Can you tell the difference between these three Senators? I can't.

Coburn (R-OK), Yea
Inhofe (R-OK), Yea
Klobuchar (D-MN), Yea

As the TPM Reader JC mentioned in that post, let me add that I blogged about this earlier and felt compelled to respond to David's original post at TPM HQ. Here is part of what I originally wrote over at The Pesky Fly, where I co-blog:

Why can't the Democrats force the Republicans to actually filibuster? According to Democratic consultants before the 2006 elections, actually filibustering something like Alberto Gonzalez's nomination would have been political suicide because the American people wouldn't stand to have Congress deadlocked over some silly partisan politics. So now that Democrats are in charge, why not force Republicans to commit political suicide by deadlocking Congress over some silly partisan politics? I don't get it. I just don't get it.

One witnesses these things and one can't help but wonder: do they even want to win, or are Democrats the political equivalent of the Washington Generals?

This kind of failure to lead is what drives the angriest and most motivated liberals into the arms of third parties. I know a lot of dedicated Democrats who are throwing up their hands and saying, "If not now, when?"

Depressing, but true. Maybe "More and better Democrats" could do it. But these clowns still cower at Lieberman, who is getting nuttier and nuttier every day.

thosethingswesay.blogspot.com

MJ,

You beat me to it. Hardly coincidental that the 23 votes against today's resolution were pretty much the same senators that voted against the war resolution in 2002. The Democrats, as a liberal party, basically have a representation of 23 in the Senate. The other 28 Dem senators are middle of the road, R-lites. The DLC policy of appealing to the middle makes liberal governance almost impossible. We can't win from losing.

The vote today really illustrates just how poorly equipped in intellectual abilities Harry Reid is as the majority leader. It is so obvious as to bring tears to my eyes that the correct course of action for the Democrats is to make the Repubs do actual filibustering. As it is now very few non-political junkies are even aware that they are blocking all activity in the senate except nonsense like todays.

Again, allowing that absurd vote today is a further demonstration of the inadequacies of Harry Reid as a leader of anything except latrine duty. The man looks utterly befuddled and obviously is.

Now, lets look at the dinos who voted for that MoveOn resolution. My senator Feinstein received a blistering email from me immediately after her vote letting her know how ashamed I am that she is my senator. Sen. Leahy also voted for it - a vote he couldn't explain rationally if his life depended on it. I can excuse Webb for his vote simply because he is so green I doubt that he realized what he was voting on. But, all of those votes reflect once again that our party has a totally inept leader in the senate.

Now, has anyone read the constitution lately? Note Amendment 1: "Congress shall make no law ...... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or...." Today Congress did "make a law" abridging the freedom of speech, as well as of the press. So, it is not only our ditsy president who is ignoring the constitution, but our Congress as well. Too bad we can't impeach them.

Hoppy in Sacramento

First they came for the 4th amendment (FISA) and they didn't stand up ...

Wait till they get rolled on SCHIP. They'll manage to lose the PR war on sick children.

I would like to engage you in a big argument on that, but today was the final proof. Senator Leahy voted yea??? Who gets to write the new best seller - "Profiles in Cowardness"?

Hoppy in Sacramento

How did this idiotic resolution get to the floor?(let alone in no time flat...)

Back in the day, the Democratic minority couldn't get a vote on a bathroom pass before someone pissed in his pants in the well of the senate...

Re: The virtual vs. actual filibuster...

I wanna see Mr Smith with his three day growth of beard reading telegrams from the fascist you...uh, boy scouts....I wanna see Claude Rains buckle on the Senate Floor.

Make the bastards stay up all night and talk, if they think they have the stones.

So befuddled am I at the seeming fecklessness of Reid, that I am tempted to advance the tin foil version of history, ie, this was a manufactured sistah souljah moment, with Move on and Dem leaders in on the okie-doke.

Thus, red state dems get to tut-tut for the home crowd, Clinton gets to make nice with the left.

Whaddya' think? Can it be that such a resolution ostensibly skewering the dems could have gotten to a vote unless the fix were in?

