Phoebes, if you’re still here, revdeb has volunteered to act as a link for incoming FDLers. Her email addrees is her screen name AT mac DOT com. Give her your telephone/cell number and she’ll give you hers. And have a wonderful time!

Thanks. I’ll contact revdeb. I’ll be in CT for one day while on my way to NH for a few days of business, so I’d like to do a little something for the campaign, other than simply donating money.

actually, several leading House Democrats refused to along with the Israel Uber Alles resolution — John Dingell, John Conyers, Maxine Waters, Barbara Lee and more — these are not inconsequential !

Good point, but still the congresscritters you cite are considered on the fringe of the dem establishment by the MSM. No Senator or real leader of the party has ever dared to call out (let alone question) the Israeli elephant in the center of our Middle East quagmire.

Maybe it’ll happen soon – let’s hope.

I was going to drop this, but….

Billmon’s point has never been that there are “no differences” between Democrats and Rethugs…just that these differences pale in significance to the one or two foreign policy issues that hold the greatest likelihood of getting us all killed, and for which many of our even most progressive Democrats are hellbent on matching or outdoing the Rethugs, belligerence-wise.

Ralphbon, Bingo! Thanks.

MacHeath – It is deep seated, not deep seeded.

Krugman’s argument doesn’t make any sense.

He is basically saying we (i.e. dems) have to keep the politicians who have failed us cause otherwise the repugs will keep winning.

That advice is the same as throwing good money after bad; That it is better to have a quisling wearing a scarlet d than a real D. How does that do democrats any good? Oh look, we elected a democratic candidate, now he can bend over. Yeah!

And what of Krugman’s other points? The dichotomy he seeks to establish between the person and the party is a false one. Politics is about ideas and policies, not people. Lieberman is running, at the moment, for the Democratic nomination, not the Joe Lieberman party nomination. The party label is, and has always been, a “brand” representing ideas and policies and positions independent of the people who run under its label. The candidate represents the democratic brand, not the other way around. Personal beliefs aren’t unimportant, but at least there is an expectation that those personal beliefs comport with the Brand’s beliefs. Otherwise, what’s the point?

Lieberman a “centrist”: If walking lock step with TEAM LOSER is democratic centrism than we can’t get rid of Joe soon enough. Unless Krugman wants to argue that TEAM LOSER policies are somehow “centrist.” This goes to a larger point – the idea that somehow there is a division in the democratic party between the ALLEGED “sane,” so called “centrists,” and those of us who inhabit the blogosphere and the “netroots” activists. That is a false dichotomy, and if anything fits into playing into repug hands it is the idea that the blogosphere and the netroots represent the fringe, and that there is some sort of rift in the democratic party. That’s the lie. And that is a lie that Joe created. Whether it apes repug themes doesn’t matter, Joe had no choice but to argue that it is a fringe element who is against him b/c otherwise he would have no place in the party. But the numbers don’t lie, and if the “centrists” weren’t against Joe he wouldn’t be about to lose. So, just like with the war, either a majority of Americans who want us out of Iraq are leftwing moonbats, or the majority of CT dems are left wing moonbats. Probably not.

As for the animosity, it’s not the word I would use. I would go with frustration: frustration at a politician who forgot what his job was – to represent the people of his state, not to represent himself; That’s the disconnect.

Your concerns about a Pyrhhic victory are noted, but not well placed. That will only happen if the Lieberman the quisling is reelected. Otherwise, why have a Democratic Party?