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Crashing the Gate

By Jules Siegel, Cafe Cancun. Posted February 2, 2006.


The founders of the Daily Kos and MyDD blogs argue in their new book that Democrats aren't losing on the issues -- they're losing in the ground wars.
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"Now it's our party: We bought it, we own it and we're going to take it back." -- Eli Pariser, MoveOn PAC, Dec. 9, 2004

"Crashing the Gate" is a manifesto aimed at fixing the structural defects that have caused the steady decline of Democratic power since Lyndon B. Johnson abdicated in 1968. Jerome Armstrong and Markos Moulitsas Zuniga brilliantly exploited bleeding-edge technology to create a new kind of interactive political media that brought open source journalism to the ordinary internet user. They helped convert the netroots (the digital equivalent of grassroots) into a $40 million ATM for the Howard Dean campaign.

Their book is at once awesomely inspiring and profoundly depressing. Devoting themselves almost entirely to analysis of political technique rather than ideology, Armstrong and Moulitsas describe the massive superiority of the Republicans in creating and deploying political infrastructure, the greedy incompetence of the Democratic consultants who enrich themselves while losing again and again, the fanatic single-issue pressure groups that have made it impossible for the Democratic party to present a unified, disciplined public image.

"In April 2005, about a hundred progressive leaders descended on Monterey, California, to extract lessons from the 2004 election debacle while finding ways for progressives to move forward," they write. At the beginning of one session about collaboration, a participant complained, "This isn't speaking to my issue. When are we going to talk about my issue?" Armstrong and Moulitsas write, "That set off an avalanche of copy cat complaints -- 'What about my issue?' -- from all corners of the room."

The session then split into five subgroups, each discussing its own individual issue. When Rhode Island Democrats were choosing a Senate candidate, polls showed that Rep. Jim Langevin had a 41 percent to 27 percent lead over incumbent Republican Lincoln Chafee. Eminently progressive on most other issues, Langevin "opposed legislation that would have allowed women to obtain abortions at overseas military facilities using their own money, and voted for the criminalization of transportation of minors across state lines for abortions without parental consent," they write. Lincoln Chafee had a 100 percent pro-choice rating. Langevin withdrew under heavy fire from NARAL and the National Organization of Women. NARAL endorsed Chafee for senator.

A Brief History of Netroots
In "Crashing the Gate" Jerome Armstrong and Markos Moulitsas Zúniga claim that Armstrong coined the term "netroots" in 2002.
Actually, a Paper Tiger Productions film, "Net Roots: Cultivating the Digital Park," was -- ironically -- already skeptical of the Internet collectivist hype in 1995. In 1997, lobbyist Jack Bonner formed a division called NETroots to dispel the myth of global warming.
Armstrong did mention netroots in a 2002 blog item about the Dean campaign. "It just came to my head as I was writing the post to describe the online activism of participating in online polls, blogs, and other online activity," he told me.
[Read more]


A few weeks later, Chafee voted to confirm pro-life (and more important, pro-business) Janice Rogers Brown to the federal appeals court in D.C. Chafee voted against the Alito filibuster (when there might have been a chance of stopping the nomination). Then he polished his pro-choice rating by casting the purely symbolic lone Republican vote against confirmation. So he was able to have it both ways. But if Democrats had controlled the Judiciary Committee, neither Brown nor Alito might ever have made it to the Senate floor.

Armstrong and Moulitsas argue that other self-serving political strategy errors deprive the Democrats of some of their strongest candidates. Armstrong and Moulitsas claim that the grotesque caricature of Howard Dean as some kind of unelectable loony leftist didn't originate with Republicans but with Democratic insiders who feared his threat to their control of party policy and funding. With the exception of his very strong and early opposition to the Iraq war, as governor of Vermont, Dean was a classic centrist, a very effective fiscal conservative. Yet the word started going out that he was a wild man.

Armstrong and Moulitsas write:
On November 7, 2003, a mysterious new group called Americans for Jobs and Healthcare ran a series of ads against Dean in Iowa, distorting his record, criticizing him for his positions on trade, Medicare growth, and gun rights, implying that Dean was not a progressive. The worst of the lot zoomed into the eyes of Osama Bin Laden on the cover of Time magazine while the announcer intoned, "We live in a very dangerous world. … Howard Dean just cannot compete with George Bush on foreign policy."
The ads were financed by forces backing Kerry and Gephardt. CNN helped bury Dean by showing the dubious footage of his grotesquely distorted "scream" over and over again, but it was his own party that depicted him as a political vampire and drove the wooden stake into his heart.

