Smart does not mean being wise or even virtuous. Smart men gave us the atom bomb, missile technology, plastic pollution and neoliberalism.....

The question is how wise will Obama, and will he be able to resist the manipulators in his cabinet? Will he show some understanding of the problems that plague us, without assuming that 'science' has all the answers.

Moore should know better than to assume a knowledge of science includes wise consideration of its use.

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You have eloquently captured everything that is on our minds right now. And you are right that it is time to celebrate and to let joy and light back in following 8 years of darkness and death.

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...Join the November 5th Movement!

The idea is to created organized constituencies in every Congressional District to push Reps. and Senators on specific legislation to address the important changes that need to be made in this "new era".

Like single-payer health care?

There's a bill in Congress now to enact it. It has 93 co-sponsors. This is a hugely popular idea who's time has come. Now that the Dems have increased their majorities and they have the largest executive mandate since 1984, they CAN get it done. But the insurance company lobbyists are right there in D.C. and money=electoral success, so good bills like this stay stalled.

How can we change this?

Pressure on the individual members -FROM THEIR OWN DISTRICT- is one answer.

Remeber the bailout?

Constituent pressure caused its first failure in the House and led to the Senate needing to load it up with earmarks to get it through -and that pressure was largely individual and unorganized.

Imagine what ORGANIZED local pressure could do!

The movement is only in its formative stages and needs massive interest NOW to get it really rolling.

Its time to stop complaining about a lack of action in the Congress and actually DO something about it!

Join up and get active.

Go to http://november5.org , watch the short explanatory video, and sign up ASAP, brothers and sisters.

The times they are a changin'.

But they need your help to change the right way.

-matti.

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Mr. Moore, you have ushered in this spectaular watershed moment. You were a leading light in a very dark age. You was a chief of a tribe of Anne Frank's and Joan of Ark's and might I add, the true followers of at least the philosophies of Jesus.

We have endured a swirlwind of storms in this horrible age of darkness; tyrrany, lies, false improsonments, and well, tyrrany.

It was amazing to see all the truly happy faces the night of November 4th. This true happiness. Not one liners and we laugh kind of happy. Not even our team won the championship type of happiness. It was even better than that. It was rosy cheeks happines. It was jubulant happiness. It was an enlightenment type of happiness.

People may think that this happiness happens during every election when a groups party wins. But this is different. This isn't a "Ha, the power is in our hands and we can crush our enemies now," or "alright! We can run our agenda now... We can lower taxes - Yay." This isn't "My party won, Yay, we're back in power." or "Good, the guy who made a lot of dazzling promises that I believed won."

NO!!!! This was absolute jubulant, freedom like we've never even smelled it before kind of happiness. And you can even feel it around the globe. People like us now. Heck, they don't just like us, they love us. They look at us with a tear glistening in the corner of their eye. They want to hug us and never let go.

And Obama has been humble the whole time. His supporters have been positive the whole time. Much different than the attacks and smirks of the elections winners of recent past.

Hopefully he brings in fresh faces; grassroots types of peoples. People whose forethought doesn't carry a $ sign. People who would care less if they slept in velvet layered bed of a five star or on bag in a tent. And as Mr. Moore mentioned about science, people who really look at the economy scientifically and really disect all dimensions. People who see the artistic side by understanding the cultures and social variables of the equations.

There is certainly a lot of rebuilding to do. And Obama does need to keep a firm hand especially in these early months after conception. His presence needs to be well known. The Fraudulant Right is going to weasel their views back into the mainstream. They're going to say their views are the only correct views and their going to spend billions on marketing their views and try to find that perfect angle to present it to us in that one area of untreaded ignorance that lies within our minds.

They're going pull out their slick tricks, and Barack shall not slip on their grease. He needs to stand firm and shed the light that to be liberal is to be human. It's to be humane. It's to love your neighbor. It's to be reasonable. To be practical. To be artistic. To be virtuous in your hobbies. And it's to share stories and recipes with your neighbors (without getting on the terrorist list). And most of all, a liberal is one that wins the revolution against tyrrany.

