I really, honestly thought Obama was going to be tougher than that.  If anything, during the primaries he seemed to demonstrate a tendency to defend every statement to the death, even those that could have been worded better.

Republicans predicted the apocalypse when their original bill did not pass in February. Democrats were able to push back reasonably forcefully about how ridiculous that notion was, and have been proven correct.

The Democrats, with Congressional majorities, could have come up with any number of legislative strategies to kick this issue safely into the next Congress, when the whole program could be subjected to real accountability and hearings on how some of the technical issues could be addressed. They could easily have pointed out that White House stonewalling, refusal to cooperate, demonstrated misleading of Congress, etc. made it impossible to look at any thoroughgoing legislation in this term, and essentially then dared the President to veto the PAA extension legislation and put the onus of "endangering the nation" squarely on his shoulders.

Telecom immunity should never have been on offer, particularly because the Democrats could always challenge the President to defend the legality of  his program and to use his pardon power if he was so concerned about telecoms aiding and abetting his lawbreaking.

People far more clever than me could "package" the above as compelling politics, not just a lot of high and mighty "principle". It would be good politics because Democrats need to show that they are different than Republicans -- why take the pale imitation when you can have the real thing? The voters out there looking for a red meat elective dictatorship aren't going to vote for Obama, anyway. This issue is too complicated for a shrewd "pander" in any event -- in the end the Republicans will still be saying that they believe in wiretapping the terrorists under people's beds while Democrats are worried about civil rights for terrorists.

At the rate Obama is going, his campaign is going to boil down to the fact that he's younger and taller than McCain. By sacrificing "change" for "safer politics", he's putting his relative inexperience right back into play.

He could still be saved by the economy, but he won't be achieving the realignment he's allegedly pursuing. Whether he knows it or not, he's also limiting his room for maneuver as President, as the Republicans and the corporate Media will be only too happy to hold him to his "centrism" with a ferocity only dreamed of by progressives wishing to hold him to what they thought were his beliefs.

Even the most ardent of Obama critics would have to concede he has the rhetorical skills and presence of mind to carry off flip flops.  Kerry did not.

There will be no "I voted for it before I voted against it" soundbytes from Obama.

At the same time, I agree with this post 100%.  People do tend to respect politicians more who do stay somewhat consistent to a sense of purpose.  But I still have something to say.  

I have huge misgivings about this because of how easy it is to shamefully manipulate people on this issue.  My example is sitting in a diner and saying "i like ketchup on my french fries but i don't like ketchup on my hamburger" and then the person I'm talking to runs around and lies to people quoting me like this:

"I like ketchup ...  I don't like ketchup."

Which is what Edwards and Obama did to Clinton in that MSNBC debate.  Edwards moreso than Obama and it's why I actually find Edwards more deplorable than Obama at times.

So I think it behooves an intelligent voter, and issue advocate, to listen carefully, and as far as that's concerned I think there's a case to be made that while Obama will carry off flips flops better than Kerry did, Kerry's flip flops were more media contrived than Obama's will be.

He vamoosed on us. But he hit the top of the rec list at dKos yesterday.

I think that's fairly symptomatic of dKos, though, especially these days. The place was always about the pack, but used to be, there was still original content and interesting stuff being posted. Anymore, though --- not so much. It's about The Group and maintaining status quo, despite the mess we're in.

So be it.

O/t, I'm going to be in Puerto Rico for a week in August. :D It's a working "vacation, though, so I won't demand you meet face to face with Teh Fearsome and Pugnacious cookiebear.

I would greatly appreciate, though, a few restaurant recommendations --- when not locked in a meeting, I plan to do my best to chow my way from one end to the other.

San Juan, btw.

Some of his supporters have argued that Obama was always more middle of the road than many believed. Well, that's certainly not how he positioned himself  as a candidate.

all over agian.

And this is just one problematic issue Obama has.  Those who predict a landslide are deluding themselves, I'm afraid, unless something changes soon.

