"...full recognition of past sacrifices and contributions he has made..."

What sacrifice?

Being a Vietnam surrender monkey is NOT a sacrifice.

Sorry, David, but the reason the big "O" isn't fighting back is because he has no more substance than McCain. It's increasingly clear (as it was from the beginning, to anyone willing to look) that he cares about being elected and nothing else. Maybe once upon a time he cared about something else, but no more. Does that mean he'd be willing to lose a war to get elected? No, it means something worse, as his own words are making clear: he'd be willing to let other people keeping fighting, dying and being killed to get elected.

John McCain is a scumbag, but he is also a war criminal: bombing innocent civilians from thousands of feet above.

I am not an Obama fan...but let's call a war criminal a war criminal.

I am with Wesley Clark: being shot down and detained in a prisoner of war camp does not qualify one to be president, but I want to go a step farther: it also does not make one a hero, at best, it makes one a victim.

Cindy

Phillip Butler was a POW with McCain... or rather McCain was a POW with Butler:

http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,164859_1,00.html

And, though I understand David's annoyance, I hate to tell him that there never was a golden age of politics where there was no mudslinging and issues were debated honorable. Rovian tactics go all the way back to our earliest elections, even ones with Founding Fathers as candidates.

Don't believe me? Read up on it.

Mr. Green: Are you just now being enlightened about the Republicans? They and their policies have been advancing the dark side for a long time. It is not they who make the sacrifices for the country; it is the rest of us, who are not them. They benefit from our courage and committment; the rest of us just get screwed. Your outrage is understandable, but a little late in the game. I suggest you work to get your favorite candidates elected to office.

OBAMA position: ... "would be willing to lose a war in order to win a campaign"

TRANSLATION: ... "would be willing to stop killing people [for oil] to win a campaign"

McCAIN position: ... "would be willing to keep killing people [for oil] to win a campaign."

presidential politics almost requires candidates to bathe themselves in filth and stench. it is no accident, or incidental by-product. it is part and parcel of the american way - it's all about winning, whatever the cost. the ends are eternally divorced from the means, and so the ethos of "whatever works" is passed from generation to generation.

we are certainly no unique among the world community in the way we abuse our democratic principles - only it's most hypocritical participant.

presidential politics almost requires candidates to bathe themselves in filth and stench. it is no accident, or incidental by-product. it is part and parcel of the american way - it's all about winning, whatever the cost. the ends are eternally divorced from the means, and so the ethos of "whatever works" is passed from generation to generation.

we are certainly no unique among the world community in the way we abuse our democratic principles - only it's most hypocritical participant.

In Washington they use a BELL CURVE to measure integrity. Wait til the campaign heats up !!!!!

Between the DLC, the MSM, and the corporatists behind it all they are trying damned hard to keep this election from being a landslide! Keep it close and there will be no mandate...except if McShame wins.

Cindysheehan, I'm sorry but if you want to get elected, you're going to have to make some changes.

Not least of them is your propensity to speak plain English.

So ixnay on the ruth-tellingtay!

Being a prisoner of war makes one a victim. Refusing release, knowing full well it means years more of torture, because one's fellow soldiers are not also being released is something else altogether. Ignoring that fact is willful blindness that does Dems no good, as is the refusal to acknowledge that Obama gives no evidence of ever having had to sacrifice, much less that he'd be willing to be tortured for an ideal or a fellow human being. He dumped his preacher, his church, is dumping many of his supporters by changing his positions to be more appealing to Republicans. He certainly doesn't evidence moral staying power of any sort. (I am not a McCain supporter, but the only way Obama will have any policies different than McCain's is if progressives and others stop closing their eyes to his hypocrisy and ego.)

I'm not an Obama supporter, nor will I vote for him, but I was with Green all the way until this:...

"Of the four of them (and many more), only Obama has always opposed the war. Only Obama had the guts to do so at the beginning..."

