'Don't Ask Don't Tell' Discharges Can Continue For Now, Supreme Court Rules

Congratulations.  You can count.  So can they.

They could count before they took the vote, they knew who was voting and how, so why would Harry Reid have put it up for a vote knowing that the votes weren't there to repeal DADT?  Could the upcoming midterm elections have had anything to do with it?

Democrats in both chambers of Congress work as a team. They identify what they hope to achieve (pro-corporate legislation) and then strategize how to get it while saving each other's hides with constituents come election time. 

Those in liberal districts get to talk a good game about being champions of the People, but when push comes to shove, if their votes are needed to cross over and k!ll liberal legislation (like a public option or access to ab0rtion), the DNC will make sure they are covered come election time, with massive infusions of money into their campaign war chests and crushing any principled challenges to them from the left in their primaries.

Here's an example of how they tag team us - Progressive Congresswoman Woolsey Endorses Pro-War Blue Dog Jane Harman Over Progressive Marcy Winograd:

http://www­.laprogres­sive.com/e­lection-re­form-campa­igns/progr­essive-con­gresswoman­-woolsey-e­ndorse-pro­war-blue-d­og-jane-ha­rman/

It's no big accomplishment when Democrats in the House pass legislation that Democrats in the Senate don't.  Did the Senate pass those 420 pieces of legislation that were passed in the House? (No)

A Democratic president isn't doing everything that he can to end DADT, beginning with signing a stop-loss order that would move the ball far down the road to ending DADT sooner rather than later.  

He has never used the power of his office or the bully pulpit to advance Democratic constituents' issues, preferring instead to knee-cap us and make Republicans stronger and help get their issues passed into law.  Obama has never used his power as head of the Democratic Party to pressure Blue Dogs, or his political capital from getting more votes than any other candidate for president in history to smack down Republicans.  Instead h­e insults liberals and progressives, rallies against Dennis Kucinich in his home state to get him to drop his insistence on a public option.
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Obama Clarifies Tax Cut Position As Hill Dems Look For Deal

Just like Obama's timidity is myth (he's plenty tough when it comes to standing up to the Democratic base), rumors of the Democratic politicians having no spines are greatly exaggerated.

Democratic voters have mistakenly believed that Obama and Democrats want what they want. The DLC-controlled Democratic Party gives lip service to all populist issues (like civil rights protections, restoring habeas corpus, ending the wars, public healthcare, Wall Street reform, environmental & energy issues, etc.). 

If the Bush years taught us anything, it's that anyone can sell anything to Americans, if you're stolid and relentless in your sales pitch and tactics. It's not that Bush and R0ve were geniuses and knew something that nobody else knew; Bush and R0ve were just more ruthless in doing what politicians and the parties had gone to great lengths to hide from Americans -- If you keep at it, escalate your attacks,  don't take 'no' for an answer and never back away, you will wear the opposition down.

Obama didn't get to be the first black president, vanquish the Clinton machine (to get the Democratic Party's nomination) and the oldest, most experienced politicians in US history (including the R0ve machine) by not having mastered these skills.  Nor do Democratic politicians (more incumbents than ever, in office longer) not know how to do it. How do you think Democrats managed to keep impeaching Bush and Cheney off the table, have us still reelecting them and not marching on Washington with torches and pitchforks?

Obama and Democrats know how to do it -- They don't want to do it. 

The trick for them has been to keep the many different populist groups believing that they really do support our issues, but they're merely inept. And to get us to keep voting for them despite their failure to achieve our alleged shared objectives.

Getting Democratic voters (and Obama's 'most ardent supporters') to understand that Democratic politicians have been taking us all for suckers and patsies is the most immediate problem and the challenge.
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'Don't Ask Don't Tell' Discharges Can Continue For Now, Supreme Court Rules

Our entire government, all 3 branches, are engaged in an elaborate game of 'Hot Potato'.  Each branch is kicking the can down the road to a later time or to another branch to have to deal with.  We have no leaders using the power and the tools of their offices to serve the American people.

Not only on repealing DADT, but on everything­ except when it comes to siphoning money from the bottom (poor and middle classes) to the top (the rich).  On that, each branch is pro-active.
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George W. Bush In Chicago: Praises Mayor Daley's Leadership

Did you read my entire comment?

It doesn't seem as if you did if you could write what you did.
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Bush's Waterboarding Admission Prompts Calls For Criminal Probe

PS: Secret prisons are still a daily reality !