This was well documented in TalkLeft at the time.

I remember the night of the primary in 2006 and how it felt when it turned out that Lamont had actually  defeated Lieberman for the nomination. It was the first ray of hope I felt that the Iraq war might actually be ended.

And this was no thanks to Obama.

So - what are Obama's core beliefs? If he could put ingratiating himself with the democratic party regulars ahead of the lives of those on the battlefield fighting what he called a "dumb" war, his core belief would appear to be his own ambition.

As far as Kerry's campaign was concerned, I couldn't belief how terribly he performed in the debates. I particularly remember him kissing Bush's keister saying how wonderful the twins were etc.

He didn't take the opportunity to point out in front of a mass audience how Bush and his crowd has lied. There was plenty of evidence out there, but he chose to ignore it.

He did not appear to have any passion.
He seemed intimidated by Bush.

At the convention, his wife talked about her first husband, Mr. Heinz. If she had anything good to say about John, I don't remember it.

Obama got up and talked about himself and what a great country America is. Hardly a word about Kerry.

Edwards was positively dreadful in his debate with Cheney.
I forgot which of them brought up the subject of Cheney's lesbian daughter, but it was a dreadful moment. How low can you get? And it was in the guise of a compliment to Cheney!
I felt a twinge of sympathy for Cheney - a man I despise.

Kerry stood for nothing.
He had a chance to end the war. He lacked the passion to do so.

"Tacking to the center" on FISA is a fallacy because it situates the Constitution on a partisan spectrum when, in my view, the Constitution is non-partisan, or should be as much as possible. Yet Barack had the idea that he could do a cheap throw-away "Sister Souljah moment" with the Fourth Amendment and the rule of law, as if to say we don't need to know those pesky facts about what Bush and Cheney did with the telecom companies; who they illegally wiretapped and all the ways they broke the law.

The underlying kicker is that this FISA bill has little to do with "fighting terrorism" and much to do with allowing the executive branch to be even more unfettered and unaccountable and separate and apart and above the other two branches, with the ultimate aim of not having to ask permission of anybody.

BHO had a chance to begin deconstructing executive tyranny and instead he appears to be willing to make it worse.  Maybe he thinks that because the power will be in his own hands when he's elected and he's such a nice guy (he thinks) and he can be trusted (he thinks) that it's okay to give away the Constitutional store to himself. But after his reversal on core principle to fold on FISA, how can he be trusted? And what about the next president? As a law professor, he knows the Founders set it up precisely so that we don't have to trust one man acting as king. Only the Constitution can be trusted, that's it. Period

Barack had everything to win and nothing to lose by fighting FISA and he folded. It could have been a "teachable moment" for Obama to stand up to the schoolyard bullies on the right and call them scaredy cats and refuse to be cowered by being called "soft on terror" and refuse to allow the American people to be cowered in fear. This would have been real "change" but instead he is saying in effect we must be afraid, very afraid. The terrorists win (and their proxies are Bush and Cheney).

This is assuming Obama does not reverse course yet again after the Fourth of July and come back and say "My position has always been . . ." that "this FISA bill along with the immunity provisions is a bad idea and so I am filibustering against it and voting against it and leading the charge of the Democrats in Congress against it."

When a Republican says hypocrite! he is always believed.  Somehow, Republicans turn their own hypocrisy into "I do what I gotta do [to keep the country safe]."

All it takes is one idiot juror to let a guilty person off for the wrong reasons.

What's most amazing about the unexamined premise that Democrats must "move to the Center" (i.e., adopt GOP views) is that this is the same advice Democrats have been following over and over and which keeps leading to their abject failure. It's the advice Kerry followed in 2004. It's why Democrats rejected Howard Dean and chose John Kerry instead.

Democrats rejected Howard Dean because he.. moved to the center? Huh? This was all in the primary, and neither Kerry nor Dean had "moved" anywhere yet. That doesn't make any sense.