I'm beginning to think that, unfortunately, Defeatocrats is the right name for many of our present Democrats in Congress.

I remember back when Clemons pitched for the Red Sox, fans would hold up big signs with the number of his strike outs.

Maybe the Dems could arrange for a big sign to appear on C-SPAN, behind the podium?

Like 42, 43, 44, ... 160 (though apparently they're only on target for 153).

Oh,if only that were true.

I keep coming back to trying to figure out what moveon.org was trying to accomplish. Surely they knew the ad would be picked up as being divisive? Or are they that clueless? If they thought by doing the ad, they could get masses to affect the General's conscience, they are clueless. If they intended to paint Patraeus as one and the same as Bush (with the associated low approval ratings), they failed, they failed because of the O'Reilly et. al. counterattack which they should have been able to foresee. People are blaming Senators here for a vote, but are they happy with how moveon.org spent its donations creating the situation that ended up with this vote? The point: there are all kinds of ads they could have created to address the topic. I used to admire their savvy, I don't any more.

aa,
I agree that MoveOn was stupid, and I will take it further.

General Petraeus, on his record, was open to criticism. He did some good things as CG of the 101st Airborne in Mosul, but his subsequent assignment when he was responsible for training and equipping the Iraq army, his political op-ed during the 2004 presidential race and his arming of Sunni gangs, killers of US troops in al-Anbar, were grounds for questioning his judgment and veracity.

The US people are being betrayed by General Petraeus. We expect a general to be non-political, effective and honest. Actually, though, we now have a climate of betrayal, criminal betrayal, coming from the top of our government and permeating many in all three branches of government. In this, Petraeus is only one of the most obvious.

But a full-page ad in the NYT blatantly defaming the US military leader of the Iraq war went too far. Freedom of speech does not include the freedom to defame a general officer, and, as you point out, in this case it wasn't wise tactically. Just the opposite--it boomeranged. Plus it was petty and childish, depending as it did on his name. I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me that MoveOn crossed the line from criticism to defamation. And the law doesn't matter that much because, as you write, they should have forseen the political consequences.

MoveOn has made it more difficult to move on.

It is not a defamation issue in a legal sense because Petraeus is a public figure.

It wasn't a very smart move. In my opinion going after the military is not a good idea - it's better to convince people that the military are victims of this war and keep hammering that the repubs are responsible.

It certainly brings into question where the loyalty to the CIC should end and loyalty to the country begins.

It reminds of Colin Powell - he knew that what he was telling the American people via his U.N. report was based on lies and yet he put his loyalty to the administration first.

The discussion should be on Bush's War, what is really happening in Iraq, can the surge ever work, will the Iraqi government be able to govern their own country. Instead MoveOn has made the issue themselves and their issulting a respected military officer. Petreaus is not above criticism, but it should be adult criticism not something that reminds one of Jerry Ruben and Abbie Hoffman.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

It must be encouraging to the GOP to see that we are as stupid as they expected us to be. General Petraeus is an ambitious man, who would some day like to be president. He has signed on to the Republican team and his testimony to Congress was well known in advance to be filled with distortions and misstatements, if not lies. MoveOn decided to move preemptively and bring his dishonesty to light before the press canonized him. I donated specifically to fund that ad, and will do so again if the opportunity presents itself.

Just being a general does not confer any form of divinity, or honesty, or even intelligence to any man. So Petraeus was just as fair a target as any other ambitious politician would be. The fault lies with him for allowing his ambition to trump his honesty. And, his mea culpa moment, which will follow in about 5 years, does not confer any current immunity on him, just as it didn't with General Powell.

So, why don't we can the talk about what a dastardly deed MoveOn did by pointing some of this out? I, for one, will not join the GOP in any of their dishonesty, and I hope other Democrats will do likewise.

Hoppy in Sacramento

The Globe Trotter/Washington Generals analogy appeals to me for a lot of reasons. The most profound reason of course is the inference that their performances were not really basketball games. Only the children in the audience believed that what they were watching was what it appeared to be. So much for Move-On.org. In contrast here">http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/09/20/countdown-special-comment-the-president-of-hypocrisy/">here is what an adult appreciation of the Petraeus show might sound like.

