Justifiable Anger

As I troll around the blogosphere tonight, I see lots of articles on Kos and MyDD about how the dems can develop a winning strategy the next time by building an organization like the republicans did in the 80s and 90s. "Liberal" won't be an epithet anymore. And yes, this is certainly possible.
If they have time to do it.
I also see one emotion over and over on the blogs tonight -- anger. Pure, simple anger. It's in frogsdong and digby and Americablog and Gadflyer (which I just added to my links) and lots of others. It is anger against the Americans who voted for the Bush administration.
Here is Janet Sullivan in Salon:
"[The media have] dusted off the old theme that the Democrats need to "reach out" more to the "heartland." Reach out? How, exactly? Forget that these folks blindly ignored all objective reality -- and their own best economic and national-security interests -- and voted for Bush. Look what they did at the Senate level. In Kentucky, they refused to use even basic sanity as a litmus test, and reelected a guy with apparent late-stage dementia; in Oklahoma, they tapped a fellow who wants to execute doctors who perform abortions, who was sued for sterilizing a woman against her will, who pled guilty to Medicaid fraud, and who largely opposes federal subsidies, even for his own state; in Louisiana, they embraced a man who has made back-door deals with David Duke and who was revealed to have had a long-running affair with a prostitute; in South Carolina, they went with a guy who thinks all gay teachers should be fired; and in Alaska, they reelected a woman who was appointed by her father to the job after a spectacularly undistinguished career as an obscure state senator. And compared with the rest of the GOP Class of '04, she's the freaking prom queen. These are the stellar elected officials that the "heartland" has foisted on the rest of us. "Reach out" to these voters? Yeah. Then boil your hand till it's sterilized. "
Because this actually was the most important election America has ever had - this democratic meme was true. The progressives are going to try to get back to business, but with faith-based Bush and his administration remaining in the White House plus these regressive idiots in the Senate and the House, the future of America is grim.
Here's my point: America has lots of natural advantages which were the basis of its 20th century empire -- moderate climates for substantial food production, sufficient water and rainfall in most of the country, broad industrial and economic development, relatively cheap sources of energy and power, lots of universities for scientific advancement, stable governance, protection from war by its geography. All this has produced a generally happy and productive and proud citizenry. (And we Canadians have benefited right along side you, too -- our climate not as good, our industry not as big, nor our population, but we've done pretty well being next to you.)
But - one could have said much the same about the natural advantages of the Egyptians in 1000 BC, or the Romans in 40 AD, or even the British in 1900. They were all the Kings of the World at that time.
They lost their empires by their own bad choices -- fighting wars, amassing unsustainable debt, leading to unemployment and poverty and economic decline.
By voting for ignorant, intolerant, mean-spirited, regressive politicians, Americans have taken a path which may ruin their beloved country. By the time the dems get organized again, wars and debt and pollution and unemployment may have so destroyed the economy that the downward spiral is irreversible. Historians of the late 21st century may well mark 2004 as the beginning of the end of the American Empire.
So the anger is, I think, justified.

Oh, lets have a laugh on all those loser dems!

I presume that The Note thinks the nation's news media will find this funny -- ABC News: The Note:
"Friday, November 19: Exclusive: Shrum's first draft of the Kerry Senate floor speech in which he announces his co-sponsorship of the President's new multibillion-dollar request for more military spending in Iraq WITH NO TAX INCREASE OFF-SETS, because those, Sen. Kerry will intone, 'could cut off the economic vitality that is so needed to be as strong at home as we are abroad under this President's great leadership and (Note: the following is an adlib that does not appear in the Shrum text) who among us does not love economic vitality?' "
See, its such a clever play off Kerry's supposed quote 'who among us does not love Nascar', which Maureen Dowd made up and attributed to Kerry. Ha, ha, ha. And then there's this one:
"Monday, November 22: Behind the scenes at America Coming Together --who has stolen which data bases and lists and what do they plan to do with them?"
Oh, isn't it just too funny? Let's all have a good laugh about sky-high deficits and republican dirty tricks and all that stupid stuff the dems were so worried about. We're all in Bushworld now, where those things don't matter one bit. What, me worry? Ha, ha, ha.
Well, I guess we can give up any hope that the media, at least, would take a serious look at who won and why and what it means for the United States. Too busy laughing all the way to the bank, I guess.

