Word of the day is...

Schadenfreude.

I'm sort of waiting for congressional repubs to send staffers to riot in Washington State. Until then, let us appreciate GOP Chair Luke Esser, who isn't all that big on counting votes, but apparently he does like pigs. Or he did, until HorsesAss updated their blog to remove pig-love references.


And The General has helpfully offered a redesign of the Washington State GOP's website.


If only the Washington GOP had managed to pass really great voter ID laws, I'm sure there wouldn't have been a problem.

Obamamania

I have some dear friends who are very frustrated with my support of Obama. And yes, they've worried the "cult" word a bit. Today at Orcinus, a typically brilliant bit on Obamamania in particular and transformative momentum in general.

What's going on is that we've finally got a Democratic candidate who understands exactly how the Republicans did it. As I pointed out my very first week on this blog, the GOP didn't come to power by talking about plans and policies; they did it by using strongly emotional appeals that grabbed people by the gut and didn't let them go. Theirs was never a movement based on reason. It was, from the very beginning, a movement of hearts and souls. And it was that deep, emotionally sustaining commitment that drew people in so deeply that they were willing to give 25 years of their lives to bringing about the New World Order their leaders promised them. We may hate what they've accomplished -- but we're never going to be able to do better until we can inspire that same kind of passion for change.
[snip]
Hillary is going the old route, with more plans and promises. And she's losing. Obama is trying something that's new to Democratic politics -- but that also has a proven track record when it comes to raising and consolidating truly transformational movements. In fact: that kind of change simply does not happen unless you've got this kind of committed mass movement.

This misguided "cult" talk not only misunderstands how social change occurs; it's also giving the GOP a weapon it will use to the hilt if Obama is the candidate in the general election. They're going to demonize those energetic kids at the living ghosts of the dirty fucking hippies of the 60s. And, in a real historic sense, they are. They're our own children, emerging to finish the work that their parents got too tired and too disillusioned to finish. For us old Boomers, they're our very last shot at the dream.

If Hillary is the candidate, I will back her for all I'm worth. But I think it's worth taking a serious look at a candidate who inspires so many, and so deeply.

And when the nominating process is over, we're all going to have to hug and make up. So it really doesn't behoove any of us to level either of the C words at either of our candidates.

Drinking Liberally tonight!

Painful memories

Atrios posted this last week, and I was surprised how much it affected me. I had this physical sensation that was very unpleasant, strolling through the mental nightmare memory of 2002-2003:

It's hard to try to recapture those time. A nation had gone truly mad, our discourse was run by warmongering fools and Very Serious Liberal Hawks, and any attempt to oppose the Iraq war was marginalized 3000 different ways.

Proof in the pudding: an old post by Kevin Drum - who is very smart and whom I read regularly:

What's more, they know that everything they say is easily verifiable once the war starts. No one ever pressed LBJ for proof of what happened in the Tonkin Gulf, but there will be dozens of countries and dozens more NGOs who will be looking very closely at what we find in Iraq after ground forces move in. It will hardly be possible to fake vast numbers of mobile weapons labs, swimming pools of anthrax, ballistic missiles, and the like, and if those things aren't found in substantial and convincing quantities George Bush will be lucky to escape impeachment, let alone win reelection.

If your opposition to war is based on the idea that Saddam does indeed possess illegal weapons but it's best to leave him alone anyway, well and good. But if it's based on the idea that the administration is lying and none of this stuff exists, you should tread carefully. I think it's pretty likely you will be proven wrong shortly.

It gives me shudders to think back on that time, and worse: it makes my blood boil that we have come this far from then, and no one has yet been held accountable.

Primary unease

First, I would like to send congratulations to the GOP- who've managed to grow their anti-voter efforts since the 2000 elections so succesfully. Back then, they only threw out Dem votes. Now, they throw out their own.

And I'd like to note that I was having a lot more fun before I voted in the primary. I liked not owning any of the candidates. I liked knowing that our side offers strong choices, and that I'd be happy with whomever won.

Now that I've voted, I feel like I have a stake in the Clinton/Obama race, and it isn't as much fun.

I voted Obama, by the way. And I've been thinking about a cabinet.

AG: John Dean
State: Richardson
Labor: Edwards

That's as far as I've got... any ideas out there?

Which reminds me

Of this endlessly amusing (in a very sad way) map that a repub friend sent me.

How things change...

Interesting how, since I made the post below, much of the angry right seems to be flocking to Hillary's defense.

What a difference a John McCain run makes.

Although I also have a liberal friend who says he'll vote McCain over HIllary. His issue is the middle east, particularly Arab/Israeli relations (he's Arabic). He's rather sick of his family's homelands being relentlessly bombed. When I protested that McCain wants to bomb everyone, he said yeah, well, at least he's honest about it.