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I am so glad you have the courage to make the above statement. America has just voted in an inspirational and brilliant President Elect. Much has been made of the historic election of America's first black President. Importantly, He is half white. He was raised as an American by a white family; a white family who inspired and supported him to do his very best, and to avail himself of the finest possible American education. A white family who helped spring-board him into the highest office in the land. So lets let go of this racist BS, he is a true son of America and an inspirational citizen of the World.

Unlike the majority of Afro-Americans, he is not a descendant of slaves. None-the-less, he has helped to vindicate the sacrifice and contribution made by these ancestors. For all the young Afro-American young people who were inspired to get out and vote for him, now is the time for them to be inspired by his erudition and dignity; time for them to pull up their trousers and roll-up their sleeves. They can do it!

The real dinosaurs are thos re-actionary, religious fundamentalist bigots who have held sway for too long; those who tried to lead us to believe that dinosaurs frolicked in the Garden of Eden, and that the 'Rapture' was going to syphen them into Heaven. They are a dying breed who have just received a rude awakening, with more to come. The man who was Jesus Christ preached a doctrine of love, tolerance, equality and peace. The mis- interpretation of Christianity as a doctrine of fear is not only so last century, it is also a lie.

The vast majority of Amaricans are comparative new-comers to the continent of America. For eons, the vast fertile swathes of continental America were husbanded by the true Native Americans. It was the genocide of these nature revering natives that made possible the much talked about 'American Dream'. The descendants of those who survived this slaughter are now to be found in reservations that are dotted about the continent. Missing from the big debate about race are these elder brothers of the American Continent. Dare one to think that it is possible, some time in the future, to see a Native American inaugerated as President of the United States of America?

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... some of you may recall that Tony Blair was elected in the UK as a new bright hope for enlightened change, and look how he turned out! President Bush's right-hand puppy-dog in Iraq and Afghanistan. Blair proved even more right-wing than Margaret Thatcher. Yet his "new" Labour Party was supposed to be "Left-wing", democratic socialists and more akin to your Democrats, not right-wing like your Republicans.

So, don't get too carried away, folks. The proof is in the pudding, not the promises of the cook.

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Its still the same system, with a new guy at the top. Change has to start at the bottom. I think a lot worse things are going to have to happen before the leopard will change its spots!

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"Those who have committed war crimes will be brought to justice."??
I would rather see a Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

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It feels feudal because it is feudal. Feudalism is a military system of government where those at the top take the spoils and the rest of us do all the work.

Slavery of one type was abolished only to be replaced by another. How many people have stayed in a job they've hated because they have to pay the mortgage lender and hang on to their health insurance?

I am hopeful that Obama will bring us all together to construct a new view of the world, replacing dog-eat-dog with live-and-let-live!

Did any of you come into the world to make life easy for the psychopaths? Turf them out but treat them fairly.

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If Israel didn't help engineer 9/11 w/the CIA's help, then let a complete, cogent and proper investigation clear them of this universal suspicion.

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Moore and others may not be able to feed off Bush hatred anymore, but I think there will be plenty to keep them in business, apart from the more positive stuff mentioned in the article.

Once the smoke from the fireworks clears, you'll find that Idiot America is still there. And now they're more bitter, pissed, repressed and paranoid. They're going to be trying some crazy s*** during the next 4 years. It will be scary, but also food for good comedy.

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For the last time, John McCain is NOT a war hero! How does being shot down and captured by forces of a sovereign nation that the US was waging an immoral, illegal war against qualify one as a "hero"? If any thing, he is a war criminal, just like his master, W.

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Moore has high and low points. This is a low point. Racist are the reason we never had a black president before? Really! Take a look at who ran before -you might find the answer.

The stars aligned for Obama - Bush was a president with 30% approval, Obama sounded intelligent (unlike Jesse Jackson) and had a message.

Shirley Chisholm , Lenora Fulani, Carol Braun - regardless of race America isn't nearly ready to elect a women for President. That was plainly visible in this election.

Alan Keyes and Al Sharpton - what else can I say. Sharpton isn't exactly presidential!

So Mr Moore, the real racist may be the 95% of all blacks that voted black! Powell for example!

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November 4 wasn’t an election for a new president.

For most Americans, black skin had little to do with the event.

November 4 was a revolt, a classic revolution.