Uh, would that have been when he was a state-level rep that had no actual power to do anything? Because since he's gone to the Senate, I don't see him voting against more money, more troops, more war all the time. Get a clue Green, Obama is just the other side of the same coin. He's voted for all the right things side by side with the rest of the 'War Party' (h/t to Justin Raimondo)

While I abhor the ugliness McCain has introduced into the campaign, and I am as disappointed as Green in not seeing much stronger and aggressive responses, or even--shudder!--an attack on McCain in ways suggested, I'm not surprised at all we've sunk to this level of hypocrisy and name calling--surprised it took this long. My money says the Rethuglican machine will once again sink a cowering and submissive Dem opponent with all this, and McCrazy will get in. Like so many Dems before, Obama will be swiftboated and sunk.

Vote third party. Don't enable and support the current system by falling into the same tired lesser of evil trap.

But vote for Cindy!

I understand that Obama does not want to enter a poop hurling contest. But framing the issues as a rebuttal will go further than silence.

And Mr.Green might end up being right.

What is ironic is that our current president has sacrificed our soldiers for oil. Isn't that bad enough?

The Democrats are the party of gracious losers, as is obvious from their refusal to talk about or contest the stolen election of 2004, their failure to impeach the most criminal president in US history, and their sycophantic capitulation to the Military Infotainment Complex after the 2006 election by failing to end the illegal war in Iraq. Why would you expect different from Obama? He knows the script. Vote Green. Vote Cynthia McKinney for President.

JLocke...
LOL

thanks for making me smile today!

xo
Cindy

I look forward to a time when our election campaigns become more civilized, a time when each candidate must spend his dollars on getting his/hers Platform and only his/hers platform to the public, keep the Issues, all of them, clear and understandable. Where are the issues in this cat fight? It must appear to those in other countries as if our system of electing someone to run our country is a mud fight and the dirtiest wins.

The fault lies not with the politicians but rather the media and we the people. The media in the US does not respond with indignation to mud slinging, and the people permit themselves to be influenced by it when it comes time to vote. Here in Canada the Conservatives launched a negative ad compaign regarding the Liberals carbon tax proposals which the conservatives labelled another tax grab by the liberals. I got to listen to Stuart Mclean on July 7th lambast the conservatives for sinking to the level of American politics, saying that political discussion should be about argument - not the twisting of what the opposition proposes the better to make a weapon to wield against the opposition. If the media doesn't say this, what is going to keep politics the honourable profession it always has been.

P.S. If they continue the mud slinging instead of addressing the issues on the minds of most Americans we will probably beome so disgusted that we will have the lowest voter turnout in history, then what?

McCain will do anything to be president, but his wife will do anything to be the first lady. There is no evidence that the two of them have even lived together for the last four years. The MSM is not touching this so far because she is doing the good duty and showing for all of the photo ops. I am sure that the White House is a duplex anyway, otherwise Hillary might have moved out.

Yet once again, thank you, David.

David, you're absolutely correct – John McCain is a scumbag, a truly despicable person.

But that being the case, and given his right-wing political ideology, why isn't Barack Obama wiping the floor with him -- *slaughtering* him in the polls!

Obama should be 7000 points ahead of McCain in every poll.

The reason that's not the case is that Obama is not a true oppositional candidate, and the Democratic Party is not a true oppositional party.

If McCain and all he represents ideologically is so reprehensible (and indeed he and his party are just that, reprehensible), then why after he captured the Democratic nomination did Obama lurch dramatically to the right?

Put another way -- if McCain is so bad, personally as well as ideologically, then why is Obama moving to the same right-wing positions that McCain now occupies. To wit:

(Continued)

15 REASONS BARACK OBAMA IS *NOT* A PEACE CANDIDATE -- NOT A MEANINGFUL ALTERNATIVE TO THE MADNESS OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION …

1.) Barack Obama supports the US presence in Iraq. His position went from that of a "peace candidate" during the primaries to what it is now. That is to say, Barack Obama *now* says that he will defer to the judgment of the commanders in the field. On July 2, 2008, in a speech in Colorado Springs, Obama stated:

"I have always said I would listen to the commanders on the ground. I have always said that the pace of withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability."

In other words: I may withdraw troops in 16 months; but, if conditions change, I may not.