And pardon my ignorance

that "moral values" were so important to Republican voters -- I think it was all the blog comments and freeper posts telling progressive bloggers to "fuck off and die, you commie French-loving lesbo homo bitch asshole" that mislead me. Either that, or Cheney's "go fuck yourself" remark. My mistake. . .
UPDATE - see Digby - in essence, he says it was 130,000 votes in Ohio that won Bush this election, NOT a cultural war between godless democrats and morally superior republicans. And it was mean-spirited, underhanded gay-bashing that produced those 130,000 votes, NOT Christian values.

The Moral Mandate? Here it comes

That great upholder of national decency, as long as it doesn't happen in Vegas, Bill Bennet writes today in the National Review Online: "Having restored decency to the White House, President Bush now has a mandate to affect policy that will promote a more decent society, through both politics and law. His supporters want that, and have given him a mandate in their popular and electoral votes to see to it. Now is the time to begin our long, national cultural renewal -- no less in legislation than in federal court appointments. It is, after all, the main reason George W. Bush was reelected."
And when they succeed in overturning Roe V Wade, and requiring the teaching of 'creationist science', and saying the Lord's Prayer in schools, and mandating Christmas creche displays, and preventing the broadcast of critical movies and MTV, and outlawing porn and being gay, will America be a more "decent" place?
Has anyone read The Handmaid's Tale recently?
(Thanks to Josh Marshall for the link.)

Dean for America

Howard Dean could probably claim the title of most disappointed man in America -- after a primary campaign that jump-started the DNC and inspired millions of democrats to rejoin the democratic wing of the democratic party, he lost the nomination to Kerry -- then watched Kerry lose an election which, likely, Dean is personally convinced he could have won (and won't THAT be a debate for the future?)
But Dean still writes a message of hope on Democracy For America:
"Today is not an ending.
Regardless of the outcome yesterday, we have begun to revive our democracy. While we did not get the result we wanted in the presidential race, we laid the groundwork for a new generation of Democratic leaders.
Democracy for America trained thousands of organizers and brought new leadership into the political process. And down the ballot, in state after state, we elected Dean Dozen candidates who will be the rising stars of the Democratic Party in years ahead.
Tens of millions of us are disappointed today because we put so much of ourselves into this election. We donated money, we talked to friends, we knocked on doors. We invested ourselves in the political process.
That process does not end today. These are not short-term investments. We will only create lasting change if that sense of obligation and responsibility becomes a permanent part of our lives.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said, 'Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.'
We will not be silent. "

Some random thoughts

1. Oh, damn it, damn it, damn it.

2. When you look at the experience of democracies around the world, it is not uncommon for political parties to spend years and years in the wilderness before coming back to power -- look at Labour in Britain, look at the NDP here. It ebbs and flows. The 2000 and 2004 election were both so close that democrats know their message resonates with millions and millions of northern and west coast Americans -- the dems just haven't been able to close the deal by winning a southern state. Edwards should have carried North Carolina but he didn't; Gore should have carried Tennessee but he didn't. The democratic candidate in 2007 and/or his running mate will win the northern states again but MUST also be strong enough and well-enough connected in the south to win a southern state.

3. One lesson learned: a northeastern senator or any perceived Washington insider CANNOT win the presidency anymore, not with the population shifts and the southern evangelical vote, and not dragging a senate record behind him. Next time, look for a southern governor. And be ready for rapid response on personal attacks.
4. Get serious early, for heavens sake -- exercise enough party discipline that you do NOT have four or five absolutely hopeless candidates running month after month for the nomination -- Al Sharpton? Carol Mosely-Braun? Give me a break. Nice people, yes, but with such a lengthy primary season, its irresponsible for people who have no chance of winning nationally to use the democrats just as a stepping stone toward their own national reputation. It made the democrats look confused and trivial, and made it more difficult for Kerry to establish a national profile. Let two or three credible winners fight it out in 2007 and show the country that the dems know how to lead.
5. Yes, Obama is impressive, but in 2007 he would suffer from the same problems Edwards had - a great speaking ability but only three years senate experience, and no experience running a government. Against Jeb Bush or Arnie, Obama would be toast. The dems cannot afford to lose Obama the way they have now lost Edwards.
6. And finally, well, at least the anti-war movement can come back now. Showing commendable discipline, anti-war people shut up about it for the last six months, not wanting to cause any rifts in the Kerry campaign and also believing that perhaps Kerry, once elected, could actually achieve some success in Iraq -- but that's all in the past now. We KNOW that Bush cannot succeed in Iraq, so we are free to blog against the war once again.
UPDATE - 7. Read Digby