Instead of muskets firing powder and shot, Americans Tuesday fired their .50 caliber ballots. They stormed the precincts and raised the original American flag over every polling booth in the land. 

Americans revolted against Corporate America and against Wall Street and against the Federal Reserve and against Big Pharm and against the Power Elite and against Big Money and against all the social leaches who suck the financial blood from the 95% of people in this great land who struggle every day to live. 

Americans didn’t vote for President Obama because he was black. Americans didn’t really vote for a president. They revolted – once again – to be free.

O say, can you see our flag finally flying without the dollar signs of corporatism in place of the stars! Without the banner of Empire flying over the White House! It’s been a long time coming. But it’s here. 

Now, let’s put our house in order and clean, reload and cock our ballots for the next attack. 

And there will be a next one.

– brab

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Prop. 8 wins in California . . . Arizona and Florida also legislate discrimination. It's great to have Obama at the helm, but there is still so much hate, fear and prejudice among even the most "liberal" and "smart" Americans who still have a problem with gay people. Being smart does not keep one from being insecure . . . an affliction that is rampant in the U.S.A.

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Wow, a Smart president. Almost sounds like an oxymoron doesnt it? I cant remember the last time we actually had a smart President much less one with dignity!

Jiff
Privacy Center

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Obama's defense advisor is named Danzig, do I need to even say more? They've already met wit Israel and drawn up plans. Your beacon of light is about to drag this country into an escalation of financial attacks on Iran until they snap, then we will drop bombs on them. They will retaliate, and things are going to get much worse.

How long will Europe and Asia continue to fund our imperialism, even with a President that fits their visual agenda? How long will all the liberals set free by this momentous event praise and worship a leader that drags us into one more nightmare?

And how long, dear readers, before Mr. Moore is lambasting the very icon he lauds? You don't have to be an imbecilic racist to drag the country into a protracted war.

Gonna be fun to watch. Ok no it's not.

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Michael, here's an idea for your next project- kill the N word. Go around to high schools all across this country and get kids to abandon the N word...then get the rappers to give up the N word...I, for one, am so sick and tired of San Francisco Bay Area kids of all ethnicities (think Vietnamese and Somoan, for example) calling each other Nigga.

Sure, I'm up for free speech but let's transform our youth culture by killing this word once and for all.

For all the people who have endured racism and violence over centuries, for all today's youth affected by violence. And now, for Barack, Sasha, and Malia.

The N word gotta go.

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A couple of thoughts on this topic:

(1) The rush of relief is profound. Just a little bit more and "W" shuffles off to the ash heap of history, although undoing his manifest evil and idiocy will be a longer job than most folks realize;

(2) Dim Leader has another seventy-four days in office. He yet has time enough to damage this country just a little bit more. Remember his nasty, ol' Daddy? George H.W. Bush was on his way out and handed his successor an ugly little war in Somalia as a sort of Presidential whoopee cushion.

As such, I recommend a tempered joy at this electoral victory. This is the joy of knowing we have a chance; of knowing that America has decided to stop staring into the Abyss and instead look to the light.

Obama won the election, but in places like California and Arizona and Florida, hate prevailed at the same time. Bigotry is alive and well in the United States and must be opposed at every turn.

Obama, after all, is a means to an end, not an end in himself. He called upon America to work and to sacrifice. The campaign meme remains the same: we will be the change we seek.

The booger-stupid right wing said Obama fancied himself a "Messiah." Nothing could be further from the truth. There's no magic here. All we have is a chance to roll up our sleeves and save this nation, with Obama at the head of the attempt.

This moment is the end of the beginning. What happens in the next four years is entirely up to us. We begin by making sure that a gang of creeps and crooks and murder merchants who still hold power are rendered powerless in their remaining days.

After that, we can start fixing the broken, healing the wounded and comforting the afflicted.

While the to-do list will be long, it will be joyously do-able. Ending the wars, fixing the economy, closing Gitmo, ending torture, restoring our Constitution and the Republic . . . there's plenty for all to do.

For my part, I'm going to keep my focus on ending mountain top removal. Appalachia is America's beating heart and murdering my home so someone can run three refrigerators and seven televisions and leave the computer on all night is NOT part of that agenda.

Get On The HORN!

