe v. Wade is maybe the most overratted Supreme Court decision ever in its true impact.

The fact that most people don't even realize that Roe v. Wade has largely been supplanted by other case law is most telling.

I know, PP vs Casey, I get it.  but the main purpose of language is communication, agreed?  the term Roe takes on a meaning that is easy to communicate.  I'm not going to change the course of dialogue singlehandedly, so I'll fall in lockstep and ignore a small detail.

[© tweed]

if you killed yourself, God would know it long before it happened, having KNOWN that's what you'd be doing by placing you on this Earth, so I doubt he'd mind, since he could have stopped it if he wanted to.

[© tweed]

nym...

Clinton's story is wonderful, sure, but, shouldn't that have bred compassion on his part?  instead he went along raping the peoples he once belonged to...  look up the 1998 Amendments to Federal student Financial Aid to start with...

Hillary's "universal" system is bullsh**t...  forcing people to get insurance, running it through the hands of the private companies...  not a surprise, considering the hundreds of thousands she takes in from the drug/pharmaceutical/healthcare lobbyists every year she's in the Senate... 

and so on...  don't feel like going blow for blow much longer on these particular points

[© tweed]

considering about 9 elections in the USA in the past 100 years have been decided by <1 vote...

Technically speaking I don't think it's even possible for an election to be decided by less than one vote.

ties

[© tweed]

and obviously individually "dropping out of the process" isn't going to matter, but if tens of millions of people did it, well, we'd have something...

Tens of millions, no more than that, have been "dropping out of the process" for years. And has this brought about the sort of changes that you would like to see? Why would you expect more of the same to give a different result?

most of those were never involved in the process, and aren't even registered to vote...  very few volunteer for a campaign one year and don't bother to vote the next...  if the latter happened, en masse, it would make a difference.

[© tweed]

Anyone who is honestly not bothered by the thought of 24+ years of Bushes and Clintons probably doesn't really deserve to vote.

And 'Democrats' who are willing to vote for this couple after the horrifying years of Bill Clinton's presidency either have long term memory loss or are actually hardcore conservatives.

exactly, and they don't even realize it...  they don't realize that the Democratic Party is, essentially, an extreme conservative/reactionary organization that endorses 99.99% of the status quo.  they can't see it, perhaps, because they never entertained the thought, because the big bad Republicans just seem so...  bad...

[© tweed]

most of those were never involved in the process, and aren't even registered to vote...

38% of registered voters in your state didn't vote in 2004. When you consider how voter registration works in the United States, that is an astonishingly high figure. That figure has been pretty stable in all three Presidential elections since 1996 and is, of course, even lower in mid-term elections.

Try again.

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You are not going to get huge numbers of activists dropping out of a system that they have a stake in.

not quite sure why I have to "Try Again"...  did you come across the figure of the % of the VAP not registered to vote?  that's many millions of people who never were involved.  and I don't think a majority of that 38% were ever heavily involved in the system, maybe have never voted...  I know you don't think activists will every "give up," and maybe I'm a dreamer, but I think once they realize they're working for a system that doesn't work for them, they may...

[© tweed]

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What you don't understand is that the system does work for them. To a limited extent in most cases, but that's (more than) good enough.

I don't see how, besides psychologically, being a part of something and doing your "civic duty" and all that.  but if you have some concrete example of how it does work for them, outside of their backstage passes at the national conventions and whatnot, I'd love to hear it.

and the %ages are interesting.  people are dropping out of the process, that would seem to indicate.  either it has to happen in much larger numbers to matter, or it just simply doesn't, who knows.

[© tweed]

I don't see how, besides psychologically, being a part of something and doing your "civic duty" and all that.  but if you have some concrete example of how it does work for them, outside of their backstage passes at the national conventions and whatnot, I'd love to hear it.

It gives them power and influence, or at least the illusion/possibility of power and influence. And American politics being what it is, there's always the possibility of very real, if technically illegal, financial benefits. You forget that the Democratic and Republican parties are, to a great extent, effectively branches of the State rather than being political parties in a normal sense.

your first sentence is just a mimic of what I said about the psychological benefits of being active in the process.  and the second part, I simply don't buy - when I volunteered for Steve Israel in 2004, I (unfortunately) receive no bribe and I'm 100% sure nobody around me did, either...

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I don't doubt that 50% VAP turnout is no reason for them to worry, but perhaps 15% or 10% or 5% would be.  either the trend will accelerate, and we'll see, or it won't and we won't.