Can you spell "backfire"?

This confirms my own thinking, so of course I'll post it. pandagon's Jesse Taylor reports on the voting experience in a primarily black precinct and concludes: "The Republican voter challenger debacle, alongside the Milwaukee and South Carolina flyers, may be the worst conservative strategic blunder of any election in recent memory. From my precinct (an admittedly small sample), a lot of people feel like they're back in the 60s, fighting against a tyrannical and prejudiced power trying to keep them from exercising their constitutional rights."
The republican meme -- that everybody really loves George but democrats are trying to steal this election by fraudulent voting -- is an insult to all of the election supervisors and poll workers who are working their guts out today all over the US. I know how hard it is, because I've worked elections. And I know how dedicated and professional the poll workers are.
OF COURSE there are errors in the voters lists -- without a system of pre-election ennumeration like we have here in Canada, there is no way to tell how many people have died, moved, married, divorced since the previous election, and a system which allows private individuals paid per-voter to register people for voting encourages the Mickey and Minnie Mouse type of registrations. But the poll workers sort this type of thing out -- that's what they are being paid to do.
That meme is also a cover for what appears to be a deliberate, targeted attempt to block black and hispanic voting by intimidating and harassing legitimate voters -- and that is truely despicable, not to mention horrifying to the moderate middle who MIGHT have voted for Bush this time but now will not. The republicans will rue the day they ever let Rove talk them into this.

"Avoid history at all costs"

Gary Kamiya wrote a prescient article just prior to the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, entitled Sleepwalking to Baghdad: ". . . we have gone from being in a political moment to a historical one. I use the words somewhat eccentrically, to distinguish between events that are simple enough to be fully explicable ("political") and those that are too complex to be defined ("historical"). The war against Afghanistan took place in what I am calling the political realm: It had a clear, limited and achievable goal, one understood by all -- and widely supported around the world. The impending war against Iraq, on the other hand, is a historical event. It cannot be explained or defined. When it comes, it will simply exist, with the opacity of history. Its outcome is not foreseeable. The distinction also has a moral dimension. To exist in history is to have passed beyond the pieties and slogans of the political. History is tragic: politics is not. History is glorious. It is also fatal. The two great competing ideologies of the 20th century, fascism and communism, were both self-consciously historical movements. As Czeslaw Milosz brilliantly noted in his classic study "The Captive Mind," it was precisely the abstraction of communism, its claim to have attained the summit of morality and to have incorporated into itself all possible contradictions, that made it so meticulously horrifying. In similar fashion, fascism contained a kind of blankness at its core: the self-glorifying violence of the state simultaneously concealed and revealed the emptiness of its founding concept, the national tribe. The lesson every government should have learned from the bloody 20th century, one written in blood across the tortured soil of old, very old Europe, is very simple: Avoid history at all costs. History is too big, too abstract, too dangerous. Avoid men with Big Ideas -- especially stupid men with Big Ideas. Take care of politics: let history take care of itself. In a word, don't play God."
Well, they didn't let history take care of itself, and Bush did play God. Now Kamiya writes about the results: American nightmare. He concludes "A pious, foolish and poorly educated man, surrounded by zealots and knaves, dreamed of smiting the evildoers, but instead put a sword into their hands. He imagined that by invading a state in the heart of the Arab world, he would cut through the Gordian knot, but he entangled his army in writhing coils. He fantasized that an all-powerful America would stand atop a grateful world, but he made his nation despised everywhere, and particularly in the one region of the world where it is most important that we not be despised. This is the world Bush left us. We must make a new one."