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Preach it, Brother Michael! Finally someone brings up the two reasons I don't beam with pride, and giggle with excitement, when someone boasts about this "great" country. People say "that was then" and "I didn't do it" and "I wasn't there". What the hell does time have to do with it? It does, however, serve as a reminder that as the more time passes, the further away from an equitable solution we become. (I tried using this reasoning with my alimony payments, but to no avail.)

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Obama anti-war??
He, like Kerry was, is fully behind this war. He votes for the funding of a permanent military presence in Iraq and wants a surge in Afghanistan. He doesn't accept that this war is illegal under US and international law. Even if he did, he's quiet about it, and therefore complicit, in it.
Anti-war makes as much sense as a little pregnant.

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Since the economic meltdown began, I've been amused at the number of evangelical leaders backing away from the political arena.

Gee... ya think it may have something to do with the fact that tithing ten percent of zero.... is... umm.. zero? Could it be that their coffers are feeling a bit thin these days because their flock are loosing their jobs?

The family had a bet on how long it would take a major evangelical player to publicly begin to espouse rhetoric that vaguely resembled anything near to a stance more in line with the Christian philosophy that they espouse. Do unto others? Anybody? Anybody? Love your brother? Anybody? Take care of the least of us? Anybody?

In fact... ANYTHING other than gays are damned and life begins with a woodie...(which YOU should NOT have to begin with, btw. Wood is BAD..unless you are chasing male prostitutes while demonizing gays.. well it's okay then).

Once Obama was elected and the democrats gained an even bigger majority, I wondered if evangelical corporations would begin to worry about their tax-free status. Gosh.. if you begin to be a political organization then perhaps you loose your Get Out of Jail free card. If you are a BUSINESS, then be a BUSINESS. If you are a political organization, then jump thru the appropriate designating hoops. At any rate... get the HELL out of my politics.

Sure enough, REAL soon after Obama was elected, Pat Robertson showed up on CNN talking about what a transformation individual Obama was and how we should all get behind our new leader.

What's the matter Pat? The Repubs bankrupt your shills?

Before you folks jump all over me for attacking Christianity. Forget it. I'm not. Used to be one. Understand the inclination and admire much of the message.

However, take a drive in rural Arkansas where people are living in abject poverty, in the worst of conditions, and I can guarantee you that within a mile you will see churches that rival European cathedrals in unfettered wealth.

That's a business, folks.

So, umm.. yeah... Bring back science PLEASE!

Spirituality... cool. Dogmatized bullshit.. not so cool. Organized effort to enslave people for a political agenda...well, I've done my quota of swearing today so I'll stop now.

Menopausal Mick

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We have a president with the best qualities of the leaders of the past. Obama, instills hope and promise in same JFK had and has the ability to move an audience as King.

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Thank you, Michael, for that great piece of writing. Needless to say, I may be one of your biggest fans, if not the biggest.
Obama has given me hope. Hope I never thought that I would live to see. Hope that my children will be able to get a decent education and make something of themselves. We are a very hard working family. I have always worked very hard at all my low paying jobs, thinking that the boss would recognize hard work and loyalty and reward me for it. The joke was on me.
Now my daughters and my 16 year old son have followed in my footsteps. Of course, they only make a few cents above min. wage doing back breaking work. Literally, back breaking, for I now have, thanks to all the sh*t jobs that don't pay squat, three discs that are bulging and herniated. It is very painful to sit for more than an hour at a time.
I have hope that Obama will have an agenda that creates Laws to protect people like my family.
Thanks again. You are a good person to keep people informed and issues on the table.

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Our elections are always between exactly two candidates, one of whom is a lesser evil than the other, and a third candidate who is mocked as a "spoiler" and excluded from any debate. With only two candidates, throwing mud is perhaps the prime tool used to win the election. With only two candidates, they align themselves into exactly two parties. In my lifetime these two parties happen to be called Democratic and Republican.

Whenever one party gets more than 51% of the vote, the other party carves off a section of the winning party's coalition and the two parties are equal again. For example, the southern racists used to be firmly in the Democrats' pocket. Then LBJ supported the voting rights act. Nixon's southern strategy firmly put the southern racists in the Republican pocket. Later the evangelical vote was firmly in the Republican pocket, but Obama is a pretty conservative Christian and some younger evangelicals deserted.