Meaning: Obama's current position on Iraq is essentially the same as that John McCain and George Bush.

(Continued)

2.) Months ago, Barack Obama, along with the rest of the Senate, gave George Bush the green light to invade Iran. (The Senate to Bush -- If you invade Iran, we won't object.)

3.) Obama now wants to escalate the war in Afghanistan. In a July 14th "New York Times" op-ed piece, Obama proposed sending 10,000 more troops to Afghanistan. ... Interestingly enough, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, also feel that there are an insufficient number of troops in Afghanistan. ... And guess how many additional troops they recommend be deployed in Afghanistan -- the same number as Barack Obama, 10,000.

NOTE: Less than 24-hours after Obama's aforementioned "New York Time" op-ed piece, George Bush, in a White House press conference, indicated that the US and its NATO allies were already initiating a "surge" in Afghanistan.

(Continued)

4.) Obama has threatened to invade Pakistan. Quoting Obama from the above-cited op-ed piece:

"The greatest threat to that security lies in the tribal regions of Pakistan, where terrorists train and insurgents strike into Afghanistan. We cannot tolerate a terrorist sanctuary, and as president, I won't. We need a stronger and sustained partnership between Afghanistan, Pakistan and NATO to secure the border, to take out terrorist camps and to crack down on cross-border insurgents.

"We need more troops, more helicopters, more satellites, more Predator drones in the Afghan border region. And we must make it clear that if Pakistan cannot or will not act, we will take out high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden if we have them in our sights."

(Continued)

5.) In the same July 2, 2008 speech in Colorado Springs cited above, Obama praised the US military and vowed to increase its ranks. Obama has called for an overall increase of American ground forces by 65,000 soldiers and 27,000 marines, and "investing in the capabilities we need to defeat conventional foes and meet the unconventional challenges of our time."

Last year, writing in "Foreign Affairs" magazine, Barack Obama wrote:

"We must use this moment both to rebuild our military and to prepare it for the missions of the future. We must retain the capacity to swiftly defeat any conventional threat to our country and our vital interests. But we must also become better prepared to put boots on the ground in order to take on foes that fight asymmetrical and highly adaptive campaigns on a global scale."

In short, Obama supports two wars now in progress (Iraq and Afghanistan) and has shown a clear-cut willingness to engage in two more wars (Iran and Pakistan). … Does that sound like a critic of the military-industrial complex or an enabler of the military-industrial complex?

(Continued)

6.) Afghanistan is the 20th country the United States has bombed since the end of World War II. ... *Before* Bush started bombing Afghanistan, one out of every 7 Afghans were either starving or in imminent danger of starving. I don't have a statistic on what the current ratio is. I assume it's much worse. ... This is the country that Obama wants to send more US troops to -- more US firepower to -- more US military contracts and more military contractors to.

7.) Obama has voted to approve every war appropriation the Republicans have put forward, totaling over $450 billion.

8.) The Pentagon budget is over $500 billion dollars a year. Obama wants to increase that budget.

9.) The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are currently costing the US taxpayer
15 billion dollars per month. See http://www.costofwar.com/ NOTE: The vast majority of the 15 billion dollars per month is going into the hands of those who profit from America's military-industrial complex.

(Continued)

10.) Over 1 million Iraqis have died as a result of Gulf War II. See the following http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/01/31/6768/ … Quoting from an article by Patrick Martin, "Obama Backs Long-Term US Military Presence in Iraq" –
"In an interview with Newsweek correspondent Richard Wolffe, published on the magazine's web site Saturday (July 26th), Obama emphasized that his policy in Iraq was one of 'phased withdrawal,' in which US troops could remain in large numbers in Iraq for many years. 'They're going to need our help for some time,' he said."

11.) Obama voted to confirm Condeleeeza Rice, as well as a host of other Bush nominees.

12.) In 2006, Obama went out of his way to campaign for Joe Lieberman.

13.) Obama voted to re-authorize the Patriot Act.

14.) Obama voted for the F.I.S.A. bill – after vowing not to.

