signs of the recovery

a ray of light shines in the gopher state:

(hat tip to john cole)

quote of the day

tim f. @ balloon juice:

barack obama stripped millions of americans of their right to not have a black president.

they hide in the light

from erstwhile republican now democratic convert john cole @ balloon juice:

via alicublog, i see that the cornerites are taking the time today to celebrate vince foster's birthday as an excuse to bring up his suicide. you will have to read edroso's commentary to fully appreciate the right wing ability to raise "serious questions." [snip] i don't know if i will ever be a member of "the cause" again. on the eve of obama's inauguration, it is both funny and disturbing to look back to how things were eight years ago — i was so thrilled that a republican was about to be inaugurated. i was so excited to vote for bush in 2000 that i literally could not sleep, and, as always, was at the voting booth at 6:30 — 7:00 in the morning, the only person under 60 standing in line. now, today, i am so disgusted with the republican party that i don't think i will be able to vote for a national republican for twenty years. i wouldn't say my positions have changed completely, either. i really don't feel like there has been a dramatic shift in my opinions. on several issues, i am certainly more to the "left" than i was before. for example, i was never a proponent of gay marriage, and felt that civil unions were more than an acceptable compromise. not anymore — gay marriage is the future, it is the right thing to do, and those who can't cope with that reality one day will just have to deal with it when we finally get there. what has changed, however, is that i have seen a lot of the arguments that come from the republicans for what they are — just bullshit. i have watched over the past few years and seen how nonsense bubbles up into the mainstream, and how distorted versions of events designed to distract and queer the debate turn an upside down version of events into the "conventional wisdom." you don't have to look any farther than the recent attempts to blame the entire financial crisis on democrats, fannie mae and freddie mac and poor minority borrowers. we just spent an entire election season where prominent republicans thought they really had something with bill ayers and obama's birth certificate. of course, months could be spent documenting all the bullshit that has been churned up in the past eight years. the embrace by the right-wing of the idiotic tome "liberal fascism" could itself be the subject of lengthy study. you all know by now what a dork i am, so i am not outing myself when i state that one of my favorite all-time episodes of the x-files was a show called "folie a deux", in which scully and mulder investigate a man who thinks his boss is a monster. everyone thinks the man is insane because he insists that his boss is a zombie who eats people brains, and he is driven to madness that no one else can see his boss for the monster he is. he states frequently that the monster "hides in the light." eventually, fox is able to see the monster as the show comes to a conclusion. you see where this is going, don't you? i understand now why the dirty fucking hippies were driven to near madness by the gop and the election of bush. having watched things pan out the last few years and observed how truly perverted the beltway insiders who dominate our dysfunctional discourse are, i understand bob somersby and glenn greenwald and others. i don't know how much to "the left" i have actually moved on a lot of issues, but i do know one thing. when i see this nonsense from byron york and wideload doughpants, raising their "serious questions" about vince foster's suicide, i know clearly what i am seeing — i'm just watching the monsters hiding in the light, right where they always have been. this time, though, i see.

i drink all your internet traditions!

so here's my contribution:

(if you need to catch up on the story, it germinates here, metastasizes here and becomes pandemic here.)

all bets are off

thymezone @ balloon juice writes:

a guy at work today said, "mcain [sic] is going to win big." "really?" i said. "i have a hundred dollars that says he loses." silence. wouldn't take the bet. wouldn't take the bet for ten dollars. "come on, put your money where your mouth is." "no thanks." i was talking to a guy who makes six figures, and was talking trash. wouldn't bet ten dollars on mccain. it is going to be a fun year.

quote of the day

born-again democrat john cole @ balloon juice:

my iraq war retrospective i see that andrew sullivan was asked to list what he got wrong about iraq for the five year anniversary of the invasion, and since i was as big a war booster as anyone, i thought i would list what i got wrong: everything. and i don’t say that to provide people with an easy way to beat up on me, but i do sort of have to face facts. i was wrong about everything. i was wrong about the doctrine of pre-emptive warfare. i was wrong about iraq possessing wmd. i was wrong about scott ritter and the inspections. i was wrong about the un involvement in weapons inspections. i was wrong about the containment sanctions. i was wrong about the broader impact of the war on the middle east. i was wrong about this making us more safe. i was wrong about the number of troops needed to stabilize iraq. i was wrong when i stated this administration had a clear plan for the aftermath. i was wrong about securing the ammunition dumps. i was wrong about the ease of bringing democracy to the middle east. i was wrong about dissolving the iraqi army. i was wrong about the looting being unimportant. i was wrong that bush/cheney were competent. i was wrong that we would be greeted as liberators. i was wrong to make fun of the anti-war protestors. i was wrong not to trust the dirty smelly hippies. i mean, i could go down the list and continue on, but you get the point. i was wrong about EVERY. GOD. DAMNED. THING. it is amazing i could tie my shoes in 2001-2004. if you took all the wrongness i generated, put it together and compacted it and processed it, there would be enough concentrated stupid to fuel three hundred years of weekly standard journals. i am not sure how i snapped out of it, but i think abu ghraib and the negative impact of the insurgency did sober me up a bit. war should always be an absolute last resort, not just another option. i will never make the same mistakes again.

quote of the day

from ex-republican¹-turned-democrat john cole @ balloon juice:

this is starting to turn into a ritual: dissatisfied with the debate here wednesday that drew widespread scorn, iowa republicans will discuss on friday the possibility of holding another forum before the january 3rd caucuses. the debate this week, sponsored by the des moines register and iowa public television, was to have been the final gathering of the gop contenders, but one well-placed iowa republican said tonight that they were interested in getting the candidates back together. "we'd prefer if the register debate did not leave a bad taste," said this source, who requested anonymity. "iowa deserves a little better than that." at some point, maybe after a few more debates, they are going to realize the problem is not the debate format, or the moderator, or the youtube videos, or the "drive-by media," or whatever else they will come up with to fool themselves. the problem is that the candidates suck. at any rate, i agree — iowa does deserve better. so does the rest of the country. which is why i am not voting republican next year.

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¹ read about john's halloween transformation @ "say hello to the newest member of the vast left wing conspiracy"