Need more proof? Request and I will list the links (however limited to 250 letters, I will need about 6 comment post to list all of them)
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Please post them.
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Bush's Waterboarding Admission Prompts Calls For Criminal Probe

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Alaska Senate Race: Lisa Murkowski Slams Delay Of Game Tactics In Write-In Ballot Count Saga

Take a deep breath -- I think you need to read my comment over a few times.

You're not getting my point, and you're really not getting my position, or what my comment is relating to.
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Bush's Waterboarding Admission Prompts Calls For Criminal Probe

I've been trying to understand your point, the distinction you're trying to make.

Here's the distinction that I see:

The atrocities that you're talking about, what US troops have done to German soldiers, Japanese soldiers, to Vietnamese soldiers, etc., were in the settings of 'on the battlefield'.  War is chaotic, it's h3ll, and it's why it should always be a last resort, not as a 'preemptive' measure, but that's a separate discussion for another time.  

Soldiers on the battlefield are given more leeway because of the chaos of the battle, in the moment.  

Where the line of 'accountability' is drawn is higher up (officers, Commander-in-Chief) and farther away from ongoing battle, both in geographical distance and in time.  

If a combatant is in custody, the combatant is not causing any imminent danger to troops.  There's no battle ongoing where a US soldier is reacting and trying to save his own life.  With taking custody of a combatant comes special responsibilities.  Legal responsibilities, both in US law and international law.  

What's particularly important to remember is that the t0rture and abuse committed by agents of our government was done on DETAINEES.  No due process, not on battlefields (just being in Afghanistan doesn't make a detainee a "combatant", as was the Bush administration's definition of "enemy combatant"), these people were kidnapped and transported to secret dungeons, kept away from US government oversight and T0RTURED.  In our names.  

The hypocrisy that is Barack Obama, here. 
About George Bush Book
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George W. Bush In Chicago: Praises Mayor Daley's Leadership

"When your ranting finshed, you seemed to ignore one very obvious thing.

I have a steadfast rule that I follow every single day. if I have a complaint about something or someone, I don't say a thing until I can offer another way to go. I notice your rant is just that, a rant, without a single positive suggestion."

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I, too, have a rule that I follow:  I point out to others when they're being rude, insulting, and abusive.  

I didn't always, preferring instead to either ignore it, let it go (which invariably led to their escalating the insults and abuse), or dealing with it indirectly, by returning their passive-ag­gressivene­ss with like-language (which always led to their howling in outrage that I would insult them, oblivious to their own 'first strikes').  

Oh, what wretched wretches we must suffer on the invisible anonymous internet world.  But I digress.

You claim that my "rant" didn't offer "a single positive suggestion".  

That's not true.  I didn't offer "a single positive suggestion" to your liking.

You then go on to make wild assertions and assumptions, like "I'm assuming that your anti-Obama rant indicates you choice would have definitely been for a McCain/Palin admistration."  
If I'm criticizing Obama for not holding the Bush administration to account, wouldn't it stand to reason that I'm not a fan of Republicans?  

Think, and maybe research your subject (me), before you go off on a tear, grasshopper.   I've posted 16,000 comments here that include an entire alphabet of plans, beyond your A and B, and that have laid waste to your pedantic assertions about Obama's choices.  Go read them.  And then learn how to communicate with others unoffensively.
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Rachel Maddow Clashes With Jon Stewart, Civilly, In Hour's Worth Of Interview Excerpts

"He's an entertainer she's a newscaster. If you can't see the difference it's because you don't believe there is one. But there is."

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I was going to say that the line between newscasting and entertainment has been blurry for years, but, in fact, when news divisions were folded into entertainment divisions at the networks, the line was rubbed out.

I don't know if you saw Maddow's interview with Stewart, but in it she describes what she does, how she approaches her job.  "How to tell the story humorously, entertainingly".  

It really isn't all that different, except that she doesn't hide from taking responsibility for her opinions as Stewart does.  

And also when she does it, when she is using humor to tell the story, it's for the integrity of the story.  To hold the audience's interest, to make understandable, about why the story is important for the viewer to know.  When he does it, when he uses humor, it's for the ultimate aggrandizement of himself.  So yes, there is a difference.

When your opinion flows through a joke, it's the joke that either works or doesn't.  You can move on to the next joke, without having to own the opinion.

