Well, I gave what a broke college kid can give. Now it’s time to clutch my pillow, rock back and forth, and ponder how the fuck it even got to this point in the first place. Is that really all it takes? Not being in power, and acting like complete asses all the while, until the American people start to, for whatever reason, think you won’t fuck up as bad this time? Nobody answer that.

awwwwwwwwwwwww yeah mothafuckas rahm-dogg here waitin to fuck all y’all gently with a chainsaw. welcome to my party, mothafuckas. pony up that mothafuckin cash and bend over y’all. we runnin this shit. we pick up enough seats and we’re gonna start in with that progressive agenda any day now, homeboys.

RAHM OUT!

OK, pitched in.

C’mon, Sadlies, just imagine Toofie coming ’round to crow about the Mass. Senate seat we lost.

I actually don’t think she’s awful, politically. She just sucks at campaigning. She’s like the anti-Huckabee.

Sidebar is covering comments. I know there’s a technical term for this. [Tintin adds: Fixed. An evil div tag was responsible. It was waterboarded to death]

I don’t get this whole Fenway thing. Are there still games going on now, that she should be standing out front shaking hands?

Or are you such a Schilling fan-boy that you’re playing into his hands?

Fenway thing doesn’t bother me. It’s more that she complained about having to shake hands in the cold. It’s not a gaffe, it’s a pattern — she just doesn’t like being around people. Sigh.

They should make that a slogan for her.

“Coakley: She’s not trying to sell you a Handshake and a Smile.”

I’ll waive my normal consultant fees.

Sidebar is covering comments. I know there’s a technical term for this.

Spiders.

I don’t get this whole Fenway thing.

Teh Demoncrat party can’t be arsed to nominate successful politicians. Just suck the dew off their rings, or else be sent to Gitmo by the Repukes.

It’s all very exceptionally exceptional, and don’t be an American Hater and say nothing cross.
~

Maybe we can consider this a test run for a new 2010 bumper sticker.

“Democrats: not as bad as the Teabaggers!”

She’s throwing the election. Nobody can be that awful.

America’s conservative Southerners finally have a reason to support stem cell research.

Call it pork in a petri dish — a technique to turn pig stem cells into strips of meat that scientists say could one day offer a green alternative to raising livestock, help alleviate world hunger, and save some pigs their bacon.

Dutch scientists have been growing pork in the laboratory since 2006, and while they admit they haven’t gotten the texture quite right or even tasted the engineered meat, they say the technology promises to have widespread implications for our food supply.

“If we took the stem cells from one pig and multiplied it by a factor of a million, we would need one million fewer pigs to get the same amount of meat,” said Mark Post, a biologist at Maastricht University involved in the In-vitro Meat Consortium, a network of publicly funded Dutch research institutions that is carrying out the experiments.

Post describes the texture of the meat as sort of like scallop, firm but a little squishy and moist. That’s because the lab meat has less protein content than conventional meat.

Awesome! Laboratory pork scallops! Yay! Five times tastier than pink slime! And totally vegan friendly — no animals were harmed in the production of this meat and/or meat resembling product!

I think the Democratic governors have colluded to provide support for a constitutional amendment revoking their ability to appoint replacement Senators by picking the most lacklustre and pathetic group of unelectable candidates imaginable.

My god, Burris may actually be the best of the lot.

I have to confess, at this point I want health care to fail — seeing as it’s just a boondoggle for Big Insurance at this point anyway. And a fig leaf to conceal the feckless, spineless, [noun]less Democrats’ inability to accomplish anything useful when in power. Let’s just have it fail and then everybody can agree the Democrats are worthless.

Then — yeah, there’s more, my cynicism is basically fathomless at this stage — I want the Republicans to sweep in during the midterm elections and wrest control away from the Democrats. Sure! Let’s have the inevitable Obama impeachment, repeal income taxes for the top 1%, and ensure Alaska is drilled like a five-dollar whore on shore leave weekend.

Then — maybe, possible, probably not, but what the hell — Americans will figure out it’s time to change the way Washington is operated. I know, it will never happen, glass half full, etc. but dammit, if we’re going down, I want to go down hard and heavy, not incrementally, as Obama, Reid, and Pelosi would have it.

Also.