As to the Democratic majority and its behavior, I’d like to suggest this consideration. Imagine if you will a composite Democrat in the role of a Washington General. (No real Democrats were harmed in the creation of this composite.) Their money comes from the same sources that pay the Globe Trotters. Ford and GM, Boeing and Lockheed, Corporations A to Z do not have dueling boards of directors, one Republican and one Democratic. Only a child would think that the money given to Democrats is intended to produce a different outcome than the money given to Republicans. And our little Democratic composite must surely know this. Like any kid who aspires to play in the big leagues, he or she plays their heart out in real contests, all in the hope that some day they move to the “professional” stage where the game is no longer played and becomes theatre, very well-paid theatre.

Everyone knows that the Globe Trotters always win. Actually there was the occasional General’s victory, but that was just gris for the mill. Every player on both teams knows that their income and the whole enterprise depends on this outcome. And so it is in our Congress which, I would remind you, has a rate of incumbency as secure as anything the Russian Dumas displayed at the height of the Soviet period. But what if the Democrats actually legitimately won just one game. My little composite Democrat would be faced with the horror of expectations of a second victory. It is the implication of this second victory that frightens Democrats into submission. To pursue this second victory would be to forfeit the big financial support which bought them their constituency. My little composite would also immediately become estranged from their team mates by trying to win while the rest are content to continue the theatrical plot. Moreover the pursuit of a second victory inevitably begs the larger question, namely “What is the grand strategy?” By answering that question my little composite is about to create real enemies.

And so my little composite faces the simple fact that they would undo their whole little world in the pursuit of a single victory. In fact they would be challenging the entire enterprise. My little composite friend may be a lot of things but not a revolutionary. No. Rather give a speech about respect for the institution and leave things as they are. The Globe Trotters win, the children are happy and everyone gets paid.

I thought the play on his name was kidlike. It wasn't the smartest move, but the senate dems were even dumber to play along with the repubs.

This mindset that a politician can't criticize the military and survive politically is so entrenched that to point out to them that this is just not so is like drilling concrete with a butterknife.

Well written and a pleasure to read.

"Freedom of speech does not include the freedom to defame a general officer, and, as you point out, in this case it wasn't wise tactically."

Au contraire. Freedom speech sure as hell does include the freedom to make the statements MoveOn made about Petraeus. Perhaps it was tactically unwise to use the too-clever "Betray-Us" hook. (Although polls have shown that a plurality of Americans didn't buy that he was a disinterested participant.) But this is pure and simple about squashing dissent and insulating the military from criticism. What are we? A banana republic?

(Unfortunately, a rhetorical question...)

I expressed my displeasure with the Senate's grandstanding by signing MoveOn's petition and making a donation (possibly my first donation to MoveOn).

I'm not in disagreement with the sentiments of the ad, but yes, it could have been put better - the name play was childish. The dems are so used to being reactive and defensive that they played right along with the repubs, which is a far greater mistake than the ad.

President Bush's comment was so awesomely anti-American that it should be exploited at every opportunity - "the democrats are more afraid of irritating a left wing organization like Moveon than they are of irritating the military." "THAT'S THE WAY IT IS SUPPOSED TO WORK YOU MORON."

No American should ever be afraid of the military and no American should ever be afraid to speak out when he thinks they are wrong.

But a full-page ad in the NYT blatantly defaming the US military leader of the Iraq war went too far.

What, exactly, was the defaming aspect of the ad? Is asking a question the same as asserting something as fact?

It wouldn't have mattered what MoveOn put in the ad; there would have been howls of manufactured outrage coming from the right wing noise machine however innocuous it was. The only way not to provoke that outrage is to shut up and sit down, which is exactly what the right wing wants the left to do.

MoveOn.org probably figures it's as well to be hung for a pound as for a penny. Besides, they're an advocacy group. Being provocative and controversial is what advocacy groups are all about. As Rachel Maddow said on "Countdown" several nights ago, show me a polite activist, and I'll show you a cause that is probably not getting heard.

