Why couldn't this Foley business have broken a couple days ago, when it might have derailed the torture legislation?  

I don't entirely mean that wistfully: what did determine the timing of this?  Was it ABC?  How long had they had the emails and IMs?  I seem to remember that John Aravois said he had seen the emails, though not the IMs, months ago, but was uncertain of their authenticity.  I think it was suggested somewhere that the IMs were produced after the pages heard that the emails were out.  But there's still a precise timing question, and after the New York Times fiasco, I think we're justified in asking ABC for a full account of their release decisions.  

One wonders--and the more familiar you are with Washington, the less conspiracy-minded this will sound--whether there were deals to either a) delay the announcement a couple more days to let the bill pass, or b) someone decided after the torture bill was passed, alright, the gloves come off.  I wonder.

Is there any other liberal out there who finds this whole attack on leakers and journalists on behalf of the US covert security apparatus a bit disturbing?

I know Dailykos is about equally made up of pragmatic centrist democrats and more lefty liberal democrats, but it seems surprising to me that all I read, in diary after diary, is a desire to make those who have put our spies in harm's way pay.  The fundamental desire, in this case, may be to see Rove "frog-marched" and take down as many of the hypocrites in the White House as possible, but it is remarkable how few people say, well, frog-marching Rove is great, but I'd like to do it without praising the CIA to the skies, and without damning all leakers and journalists who publish the leaks.  Sure, Miller is pretty damn sleazy, but again, just because we hate the leakers--Rove, Libby, etc--and we hate the journalist--Miller--and we like the CIA couple--"Plame" and Wilson--do we have to then generalize against all leakers, against all leak publishers, and in favor of all those poor NOCs trying to give America whatever edge they can in the dangerous international arena?

I didn't see this anywhere, though people were asking for it on the giant atheism thread.  

Regarding atheism/agnosticism, you can take this or leave it, but my usual rule of thumb is Santa Claus.  Absolutely proving the non-existence of something is almost impossible, but we probably all agree Santa Claus doesn't exist, and can call ourselves a-Santaists.  If you are as sure God doesn't exist as you are Santa doesn't, my feeling is that that should qualify as atheism, even if you grant some general epistemological doubts about whether God's non-existence could ever be proven, or if you hold out hope that God may turn out to exist.  On the other hand, many people may think God has a better shot at existing than Santa, and still consider themselves atheists, while others may feel that the nature of God is different from Santa in a way that disrupts the analogy.  So feel free to ignore this rubric and answer as you please.

(Sorry, that title is just to get the goats of those who think diaries shouldn't be comments on other diaries.)

The arguments against filibustering or fighting the confirmation of Harriet Miers mostly seem to boil down to saying that we could do worse, much worse, and in any case, there's very little chance that we'll stop the nomination (absent a coalition revolt with the right wing).  

But the fact that we are unlikely to be able to stop the nomination is what allows us to fight as hard as we like without worry.  What is the harm in fighting?  Georgia10 enumerates some of the many practical advantages to be had in the hearings, and Meteor Blades enumerates the principled reasons for opposing her.  Most of us agree that she is both far to the right of our principles, and obviously unqualified.  Who cares if we could do worse than her?  We won't.

For once, there is no need to muffle your principles with pragmatism.  Let your anger at conservative cronyism run free.  Fight!  

My god, Hunter's slogan is awful.

It sounds Republican because it is.  "Strong" is not what I stand for.  "Right" is what I stand for.  Good, just, fair, honest, helpful, progressive, true, happier, healthier, optimistic--it goes on a long way, but "strong" ain't there.  

Families are good, but doesn't Hunter realize that in choosing "strong families" and a "strong nation," out of so many laudable things out there, that he is evoking--whether intentionally or not--a whole set of values that are, essentially, conservative?

Compared to helping out the unfairly poor, hungry, abused, and downtrodden, I don't give a shit about a "strong nation."  Is Hunter actually suggesting that we should aid the poor to boost American economic competitiveness?  It makes me puke in despair.  We help the poor because they don't deserve what they've got, because it is intrinsically the right thing, dammit!  