Excuse me, but any indication that things have changed forever into the future is baloney.

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so give Obama a sprout. Change will take time and the whole country needs to be brought along, not just the progressives.

Obama knows that if the Dems are to maintain a hold on power they must govern from the center with only a slight tilt to the left. Otherwise it's 1994 all over again.

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The election of Obama could be a wonderful thing, or not. Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. This election was a very good day in a long struggle, but much remains the same as it was the day before 4 November. The election package was presented well, but domestically, we're still broke and though he vows to talk to previous untouchable nations, his policies on Israel, Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq don't sound much different from current. So far, his attitude toward Israel portends more of the same in that part of the mideast. He might go after Bin Laden, but that capture would only mean removal of the sole recognizable face on the wanted poster, and reduced focus dometically. The internet racists are wasting no time and have already launched. The fanatic smear-mongerers have been hibernating, but will no doubt awaken. The zealot citizens of moronistan remain out there armed and paranoid, and that battle may only be beginning. The real battles still are ahead. We've learned to hope for the best but also to expect the worst. Obama has already accomplished one task thought near impossible. Here's hoping there's more where that came from.

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Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton -- whatever else might have been wrong with them -- were both highly intelligent and well educated.

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http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=10809

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In all this debate over what Obama can do or will/will not do to save the nation, eveyone seems to be missing the point of what has happened here. It's not what Obama will do as President, even if he completely fails as President, he has already served the nation powerfully just by what he has shown us in the election. He has shown that the people of this nation are not powerless, ineffective sheep who can never make any difference in politics. He has reminded us where the real power lies. Yes, we can! He has awakened the sleeping giant of the electorate to an awareness of its own might and a commitment to its own responsibility. Yes, we can! Our task now, our commitment, must be to hold on to that awareness and not sink back into apathy. He has shown us that "when any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it and to institute new Government." Nay, it is more than our right; it is our responsibility. Let's not lose sight of the real lesson of the Nov. 4 election in the euphoria of victory. Let us rather organize ourselves to preserve and extend what we have won, to dedicate our efforts to the growth of light, life, love and liberty in our own hearts, in our local communities, in our nations and in our world. This is the challenge that President-elect Obama sets before us.

If anyone is going to save the nation it must be us, the electorate, for we ARE the nation, not Washington, not the Congress, not the President, not the Supreme Court, We, the People. It is our task, our challenge, our duty as patriots, as lovers of liberty, as humans with human minds and human hearts.

"My country right or wrong, when right to be kept right, when wrong to be put right, but, right or wrong, my country." We cannot, we dare not default on this responsibility to our nation, nor to ourselves. Remember, remember, the fifth of November.

Now let's roll up our sleeves and get to work, develop organizations, tactics, strategies and networks to consolidate our gains and move forward, roll back the forces of bigotry, hatred, fascism and tyranny. Let's get serious about our principles for the first time in decades. We know now that the voters will be with us if we simply present something for them to be with.

With love under will,

Bob, Adastra,
The Wizzard of Jacksonville

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...nothing changes until a critical mass realises that 6% of the population are psychopaths. Furthermore, a high ratio (relative to normal people) reach the top of all fields - politics, education, media, wall street, you-name-it... Obama is their new man (I doubt if he himself is a psychopath or is aware of the scale of the problem, or even that psychopaths run the show). They will manoeuvre Obama to precisely where they want him to be. When the next shock hits us (economic, military, state terror - they've got a whole range of shock implements available to them), BAM! Obama will have no choice but to react and play the card they want him to play.

The only revolution that will produce another world, is through knowledge. We need to become aware of the ROOTS of the problems first. And right now those roots point to a sub-species of humanity that has remained hidden until now because they're coming out of the woodwork into positions of power the world over.

Humanity has found its natural predator.

www.ponerology.com

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Do not treat the Republicans in your life the way they have treated you the past eight years. Show them the grace and goodness that Barack Obama exuded throughout the campaign. Though called every name in the book, he refused to lower himself to the gutter and sling the mud back. Can we follow his example? I know, it will be hard.

