Some people think this is the key issue before us. Not being one to argue unnecessarily, and always pleased to join a good cause, I suggest all who agree on its importance consider voting for the following question now leading the pack at Obama’s “Change.gov” website:

"Will you appoint a Special Prosecutor - ideally Patrick Fitzgerald - to independently investigate the gravest crimes of the Bush Administration, including torture and warrantless wiretapping?"

It is Bob Fertik’s question, and he has all the details here. Seems a respectably subversive sort of an effort, organizing to take control of the agenda, so please take a moment straightway before this cycle closes. Read more…

How Corporatists and Progressives can work together for a better America and a better world. Read more…

Most of those I know on the Left are cautiously hopeful about what can be done under the new Democratic majority government. Read more…

No one should be mistaken. There has not been, nor will there ever be, a purely plebeian owned and operated society of significance. Read more…

The King is Dead! Long live the King! Read more…

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While a number of the more cowardly VRWC mouthpieces in the MSM have abandoned the usual the Republican lockstep approach to candidate support solidarity while they try to climb on the Obama gravy train, others in the Party see this schism as a chance for purification and an opportunity to seize the apron strings of power. Read more…

Proposition 8:

ELIMINATES RIGHT OF SAME–SEX COUPLES TO MARRY. INITIATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT.

Changes the California Constitution to eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry in California.

Provides that only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California. Read more…

Been a while since Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) has been exercised here at Corrente, and there is good news and bad news – of a sort. Read more…

For those interested in the analytical side of universal health care challenges, a fascinating comprehensive series of articles on the current state and future prospects for health care in China is now available online from The Lancet (simple registration required). Read more…

On November 2nd, but Why, Oh Why? Read more…

Amongst the Sturm und Drang of high-profile sexism and misogyny, it can easily be lost that many of the younger generation have already moved past bigotry and not just in form but in function. It is the older generations that continue to fight the same battles over and over again while all around us, quietly and without fanfare, the kids are getting it right. Read more…

Is Sarah Palin fully qualified as Republican Party candidate for Vice President?

Yes! Read more…

because voter opinion is actually having an effect.

Members of congress are reporting a deluge of calls, emails and faxes condemning the Trillion Dollar Giveaway (I refuse to call it a “bailout” because it isn’t; it’s a giveaway). The result was defeat in the House on Monday, and the direct effect of those voter contacts can be traced to a specific cohort of House members.

Nate Silver at fivethirtyeight.com helpfully pulled together the names of representatives who are in close races, people who are most acutely tuned to the will of the people. Relying on “lean” or “tossup” risk status assessments from Swing State Project, he cites a total of 38 vulnerable reps; 20 Republicans and 18 Democrats. Of those 38, 17 Republicans and 13 Democrats voted “Nay” while only 3 Republicans and 5 Democrats voted “Aye.” This 30 to 8 rejection compares to a near-even split, 197 Aye and 198 Nay, among members whose seats are considered “safe.” Read more…

Ladies and Gentleman, please give a warm welcome to Read more…

Both the Obama and McCain campaigns are acutely aware of where this election will be decided, and it is not amongst Liberal voters. Read more…

Jerry Wexler, dead at 91.

Genius comes in many guises; Jerry danced like a white man, like a marionette with a broomstick up his ass, but he had a sense of rhythm and an ear for the poetry behind the pain of roots music, blues and jazz and soul, that reached beyond race and gender and age into the center of all that is human.

There is a lot of talk these days, about post-this and post-that. Jerry Wexler was post-everything petty and mean and low; he was crazy and wild and had no regard for limits and never backed down from a fist fight, but first and foremost he was a decent human being who saw all others as human too, no more and no less. Read more…

And use me as your surrogate! What could be better? Read more…

Have you ever started out with what seemed like a good plan, what might even be thought of as a delicious plan, and then had it linger on a little too long without completion? So long, in fact, that you are forced to consider that maybe the plan wasn’t quite thought through properly in the first place, that maybe you hadn’t considered all the consequences? So very long past any hope of actually achieving what you set out to do that it starts to smell a little odd, to appear discolored, to get all soft and mushy but still, against all reason, you just can't bring yourself to let go?

Of course you have. It isn’t a secret; everyone knows, and you don’t have to be ashamed.

You aren’t alone, we’ve all had it happen at least once in our lives, and there is hope. You don’t have to cling, bitter and weeping, while little flies start to gather and circle the slowly corrupting remnants of your decomposing dream; come with me, let me show you how to get past the grief. Read more…

This move of the 2008 Democratic Convention to an outdoor venue for the Nominee’s acceptance speech isn’t the first time it has occurred. Read more…

Containers, tomatoes and great huge pink balls. Read more…

All coming soon, to a planet near you.

Twenty years ago, June of 1988, Jim Hansen of the Goddard Space Institute presented the first sound data showing human involvement in changing the Earth’s climate. Since then all of his predictions, from temperature rise to melting of the polar ice caps and the glaciers, have come true. With new data, a more comprehensive understanding of the feedback mechanisms and better modeling, he sees much worse to come: sea level rises that will displace hundreds of millions of people, floods and drought on a scope and scale far beyond anything known in human history, extinction of half or more of the species on the planet and collapse of entire ecosystems.

Not to worry, though; we still have twenty years before it all spirals hopelessly out of control.

Maybe. Read more…

Yet another attempt is being made to pass a FISA revision bill that will provide immunity for the telecoms against lawsuits for their part in illegal spying on American citizens. The cabal planning this maneuver expects to take their plot to both the House and Senate next week, where coalitions of Republicans and BlueDog Democrats could provide enough votes for passage.

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Update 3: NYT article and a blogger talks to Hoyer’s office

Update: More on the new FISA deal from The Hill and Glenn Greenwald. Text is down at the bottom.

Update 2: Congressional contact information list Read more…

“A lie told often enough becomes the truth.”

V.I. Lenin

Are there any limits to what can be said about political opponents? Should there be any limits? Does anything go, no matter who is the target? Are we all no better now than Karl Rove? Read more…

[Hillary's speech: Since bringiton has framed the issues so nicely, let's use this post as an open thread for Hillary's speech, which TalkLeft and RiverDaughter are liveblogging. CSPAN here.]

It would be a grave error for anyone to underestimate Hillary Clinton. Read more…