The main theme of "Crashing the Gate" is not ideology, but winning. Democrats mainly lose on the ground, not the issues, the authors observe. For the past 40 years, conservative Republicans have been training and supporting an astoundingly effective cadre of killer bee operatives. Meanwhile, the Democratic leadership has been doing its best to imitate Republicans on the issues, while ignoring their ferociously effective political marketing techniques on the ground.

Many will disagree with one or another of the prescriptions in "Crashing the Gate" for curing the Democratic rot, but this book could be the most important political work of 2006. Although the language is blunt, the aggressive self-confidence a bit obnoxious at times, the overall enthusiasm and just plain political good sense offer Democrats a tantalizing glimpse of hope in a very gloomy time.

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Jules Siegel administers newsroom-l, a news and discussion list for journalists. His reporting has appeared in Playboy, Rolling Stone and many other publications.

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Listen Up!
Posted by: oldgringo on Feb 2, 2006 3:06 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Lots of us have been screaming for a long time that "the dim-Dems of the beltway gang are locked into the "OLD quid pro quo" politics of the last century....and it just AIN'T GONNA WORK NO MO', NO MO'!
Lieberman and Bird have both flow to the Highest Bidder..(BIG OIL, no matter what the actual coin happened to be, Big Oil is who is paying the price...just ask Zell Baby!)...If there is ever to be any hope of breaking the back of the new fascist gang, the "opposition" has got to break the "BELTWAY MOLD" no matter WHAT they decide to call their "party"!
Kos and Company are headed in what I hope will prove to be the way out of this mess!

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a correction
Posted by: hotar on Feb 2, 2006 5:12 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Dr. Howard Dean is the former governor of Vermont, not New Hampshire. There is a big difference!

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» RE: a correction Posted by: JoshuaHolland
» RE: a correction Posted by: jules_siegel
Point made was excellent.
Posted by: Prophit on Feb 2, 2006 6:03 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The dems eat their own. Dean was on a roll and I doubt it couldn't have been overcome, in fact, the neocons, had that been Bush (and lord knows he has done even worse) would have overcome it by turning it into a positive. All the dems had to say or even Dean himself, was that he had passion for the American peoples plight, for the injustice, the blatant corruption at the highest levels of government.

In fact, he could have really taken that opportunity to expound of one of the many problems with Bush and used that as the reason. It would then have focused the issue on whatever transgression Bush was currently engage in.

I was going to vote for Dean in the General since I couldn't in hte primary as I am a registered republican. But when they put Kerry in there, it was like "oh, we don't want to win". I couldn't figure that one out. I held my nose and voted for Kerry anyway, but I reallly "WANTED" to vote for Dean.

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» ^^^^^^^^^ Posted by: decembrist
Correcting an error in the formatting of the story
Posted by: jules_siegel on Feb 2, 2006 7:01 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Armstrong and Moulitsas didn't write:

The ads were financed by forces backing Kerry and Gephardt. CNN helped bury Dean by showing the dubious footage of his grotesquely distorted "scream" over and over again, but it was his own party that depicted him as a political vampire and drove the wooden stake into his heart.

I did. I'm sure that this will be corrected in the course of the day.

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not to put too fine a point on it...
Posted by: lexicon on Feb 2, 2006 7:12 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
...but Dean was Guv of Vermont. While its certainly true that NH has an illustrious history of electing overwhelmingly republican legislatures and Democrat governors, we, alas, cannot claim Dean as one of our own.

lexicon

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Kos wrote a book?
Posted by: AlanSmithee on Feb 2, 2006 7:36 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
That's the same anything-for-money Kos who once worked for Henry Hyde, right? Now Kos and his munchkins have written a book about how noble his procorporate cause is? Should be the comedy read of the year!

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» RE: Kos wrote a book? Posted by: jules_siegel
» RE: Kos wrote a book? Posted by: jules_siegel
Tell it to the DSCC
Posted by: gailkate on Feb 2, 2006 7:40 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The Dem. Senatorial Campaign Comte asks for money to support Dems all over the country. I, for one, am not donating to any more national appeals for croakers like the craven
bozos in SD, etc. Let'em cozy up to their lukewarm, lackluster, limp and lame MODERATES. For too many years we've tip-toed around trying not to tick anybody off. Well, I'm plenty ticked off.