(Continued)

15.) Many right-wing supporters are *delighted* with Obama's move to the right. So delighted was the "Wall Street Journal" -- whose editorial board generally reflects not just the right-wing but the right-wing within the Bush administration -- so delighted was the "Wall Street Journal" regarding Obama's recent lurch to the right, especially as regards Iraq, that on July 2, 2008, they published an editorial entitled "Bush's Third Term." In it, they gloatingly stated: ""Maybe he (Obama) is worried that someone will notice that he's the candidate running for it (Bush's third term)."

Sounds to me like Obama wants to be a "wartime president" -- just like McCain and Bush.

(Continued)

Obama is not swamping McCain in the polls because both major political parties are mouthpieces for Corporate America.

One way the Democrats serve the economic elite is to act as a "safety valve" in times of political unrest. As things start to heat up on the left, the Democratic Party goes to the American public and says: "Vote for us. We will represent your interests. Besides, don't forget T.I.N.A. -- "There Is No Alternative" – there is no alternative to the current political system, it's either us of the Republicans, that's your only choice."

And then taking the bait buying into the con
("T.I.N.A"), the American public, as it rumbles, heats up and organizes on the left, instead of breaking away from the Democratic/Republican duopoly, *enables* the Democratic/Republican duopoly. Allows the Democratic Party to co-opt their broad-based mass movement, dilute it and, eventually, sell it out.

The Democratic Party has done this with any number of broad-based grassroots progressive movements. They did this with the Populist movement in the 1890s ... the labor movement in the 1930s ... the civil rights movement, the environmentalist movement, the antiwar movement.

And the result is that nothing changes.

(Continued)

Interestingly enough, David, you acknowledge that Democrats such as Kerry and Hillary Clinton and all those others Democrats who voted to authorize the Iraq War are just as criminally liable as George Bush and Company. ... But what about Obama? ...

Obama favors two wars in progress and has shown a clear-cut willingness to engage two other countries in war – Iran and Pakistan.

(Continued)

You write,

"Of the four (Kerry, Clinton, Edwards and Obama) of them (and many more), only Obama has always opposed the war ...

"Only Obama had the guts to do so at the beginning, when the Bush people had made that an excruciatingly hard thing to do. True, he wasn't then in the US Senate, and he didn't actually have to cast a vote on the issue. Nevertheless, it was pretty widely understood at the time — not least by Rove and the three Democratic would-be presidents listed above — that going on record against the war was the kiss of death for any presidential ambitions. Obama not only took that risk, but he hit it just right, not opposing all wars (for there are rare ones for which the alternative is even worse), but opposing dumb wars, and labeling Iraq just such." (Words in parenthesis yours.)

But what you write is not correct, David. ...
Quoting from Matt Gonzalez's February 2008 article entitled, "The Obama Craze: Count Me Out" —

"First, he (Obama) opposed the war in Iraq while in the Illinois state legislature. Once he was running for US Senate though, when public opinion and support for the war was at its highest, he was quoted in the July 27, 2004 Chicago Tribune as saying, 'There's not that much difference between my position and George Bush's position at this stage. The difference, in my mind, is who's in a position to execute.'

Gonzalez continues:

"The Tribune went on to say that Obama, 'now believes US forces must remain to stabilize the war-ravaged nation;¬ a policy not dissimilar to the current approach of the Bush administration.'

"Obama's campaign says he was referring to the ongoing occupation and how best to stabilize the region. But why wouldn't he have taken the opportunity to urge withdrawal if he truly opposed the war? Was he trying to signal to conservative voters that he would subjugate his anti-war position if elected to the US Senate and perhaps support a lengthy occupation? Well as it turns out, he's done just that."

Click here for the entire article -- which includes loads of *other* reasons not to vote for Obama -- http://www.counterpunch.org/gonzalez02292008.html

Obama supports two wars currently in progress (Iraq and Afghanistan); and, moreover, has shown a willingness to start wars in *two more* countries (Iran and Pakistan) ... This sounds to you like someone who is opposed to starting, as you put it, "dumb wars" ???

(Continued)

Cindy:

Since you're on this string and check into CD on a regular basis, I have a question:

About a month ago, I challenged CD readers to match a contribution to you (I didn't name the amount) and pledged to contribute what I can every month -- which I am doing.

