Joan Walsh has a decent piece in Salon today entitled Mistakes of the 2008 Democratic Primary. I agree with a lot of what she says. I don’t think you can know whether Clinton would have been more progressive than Obama. I don’t think she would have. On policy, they were damned near identical. Neither one was a progressive. The progressives in the race were Kucinich and Edwards. One thing you can’t do, though, is look back in hindsight and say that we should have chosen Edwards. Obviously, that would have been a total disaster. No one takes Kucinich seriously as potential president outside of his own fans. That leaves you Obama or Clinton. I think a lot of progressives were willing to sort of graft a projection of progressivism on to Clinton or Obama that never existed because of the tendency to accept identity politics in the Democratic Party. In fact, I think a lot of Obama supporters did just that. If you were going to graft progressivism onto a candidate, he was the easier choice even without the identity politics. He quite intentionally used soaring, hopeful, progressive rhetoric. That was the real genius of his campaign and of his public persona as a national figure before he got in the campaign. Clinton chose to center her campaign image around being the solid, reliable establishment candidate, the steady hand, etc. She left the aspirations of people to see a woman president as a background theme, one that was only emphasized for specific audiences.

In point of fact, there really wasn’t a viable progressive choice in the 2008 primary in hindsight because of what a total piece of shit John Edwards turned out to be. So even though I currently have no intention of supporting Barack Obama’s re-election efforts and I may even vote for a 3rd party candidate, I think the idea of setting up a primary challenger for him is folly. If you’re a democrat, a well funded challenge just guarantees that he loses if the GOP manages to nominate anyone but the worst of the slavering mouth breathers. I’ll close with the final paragraph of Walsh’s piece. I think it is pretty much politics 101 for anyone who cares about the electoral world, but it’s something that damn few people in the mainstream media are willing to engage with. Only some progressive activists and bloggers had taken this on as gospel until pretty recently:

I think many on the left anointed Obama the only progressive in the race out of a rescue fantasy. But it’s possible people who want to see Obama face a primary — and I do not, as I’ve said too many times to count — have the same fantasy with a different, as yet unnamed savior. It gives progressives a sense of control: It’s not that Republicans are better organized than we are, or that they’ll fight Democrats by any means necessary; it’s our fault that we somehow chose the wrong candidate. At least we might have it in our power to make better choices. But I think it’s time to reckon with the fact that no matter whom we choose, Rush Limbaugh and his Republican Party will do whatever it takes to see them fail.

…is the best way that I’ve ever heard anyone say that right wing economics is full of shit.

I woke up this morning and turned on MSNBC. President Obama was about to make his speech at the national prayer breakfast. I watched the first few minutes before getting in the shower. I was really pleased that he took yet another high profile opportunity to acknowledge Americans of “no faith”. I have never in my lifetime been acknowledged as a part of the national community in that sense. I have never been acknowledged as someone who might be a good, thoughtful, committed person who wants good things for the world and community he lives in. It’s a powerful thing that really placates my sense of disappointment in some of the other things he’s doing. He also said that when he, later today, makes an announcement about his office of faith based and community programs that this office will not privilege one religion over another nor privilege religious groups over secular ones. Win.

Someone needs to send NBC’s Lee Cowen a copy of the constitution.

You may well have heard that Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has supposedly decided to appoint former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris to Barack Obama’s senate seat. I just watched Lee Cowen speculate that the U.S. Senate may just have to accept this because, after all, Blagojevich is the legally elected governor of Illinois and he has the sole power to decide this, in spite of Harry Reid’s objects.

Um, no.

Given the nature of this scandal, one might have thought that reporters covering the story would take two minutes to brush up on the appropriate section of the constitution. Since Mr. Cowen didn’t bother, I’ll provide this to any member of the media who wants to comment on this news story. It’s Article I, Section 5 of the U.S. constitution:

Each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns and qualifications of its own members, and a majority of each shall constitute a quorum to do business; but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner, and under such penalties as each House may provide.

Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two thirds, expel a member.

Each House shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such parts as may in their judgment require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the members of either House on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the journal.

Neither House, during the session of Congress, shall, without the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other place than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting.

I had hoped that Obama would actually take office before disappointing me. Y’all know I was never too enthusiastic an Obama supporter until the final weeks of the campaign. So, it’ s not like my expectations were super high to begin with. Obama is the reason that Joe Lieberman continues on as chairman at Homeland Security. If the senate Democrats don’t boot Lieberman the very first time he fails to tow the line on some important issue, I’m done with them. No more donations of time, money, or anything else until the leadership changes.

On a completely unrelated note, Congressman Phil Gingrey is a moron.