HAVE YOU SEEN THE LATEST POLL!? BREAKING BREAKING BREAKING!

McCain is up by 5 points! Game Over Man! Game Over! We are going to get hosed man, we'red going to get hosed! The Sky is Falling! Dogs and Cats are sleeping together! Alligators will walk on their hind legs and eat small children and midgets! GAME OVER!

Unless Barack Obama does exactly what I say starting right now!

McCain is on a roll right now.  The disaster at Saddleback is only the latest.  OBVIOUSLY, he heard the damn questions first--it was on the honor system and McCain has shown he has none.  For Cripes sakes, he plagarizes WIKIPEDIA!!

But showing up Obama at Saddleback was just the latest.  McSame has decided to go extremely negative and smear Obama on a national stage.  We all laughed at those incredibly stupid ads and this site filled up with bloggers saying they were pathetic and Obama shouldn't degrade himself by responding.  

Guess what--they worked.

I know many Obama supporters have supreme confidence in Obama's campaign strategy , but i see a lot of cracks in it , and it deserves a lot of scrutiny and careful consideration on whether Obama is running the wrong strategy against McCain.

Washington is a cesspool of conventional wisdom. People in Washington do not want to contemplate change. People in Washington are disconnected from the hard realities of American life in the era of $4 a gallon gas. Unfortunately, Barack Obama's campaign for President has fallen into the beltway conventional wisdom trap this week.  

I'm sick and tired of the Obama Purity Robots who label anyone who dares to vocalize dissent regarding some of Obama's positions on issues a "Purity Troll" or a "Concern Troll".

It is very reminiscent of misguided behavior in the 60s. If a feminist (for example) brought up feminist issues in the way an anti-war group was being run, she was told to shut up about that for the moment, there was a war to terminate. As if we humans are too dumb to multi-task on political issues.

Yes, it is probable and possible that there are moles on kos that attempt to disrupt "unity" by posting divisive posts. However, it is also the case that there are many progressives on this blog that post their dissent quite honestly, and they get brutally flogged by Obama Purity Robots. And it is not difficult to see the who the honest dissenters are.

Read on, Puritans.

As the weeks have turned into months, and the election draws ever nearer, it has become all-too-apparent what strategy the Republicans will be using this election cycle.

They can't run on their own policies: their policies have been the ones that have taken this country perilously close to the cliff's edge.

They can't run on their track record: see above.

The only tactic they have left is to throw enough shit to see what sticks.

However, they can't do it out in the open. The word 'Republican' has become as unsellable as a Ford Pinto (or in today's economic climate, a Hummer). So the Conservatives and Libertarians and Republicans (whatever they're calling themselves nowadays) are going to the shadows. They have to pretend to be Independents and Liberals and Progressives, and then throw their shit in a passive aggressive manner.

And that, gentle readers, is Concern Trolling. How do you spot it and combat it? More, below the fold.

Was Barack Obama influenced by Chicago corruption? I want a president who is a public servant, who puts the good of the people above their need for power and money.  If Obama’s political career was created in what is believed to be the most politically corrupt city in the United States, then his background must be thoroughly checked in order to protect the people from possible corruption.  For the public good the press must thoroughly investigate his political career in Chicago and Obama must disclose his Senate records.

References:

August 28, 2005) Natasha Korecki reported in the Sun-Times that, "there's so much corruption to investigate in the Chicago area..."

Robert Grant, FBI Special Agent in Charge, told the Times that he had reorganized the bureau to add a third public corruption squad, giving Chicago the largest corruption unit in the country, even bigger than those in New York and Los Angeles.

"It is the second time in two years the FBI in Chicago has expanded its public corruption force," Korecki noted.

http://www.countercurrents.org/...

   This is what is passing for journalism at Newsweek's web site... a whopping "concern troll on steroids" of an article, as their Top Story.
  It is penned by Evan Thomas as an 'open letter' to Obama about the 'serious racial issues' he will be facing and includes a reference to DailyKos... and the excellent in-depth analysis of the how Appalachia has a unique history and mindset in racial sensibilities that have been chronicled here.  Thomas then proceeds to create a laundry list of smarmy ideas to win over white America, including:

Throwing a grand ole Fourth of July barbecue also sends the right message.

  Or, uh, "Be more like McCain?  Is that what you're saying, Mr Thomas?
  But the real headshaker in this article is the creation, by Newsweek, of this "Racial Resentment Index" and their use of it as a tool to analyze polling  data.

I'm an independent thinker and a life long Democrat-- not out of blind loyalty, but from the sincere belief that the Democratic party best represents my political beliefs and ideals.

After my favorite candidate, John Edwards, dropped out of the race, I made the unfortunate decision of choosing a new candidate to support based on my best judgement, rather than following the herd.  