If the Corporate Media was really on our side, you would see a headline like you suggest blaming the Rethug's. However, the media is NOT on our side and is fighting very hard to keep us out from the halls of power.

I'm no Republican and will not vote so in the next elections. But damned if the Democrats aren't like behaving like a bunch of older adults with a new computer game (in this case, Congress) and asking one another, "How does it work, how is it played?"

You don't have to be a blind conservative not to see it, just an ignorant one to deny it.

"I don't think that's really even a downside, as the Dems are useless." -cscs

Unless you have some other plan for governing, the Dems are what we've got. Disappointing, yep. Not as strong as we'd wish, I certainly agree. Need more and better Dems in the 08 election, you bet. But it is throwing out the baby with the bathwater to say that they are useless and to dismiss them. Unless you have some other plan? General revolution? The people in the streets? It ain't gonna happen. The Dems are the tool that we have.

I don't see the ad working to get people talking about how the war marches on; I see it allowing the Repubs to change the subject (with the compliance of the media).

I think it was a juvenile mistake by MoveOn. Juvenile mistakes happen, I'm still a MoveOn supporter, but boy, I think this one really hurt.

Could it be the same reasoning that led 23 of them to vote today for a resolution condemning Moveon.org

And that reasoning would be what again? Because to my way of thinking there can be no reason.

Leahy's not afraid. His seat is his as long as he wants it. Vermont would never turn him out. The MoveOn ad was stupid. He's disowning the awkwardness of it, so it doesn't get pinned to the Donkey.

Why should anyone defend MoveOn? It's a not-very-bright group that sometimes helps, but as often hinders, by embracing unsophisticated, simplistic doctrines and then claiming that anyone who disagrees with them on as much as a single item on their agenda has "betrayed" true virtue as revealed to them.

MoveOn is the left's answer to the idiocies of the Born Again.

Say what you want: Harry Reid and Nancy pelosi have proved to be ineffective leaders. No personality, no charisma, just empty words. I have given up on this sad lot. You will recall in the last Congress that when the Democrats announced their plan to filibuster judicial appointments the Republicans threatened to change the rules to get back to a simple majority. The Democrats have refined the art of caving in, empty threats, bombast and cowardice. They don't have a united caucus. Too many DINOs and LieberIran (who had left the party but got chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee which is a pretty ineffective oversight committee). This is a sorry lot. My money will goes to MoveOn. I don't care about polarised debates. We are already there.

SeeDee

I only wish I could have rated hoppycalif2 a '7' or an '8'.

I am weary of this faux concern for degrading a 'general officer'...If the 'general officer' in question has willingly projected himself into the political arena, or has willingly allowed himself to be used to champion a particular view of a political issue, then why in hell should he be immune from criticism IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM?

Petraeus' non-comment on Rudy's use of his (Petraeus') uniform in a political ad is tantamount to deliberate flaunting of military rules and regs RE political campaigning. What about some punitive action for this mis-guided little general?

SeeDee

Amen to your commentary, RandyR.

I'm not so sure that the 'notorious' ad in question might still come back to haunt those feckless Senate democrats who caved in on the principles involved. It may also further shine a brighter light on just how corrupt the 'general' in question has been and how the Bush administration is using the military to prolong the war.

I notice Giuliani is calling for jail time for the 'Moveon' folks responsible for the ad...I really think jail time would be appropriate for ANY presidential candidate who openly advocates infringement of the FIRST Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Third parties lead to people like Bush getting elected. Why don't they just join MoveOn instead?

I don't think it's all that clear that it boomeranged, other than allowing the minority party to make the Dems look like wimps once again in the Senate, which was the Dems' own fault. Has a Sense of the Senate resolution ever passed about all the nasty stuff people on the right say?

Clearly, Petraeus did not move the debate. Was that the best he possibly could have done, or did priming the public in advance by suggesting that he was a Bush crony make a difference? I don't know, but portraying Petraeus as less-than-candid in advance may have had some impact.