Kerry - EV 290

Well, here's the CathiefromCanada prediction. Not mathematically precise, I know, but I think it will be 290 or higher for Kerry.
Today's electoral vote predictor has Kerry at 298, not including New Mexico.
I was talking today with an American professor who had voted absentee and was worried that Kerry hadn't "closed the deal". Well, its always easier to vote for someone who is 60-40 rather than 48-48, of course -- but I remembered something that either Churchill or Eisenhower said before D-Day -- that the chance of D-Day success was about 50-50, and it had taken four years and the combined might of the free world to get that single 50-50 chance.
Various bloggers have said this already, but let me chime in -- what Democrats and progressives have achieved, in less than two years, is magnificent.
Following the mid-terms, Democrats were in total disarray, demoralized, disorganized, half-caught by Bush's charm, impressed by his political performance at the UN and in Congress, and ensnared by the patriotic idea that anyAmerican Leader should be supported after 9/11. Then came Howard Dean, proving that the Beltway pundits were getting it wrong about how Bush and his war in Iraq were universally beloved and supported. Then came the nine Democrats, who had to vie for the nomination by out-democrating each other. Finally out of the pack came John Kerry, a fighter, principled, a leader. And his Democrats are organized, on message, enthusiastic, and getting to the polls already in record numbers.
So maybe its still a 50-50 chance, but you created that chance for yourselves with your hard work and dedication to democracy. I congratulate you and I will be cheering for you tomorrow.

First the astrologers, now the Redskins -- its a Kerry win for sure!

On Friday's Countdown, Keith Obermann said the one invariable election predictor for the last 70 years has been whether the Washington Redskins win their last game before the election -- if they win, so does the incumbent President or party; if they lose, then the challenger is voted into power.
So today, the Green Bay Packers defeated the Redskins 28-14.
Here is a quote describing the teams from the Comments of the MyDD post about this. And if you replace "Redskins" with "Bush" and "Green Bay" with "Kerry" you get a pretty accurate summary of this year's election campaign too, I think:
"Green Bay, which was widely considered to be a Super Bowl contender before the season started, had a surprisingly bad stretch where they lost 4 games in a row early this season. But they looked far better in their last two games, winning each of them comfortably with huge numbers on offense, 38 and 41 points in those two wins. The Redskins have one of the best ranked defenses in the league, but their offense is mind-numbingly bad, no more than 18 points in any game all year. The Packers' defense has been their undoing in most of their losses, but Washington's offense is so bad that it's hard to see where the Redskins can find an advantage. They've had a terrible season, and few people think they can beat the Packers today. Anything can happen in sports, as the Red Sox just demonstrated, but we're talking about a pretty sorry bunch of underachievers in the Redskins, and a pretty confident Packer team that's plenty motivated to continue turning their season around. "
Pretty goofy, eh?

Heading for the rapids

Billmon has a couple of new posts about American fascism. The incidents he reports perhaps could have happened during any recent (last 20 years) American election campaign -- except maybe for the Bush Loyalty Oath stunt.
I'm not surprised that one person quoted in the Goldberg article thought that Kerry had a gay daughter, not Cheney -- its a typical kind of misinformation fog that affects a lot of people who really don't pay a lot of attention to the news, debates, etc. This is why advertisers warn against negative product comparison ads -- people viewing them with half an eye can easily attribute all the negative stuff they're hearing to the wrong product, the advertisers product.
But this is what makes the fascism stuff a little more chilling, too -- it can creep up on you because people aren't really paying attention. Billmon concludes "even as these people move, like sleepwalkers, towards a distinctly American version of the cult of the leader, most of them honestly appear to have no idea what they're doing, or creating. I'm not even sure the Rovians themselves entirely understand the atavistic instincts they've awakened in Bush's most loyal followers. But the current is running now, fast and strong. And we're all heading for the rapids."

This is the dawning of the Age of ...Kerry

Astrologers for Kerry! The Planets Have Made Up Their Mind: Kerry Wins What a goofy story, but the tune floating through my mind was "When the moon is in the seventh house....."