I happen to like Jon Stewart tremendously, but I think he's made a huge mistake engaging with the media as he has, and entering the discussion as he has (the rally and with this interview).  It has opened the door to what the great comedians know to avoid -- Making yourself the subject, your opinions the focus.  It leads to analyzing you, your psyche, your humor, before your audience, which always loses the 'funny', the magic; it's like pulling the curtain away so that we see the wizard, and you never get that back.
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Rachel Maddow Clashes With Jon Stewart, Civilly, In Hour's Worth Of Interview Excerpts

I was going to say that the line between newscasting and entertainment has been blurry for years, but, in fact, when news divisions were folded into entertainment divisions at the networks, the line was rubbed out.

I don't know if you saw Maddow's interview with Stewart, but in it she describes what she does, how she approaches her job.  "How to tell the story humorously, entertainingly".  

It really isn't all that different, except that she doesn't hide from taking responsibility for her opinions as Stewart does.  

And also when she does it, when she is using humor to tell the story, it's for the integrity of the story.  To hold the audience's interest, to make understandable, about why the story is important for the viewer to know.  When he does it, when he uses humor, it's for the ultimate aggrandizement of himself.  So yes, there is a difference.

When your opinion flows through a joke, it's the joke that either works or doesn't.  You can move on to the next joke, without having to own the opinion.

I happen to like Jon Stewart tremendously, but I think he's made a huge mistake engaging with the media as he has, and entering the discussion as he has (the rally and with this interview).  It has opened the door to what the great comedians know to avoid -- Making yourself the subject, your opinions the focus.  It leads to analyzing you, your psyche, your humor, before your audience, which always loses the 'funny', the magic; it's like pulling the curtain away so that we see the wizard, and you never get that back.  
About Jon Stewart
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Rachel Maddow Clashes With Jon Stewart, Civilly, In Hour's Worth Of Interview Excerpts

I have a brother who reminds me of Jon Stewart.  

Both are very bright, very funny, but I think both are uncomfortable being around conflict.  I know my brother is, and he tries to 'fix it' by becoming the clown.  It may work for the moment, but only until he's out of the room or the situation.  Differences between people have to be worked through and that doesn't happen by short-circuiting the process or trying to avoid it altogether.  The differences don't go away, and trying to manage how the differences get expressed, in a way that satisfies people like my brother or Jon Stewart (or Obama), only winds up satisfying the people like my brother, Jon Stewart and Obama.  It actually dishonors those in conflict, by failing to accommodate their process of resolving conflicts, and works to sabotage their coming to agreement.

Both Stewart and my brother seem to use intellectualizing (seeming to be above, and thus better, than those butting heads) as a means of alleviating their own tension over witnessing conflict.  

Ironically, when Stewart lumps the left and the right together as equally guilty of what each accuses the other of doing (and what Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann argue are false equivalencies), Stewart's doing the same thing.  

What the left and the right are at odds with each other over isn't anything Jon Stewart can relate to.  I would bet that when an issue arises that Stewart does relate to, that he feels passionately about, he does the same thing that he's accusing those in the media, at cable news networks, of doing, gratuitous insults and exaggeration.
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Rachel Maddow Clashes With Jon Stewart, Civilly, In Hour's Worth Of Interview Excerpts

I do not understand how Jon Stewart believes he's in a different "game" than Maddow, removed from "the field', just a monkey on a tree limb throwing fruit at the movers and shakers and powerful leaders in our world, when he interviews them on his show.

He's showcases them and is propagandizing just as much as he accuses the cable channels of doing.  Stewart just had Obama on his show right before the second most important election of Obama's career!  How can he believe he's not "on the field"?
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Jon Stewart

I don't know how Jon Stewart can say (and I'm paraphrasing) that he's not as influential as Rachel, or "in the same boat", or "in the field" as those with programs on MSNBC or other cable news shows. I don't how he gets away with saying that he's just a comic satirizing politics and current events, "out of the game" when he has the president and every major political and cultural figure on his show.

How Stewart interviews them, how he showcases them, does indeed influence viewers about these politicians.

I have a brother who reminds me of Jon Stewart. I think both become uncomfortable around conflict and hearing emotionally-charged rhetoric. To feel better themselves, they must change the atmosphere, fix it somehow, so they first try to dispel the tension with humor, becoming clownish. They thinki that if they can cajole people with laughter, whatever the conflict was about will disappear. All it does, however, if it works, is break the tension for the moment. It solves nothing.

WIthout a thorough airing of the hostilities, an acknowledgment of the grievances, there can be no resolution, and the conflict is sure to surface again. And when it inevitably does, people like my brother respond by trying to rise above it, intellectualize it. That way is fraught with judgment, and helps nothing.

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