I'm also not sure whether any of this wait til September BS made any difference in terms of what the marginal GOP Senators were going to do (continue to side with Bush) or the Dem leadership (not cut off funding and fail to get 60 votes for anything substantive).

So we may have been left to wait for Jan. 2009 in either case. It's also hard to fault the Dems for not wanting to take over the responsibility for the Iraq War at this point and get blamed for whatever inevitably goes wrong. It may well be better to elect more Dems and prevent another misguided war in the first place.

I don't know. It's not like the GOP didn't have BS talking points about Iraq before the MoveOn ad that they would have just continued using. I don't know if it really had much impact.

The Sense of the Senate Resolution that you shouldn't say something isn't a law actually preventing you from saying it or punishing you for saying it.

The third is a miserable senator. She voted to fund the war. She voted for FISA. She voted for the farce yesterday. She has voted with the two biggest lunatics in the Senate on every meaningful vote since she's been in office.

"Why should anyone defend MoveOn? "

Maybe because they've funneled tons of money and activists into Democratic campaigns? Maybe they should channel all of that into a 3rd party campaign in 2008 and we'll see if we can quantify their impact.

And what good would that do?

Maybe I read these blogs because, I begin in the same place that you do... with the illusion that the give and take between parties can change things, but have in the last few years awakened to a new understanding, and maybe I want to awaken other people from the matrix and stir real political change by pointing to the false choices that Democrat and Republican represent.

Sure, I'll still pull the lever for a Democrat in the fall, but without any illusion that it will matter.

Or, hey, maybe we shouldn't feel powerless in relation to these broad historical and global trends, but should find extra-political ways to hasten those historical processes along, until the ground shifts and a political party really can ride the winds of history in a new direction?

Or would that be too radical?

I think you are wrong. Klobuchar is really awful. I think bluebell really says it clearly...Klobuchar is an utter fraud. She has not voted meaningfully on any issue of import since her election. I do not think we will get any meaningful change in this country with the likes of Klobuchar. The one thing you indicate that she might do is not support the far-right shift in the Supreme Court. Probably. Although she seems to be a strong LieberDem so I will not be surprise if even here she sells out. I am certainly she would have supported the moderate deal for the Dems not to filibuster Judicial appointments. Remind me if the Dems got anything from that bold compromise.

So, as I say, onto cloture. The decision to settle for the cloture vote and not endure a filibuster is being taken here as a moral failing, a sign of cowardice and complicity, and a reason we're failing. I'm saddened that I'm always, it seems, in the isolated position of being between the majority of commenters who feel this way and a minority, whom I don't agree with, who endorse moderation and compromise. Yet I find the majority position dead wrong.

This is a strategic question, not a moral question. It does not change the outcome. It does not prove a darn thing to anyone. It does not take us further from or closer to an end to war, where we have lost, at least as long as Bush in is office. It is no more than an argument over whether to walk away from the school bully or to scream as loudly as you can "he kicked me." There can be much to be said on both sides, but let's stop pretending it means more than it does. There's a loveliness in demanding, like the Japanese at Iwo Jima, to die rather than surrender. But let's not call it making a difference.

The plain fact is we're not overcoming a filibuster. And the plain fact is that the Democrats did, bravely or cowardly, vote in lockstep that I can only praise. On the war resolution, the party was unanimous. It was for the habeas corpus bill. And it was, too, for voting right to DC. The press may always report it as 49-1 or 50-1, which only goes to show that it's long overdue to stop talking about "Democrats and independents" as if Lieberman were anything but a full part of the Republican voting block down the line. This includes Democrats we like, Democrats like Landrieu we don't, and Democrats like Clinton on which TPM members disagree.

We should be shouting again and again: this is GOP cravenness. The Democrats have asked for change, and the GOP has once again stood against the popular will, just as every single GOP member voted against the Clinton budget in 1993. Seems to me that if we started shouting that message more and shouting less that they're all cowards, militarists, and corporate shills, we might have gotten rid of Bush in 2004. Ask yourself: where will you be in 2009 when the GOP calls it a Democratic president's war?