Brer Bin Laden "Oh please, oh please don't vote for Bush"

I've been trolling the right-wing blogs to see what they are saying about the Bin Laden video. The answer is, not much -- strangely, they're not objecting to any of Bin Laden's references to Bush's cowardice and mishandling of 911, except for obligatory flailing of Michael Moore.
Instead, there is an undercurrent of worry about the election -- they're still trying to reframe last week's explosives story once again, they're reassuring each other how good their polls are, and they're writing myths about how Bush will increase his minority vote.
Kos, on the other hand, has a great post about how a Bush strategist is quoted in the New York Daily News as saying the video is a "little gift" for Bush -- is there NOTHING in the world that offends or shames these people?
This reminded me of Bush's offensive "trifecta" reference, in which he asserted how lucky he was that 9/11, the recession and the war had let him off the hook in balancing the Social Security budget.
And here is a great column from the Chattanoogan, which I presume is a Tennessee paper: Osama, My Pajama Its the second story on the Google list of more than 3.000 stories now running about the Bin Laden video.
Author Bart Whiteman starts by saying "Some people are suggesting, and I am not sure what corner of their diminished brain capacity they are getting this from, that if John Kerry is elected, Osama bin Laden will be eating dinner at the White House. Well, fine and good. Then we can catch him (finally) because we will know where he is."
Continuing, he reaches this point: "The fact that Al Qaeda would be rooting for Kerry is ridiculous. Bush is their man. Bush has been the best thing to happen to them in a long time. They are taking Bush to the bank. With Bush, they know what they have. With Bush, the next four years are entirely predictable. More of the same. And the same means more recruits for Al Qaeda every day. The same means continued sinking of American esteem internationally. We are probably at the lowest level of international support and reputation than we have been at since we our history began. And this is no mean feat. With Kerry, they don't know what they will have. Things will be unpredictable. And that is what is lacking in our current military deployment. "
He concludes: "Yeah, Al Qaeda fears Bush just the way Brer Rabbit feared the briar patch. “Oh, please, oh, please don’t vote for Bush.” We give them Bush, and they’ll be singing songs of six pence. We give them Kerry and they will have to re-group and wait and see what’s coming."
And I've thought a little more about Bin Laden's ceasefire offer -- I wonder whether he's thinking that Bush and America have had enough of the Middle East and that a reelected Bush would be willing to pull out in exchange for Al Qaeda guarantees, rather than continue fighting, especially since the US is losing Iraq anyway? Powell's trip this week to the Far and Middle Easts resulted in little American coverage, but Al Jazeera reported on Thursday that Powell had warned Israel against using force to attack Iran's uranium projects and other news stories reported Powell's praise for Israel's Gaza pullout. From the ground in the Middle East, maybe it looks as though Powell is being firm with Israel, while Bush just wants to find some of the good old 'peace with honour'?

Ceasefire?

CNN.com - Bin Laden's message is not a threat, its a cease-fire offer. The translation ends "Any nation that does not attack us will not be attacked" -- if accurate, there is an implicit promise here that Al Quaeda will stop its attacks on the west if the west no longer "spoils" Islamic secutiry. "We want to reclaim our nation" he says -- its not clear whether he means an actual nation-state, like Afghanistan, or the "nation" of Islam. He blames Reagan (Lebanon) and Bush Senior as well as W for the motivation for 9/11, and implies the attack was easier because of US corruption and its impact was worse because W did not respond quickly enough.
Bush should have caught Bin Laden two years ago but has outsourced the job to Pakistan. Its been stated around the web that Bush and his administration are still thinking of terrorism as a threat only when it originates from a nation-state, like Afghanistan or Iraq, and so they took their eye off Bin Laden as soon as his based in Afghanistan was destroyed. Its clear that Bin Laden thinks of himself as the leader of Islam, state-based or not. Kerry is right that he should be America's top priority. But I think the ceasefire offer was the most interesting aspect of the video -- and I wonder how America will respond?

ENCORE - Saskatchewan's Dinner Party

A friend of ours, who is a director on the Flax Council, invited us to this event tonight -- ENCORE - Saskatchewan's Dinner Party -- what a terrific evening it was. And do try the recipes -- delicious.