Did the match ever turn into anything? The other part of it was urging you to get alot more signatures than necessary because of inevitable challenges (largely by Dems).

Have your petions been verified yet?

In Struggle There Is Hope,

tj

if you don't watch tv, you don't have to stress out over all this crapola...I pick up all kinds of fascinating facts via the internet, most of which come from sources outside the MSM, and have very little to do with the presidential race, which is notable for it's virtually complete and total absence of fact...who cares what McCain or Obama say about anything? Can't you look around, dig a bit and figure out what's going on? The world is one big 'arrangement', and the only thing allowing it to continue is the continued, denial-enabled participation of it's competing working\consuming citizens...all of us ratcheting down is the only way out...these political people are insulting to one's intelligence...unfortunately, as long as they are able to keep manipulating the populations via fear and hatred (while soaking them for money\power), they are also very dangerous...deprive them of their money and power by loving one another and living with less...remove the profit from the system...

David, you ask a very good question:

"Why are you (Barack Obama) not disemboweling McCain every day of the week, every week of the month, for his outrageous allegation that you are sacrificing lives in order to win an election?"

That's my question as well! And the answer is simple. Because Barack Obama is not a true oppositional candidate, and the Democratic Party is not a true oppositional party.

For Obama to atttack McCain, as McCain SHOULD be attacked, Obama would have had to move to the *left* after he captured the nomination --not lurched to the right, as he so calculatingly and so cynically in fact did.

But none of this should come as any surprise. Historically, this is "standard operating procedure" for any Democratic presidential nomineee. ... Capture the primaries by appearing to be on the left, then once the nomination is in hand, a.) move to the right, and b.) remind the voting public about ... T.I.N.A. ... "There Is No Alternative: we're the only game in town."

All those voting millions of people who will vote for Obama as "the lesser of the two evils" need to dwell on the last word in quotes in that phrase – *evil.*

Vote Nader. Or else vote McKinney. Or else vote socialist. Only by establishing a viable third party in the US will real change come about.

Green's just upset because his Jeezus isn't winning.

Thank you David Michael Green for exposing the Repuk monster to Common Dreams readers. Now we progressives want John McKane to expose the monster more fully to Thime/Newsweak readers, and American Idole watchers. So we progressives are voting our third party principles in the elections and also in our general exchange/association. If McKane wins, we blame it on the Demoks for failing to move their sorry butts to the left, and then we prepare for the final self-destruction of the class war aggressors, the hapless elites. Then we'll throw them in the slammer, and accelerate our building of the Progressive World, with strict size limits on everything.

David Michael Green, you know better so I have to assume you're practicing bad journalism in order to mis-represent the truth. creepy.

Obama never voted one way or the other on the invasion of Iraq. He was not in the Senate at the time. I could not care less about his words at the time. He was campaigning for a Senate seat while in Congresss and saying he's against the war was the way to do it. Once safely in the Senate, however, he began to consistently side with George Bush on the occupation of Iraq and many other Bush agenda items.

One salient example: Obama sided with Bush and the telecom corporations on illegal spying of Americans. He does not believe the president and corporations have to follow the rule of law! Spy away, says Obama. This is scary because Obama has "charisma" (Ted Bundy had that, too) and he could easily get Americans to think spying is just fine. Really, he has the power to do that, I see it coming. Trickier than Clinton!

DMG, your article is shallow and biassed. Aren't you supposed to be a professor. I hope some of your brighter students see this sham of an argument and call you on it.

"It has now become transparently clear that this man will do anything to be president. Whatever scraps of decency and uniqueness and detachment from his own sick party he once had have now all been mortgaged against that goal."

Of course, that sentence is equally true about Obama.

Hank Fur ...

Actually, the story of Obama and the war was a little different from you describe.

Obama ran for Senate in 2004. The debate over the war was in late 2002 and early 2003. At the time, Obama was a State Senator representing a heavily minority urban district. I was in Atlanta at the time, and if the area of Atlanta I lived in was anything like Obama's district, then his constituents were heavily against the war.