I think you're right, as was the Times today: demanding a filibuster was a better strategy. But make no mistake: it's still a strategic decision, not a sellout. And, as I said in my preceding comment, lumping it in with the MoveOn issue obfuscates this in fact, perhaps for us emotionally as well. 

John

http://www.haberarts.com/

Well I question the "better leadership and the whole thing changes" because, good structuralist that I am, I suspect that "leadership" itself is something of an illusion... the underlying structures of power themselves have to shift.

Now if I was a communist I might believe that a vanguard party could precipitate that shift... but I'm not a communist and I think the lessons of history are pretty unequivocal in showing the horrors that lie down that path.

But I do watch the peaking of oil production, and the decline of the dollar, and the warming of the planet for signs of how they might change the circumstances of human life and the sands upon which power is built and exercised.

I'm not convinced that there is something to be done, other than attempt to remain alive, as individuals and communities, as the sands shift and the rats at the top (politicians) struggle to maintain their position.

You might say that's not politics, but I'm not so sure that it isn't... it's just not the politics that political blogs like to talk about. So maybe I don't belong here, but I do read here, and that's what I think.

A Dem leader simply puts forward bills funding withdrawal and refuses to put forward any other bill, and it's over. What structure of power favors not doing so and prolonging the war?

Anyway, it's a depressing time.

Even Friedman agrees:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/opinion/19friedman.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists&pagewanted=print

Well I question the "better leadership and the whole thing changes" because, good structuralist that I am, I suspect that "leadership" itself is something of an illusion... the underlying structures of power themselves have to shift.

No, I disagree with you strongly there. I think leadership is a critical factor. I think it made a huge difference to the cause of American independence that George Washington and not Charles Lee or Horatio Gates was the commander-in-chief of the American forces. I think it made a huge difference that Abraham Lincoln and not Stephen A. Douglas was the country's president during a bitter civil war. I think the presence of John Smith may have been the decisive difference that led to the English colony at Jamestown ultimately succeeding and the contemporaneous Popham colony in Maine folding after a year. (Not that luck was not a significant factor in all of those things, too. But luck is no good without the leadership that has the foresight and courage to seize on it.)

If the 'general officer' in question has willingly projected himself into the political arena, or has willingly allowed himself to be used to champion a particular view of a political issue, then why in hell should he be immune from criticism IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM?

My thoughts are it is inaccurate to say an officer willingly allowed himself to be used as he takes orders from the President. He is only allowed to serve and execute the strategy and policy of the CinC. He does not get to willingly champion a particular view of a political issue. The only time we see Generals and officers do such is after they are retired.

There is only one other explanation for a freshman Democrat, who won with well over 60% of the votes in a blue state which has elected true blue liberals like Wellstone, Mondale, Humphrey, McCarthy, voting like the most conservative blue dog in Mississippi or the most far right Republican in Oklahoma and this is an explanation I suggested after her FISA sellout.

Are the votes being fixed?

What pressure was put on Klobuchar to vote for FISA and against moveon? There was ZERO pressure from her constitutents. So where is the pressure coming from?

I agree, Bluebell. I have come to believe that the DC Dem leaders, especially concentrated in the Senate, simply do not believe that there is any real movement afoot in the Dem Party. I think they view the blogs and the money raised by moveon as well as candidates like Obama as a short-term aberration headed by far-left dunderheads.

The fight goes on.

I am not sure that she is acting out of fear; I think she is acting out of agreement with Republicans. Her votes on FISA (expanding Bush's wiretapping) and her vote on MoveOn would not have carried (IMO) serious negative consequences. Remember she is not up for reelection for six years and she really crushed Mark Kennedy in her election. Do keep an eye on her votes. They have been terrible. A major crushing disappointment.

