Maine Owl:

A whole new period of beating drums has emerged from stories of new "plots," the horrendous shooting spree of a madman at Fort Hood that wingnuttia [and Versailles generally] all too easily fits into the rubric of Terror War, and upcoming New York circus trials of tortured suspects that Attorney General Holder announced this week. It's all part and parcel of the fear mongering that has proven so useful in keeping our country a bloodthirsty, revenge-thirsty purveyor of violence not just since 9/11, but for decades.

I don't mind telling you that I'm tired of it. War is making us broke, hated, and subject to blowback. It's time for new approaches that begin with standing down the foreign occupations, and the machinations of Terror War on all fronts.

If only... If only....

... but here she seems to have gotten one right:

Ana Marie Cox tweets:

Things now looking even grimmer in Maine... 76% in, @nomtweets asshats up 52/47.8 (Thanks, Obama, for all the help!)

A short while ago, she re/tweeted:

RT @twpolk If Gays lose in ME by such tight margin, the blame will falls on DNC, OFA and Obama. // Sadly, I think they all know that.

I guess it's cold comfort that a netroots cw purveyor like Ana Marie sees things the same way the real world does.

Haw.

I've been gone at the blogger's meetup for Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, which was great, and now I'm catching up. Random comments:

Mithras:

Maine voters decisively rejected same-sex marriage yesterday, 53% to 47%. Last November, when California voters overturned gay marriage there, the exit polls indicated that out of the Obama constituencies, overwhelming opposition from African-American (and, to a lesser extent, Hispanic) voters helped tip the balance. This was controversial, to put it mildly. Well, Maine is 97% white, and Obama won it in a landslide, 58%-42%.

What's the common factor?

Jesse speaks for me.

Seriously, it's a great rant and you should check it out. Not that I wasn't already there for other reasons, but I'm very glad to see more and more people join us out here in the Wilderness. What happened in Maine could've been prevented, with just a modicum of effort on the part of national Dems. But they think gay people are icky, and couldn't be bothered to help us. Oh, and it's all John's fault for being mean to them, or something.

Bangor Daily News:

“We’re not short-timers; we are here for the long haul,” [No on 1 campaign manager Jesse] Connolly told the crowd, some of whom wiped away tears as he spoke. “Whether it’s just all night and into the morning, or next week or next month or next year, we will be here. We’ll be fighting, we’ll be working. We will regroup.”

I think that's exactly right.

The Yes on 1 campaign, led by the group Stand for Marriage Maine, built its lead by winning votes in rural Maine as well as in some larger towns such as the Roman Catholic and Franco-American stronghold of Lewiston*.

is not the nut you think. Atrios points to this from Howard Fineman on Snowe ("What’s So Hot About Snowe?"). But here's the buried nugget:

[Snowe] remains deeply skeptical of a publicly financed alternative to private insurance, in good part because of what she sees as the failure of Maine's* version of the idea...

Check Maine Owl's past posts, too.

Historic legislation to expand U.S. health care and control costs won its first Republican supporter Tuesday and cleared a key Senate hurdle, a double-barreled triumph that propelled President Barack Obama’s signature issue toward votes this fall in both houses of Congress.

"When history calls, history calls," said Maine Republican Olympia Snowe, whose declaration of support ended weeks of suspense and provided the only drama of a 14-9 vote in the Senate Finance Committee. ...

That's the front page of the Bangor Daily News today.

If you read down a ways, you'll find some discussion about what is actually in the damn bill, all couched in the politics.

[Do read the comments. --lambert]