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» RE: Tell it to the DSCC Posted by: outsidea
ME EITHER
Posted by: krose on Feb 2, 2006 7:45 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I WILL GIVE NO MONEY TO THE DNC, THE DLC, THE DSLC, OR ANY OF THEM! I will only give my hard-earned money to individual candidates who I feel are deserving! It is time that this party get the message!

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Bill Richardson for President
Posted by: janvdb on Feb 2, 2006 8:00 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Hillary?

Kerry?

DEATH WISH!!

We need someone who can appeal to the working classes, the westerners, the grass roots. Someone who wears snakeskin cowboy boots, yet is progressive and liberal.

For those who don't know who he is, Bill Richardson is the Governor of New Mexico, Bill Clinton's ambassador to North Korea and UN guy under Clinton.

Jan VanDenBerg

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You can't win in a rigged system.
Posted by: antiapathy on Feb 2, 2006 8:09 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Back in 2004 I was really excited about the election, and I thought that there was a chance for some real change. But over the course of the primaries I realized that the nomination was going to go to whoever was perceived as the "most reasonable", i.e. centrist, Dem. But I was still willing to support Kerry because even his corporate-whorishness seemed reasonable to me compared to the alternative. (Of course I voted for Cobb since I live in a safe blue state.)

After the election I came to realize that our political system is irrelevant. Corporations control Congress, and the election itself was stolen by fiends such as Blackwell in Ohio, and Diebold programmers. And Congress doesn't care; they have had ample opportunity to require paper trails or election-day registration. They don't want campaign finance reform, because then they would actually be accountable to the people.

Strategizing may help the Dems win over the majority of voters, but the elections are still going to be rigged. And citizen-consumers don't care enough to hold Congress or state and local officials accountable.

I loathe participating in such a corrupt process. That is why I gave up on compromising my vote. Third party candidates actually stand for something, unlike the Dems who are afraid of offending anyone. Also, third-party candidates are less likely to have their votes erased. The Democrats are commited to shifting to the center in order to steal some votes from moderate republicans. They gave up on progressives a long time ago, I think we should return the favor.

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Taking issue
Posted by: JoshuaHolland on Feb 2, 2006 9:08 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
With all due respect to Jules Siegal, this line was troubling:

the fanatic single-issue pressure groups that have made it impossible for the Democratic party to present a unified, disciplined public image

That's nothing more than a right-wing narrative meant to marginalize the left.

Which groups, exactly are fanatical? The environmental, pro-choice and civil liberties groups are the only ones that hold real sway with the party. Are they fanatics?

More so than the NRA or the anti-tax zealots on the right? Please.

It's legitimate to criticize NARAL for not pulling the plug on Chaffee after he voted for cloture on Alito. But would they have supported him in the first place if not for the increasing number of Dems who would throw women's rights overboard in order to gain traction in the red states? I think not; it was a shot fired across the bow of the Democratic Party, nothing more and nothing less.

The real issue is a lack of leadership -- and the critique of beltway political strategists is right on. The fact is that we are liberals, we don't blindly follow our Dear Leaders right or wrong. That's a condition that won't go away and begs for strong leadership, not the dismissal of valuable constituents.

The bottom line is that Kos and Jerome are frat-boy lefties who are all-too-happy to chuck women's rights to the wind to make electoral hay. But it's a fool's errand: Americans are still pro-choice by and large and what they really detest about Democrats is that they don't stand for anything, including their core principles.

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» RE: Taking issue Posted by: Entheogenic
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: JoshuaHolland
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: jules_siegel
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: JoshuaHolland
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: jules_siegel
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: JoshuaHolland
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: jules_siegel
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: JoshuaHolland
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: outsidea
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: jules_siegel
» On/off topic Posted by: JoshuaHolland
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» RE: On/off topic Posted by: JoshuaHolland
» RE: On/off topic Posted by: jules_siegel
» RE: On/off topic Posted by: JoshuaHolland
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» RE: Taking issue Posted by: jules_siegel
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: lyrebird
» RE: Taking issue Posted by: jules_siegel
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» RE: Taking issue Posted by: drone
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» RE: Taking issue Posted by: saywhat?
......RIGGED ELECTION.....2004
Posted by: picket on Feb 2, 2006 9:19 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
American citizens took the time to put their lives "on hold" to go door to door for the DEMS in Ohio, in the 2004 election DEBACLE. It almost worked, but still election fraud has gone uncorrected. Dem leadership a little 'too late'. Looks like Kerry wants another chance!!! Corporate America does not care which party wins.