John, half of politics is the public perception of what you do. (Maybe even more than half). The reason for forcing the Repubs to actually do a filibuster is not to change the outcome - that is predetermined by the raw numbers in the Senate. It is to change the public perception about what is going on in the Congress. Right now the public, and most of the commenters here believe that the Democrats have reneged on their presumed promise to the voters to force Bush back to the "highway" on as many issues as possible. They believe that this is a do nothing Democratic Congress, which talks a good game, but that is all.

This public perception can only be changed by making the truth so obvious that the news media cannot misrepresent it in any believable way. One technique for doing that is to make the obstructing Repubs visibly do their obstruction, do it right out in the open, right in front of the cameras. When we allow the Repubs to halt all progress by simply telling Reid that they will not allow a cloture vote to succeed, no one in the general public is aware of what that means.

This Congress is truly a do nothing Congress, and it will be that throughout its 2 year term. That will not change. What we have to change is the public perception that it is the Democrats who are the problem. Otherwise, we get a Repub majority Congress in 2009.

Hoppy in Sacramento

And if money was determinative, there wouldn't be any Dem majority either, since the funders could have just kept the GOP in power forever.

I think Larry H answered this point in his analogy, " To pursue this second victory would be to forfeit the big financial support which bought them their constituency. My little composite would also immediately become estranged from their team mates by trying to win while the rest are content to continue the theatrical plot."

In other words, ohiomeister, to follow the analogy, the Washington Generals do need some 'wins' to continue interest in the 'theatrical' game. Interest would flag or disappear if the Globe Trotters were the only ones scoring.

Having read the 1993 book, 'Indispensable Enemies' by Walter Karp, which describes and explains collusion between the parties, I am inclined to appreciate the simple beauty of Larry's analogy, as far as it goes.

Your point about funding of Dems and Republicans not being the same has some validity also, but any differences in funding mainly track along topdog/underdog lines. Dem financing other than corporate funding comes from organizations representing the 'underdogs' of the overall economic system, while Dems who get re-elected do gain topdog corporate funding overtly or alternatively win covert corporate support by being [inexplicable to us] wimps/colluders in Congress.

Karp's book does a great job explaining how and why the colluding parties will work together to neuter any politician of either party who gains grass roots power, that being the only serious threat to the continuation of both parties' positioning of shared gamemanship in Washington.

But, on a somewhat different note, but with a view to today's topic of wimps....... I will quote something from Karp's 1993 book that seems very applicable today:

"The political benefits of an aggressive foreign policy are both obvious and manifold.........It enables the party oligarchs to silence independent voices and crush political insurgents on the grounds that they weaken national unity and give comfort to the nation's enemies. In the crises and alarms of an aggressive foreign policy, collusion between the parties scarcely requires a mask; it can parade itself as virtuous bipartisanship in the service of national survival. Under cover of an aggressive foreign policy the party oligarchs can serve their interests with an ease impossible in a peaceful republic. In the name of national defense they can dispense grotesque windfall privileges.....In the name of national security they can shroud government in the mantle of secrecy and infringe on the liberty of the citizens..........It is the citizenry who must now prove their 'loyalty' while the government taps their telephones, monitors their private mail and organizes 'patriots' to root out neighborhood traitors. Submission replaces independence, fear replaces hope, the citizenry acquires the habit of obedience and loses the habit of self-rule.........What an aggressive foreign policy accomplishes by slow degrees, a state of war accomplishes in a trice. Overnight it kills reform.....strangles free politics........ distracts and overawes the citizenry........ blasts public hope...."

I would disagree. Eli Pariser has admitted that the tone might have been a bit harsh but the message was dead on. (not to mention that MoveOn.org had it's largest fundraising day ever after Bush's attack on them Thursday) This all reminds me of how Howard Dean was vilified when he made the remark that Saddam Hussein's capture would do nothing to make us safer and how the right wing howled when Harry Reid said publicly that Bush was just biding his time and planned to dump this whole Iraq mess into the lap of the next president. They were both proved right, after all.

Like John Lennon once said, "time wounds all heels"

Republicans are people too.....mean, selfish, greedy people

Agreed Bluebell. MoveOn might have miscalculated in tone on this one but I'm personally very grateful for them. They've transformed me from an 'armchair' activist into a 'true' one.