Universal health care was extremely important to me, as was experience and familiarity with the job, and so my choice became Hillary Clinton.  I didn't think Obama would make a bad president-- I just thought she would make a better one.

I imagine that the Obama camp is trying pretty furiously right now the insist that West Virginia's results only reflect the difficulty Obama would face in West Virginia in a general election.  In fact, Obama's crushing loss tonight reflects an important disconnect with a major Democratic constituency and it tells us about what we might expect in states like PA, OH, and MI come fall (states we can't afford to lose).  So even if you don't care about West Virginia itself, and even if you're willing to write it off in November to get Obama as the nominee, you should care about what West Virginia tells us that working class whites will do in states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan.

Let's take a look at the lessons of WV:

There has been a lot of interest in a video claiming that an advisor to the Clinton/Gore campaign in 1992 was caught on film spouting crude expletives about white voters in the state of Indiana.  It seems clear that one person who would greatly benefit from this type of smear campaign would be Barack Obama.  It makes me wonder whether his campaign was the actual source of the fixed video, which has been confirmed as fake?  

For as much as Obama and his supporters have been criticizing the "politics of destruction" and "guilt by association" politics, it is shocking and disgusting at what lengths both him and his supporters will go to destroy both Hillary and Bill Clinton.  Regardless of who you support in this election, Hillary and Bill are both avid supporters of the Democratic Party and have been strong advocates for many of the causes for which we continue to fight.  To see them torn down daily in these forums is completely antithetical to who we are as Democrats and it needs to stop.  Advocating for issues is one thing (if you don't agree with Universal Healthcare, fine, post about it), but tearing them down as if they aren't true Democrats and trying to destroy their character day after day is really disheartening.

I am a big supporter of BO and have recently felt comfortable that the democratic nomination can't be denied him because the delegate math (not to speak of democratic principles) is too rock solid in his favor for the supers to overrule. There was always a 5% chance that his campaign could crater - but such chances weren't worthy of entertaining...till now.

Kos was right (and frustrated):  Any denunciation of Wright by Obama will never be enough.
http://www.dailykos.com/...

Nothing will put this story to bed.

So, what do you do next?

Deny it?

Curse it?

Or accept it?

Obama seems to me to be revising his history with Wright on the fly in a way that does not seem likely to be truthful, in my opinion.

Bill Richardson's involvement with Mr. Blanchard is well known. Mr. Blanchard owns the Albuquerque racino, having previously been a partner in the Hobbs racino with Bill Richardson. He then moved on to owning the Albuquerque racino, and has been unsuccessful in his attempts to get support for a larger casino on the fair grounds property. Blanchard was required to replace a number of the stalls on the property and did so with sub-standard materials and construction. When it appeared that his attempts to have a larger venue had failed he then turned to his close relationship with the Governor, Mr. Bill. Blanchard has been a major contributor to Bill Richardson's campaigns and fund raisers. The relationship has been mutually beneficial to both. Now Blanchard is well on the way to moving the racino to Moriarity, New Mexico. This community is in the mountains and plateau east of Albuquerque. The land utilized will be that of former Governor, Bruce King and his family.

As an Obama supporter , i strongly feel the media is making something out of nothing , concerning Obama's "bitter" remarks , but i must admit that i've been always worried about Obama's overconfidence in thinking he can explain everything and be able to make people like him if he can get them in the room with him.

I am curious, and maybe someone has already posted this, if so I apologize for repeating it, would you all vote for re-votes in Florida and Michigan if you knew that Hillary would win them by large margins derailing Obama's candidacy.

I don't see how the Democratic Party can survive with the disenfranchising two of the biggest swing states, Obama supporters delusions that it won't matter, notwithstanding.  I am not sure that the DNC had the right to make such a draconian punishment to two state for moving up their primary elections.  Where is the authority for the DNC to do that and I doubt it ever would have happened if Howard Dean didn't have a vendetta against the Clintons.

    Well things just keep getting better and better for us life long Democrats with this debacle of a primary and what more and more is shaping up as one big disaster and embarrassing and severely depressing joke of an election for 2008..even I wondered if it could get any worse..!

    To be honest I am no Obama supporter nor in any way a Clinton supporter like the rest of the Smart People, I supported and still support John Edwards with my heart also going for Congressman Dennis Kucinich who was so unfairly treated and censored in barred from the debates by our ever more fascist corporate media..

    Now Obama seemed to dodge the Rev. Wright bullet for now at least and I did not buy his story as to never hearing Rev. Wright in almost 20 years go on as witnessed, "can I get a witness", as we all saw on YouTube..

    Now this for me isn't a bullet it's a Hydrogen tipped cruise missile or Hellfire Thermobaric Bomb more accurately perhaps..coming at our very junior Senator from Illinois and it will for sure create maximum collateral damage..and that's us America, and all our hopes to be rid of these stinking lying thieving treasonous Republicans in 2008..