Obama said a good thing about Iraq: he regards his job as not to simply deal with tactical military and diplomatic issues but rather change the entire mindset that got us in there in the first place. Changing the mindset and the underlying system is the only way to deal with this. I think a simple antiwar platform, for this reason, is a profound mistake because it does not address the underlying systemic root causes. And there is no way they can be addressed in a conventional Presidential campaign.

Time for like-minded progressives to organize a parallel process using the internet and talk radio. Very cheap. Can reach millions. Signatures can be signed. A conventional assembled within a few years and the government system changed. Gravel has a whole lot about this in one of his affiliated sites and although I don’t think much of him as a public figure at this point, I think he has the single best idea of what can practically be done. Nader is brilliant on many levels but yet another campaign run is pissing in the wind and a huge waste of time and energy. I wish he would realise this and help facilitate something more substantive.

It all seems so hopeless sometimes; and yet cynicism is also a waste of time. The progressive movement is splintered and without any real leader. And that is what it is going to take. It is always so in human affairs.

Tom Yager points in the right direction: it’s not about this present election cycle, its about using same to Build A Movement.

Happily a section of the GP has woke up, accepted Black leadership to an extent. The Democrats are the problem, GOP is open: “we ‘re out to screw you because you’re inferior scum”; but Dems claim to be Pty of Common Peeple. Most lowerclass folks buy it hook/line/sinker. Esp Blacks now in throes of Obamania.
Only McKinney can directly challenge Obamism in his core Base.

Plus Nader still trying peddle two-state illusion, perpetuate the nonsense that Izzy gov’t will ever stop trying to Transfer the bulk of Palestinian population. So he’s no better than damn Xstian Skyence Moneytor & Geoff “Keep yr Shirt on & y’ll get a Blanket”* Aronson. A perpetuator of Illusion, a peddler of Myth.

*”Be patient and ye shall receive a Comforter”;)

Will we have a Republican or a Democrat President in 2008?

Who cares! It’s irrevelant.

Is it true that the Stars and Stripes are going and a bucket of money will soon feature prominently on the America flag?

Look, I’m only kidding. Sort of.

P.S. A homosexual orgy at the Last Supper. Check Dangerous Creation for details.

As for our party’s strength relative to 2004, it’s weaker in some places but stronger in others. For example, the Greens will be on the ballot in Illinois this year because of the strength of their petition drive and statewide candidates in the 2006 election. We are also very likely to be on the ballot in Arizona. In 2004, we didn’t even come close to getting ont the ballot in either state.

Go Green: http://www.gp.org

I believe the only way out of our mess is to do what the forefathers suggested: once this system no longer works, tear it down, and start all over again. I believe strongly what we need to do is switch to a scandanavian (I like the swedish system the best, but all 5 are generally excellent; we can make it even better here) type of parliamentary system – multi-party, IRV, take the money out & the long drawn out process, and all of the bribes, putting LOW caps on how much money can be spent (it disgusts me that these candidates will raise hundreds of millions of dollars each when that money would be better used for really important things)…

What will said prez do when the Shiites, with aid and direction from Muqtada Sadr sitting in Qom, Iran, decide to purge Iraq of dissidents, both Shia and Sunni – and then the Saudi decide to lend a little help to their Sunni brothers in Iraq, and then of course to keep the entire region from conflagrating Russia and/or China, in dire need of stable oil supplies, steps in to stabilize the situation, and hopefully sell a little oil to the US of A.

Or, lets say, said prez redeploys/withdraws troops to neighboring ME countries – would that be Kuwait? Saudi? Afghanistan? Turkey? They would love to accomodate US right? Or maybe the US could station just across the Gulf in Oman, UAE, Yemen? That would solve all the US dicking around in the ME, right? Or maybe a little further away in the ‘hood, over in Somalia, Kenya, Sudan? US AFRICOM, based in Stuttgart, Germany, is eager to enhance their presence on the African continent.

I plan on voting 3rd party, if I bother to vote this time around. But third parties seem to have no plans for the aftermath of anything. Will they cut the cost of war or pump the same billions into “restitution and reconstruction” companies rather than defense contractors?

How much cooperation will a third party prez in the Oval Office get from a corrupted congress of corrupted two parties? How will the new third party be immune to corruption – after all the Republicans and Democrats were once a new third party.

And even if we had a dozen choices – we would still have the same “corporate America, the religious right, and the media” and I might add the “progressive industry” managing the same political sideshow.

I lean more toward believing it’s not as simple as changing the party designation behind the candidates name – and more toward holding pols accountable with jail time, loss of profit/property, public flogging … tar/feathers.

One possible solution, short of bearing arms, is boycott – hit them in their wallets – good and hard. Which Joe Idolology is not going to do, at least until he’s forced to by economic circumstances and by then it is too late.

You can’t really believe the “ruling class” is going to give up their lucrative system without a fight. They have 200+ years of swatting off “dissidents” like fleas on a dog’s butt.

Just keep shopping and voting – it encourages “them.” When the US has no more butter and bullets the new pols new deal will have canned meat and bean vouchers for everyone.

And here in lies the problem. Why didn’t Nader unite with McKinney and try to build a cohesive left-wing force? Nader will not leave a lasting institutional organization that can continue on beyond his campaign. At least McKinney is trying to work within the Green Party framework but alas they’ve been much weaken by their 2004 fiasco. McKinney is also trying to build the Reconstruction Party that will be more sharply focus on issue of people of color which means here focus and energy are divided. It would be nice if that energy can be coalesced. This is why a Nader/McKinney ticket on the Green Party ballot line as well as perhaps independent would have helped to unite left-wing forces.

There are too many divided and sectarian agendas in the left that leaves it in a weaken state and unable to communicate with the masses of people who have been energized this year as demonstrated by their participation in the primaries. It’s a real shame that the “left” will eventually miss out on this opportunity.