Internal Monologue

Patrick Ruffini takes an admiring look at Left Blogistan : T he four-year ascent of Barack Obama from state senator to president marks not just the triumph of a man, but the coming of age of a movement. That movement belongs to liberal (or “progressive”) Democrats, who in less than a decade have remade themselves. Once respected only in academia and the news media, they have become a fighting force. They systemically digitized the means of political organization and strategy, with the ultimate goal of dominating the political system — “Crush their spirits!” was Daily Kos blogger Markos Moulitsas Zuniga’s pre-election rallying cry. The Left’s online movement is consciously modeled after the Goldwater-and-Reagan-era conservative movement. To those trying to build the Left, the vast right-wing conspiracy was an object not of scorn, but of admiration. They studied the Right’s network of think tanks, issue groups, and talk-show hosts, looking for clues on how to push a message with brutal

Quinn loves to slide.

Greenwald : This is really exceptional news on multiple levels -- the best political news I've heard since the election: Brennan out of running for top intel post John Brennan, President-elect Barack Obama's top adviser on intelligence, has taken his name out of the running for any intelligence position in the new administration. Brennan wrote in a Nov. 25 letter to Obama that he did not want to be a distraction. His potential appointment has raised a firestorm in liberal blogs who associate him with the Bush administration's interrogation, detention and rendition policies. "The fact that I was not involved in the decision-making process for any of these controversial policies and actions has been ignored," he wrote, in a letter obtained by The Associated Press. . . Obama's advisers had grown increasingly concerned in recent days over online blogs that accused Brennan of condoning harsh interrogation tactics on terror su

Jim Martin , from his campaign website The Dec 2 runoff between Martin (D) and Chambliss (R) is turning out to be quite close . Runoff elections are notoriously difficult to poll, because it's hard to find precedent for who will turn out to vote. You can contribute to the Democrat here . Every Democrat we put in the Senate will make it easier for Obama to implement things like a stimulus package, better health care, energy policy, etc.

linc on DailyKos points out that the civics test I linked to earlier has a right-wing ideological slant to it: Yes, many of the 'test's' questions appear to be completely innocuous, but that's not the ISI's purpose. By getting our 'elected representatives' to take the damn thing and by getting us to take the damn thing without much critique of its purpose, we are solidifying, if even in a small way, their ideas on 'free-enterprise' and what 'american civics' are all about. It takes just one question in such a survey to help further their quite obvious agenda and in the very least, make us look like quite silly for playing along. Here are some choice examples, with my own, quick take on their purpose: The Bill of Rights explicitly prohibits: A. prayer in public school B. discrimination based on race, sex, or religion C. the ownership of guns by private individuals D. establishing an official religion for the United States E. the pr

Glad to hear about one evangelical Christian preacher who is sex positive : Mr. Young, an author, a television host and the pastor of the evangelical Fellowship Church, issued his call for a week of “congregational copulation” among married couples on Nov. 16, while pacing in front of a large bed. Sometimes he reclined on the paisley coverlet while flipping through a Bible, emphasizing his point that it is time for the church to put God back in the bed. “Today we’re beginning this sexperiment, seven days of sex,” he said, with his characteristic mix of humor, showmanship and Scripture. “How to move from whining about the economy to whoopee!” [...] This is not a gimmick or a publicity stunt, Mr. Young says. Just look at the sensuousness of the Song of Solomon, or Genesis: “two shall become one flesh,” or Corinthians: “do not deprive each other of sexual relations.” “For some reason the church has not talked about it, but we need to,” he said, speaking by telephone Friday night on his

UPDATE: Warning, this test actually has some right-wing motives behind it . I sure hope so, because they're pretty dumb, if this story is to be believed. Or more precisely, they are sadly under-informed on issues that bear immediate relevance to their work. Take the quiz yourself and find out. I got 33 out of 33 correct. A few questions I wasn't quite sure of, but I guess the guessing gods smiled upon me. Apparently our elected officials didn't do so well : WASHINGTON (AFP) – US elected officials scored abysmally on a test measuring their civic knowledge, with an average grade of just 44 percent, the group that organized the exam said Thursday. Ordinary citizens did not fare much better, scoring just 49 percent correct on the 33 exam questions compiled by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI). "It is disturbing enough that the general public failed ISI's civic literacy test ,