Over 70 years ago in the middle of the Great Depression, my grandfather - a quite successful businessman in hard times - packed the family in a car, drove to Florida, and bought some farm land. Being very clever with his hands and no stranger to hard work, he knew if worse came to worse he could survive off the fat of the land. The exile didn’t last long before he was back in business again, but the point had been brought home, what it takes to survive.

In 2008 if I said I was heading to Florida to buy farm land, you’d look at me like I was crazy. And I pretty well would be. His was a 1930’s strategy for survival, a very good one, but not a strategy that has aged well. There would be no place to sell the extra produce for much money to pay for staples such as gas, additional groceries, toilet paper, insurance, taxes, et al. That world is quite gone.

I thought of that today when I ran across Obama’s new weekly speech, that we were going to start a program rebuilding highways and bridges, schools, and of course invest in new energy. (“New energy” is for example what we’ve been calling solar power for the last 35 years. It’s a kind of outdated term somewhate related to “New Wave” and “New Age”, two other dinosaurs from the 70’s). I have a hat tip I learned from the Japanese before I turn serious - how about we cover 1/3 of the US with concrete over the next 4 years? It would be roughly equivalent to what the Japanese tried to do in the 1990’s, would use up incredible amounts of energy in the process, would no doubt put quite a few people to work in menial tasks, and would be completely ineffective in spurring growth in a modern economy.

Our we could call China.

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I’m waiting for the due criticism of Mark Begich who not only didn’t major in communications, he doesn’t even have a degree. Main qualification for office? His father was a Congressman who died with the House majority leader some 36 years ago. Plus he married the former chair of Alaska’s Democratic Party. So come on let’s hear some screams of “bimbo Begich”. “Dynasty”. Still checking on whether he ever entered a beauty contest.

Not much time to post, but there’s some discussion of where Eric Holder would be on restoring the reputation of the Department of Justice. There’s been much written on the Marc Rich pardon - poorly handled, but a pardon with terms draconian enough that Rich never accepted it.

But there’s more worrisome stuff. Holder was rather supportive of the Administration’s views in the days following 9/11, that detainees and American citizens could be held indefinitely without trial “as long as the war was on” - which of course means forever. Holder does not seem worried about the lack of due process in Guantanamo or that the prisoners have any rights at all. Obama has decided on leaving a couple of primary architects of extraordinary rendition in place as well as Gates (formerly “Iraq 4-evuh”) in place, while Holder seems rather wobbly on some of the biggest justice concerns of the last 8 years.

Where would he stand on politicization of Justice? We don’t need or want a continuation of the Bush policy just in Democratic skin. We need an independent, non-political justice department.

Anyway, skim through the OpenLeft article including the interesting comments section and click on through to Glen Greenwald as well. (For example:

Contrary to what several commenters have suggested, it seems clear that Holder — in the 2002 interview — was not merely arguing that Guantanamo detainees should be denied “prisoner of war” status. He was arguing, explicitly, that they were entitled to no Geneva protections of any kind (as he put it: “they are not, in fact, people entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention”). See here and here for further elaboration.

I think Gonzales put to rest forever that hiring an ethnic minority as AG will bring some sensitivity to human rights. Let’s read the fine print on the new candidate.

From a response that grew too long:

The problem I’ve found is I don’t think anyone around here knows what netroots is, who Digby is, what Howard Dean has done with 50 states, how much Rahm supported the Blue Dogs and warned people not to ever ever ever mention Iraq. So oddly they think Rahm is both bold and progressive.

But the lesson is not to abandon Netroots. It’s to push them and only them. Stoller and Bowers over at OpenLeft are excellent with focused money. For New York, they came up with a way to give money for Obama via a progressive org - to signal, “this is progressive money, not just generic money”. How to do your own spot ads for the candidate you approve of.

Because they don’t care about you. They don’t understand you. At least most of them. 42-13? For fuck’s sakes, we’re back to the right-wing thing that you’d have to sodomize toddlers while shooting mortar shells into old folks’s homes to get a reprimand.

Let’s take a trip down memory lane:

In the Senate, during the three-and-a-half years that Senator Obama has been a member, he has not reached across party lines to get accomplish anything significant, nor has he been willing to take on powerful interest groups in the Democratic Party to get something done.

So what did Lieberman do, but reach across for a handjob to support everything illegal the government was doing. Mr. Lieberman, I don’t vote Democrat to elect a Republican. If they want to earn my vote, they can go through the necessary steps to earn my respect.

Let me contrast Barack Obama’s record to the record of the last Democratic president, Bill Clinton, who stood up to some of those same Democratic interest groups, worked with Republicans, and got some important things done, like welfare reform, free trade agreements, and a balanced budget.