Um down here in the working class gutter that's a sign of weakness. Sure, I'm not gonna gloat over their defeat right in their face, but I sure as hell am not about to remain quiet when they express frustration over their loss to a "n*igra." You bet yer ass I'm gonna sling that kinda mud right back, with my fist tucked neatly in the middle.

Mike, you should know better how these things go. We can't all work in nice offices funded by our one-in-a-million films.

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The Reagan Revolution is still here. Will it ever end? When are we going to start calling this the Obama Revolution? I lost my first family to Reagan. I lost my second family to Bush, who kept the Reagan Revolution alive.
I will not hold my breath until I see it dead, dead. I am tired of working 84hr weeks with no vacation and little time off. I am too old to get anything else. My health is so bad, I shouldn't even be working, but as long as I work, I don't qualify. I have to live, somehow. Either the Reagan Revolution dies, or I will. Age 54.
I have lived the American Nightmare since 1984.

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It'll be a lot like the last time, when Bill Clinton was sellout-in-chief.

Remember that, Michael? At the end of it, you campaigned for Ralph Nader and the Greens. Who will it be in 2016?

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Bush became president in 2000 because a bunch of judges took precedence over dubious voting results in Florida.

He was returned again in 2004 because so many voting machines were rigged.

There is no reason why this couldn't have happened this time around, so it seems to me the Powers-That-Be organised it that way.

First of all, they engineered the bailout fiasco to take place just before the election, thus galvanising people's minds and equating it with Republicanism.

Secondly, they gave the population Sarah Palin whose imbecilic knowledge of anything important would have scared a lot of voters into voting for the other side.

Thirdly, the voting machines would appear not to have been rigged; thus the vote was a far closer reflection of how people did in fact vote;

The current Bush bunch have had to leave anyway, so they couldn't care less. They have done all they set out to do, so why not con the people into believing that they were in some way responsible for the result.

The Project For The New American Century is what it says - 100 years, and its continuation will be independent of who happens to be president.

The only true things you can say about Obama are (i) he is definitely heterosexual unlike the present incumbent, (ii) he has a much better looking wife, plus absolutely charming daughters, (iii) he is a charismatic and brilliant orator, and like any gifted speaker, he knows how to whip up popular feeling - just like Hitler and Stalin - who also came from poor backgrounds.

As has been said in previous comments, it is the American people themselves who must galvanise themselves into action, and when Obama says he will preside over Government by the people, of the people and for the people, it is the American people who have to make this a reality.

For starters, a proper investigation into 911 has to take place, and the perpetrators must be brought to justice. There are thousands of websites demanding this, and there are enough bright minds who were in the right place at the right time who know what really happened.

It's time the lid was taken off this.

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DLC Troll Rahm Emanuel as CoS is a move worthy of Dubya.

We will regret his letting this Republican-Lite (Rahm) into the Oval Office.

A DLC CoS is not change- it's a sell out.

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You'll find out soon enough Fatso!
But wait! He's not president yet!

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Party lines are party lines.

Where was that discussion in MM's heated glee over the myth of creationism?

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The really smart people are getting their money out of the stockmarket.

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Three simple words for the naysayers posting here, the critics out there, the Doubting Thomases who infect our world:

Yes We Can!

And note those three words are not “Yes Obama Can,” but

Yes We Can!

So, when you look at what Mr. Moore posts and you mince words like “but is he wise,” or “yep, but it’s the same system” please remember

Yes We Can!

20 months ago when we started making door knocks and phone calls in Iowa we heard things like “Barack who?” or “Obama what?” and then we’d get on a phone conference call and hear

Yes We Can!

When we lost New Hampshire, when we met Reverend Wright, when we made all sorts of errors that might have been disastrous we repeated

Yes We Can!

Let’s look back. He had no organization. He had no funding. He had little experience. He was running against the greatest political machine and the best campaigners any primary had ever seen. He was black or half white, or whatever, but the point is he didn’t look like the majority of us. He had only his ideas, his discipline, his drive, his intelligence. And us. And of course he had

Yes We Can!

And people would often say to me, but it takes more than slogans and fancy speeches. It takes more than hope. It takes more than chanting change. It takes more than "rose-colored glasses." And I would look them squarely in the eyes and say

Yes We Can!