Republicans are people too.....mean, selfish, greedy people

1. If leadership is a critical factor then it's because representative democracy has failed. Mike2 summed it up nicely above in his sarcastic (I hope) comment on leaders: "Ride it out... until January 2009, when a Democratic President with a conscience finds that he/she and the Congress he/she is beholden to for legislation are still dependent on the goodwill of corporate America." Actually there's a lot of truth in this. Many people are foolishly hoping that the next dictator/decider has a conscience. This kind of thinking is illustrative of the death of representative democracy.

2. George Washington and Abraham Lincoln were fortuitously instrumental at times when the country was being formed and had broken up. We now have a time when the country is firmly established and concentrating on expanding power and profit, which calls for a completely different kind of president. Forget about the man/woman on a white horse, that's only in fairy tales. Corporate profits rule.

re: How to "take the ad".

If the officer had been, let's say, General Pace, would have there have been a full-page ad suggesting that he might be General Betray-us? No, of course not. It would have been considered meaningless, childish and demeaning, if not defamatory, just as this ad was.

So Petraeus was just as fair a target as any other ambitious politician would be.

You're fancifully discounting about two hundred years of American history as well as current polls which show the military to be far ahead of politicians in the estimation of Americans.

To think that General Petraeus dreamed this whole scenario up and should be singled out for ridicule is wrong, and the Senate agreed. It was simply stupid for MoveOn and its supporters publicly to pick on an army general when the real enemy sits in the White House, aided and abetted by the Congress.

So now we have the Congress expressing the will of the people that a general shouldn't be defamed, brilliantly letting themselves off the hook in the process, and placing themselves on the side of the administration.

Nice move, MoveOn. Tactically brilliant. You've healed the rift between the Congress and the President. I hate disagreements, don't you?

Will the real betrayer(s) please rise?

The ad had nothing to do with Petraeus's testimony. It ran on September 10th, the first day of the general's testimony.

MoveOn was trying to play the Republican game of getting the message out to people who don't watch the news and are not paying any attention.

Maybe, but the message backfired and now MoveOn money has taken on a toxic quality. A number of our new Democratic congressional freshmen got there with MoveOn money and issue ads. MoveOn contributes more money to candidates than the NRA. Seeking re-election it will be much more difficult for these candidates, especially those in traditional Republican districts, to accept money from MoveOn, an organization that was beat up by a Senate resolution and in the MSM. One wonders whether there is any adult supervision at MoveOn.

why are the dems acting so weak?

well once reason is because they think they've essentially won the presidential election and now don't want to lose it.

its football analogue is called the "prevent defense."

unfortunately for the dems, those of us who've watched enough football also know that commentators often say that the only thing a prevent defense does is prevent you from winning.

Wonder if a strong win by Al Francken would push her more to the left. She could also be laying the foundation for a run for another office such as governor.

SeeDee

RE your impassioned defense of Petraeus' military virtues, Don Bacon, and your reference to what you must think is a stellar record:

Will you explain the dismal failure of the program to 'train Iraqi military and police forces' which was the task of Petraeus just prior to his elevation to Commander in Iraq?

Seems like, to date, there is a Pentagon investigation into $6-Billions worth of fraud associated with the former domain of your little general. And, apparently, it reaches right up to an officer who was right next to Petraeus.

With any other DOD and administration but the Bush fiasco, Petraeus would have been demoted and retired by now.

But, even ignoring these obvious failures, the idea that you have of not allowing criticism of 'uniformed officers' is plain b/s.

I'm hearing a lot of static...tell me again, who is it you're supposed to vote for, exactly, if you support seeing the Iraq thing ended? Do these guys and gals carry a little flippy sign
around with them that says 'democrat' on one side, and 'republican' on the other? Hmmm...

The ad had nothing to do with Petraeus's testimony. It ran on September 10th, the first day of the general's testimony.

Testimony which was pretty well known days (weeks, even) ahead of time.  Surely you don't think the testimony the General gave was a suprise to anyone by the time that he gave it?