And let me contrast the Democrats who sucked up to George Bush with the Republicans in 1996 who fought Clinton every step of the way. Well I admire Gingrich more than Pelosi or Reid, I can tell you that, even though I agree with probably none of his opinions.

But here, let Joe dig his little shithole deeper:

And I was there, so I can tell you, when others were silent about the war in Iraq, John McCain had the guts and the judgment to sound the alarm about the mistakes we were making in Iraq. You know… (APPLAUSE) … when others wanted to retreat in defeat from the field of battle, which would have been a disaster for the USA, when colleagues like Barack Obama were voting to cut off funding for our American troops on the battlefield…

No, you asshole, others weren’t silent. They were speaking out against the stupidity of the war and how it was being conducted and how its supposed goals were completely in denial of the facts on the ground, but Republicans were shutting down any dissent as “unpatriotic”?

Do you remember your buddy John McCain walking through a market on a sick photo op with flak jacket, 100 soldier escort and helicopters flying overhead to show how safe it was for the common man?

Do you remember that disgraceful time in September 2007 when the Congress felt it appropriate to condemn a private citizens’ group that used its own money in a newspaper to protest a General’s conduct of the war? Only 79 Congresspeople and 25 Senators had the courage to stand up to that abomination, all of them Democrats except for 1 Independent that wasn’t Joe Lieberman. That abomination that says American citizens cannot question the flaws of humans running war. Let me tell you about that.

A few days ago the Nation published new info on the Vietnam War, how one group in the push for higher and higher body counts lost complete sight of the purpose fo the war, and committed atrocity after atrocity against civilians in Vietnam. A My Lai a Month. Fucking fancy that. 35 years after the war ends, 4 years after the Swift Boating of John “Winter Soldier” Kerry for not being patriotic enough, we get confirmation that Kerry was indeed right, that free fire zones on civilians were the rule not the exception.

Lieberman wants to extend the myth and the horror of blind allegiance to war and soldiers, that any attempt to cut the war off is an act of betrayal rather than good common sense review. You specifically stated this at the convention:

… when others wanted to retreat in defeat from the field of battle, which would have been a disaster for the USA, when colleagues like Barack Obama were voting to cut off funding for our American troops on the battlefield…

Mr. Lieberman, I wish Mr. Obama had done so in those stark of terms, but for someone who came to power in the 60’s with the arbitrary foreign political decisions of a few trumping any oversight from the Congress - you should simply know better, that it is not the Constitutional right of the Executive Branch to simply dismiss the chaotic oversight of the Congressional, but that that chaotic oversight was specifically what was prescribed in the Constitution. To support the President’s extra-Constitutional actions is simply being a traitor to the Constitution, however you want to spice it up. You were wrong, but unfortunately we’re only likely to hear smug self-absorbed pronouncements from you hear on out. Congrats, you have won on the most self-defeating point possible - you’ve shown that the American people and their representatives can be complete suckers, can completely abandon their citizen duties and responsibilities. Constitution? Just a piece of paper. Joe knows better, despite all obvious goings on the last year.

Mr. Obama, a friend of mine told me quite bluntly 25 years ago - if you give respect to everyone, you give respect to no one. People earn respect, and if you give it out free gratis, you do a disservice. Mr. Lieberman deserved to lose. I certainly don’t wish treating him the way Republicans have treated us over the year, but to come to the table of mutual respect requires some effort from the other side as well. Pardons without pre-conditions sounds way too chummy. Let’s give one to the American people for a change.

Oh yeah, forget to mention, the tell all is you, and the pot being boiled is your life.

Not sure how this didn't surface yet on TPM, but apparently the most privacy invading vetting ever (in this country at least) is taking place now - For a Washington Job, Be Prepared to Tell All. Anyone in your family own a gun? What are your aliases on the internet? Have a copy of every resumé you've sent out in the last 10 years? Every activity you've been paid for? What organizations you belonged to? Net worth statements for all loans? All businesses your spouse has been involved with? Any possibly embarrassing associations by family? Any information that might be embarrassing to you, your family or the President-Elect? Description of your most controversial moments during your career?

Well, I can certainly understand Hillary not wanting to be vetted unless they were serious. As for me, I figure I'll finish writing my tome of controversial moments somewhere around the end of Obama's 2nd term, and I sure hope someone with a sense of humor shows up to review Desi's blogs. But at least I'm spared one area of grilling - I never knew nor served on a board with William Ayers. Hmmm, I guess that snarky comment alone might have sunk my application. As Sarah Palin would say, "C'est la vie".