Ab-so-fuggin’-lutely. My only moral shortcoming is the eating of dead animals. Now I can get that sweet, juicy flavor from a lab dish & be even more self-righteous!

Five times tastier than pink slime!

That is one tasty burger!

I want the Republicans to sweep in during the midterm elections and wrest control away from the Democrats. Sure! Let’s have the inevitable Obama impeachment, repeal income taxes for the top 1%, and ensure Alaska is drilled like a five-dollar whore on shore leave weekend.

At my most cynical, I say let the Teabaggers have their way, jettison federal taxes entirely, and let the whole South devolve into Redneckistan… then I realize what a horror that would entail.

Is there a way that a New Yorker can put boots on the ground in a GOTV effort in west Mass?

Ha, the local rock station DJ just excoriated Rush Limbaugh for his Haiti smears in between spinning platters…

Then — maybe, possible, probably not, but what the hell — Americans will figure out it’s time to change the way Washington is operated.

Ah, the old medicine has to taste bad theory huh?

On bad days I think you’re right, but I’m frankly ill disposed to want to believe this sort of thing is true. After all, progress was made in the 60s right, white people were comfortable and had growing incomes but still gave LBJ and the Democrats some rope to bring in the Great Society and Civil rights reforms.

Honestly this might all be Kennedy’s fault. He was the first to lower taxes, we had conservativism tamed and trained to not shit the carpets and JFK gave them a taste of bloody meat.

Let’s face it, if the Democrats are unwilling to deliver anything of any importance even when they hold 59 Senate seats, dropping to 58 won’t make any practical difference.

They might have had a better time holding 59 if the leadership had put even the slightest bit of effort into proposing better health care reform than Lieberman-Stupak.

I just came across this again, and I don’t know why it’s interesting at the moment:

No agreement yet exists among social scientists as to sources of naziism’s sudden electoral surge in 1930 and 1932. One widely held view, stressing the importance of the “outcast and apathetic,” has been sharply challenged by S. M. Lipset, who argues that electoral support for Hitler was essentially a middle-class phenomenon. But on the basis of a new analysis of the voting returns, I conclude that a combination of former non-voters and traditional Rightists gave naziism its first great success, and the bulk of the middle-class vote went to Hitler only after the Nazis had established themselves as the largest non-Marxist party in Germany.

Tristero has some interesting thoughts on the race:

This refusal to pin the blame for spectacular Democratic crash-and-burns on the leadership – meaning the people who set the overall strategy to fund, market, and sell candidates – is, quite frankly, weird. There is far too much evidence and history to ignore or dismiss. Should Coakley have started campaigning earlier? Duh. And you think the decision not to – and the economic decisions related to it – were simply hers to make unilaterally? Please, people. Her strategy, or lack of one, was a collective decision, coordinated with the national party, I suspect. (And if, by some odd happenstance, the party is NOT coordinating Senate races, that should be cause for heads to roll at the top of the party.) Likewise, no: It’s not that she didn’t have the “character” to stand up to the party bosses. It’s that, for whatever the reason, they simply weren’t gonna do a good job for her, period, no matter what she did. Or put it another way if you prefer: they’re too inept to even know what a good job is.

I repeat: It is hardly any fault of Coakley that the race is so close. She could be the least charismatic person since Zelig and the most uncooperative since Bartleby and she’d still be trouncing a rightwing lunatic like her opponent if Democratic leaders had really wanted to focus on retaining Kennedy’s seat for a progressive voice.

Or, for that matter, cared very much to pass a healthcare reform bill.

When I’m feeling glum about the state of health care reform, I ask two questions:

“Is this reform worse than the status quo? Will killing this reform make it more likely that better reform will be passed?” Maybe I’m just too caught up in conventional wisdom, but I’ve never been able to say
yes to either question. And for all the complaints about how it’s all a corporate giveaway to the insurance companies, they have been fighting it like mad dogs every step of the way. Yeah, you could argue
that it’s all part of the plan, but c’mon, that’s teabag level conspiracy talk.

Haha, fuck you, sidebars.

Sorry, can’t work myself up to feel bad about this impending loss of a Dem seat.

Aside from the point made earlier that the magic 60-vote number has been proven meaningless, the fact is that Coakley is not only an awful candidate, she’s an awful human being — an over-zealous prosecutor who has ruined lives for the sake of padding her law-and-order credentials.