Making fun of Progressives works, many are discouraged and seem to have no leadership. Maybe..maybe not . We will see!!!

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We can do better?
Posted by: monkeywrench on Feb 2, 2006 11:03 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Winning on ideology but losing on the ground: there is no honor in "going down with the ship" if you could have prevented the ship from sinking in the first place.

And, all the infighting and maneuvering for power/income within the Democratic Party brings up the obvious conundrum: that what it will take to dislodge the entrenched, self-serving Democratic leadership and return the party to its members will also, through the ensuing chaos, make it nearly impossible to defeat the Republican Machine in 2006 – and by then it may be too late to turn back their slow-motion coup-d'etat. The only hope, then, is to bring the individual truths about the criminals running government directly to the people, by any and all means available, including paid advertising, and regardless of anyone's pet "issue." Think globally, fellow Democrats; not just about your little corner of the world.

By the way – "We can do better" ain't gonna cut it as a rallying cry (wimper?). The public needs to know HOW, in no uncertain words – and uncertain words are all the Dems can offer now. We need to do better than THAT.

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your fired
Posted by: saywhat? on Feb 2, 2006 12:27 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
from the sound of the article, this manifesto is all about winning elections, and certainly the winning part is necessary to bump the current administration out of office, along with deadbeats in congress etc.

however, it is depressing to take note that this winning seems to be without holding fast on a principled platform...for example, free and fair elections in the US of A, and (to futher address this issue of winning), campaign finance reform, for real...then maybe we can do without a chess game

voting democratic for a winner is without lifeblood if the 'winner' doesn't show guts in the face of corporate greed and beligerent opposition...

maybe the game instead shoud be donald trump putting the dems in the board room and sorting out the mess there...it would make for good entertainment and could be as flashy as the campaign commercials and all the smearing ..then maybe we'd have a star?

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wake us up
Posted by: nicholasdaly on Feb 2, 2006 12:56 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The things I hear about the most in a lot of this is "Americans are sleepy." Well, we need someone to wake us up! The democrats are certainly not waking us up...Very literally, the other night during Kaine's "response" to the SOTU, I actually fell asleep. The democrats right now are just too underwhelming and weak. The polls are telling us something: the American people are sick of the GOP. We need to sieze on this! We need the democratic party equivalent of Karl Rove. It's possible to fight dirty and fair at the same time! Especially right now, with the GOP corruption and all of the downright lies of the Bush admin.- we don't even have to fabricate or sensationalize this stuff, because this truth is better than fiction. So why aren't we jumping all over this? Late last year I was thinking that there was no way we'd lose in 2006 and that we could ride that all the way into 2008. Now with every passing day I am more and more discouraged. If I saw our party with some fire I would be pouring every extra dollar and every free minute into the party and into anything they asked me for, and I know many would agree- so let's do something! As James Carville would say, "we need to be on this like stink on shit."

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Say This, Believe This
Posted by: anothername on Feb 2, 2006 3:31 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Democrats are not going to win without issues. Yes, they may take an election, but we must have issues to keep Americans of all ages caring about the government. The lie in American politics is that the individual is the ultimate elected official, but that is not true. We are voting for all the party hacks, advisors, and other unelected people that go with the party of the individual we elect.

The Republicans say whatever they want, regardless of facts, on talk radio. Democrats try to do the same. What is needed is for people - whether journalists, everyday people, or U.S. Senators - need to call Republicans on their comments at the time they are made.

Talk to voters and they still want to be asked to vote for a candidate, regardless of how much money is raised via the Internet. Apathetic voters and Independents want a reason to vote for someone, or just don't care. Moral is: Politics is still old-fashioned, for all the new technology that is targeting individual voters by their block-specific Census profiles.

Then there is the Berkeley problem. On Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, vendors must be approved by the city and prove that their product is handmade by them. Political speech is allowed, by contribution only, without specific review. What this means is that the picture of a Republican with a four-letter word that was screenprinted by hand can be sold but someone with their own words, but someone else's screenprinting cannot sell. (I give the example of William Shakespeare being allowed to handtool Francis Bacon's work on a leather case and price it at $75, but Shakespeare could not let Guttenberg's heir print William's odes so William can sell them for $10.)