So, it wasn't exactly an act of political bravery for Obama to oppose the war as a State Senator. He was just taking the position of what was probably 75% of his constituents.

However, when he ran for Senate 2 years later, he tried very hard to stay away from his earlier anti-war comments. He very much muted his tone to suit his new campaign. The story I heard was that he first tried to ignore his earlier comments, then when forced to later he acknowledged them but down-played them.

And, it was in the midst of this campaign that he made his speech to the Dem convention where he said nothing at all against the war. And it was during all the interviews at the time of the convention that he made the quote that said there was little to no difference between himself and Bush on the Iraq war at that time.

Then of course, as Hank picks up the story, he took his seat in the Senate and became a reliable vote in favor of war funding and pentagon budgets. This lasted until this year when during the Dem primaries he switched and voted against the funding of the war. That was now obviously a part of his 'lie to the democrats to get the nomination' campaign.

At the very best he adopted the Democratic congressional 'fake-withdrawal' proposals. The ones that pretend to be a withdrawal plan, but which have giant loopholes for keeping tens of thousands of troops in Iraq to 'fight terrorists' or 'train the Iraqis'.

And that's still pretty much the current plan. He's promised that we will still have troops in Iraq at the end of his term. And of course, the troops he does move out of Iraq look like they won't be going any further than Afghanistan and Pakistan to fight what Obama calls 'the right war'.

Although, that plan might be in doubt if he completes his recent promise to the Israelis to attack Iran if Bush doesn't. That will tend to tie down a lot of troops in Iraq and Iran as we start a war against the Shite muslims.

To wsws.org .... anyone who has voted in favor of any of the supplemental bills to fund the war is equally criminally liable for this attrocity.

Of course, Gen Wesley Clark is also a war criminal for his bombing of civilian targets in Yugoslavia during that Democratic war.

dubet: "remove the profit from the system…"

Good insights in your post there. But if we remove profit, they will game the system in other ways, endless ways, but always toward the goal to concentrate and abuse power. If we ban only power abuse, concentrated power may overcome the enforcement mechanism. The best approach then is to vigorously limit both power concentration/abuse. This doesn't mean that we can't do big projects. Rather it means that big projects will progress under very strict limits. Draconian? Yes. But it makes perfect sense, if you want to live in a classless society. This is not a new idea. It was the common sense response under Enlightenment principles to the wicked excesses of the British East India Company. It's effective against any and all types of concentration anyone cares to cook up.

Other than David Michael Green's first sentence this entire opinion piece is:
A COMPLETE CROCK OF SHIT!!!
"John McCain is a scumbag."
-so true!

"Lyndon Johnson, the man more responsible for the war than any other person..."
-another warmonger Democrat

"Truman to Nixon and every one in between lied to the American people about Vietnam..."
-now Obama wants to continue the wars started on lies and is no better than Truman to Nixon, Obama won't commit to removing all the troops but plans to leave many, many thousands there fighting and dying to prop up the colonial-style rape of Iraq

"...that Obama is willing to sacrifice the lives of American soldiers and Iraqi citizens in order to advance his personal career ambitions."
-that is exactly what this cowardly chickenhawk plans to do! Has he committed to stopping it? Oh hell no!

Dick Cheney took five draft deferments. John Ashcroft seven. And so on, and so on. Quick: Name one person
-Obama has never fought in a single battle but is more than happy to send my son and yours off to fight and die in Afghanistan and Iraq-all for documented lies and for the profits of BIG OIL and the MIC

"McCain has hitched his wagon to a whole barnyard full of chickenhawks and their despicable war."
-Obama is a classic tough-talking, saber rattling chickenhawk especially when addressing AIPAC

"Only Obama had the guts to do so at the beginning, when the Bush people had made that an excruciatingly hard thing to do. True, he wasn't then in the US Senate, and he didn't actually have to cast a vote..."
-a complete crock of shit!!! Now that it counts the coward Obama has jumped on the war wagon

"Democratic would-be presidents listed above — that going on record against the war was the kiss of death for any presidential ambitions..."
-complete BULL! Polls show most Americans are against the war, David Michael Green is just repeating the lie that you can't be against the war and get elected-bullshit!