Yes We Can! America. For the first time in decades I understand America again…Yes We Can! That’s what Mr. Moore is feeling…Yes We Can! That’s what all the great leaders have shared be it when they wanted to peacefully overthrow the British Empire in India, or they wanted to go to the moon, or they wanted to win an election to change a nation. Yes We Can!

And…Yes We Will! (AGAIN!)

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OBAMA: Smart. Brilliant! Thoughtful. Insightful. Charming. Honest. Responsible. We have witnessed Obama grow into a Statesman during this long campaign. He morphed before our eyes and we saw him LEARN from his campaign process ... he took in the hurts of all Americans, the readiness for his leadership and our eagerness to work for a reality kinder to the families of AMERICA!

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It's wonderful to be so full of hope and optimistic, but Mike Moore sounds extremely naive too. The realities of politics and the 21st century will reveal that Barack Hussein Obama is just a politician like any other. There's no other way he could have ascended to the highest office in the land. He's already sold his soul, he's beholden to unseen powers within and from without this nation. Let's just hope that these powers steer us and Mr. Obama in a better direction than they have the past 8 years. Eloquent speeches, intelligence, articulate replies, and a photogenic smile and family don't make you a wonderful leader, although they do help, and they especially help you get the vote.

Oh, and the FDR thing, yes a great president, Frank Capra, Steinbeck, Orson Welles and all that, wonderful!
BUT wait, wasn't there that little Hitler thing going on in Europe? Boats full of European Jewish refugees turned away in New York harbor? The US just watching while country after country capitulated to the Axis in Europe and Asia without going to their defense? Knowledge of the existence of death and concentration camps, yet no military action to destroy the gas chambers and ovens or the train lines leading to them? Oh, and I almost forgot, that little Pearl Harbor fiasco? Yeah, we sure didn't see that coming, or did we?

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Mike... I love your work, and want to see LOTS MORE of it in the future. Voices such as yours (really OURS...) are far underrepresented in today's society. However, you have to remember not to let your jubilance get the best of your logic. Yes, its a good thing Obama won this election, but, you have to remember to judge by action and not by words. Anyone can say they are a reformer, a changer a voice for the people, but only the tinyest of minorities of such folks follow their claims, grand words and speeches with real, tangible action. I, like most people, was impressed by Obama's speeches and claims, but until he actually delivers on them, they are just words. There have been many who have noted how Obama's campaign was financed by many of the same assholes who funded McInsane and Bu$hco. Please remember, when writing up your next work, to track the difference between what this man SAID and what he DOES. Personally, if he has even a 10% record once its all over, I'll be shocked. Lots of politicians rode in on speeches they didn't write making promises they never really intended to fill, and the people let those inspiring words block them from demanding results. Please don't be one of them. Wait until Obama's actions match his words before proclaiming we're stepping into the dawn of an age where reason and logic are celebrated and ignorance is ridiculed and abandoned.

Never count the chickens before they hatch.

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Mike, I don't know because I can't remember being led by one. Clinton resembled a smart one but he signed things like NAFTA, the Telecommunications Act of 1995, and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley act in 1999....so he wasn't wasn't so smart nor wise. The only hope I have for Obama is that he doesn't continue the same policies that have been shoved down America's throat for the past 40 years. Only the insane or totally corrupt continue failed policies.

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The first appointee is already stirring debate...Rahm Emanuel is pro-israel...Undoubtedly Obama is already heeding his most influence backers: the Israel lobby.

'Emanuel, as Ralph Nader points out in my interview with him below, represents the worst of the Clinton years. His profile as regards Israel is explored well on this site by lawyer John Whitbeck. He’s a former Israeli citizen, who volunteered to serve in Israel in 1991 and who made brisk millions in Wall Street. He is a super-Likudnik hawk, whose father was in the fascist Irgun in the late Forties, responsible for cold-blooded massacres of Palestinians. Dad’s unreconstructed ethnic outlook has been memorably embodied in his recent remark to the Ma’ariv newspaper that "Obviously he [Rahm] will influence the president to be pro-Israel… Why wouldn't he be [influential]? What is he, an Arab? He's not going to clean the floors of the White House."'

Obama appoints a zionist

is it wise appointing a (former?) citizen of israel???

