This whole pathetic episode has made even clearer the problems with our political system.


1) The presence of an anti-democratic body within the federal government.

2) The absence of a real, viable leftist party.

3) The cowardice and insularity of the leadership of the less conservative major party.

4) The importance of fundraising in elections.

5) Right-wing voters.

We need to eliminate the Senate, period.  At the very least we need to eliminate the filibuster immediately. We need a  strong, effective national labor/socialist/green party, and we need to make whatever changes to ballot access, fundraising, or election laws are necessary to make that possible. We need a complete removal and replacement of the Democratic leadership class. And we need all federal elections publicly funded, with private donations made illegal.

As for the right-wing voters, they're the most important problem. The present system would actually work if there were no conservatives in it. The presence of wackos is the biggest impediment to fixing any of the other problems, but to the degree that we can accomplish these other changes, the wackos will become less relevant.

It started out too small and improperly designed. Now it's even smaller and more malapportioned. They cut funding for state aid, education. I could puke.

Here is what should happen, but won't. Reid should be stripped of his leadership post. The new leadership should eliminate the filibuster and strip Nelson of any privileges. The actual Democrats should put together the $1.25 trillion bill they should have started with, pass it, and then go into conference and make the House bill match it. Obama should sign it.

Alternately, they should pass this garbage now, and then make it very clear that this failure will corrected as part of the budget process later this year.

Instead, Ben Nelson gets to walk around with his dick in the air, all these sellouts and sleazebags get to keep their jobs, and rest of us suffer. Disgusting.

I think it is a mistake to portray voters, Republican or Democratic, as victims of politicians. There seems to be a hesitance, for example, to blame Bush II's failures on the people who voted for him. They're just regular Americans, after all, and they're suffering the same as the rest of us.

I think this is a mistake. People who voted for Republicans are regular Americans, and they are suffering, but that doesn't change the fact that they are getting what they voted for. Whether they voted for Bush out of fear, ignorance, apathy, or hatred, they are grownups and they're responsible for their actions. What is happening now is the fault of people who voted for Republicans. It is not the fault of people who voted for Democrats, with the possible exception of people who voted for frauds like Ben Nelson.

We can't move forward effectively as a nation if we don't expect people to take responsibility for their own democracy. Despite the Republicans' best efforts, we still have some kind of a democracy. In a democracy, the voters get what they want one way or another. It's true that there are structural problems with our government -- the electoral college, the senate -- but even those things would no longer exist if the people had demanded those changes. Politicians are people we hire to do a job. If we are stupid or short-sighted in our hiring practices, then we're responsible for the screwup just the same as if your boss carelessly or intentionally hired an incompetent to work with you.

This voter-as-victim mentality also negatively affects our rhetoric and our tactics. How can we fight if we can't identify the enemy? We're not fighting with, or for, people who voted for John Kyl or Jim DeMint. We are fighting against them. They are part of the opposition as surely as any Republican elected official. The mainstream media bear some responsibility as well, but anyone with roughly average intelligence and any interest can find out what is really going on. I do not believe that people are helpless before the mightly power of the local paper and the 11:00 news. They can look and think, if they want to. It's not Chris Matthew's fault if people want to be ignorant, stupid, or crazy and vote on that basis. 

A democracy is not a commune. There are winners and losers. There are correct decisions and incorrect decisions. The difference between us and them is that when liberals and Democrats win, everyone benefits. When conservatives and Republicans win, everyone suffers. But that doesn't absolve of responsibility the people who voted for their own suffering.  

"I really don't understand how bipartisanship is ever going to work if one of the parties is insane."

Right.

You don't negotiate with madness.

I am tired of hearing that people who think Obama is mishandling the stimulus bill are "panicking." Yesterday on the TPM front page, Josh quoted a reader saying, "I don't share the sense of panic expressed by some Obama supporters over his approach to the stimulus package."

This is crap. Thinking Obama is wrong is not "panic." I am disappointed that Obama is screwing up this very important legislation. I am concerned that his attempts to cooperate with Republican wackos might screw the entire country. I am angry that he seems immune to the reality of his own situation. None of those things are panic. I simply believe that he has approached this in completely the wrong way, and that he does not have a handle on the situation, and that as a result the stimulus bill may end up too small and badly designed.