If this is the best the Dems can cough up in this race, they deserve to lose. I just hope they get a clue before November. But I’m not holding my breath.

Earthquake victims or … a really, really bad candidate. Neither words, numbers nor hieroglyphs can describe how terrible she is.”?

Tough choice.

Sorry, my days of donating time, $$$ and energy to national political candidates are over.

The fact is that when Scott Brown wins by 10 points, the Democrat party’s electoral hopes for 2010 will implode. Democrats will lose the House and will almost lose their Senate majority. And Obama will not be President in 2013.

No matter what, Obamacare is done. This election in Massachusetts is a referendum on Obamacare. Obama won Massachusetts by 20 points and the majority of voters will reject the Obamacare candidate. If you’re in a close race and you vote for Obamacare, you will be sent home for good.

The fact that an airhead like Martha Coakley won a nomination shows how arrogant and out of touch the Obamacrats are. If they expected this fight, they would have had a stronger candidate run for this seat.

In 2013, both Houses will be Republican and real American Sarah Palin will be President.

Reposting my earlier post hidden behind the sidebar:

Let’s face it, if the Democrats are unwilling to deliver anything of any importance even when they hold 59 Senate seats, dropping to 58 won’t make any practical difference.

They might have had a better time holding 59 if the leadership had put even the slightest bit of effort into proposing better health care reform than Lieberman-Stupak.

To which I add, losing one Senate seat would actually be useful to the Democratic party as an institution. The usual scam for Democratic fundraising is to take money from business, with the message that Democrats won’t make any reforms that will harm business interests, and to take money from the public with the message that reform is impossible unless more Democrats are elected. It’s a very effective scam, as Obama’s campaign fundraising totals demonstrate.

Unfortunately for the party, the scam falls apart when the Democrats are in power. Once in power, public donors will expect the Democrats to deliver on reform while business donors will expect the Democrats not to deliver. Whatever the Democrats do, they’ll alienate one group of donors. It’s much easier for the Party if they maneuver themselves to be nominally in power (for the purposes of perks and committee posts) but without enough of a majority to do anything. Being in limbo means being able to satisfy both groups of donors with the effect of being able to continue taking their money over the long run.

It’s hardly surprising why the Democrats have put so little effort into holding 59, really…

And Real American Jesus H. Christ will be Vice-President.

And we’ll all get PONIES!!

You guys are all a bunch of fuckin’ soreheads. Waaah, the Democrats aren’t going to give me a pony so I’m takin’ my ball and going home!

Fuck a bunch of that. Want things to change? Put your money where your mouth is, then start working the phones to get your voice heard. Quit whining about how the Democrats are just like the Republicans so why bother?

Three words for ya.

President. John. McCain.

Think it doesn’t matter? Forgotten the last 8 years already?

To misquote the late great HUnter S. Thompson, any political party that can’t cough up better than this DESERVES every beating they get.

Sheesh. Did the entire party expend ALL their Political Mojo to get Obama elected? It sure seems like it.

There’s good reason to work to prevent the GOP from seizing control of the WH or Congress.

Is there any good reason to work to help the Democrats preserve a supermajority that they only use to deliver regressive policies that are no different from the median GOP position a decade ago? I don’t see one.

Unless the Democrats decide to deliver, there’s no reason to lift a finger to do help them do anything more than keep the GOP in the minority.

Mari, the problem with that is that the way the Senate works when Republicans have 41 or more, they become the majority. If Brown wins, say goodbye to any dangling hopes of anything significant passing the Senate, and I wonder if anything at all would pass it.

Hi, Mencken from Redneckistan here to tell you the culture war is not the issue here, but the more you press that button, the moar you’ll lose.

Southern Retards who hate hate hate the Prez and all other black people and who are basically NaziStalinHitlers aren’t what’s fucking up the Senate, health care, war spending, etc.

The real problem, as usual, is fucking sensible liberals who act like Republicans. Frame this as the class issue it actually is, you’ll peel off from the tea baggers every clueless red state dullard whose tastes and social attitudes you hate but is poor or lower middle class just like you.