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As above, this shows Obama is smart but not wise...or that he is dumb and has shown is is already being manipulated...

is this the 'change' people want to see???? Rahm is the son of zionist terrorist! had he been a son f an arab terrorist, we'd see no end of this in the media!

Already Obama shows he is not so wise....time will tell what this appointment does to US middleeast relations.

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'The son of a man who helped carry out this slaughter has now been selected by Obama to be his chief-of-staff. Cries of “sins of the father” lose their gusto when one considers the fact that, after the 1996 re-election of Bill Clinton, Rahm Emanuel “Was so angry at the president’s enemies that he stood up at a celebratory dinner with colleagues from the campaign, grabbed a steak knife and began rattling off a list of betrayers, shouting ‘Dead! … Dead! … Dead!’ and plunging the knife into the table after every name.” Sounds like a nice guy.'

obama appoints killer kowalski

Yes...nice choice...werent there any other candidates????

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Smart Obama shows where he stands on NAFTA:

'Working in the Clinton White House, Emanuel helped push through NAFTA'
rahm pushed thru NAFTA

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Michael,

You are very melodramatic. It is a difficult time, but definitely not "a time of deep despair." 46 percent of the voters did not agree with you.

You have put everything in the same sentence: "nation that was founded on genocide and then built on the backs of slaves" and Barack Obama, "a good man, a black man." Back in the early 1600's, when the first conflicts with local Indians occurred, there were no United States,but the colonists from England. And the slavery was abolished in 1865. You offend your own ancestors who came to this country long ago. Do you insist that all they did was shooting the Indians and using the slaves' labor? As to Barack Obama being "a black man," this statement is wrong as well. You should have used this opportunity to mention that Mr. Obama is in deed of a mixed race and that is a positive factor in reconciling whatever possible remnants of mistrust and friction could be among various racial and ethnic groups.

You view Barack Obama as an "anti-war candidate." But, firstly, he seems to be against the war in Iraq and for the war in Afghanistan, and, secondly, only ten percent of voters were concerned about the war in Iraq.

You've mentioned that most Americans didn't really like the Democrats because they didn't have "guts to get the job done." Here is my explanation of this phenomenon: perhaps, American people somehow sensed that the Democrats offer to them mostly rhetoric and much less substance. Per Time Magazine, eleven percent of the total number of people, participating in the election, did it for the first time. 68 percent of them voted for Mr. Obama. Most of them were are young and very susceptible to the rhetoric. They hear a candidate speak with passion, and they believe him. They don't know yet that it is much easier to promise something than to accomplish it.

You are celebrating the triumph of "intelligence over a belief that Adam and Eve rode around on dinosaurs just 6,000 years ago." Is it your subtle way to tell us that Republicans are all ignorant people? You are very hopeful that under the new president "the science, banished for eight years, will return." What about the fact that 45 American scientists received the Nobel Prizes during these "dark" years.

You are talking about a possibility to “see a time of refreshing openness, enlightenment and creativity.” Didn’t you create your famous documentaries during Bush administration? Did anybody stop you? Were you put into a prison for your art?

You think that now “anything is possible.” You write that you “can wrestle our economy out of the hands of the reckless rich and return it to the people.” To start with, are you going to give to the people at least some of the millions that you made on the documentaries produced about your mortal enemy Bush? It would help to provide a universal health care system in this country. You think that you “can stop melting the polar ice caps.” Do you have a plan? Are you going to ride a horse instead of driving a car? Have you already installed the solar batteries on the roof of your house? What I am saying, this is the rhetoric again.

Addressing your fellow Democrats, you are giving them an advice: “Do not treat the Republicans in your life the way they have treated you the past eight years.” I would like to know some facts. Was any one of your friends fired from his job by a nasty and cruel Republican boss just because he is a Democrat?

Now you want to repair “huge damage” that “has been done to this great country.”
I finally agree with you: it is in deed a great country. And I am urging you: Don’t rush to "repair” this country. In a process, you can cause much bigger damage. And who is going to fix the country then?

Mike
San Diego

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"Watch a thousand flowers bloom"....very well put and I can't wait...I feel the end of an era of dominating stupidity, ugliness, and fearfulness is finally coming to an end...though I see by the comments it will never go away completely...destitute and stupid what a sad combination...we will have to remain ever vigilant...

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