"...indicating that the party would be using national security issues as its election strategy..."
-bull, polls show Americans want peace not war, David Michael Green repeats the lie

"...better country of my youth, frankly, for all its faults — no longer exists..."
WHAT THE FUCK HAVE THE DEMOCRATS DONE TO STOP IT DAVID GREEN?

"Or launching wars to advance our careers."
-exactly what Obama has done, he was against it when it didn't count, now what counts is that HE'S FOR IT NOW!!!

I liked the Barack Obama of the primary season better than the current model
-I never liked him, and despised him from the word go!

THE OBAMA PRINCE OF PEACE BULLCRAP MYTH:

Obama: "And so my job as the next commander in chief is going to be to make a decision what is the right war to fight, and, and how do we fight it?"

Obama: "We're going to have to provide them with logistical support, intelligence support," Obama continued. "We're going to have to have a very capable counterterrorism strike force. We're going to have to continue to train their Army and police to make them more effective."

Obama:"Expand the Military: We have learned from Iraq that our military needs more men and women in uniform to reduce the strain on our active force. Obama will increase the size of ground forces, adding 65,000 soldiers to the Army and 27,000 Marines."

Obama: "We need more troops, more helicopters, more satellites, more Predator in the Afghan border region...etc.

we are not absolved of responsibility for decisions of our representatives simply because we voted for someone else. this means that continuing to live here - and vote - carries with it an enormous burden. to the extent we are paying taxes, we support the madness that passes for our government.

yes, many of our leaders, and soldiers, are criminals. how then do we make the appropriate adjustments in our lives?

as much as possible, withholding the means by which they promulgate their criminality is vital. if self-employed, doing your work under the table, while risky, is always an option. you also can openly refuse to pay taxes and take your chances (it helps to not own anything).

but more than this, it is paramount that we commit ourselves to significant lifestyle change - simplifying whenever possible, and becoming familiar with an increasing range of issues and information, communicating more and more often with those who perhaps feel differently.

bottom line, we cannot let the loss of humanity at the "highest" levels of society become the template by which we live/think/feel. we cannot allow ourselves to accept the loss of vision, magic or spirit simply because it is so absent in those around us.

A question for those of us who think the electoral system is some crap--

Is it possible that Obama does NOT want to blow out McCain? If it became clear he was going to win with 60% of the vote or more -- wouldn't a lot of "progressives" start voting Nader/McKinney and give them some respect? Is it possible they want to keep it close enough so Nader or McKinney can be marginalized and labeled as "spoiler"? Just a thought.

"Despite the fact that the candidate has now issued a semi-strong rebuttal spot two weeks into this ugliness, I must say, I liked the Barack Obama of the primary season better than the current model. I liked his politics and his integrity more, but most of all I liked his fighting spirit, and his immediate response to scurrilous attacks." You liked him when he was encouraging misogyny and spouting empty speeches leaving all the room he needed to make the U-turns that have revealed him to be a wriggling opportunist as invested in war and free market profit as McCain? You deserve to be governed by amoral egotists like Bush, McCain and Obama. And since whichever is elected, the US's policies will stay the same, why not just copy Caesar, set up a triumvirate and then see which of the jousting wannabee emperors winds up on top without even having to bear the expense of the farce of an election the US staged in 2000 and 2004? I'm sure the voters would rather be phoning into mindless reality shows anyway.

RichM and tailcap sort of beat me to this.

"Only Obama had the guts to do so at the beginning, when the Bush people had made that an excruciatingly hard thing to do. True, he wasn't then in the US Senate, and he didn't actually have to cast a vote on the issue"

I keep hearing this, but I can't find any place where he spoke against the war back then.
Does anyone know of any evidense of this claim?

Tailcap....you appear not to agree with Mr. Green, such language!

"Democratic would-be presidents listed above — that going on record against the war was the kiss of death for any presidential ambitions…"

Allow me to use the word Crock and extrapolate from there. Most Americans have been opposed to this war for years, no matter their political persuasion.