Every time Kos et al prevent a large group of kos users from doing what they want--such as the one-diary-a-day rule--there will be argument.  I'm a democrat, small d, and believe that the only way to fairly maximize happiness in a group is to let the group decide on controversies democratically.  Kos et al don't feel that way regarding the website--understandably enough since they control it completely--so the arguments will continue, and more so when the next Katrina-size issue breaks.

However---

In the meantime, almost all of my own desires for more user-freedom on dailykos can be achieved very very easily by the Scoop gods.  All I want is a way to search diaries based on date, recommendation level, and number of comments.  Why? Because... [flip]

Why didn't they leave New Orleans?  When they heard the warnings that a category 5 hurricane was impending, and that catastrophic flooding was likely, why did they choose to stay?  Why, after the flooding, when the weather had cleared, did they continue to stay, and to loot, and to shoot each other over TVs and cigarettes that were probably too soggy to work anyway?  Why stand around on your roof for days waving for help when the city is full of floating stuff, and it's only a couple miles to shore?  Sure, some were elderly and disabled, but it was due to the chaos unleashed by the rest--the great majority of them fully able adult men and women--that the National Guard couldn't get in immediately to help those that needed help.  And if people were staying under these circumstances, think how much harder it would have been to get them out with MREs raining down like manna!

[More...]

That was Bush's quoted reaction to the seeing the disaster as Air Force One flew over.  When I read it, at first I was puzzled.  How could it only be doubly devastating on the ground, when that's where all the people and destruction actually are?  In fact, I wondered, what does that first "it's devastating" even mean?  Then I realized that he was just referring to the appearance, and he imagined that it would look even more devastating on the ground.  Clearly his surprise suggests he doesn't watch much TV news, but his perspective is exactly the same as theirs: "devastating" refers to the emotions of the viewer, saying to himself "holey crap, look at that floating house."  This seems to me a deep insight into how Bush and that whole half think: spectators, watching shit happen as if it were all on TV, even when they see it first hand, thinking "man, that's some devastating shit."  

The quote was taken from http://www.nola.com/newslogs/breakingtp/.  A slightly more extended chunk is in the extended entry.  Note McClellan's language too.

The users define the nature of the blog, right?  Kos has said as much many times himself.  

So here's the poll.  0 is center, -5 extreme right, +5 extreme left.  Where do you stand?  Where do we collectively stand?

You'll have to decide for yourself what each number exactly means.  For instance, how far left counts as "liberal"?

In this election the left relied on a coalition of those angry and dismayed over what Bush has done.  But across the country, the left utterly failed to sway those who preferred the core ideas of the right--its so-called "moral values"--to the left's grab-bag of complaints and minor bromides.  Clearly, the left needs its own grand ideas to counter the effective religiosity of the right.  But after all these years of downplaying our core values, people seem uncertain about what unifies us besides our distress at what the right is doing to America.  This is remarkable and sad--the left has been developing its core ideas for over two centuries, and now hardly anyone can conjure up a pithy and moving list of what we all stand for and hold deeply.  We are not just a reactive coalition.  We should proclaim these ideals loudly and sway the country with our ideas just as the right has been doing.  

The core of liberalism is...

Should we plan on any collective action if Bush wins the Electoral College but loses the popular vote again?  Should we march in the streets on Wednesday?  Obviously nothing will overturn the electoral college system in the short run, but it seems important to emphasize immediately that he has no mandate, and by all normal definitions of democracy (ie, everyone's vote is equal), has not been democratically elected.  

As many have pointed out, they "won" last time with no mandate, yet governed as if they had a large one.  We made almost no use of the fact that our side clearly outnumbered their side.  I know some may not like the idea of planning to hamstring an elected government, but we can't let them pick up where they left off if it is demonstrated once again that hundreds of thousands more voters preferred a democrat.