part one - How to feign excitement for the next 9 months?

The democratic debate on Thursday was an incredibly sobering experience.  The presence of hundreds of protesters outside the Kodak Theatre served to highlight the minimal differences between the two remaining candidates and, more importantly, exposed the woeful shortcomings of each.  Listening to Obama and Clinton argue over minute differences within substantively similar positions was increasingly frustrating; especially when the protest groups outlined the important issues that should be at the head of the Democratic platform.

Where was the candidate espousing the key issues of our time?

• universal, single payer health care  (no compromises)
• an immediate and permanent end to imperialistic foreign policy and an immediate drawdown of our forces in Iraq; leading to full withdrawal as quickly as possible
• termination of the Patriot Act, Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, Homeland Terrorism Prevention Act and any other bills shoved through Congress under the guise of “protecting us” from evil.  For a party so fond of referencing the founding fathers, the Republicans have a tough time remembering what they actually said, specifically regarding restrictions on liberty in pursuit of security.
• an immediate end to torture by the USA or our surrogates, anywhere in the world; the closure of Guantanamo and the release of all prisoners who can not be charged with actual crimes in accordance with international laws
• an end to all unwarranted spying on United States citizens and full compliance with the rules of the FISA courts.

Remarkably, the media would have you believe that this platform is somehow ‘outside the mainstream’ when in fact, it just takes us back to America before the disaster of the Reagan/Bush years.  Universal health care, while not in force in the seventies, was considered inevitable and should have been deployed decades ago, along with the rest of the western world.  The other items on this list simply define the America we all grew up in.  How did we let Republicans destroy America without a fight?   And why are we now arguing about band-aid solutions when the country is on life support?  It took the reactionary right almost thirty years to ruin this country; we can’t afford to spend that much time undoing the damage.

I just don’t see Obama or Clinton leading us in the fight to take back America.  Make no mistake, the Republicans will not give up their spoils easily, we will need to take it from them and it will not be pretty. And that is why we need someone unafraid to take on these old fools and stomp their sorry asses all the way back to Texas.  (or wherever it is that evil comes from…)