This Berkeley issue, that is repeated throughout the country, is important, because it devalues new ideas, discussion, and thought. How many William Shakespeares are being shut up because officials believe words are not as important as objects?

(Sorry for the disjointed post.)

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» RE: Say This, Believe This Posted by: anothername
Experience on the Ground
Posted by: StuartH on Feb 2, 2006 4:45 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
A lot of these comments strike me as the result of
naivete.

Issues and principles are of course, important, but
the ongoing discussions around the development of
the politics that motivate candidates to run for election
formulate the environment in which campaigns must
find successful and practical ways to cope.

I have had a variety of on the ground experiences
in winning and losing elections going back into the
late 1970s.

What wins elections is, at the core, disciplined thinking
about issues in terms of tactics and moving constituency
groups towards the ballot box.

During the '60s and '70s computer experts who were
good at using databases in a tactical way began to make
a business out of putting precinct lists together with direct
mail, polling, and TV commercials. They sold candidates
GOTV packages and replaced the grassroots.

This made campaigns more expensive, made fundraising
more central, and put special interests in the drivers seat.

To put the "netroots" or the grassroots back in the saddle, means some aggressive action and a lot of re-thinking the mechanics of political action between elections as well as
during campaign season.

Third Parties are not going to solve the problem, because
any group of people hoping to achieve political aspirations faces the same issues and the same need for disciplined thinking and acting.

The Democratic Party is there to be influenced and used
as a vehicle. This requires getting in there and putting
ego at risk. Politics is not an entertainment.

I believe everyone concerned about the way things are
going, to turn the computer off long enough to get into
the struggle - on the ground.

There has been too much tendency on the part of too
many people to see their involvement as limited to
getting someone else to take responsibility. Each one
of us must take responsibility for what it takes to really
move public policy and win elections. The experts are
all too willing to take up all our proxies.

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EVERYONE LOVES A COMEBACK...............
Posted by: Older man of the Mountain.. on Feb 2, 2006 6:32 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I knew the day the fix was put in I could tell by the look on Gephardt's face that he had just got the word from the Kerry people to fall on his sword so Kerry could go from 5th to 1st in 5 or was it 7 days out from the Iowa primary....

That was just shortly after the screw started getting turned on the good Governor from Vermont by the big tix Dems, the G.O.P. and by the media...

I have a copy of the campaign video taken from the floor that night in Iowa when DEAN was firing up the crowd of volunteers that came from all over USA to support him... There was no SCREAM!!!!!

Isn't it amazing how the big leaders that don't know how to lead are the ones that try to suppress and more times than none are successful at stopping others that are more than capable than themselves from leading.

I have known for years the big tix.. Democrats were trying to hard to be like republicans..

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A suggested solution
Posted by: Lincoln fan on Feb 2, 2006 7:41 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
"In April 2005, about a hundred progressive leaders descended on Monterey, California, to extract lessons from the 2004 election debacle while finding ways for progressives to move forward," they write. At the beginning of one session about collaboration, a participant complained, "This isn't speaking to my issue. When are we going to talk about my issue?" Armstrong and Moulitsas write, "That set off an avalanche of copy cat complaints -- 'What about my issue?' -- from all corners of the room."

It is obvious from the treatment of Dean in the last election that the Democratic leadership is not progressive. They are in the pockets of the same corporatocracy as the Republicans. They will not nominate a candidate who will be a threat to the establishmnet.

The single-mindedness in support of diverse issues that divides progressives is also thereason that a viable third party is highly unlikely.

I suggest a grassroots movement that advocates only the union of the working class majority to take control of both parties. The first order of business is to take control away from the corporate establishment. At the same time every member of the movement lays down an ultimatum to both parties, "support my issue or I won't support your party or your candidates".

Join The Lincoln Initiative a grassroots movement, not an organiztion. There are no leaders, no registration, no dues, no contributions, no marches, no meetings, and no hassle. Join today and help make "government of the people, by the people, and for the people" a reality.

Click on join today

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Thank You
Posted by: Oakland on Feb 3, 2006 3:35 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The one thing about Kos, Jerome and people like you is that you fact check what you say - unlike the traditional media. Without the bloggers from the left, we'd have no one, anywhere, to speak for us or to us.

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