WhazzamatterwithKansas still applies, but you didn’t make good on your side of the equasion. Why shouldn’t yokels vote on their side of the culture war when the carrot Dems allegedly offer them — dollas in the form of health care and infrastructure — not to do so is, in fact, illusory?

Quick prediction: When health care reform is destroyed for another 20 years, and it will be, some of those most heartbroken by the loss will also be the first to forgive the horrible rat bastard cowardly suck-up fuckface asshelmeted sensible liberals in politics *and the media* who are most responsible for its destruction. But they will blame it on wingnuts, who, while typically awful, are at least honest about their role in legislative sabotage — it wont be they who proudly call “successful health reform” the legislative blow job the Democrats are about to give the insurance industry.

When health care reform is destroyed for another 20 years, and it will be….

There isn’t going to be another 20 more years. This is it. Call if the last best chance or the last worst chance, but it’s the last. It’s the end of the lone superpower consumer empire and bait shop.

@Felonious Monk:

41 GOP does mean complete paralysis in the Senate. Because Senate Democrats won’t deliver on anything productive, however, this outcome is basically indistinguishable from the current situation. A Senate with 59 Democrats who won’t deliver is functionally no different from a Senate with 58 Democrats who have no power.

The real danger is only when the GOP get control over enough seats to pass bills themselves. Given the blue dogs and Lieberman (Likud-CT), this is probably around GOP 45 or so.

Handing victories to the GOP won’t solve things, but neither will handing victories to the Democrats. If neither party will allow reform, then the reasonable voting strategy is to ensure stalemate with the GOP out of power.

@HTML Mencken:

Given how far and how fast the Democratic likely voter percentages fell as HCR morphed into the Lieberman-Stupak Forced Pregnancy and Insurance Industry Giveaway Act, it’s pretty clear that the Democratic base knows very well to blame the Democratic leadership–and not the teabaggers–for the failure of HCR.

When Andrew Sullivan comes through for a run-of-the-mill Mass democrat with poor history and poor campaigning, you *know* the GOP is not allowed to win. If there is one thing he dislikes more than establishment dems, it’s establishment reps. I know there are many here who really dislike the guy, but he recognizes that democrats have earned to pass a bill, and that the opposition has earned to get brained and rebuked. He even dropped the “fascist” bomb – and not just to be controversial. He is making a case for applying that label to the bastards.

Also, as to the people who think the DNC getting hurt in the midterms will make them more progressive by default – grow up and think.

What you do when you want to change the content of a party is that you use your enthusiasm *selectively* – reject the blue dogs, support the progressives and liberals. But supporting/ignoring the entire party depending on your level of satisfaction is idiotic and doesn’t send a message. Punishing the decent, loyal democrats for the sabotage of the purple scum is a sure way to hurt your agenda and create a vicious circle.

Look at the opposition. Just look at those unbelievable assholes. There is no democrat vile enough to justify letting the waterboarders gain an inch if it can be helped.

Um, no. She let a guy rot in prison because she didn’t want to admit that her predecessor made a mistake. I’d rather withstand Scott Brown for 6 years than accept a Prosecutor who refuses to admit when someone is innocent into the Senate. She’s a monstrous human being who has used every ounce of power she ever had to ruin the lives of innocent people. Please, do not give this person even more power and a lifetime seat.

At some point, you have to look at what kind of human being an individual is. She may be ideologically acceptable, but she is morally and ethically compromised to a degree that makes her unacceptable.

the decent, loyal democrats

Name one.

So, the pitch here is that the product is abysmally terrible in every way, but we should buy it anyway?

I can’t help but feel that something has gone terribly wrong somewhere along the line.

Axel Edgren: What you do when you want to change the content of a party is that you use your enthusiasm *selectively* – reject the blue dogs, support the progressives and liberals.

What happens when the blue dog is running against a fascist? We’ve got to support the blue dog, right, because otherwise President John McCain. That’s how it works, right?

Honestly, who are you talking to? Nobody has made the case that Coakley is a good candidate; certainly not you. Either we support a candidate because of their positions, or we vote for them because they’re slightly less evil then the other guy.

Honestly, the Democrats are always going to be slightly less evil then the Republicans; that’s a bar low enough that even they can hurdle it. And as long as that’s a reason to vote for them, rejecting the blue dogs is going to be a pipe dream, because rejecting them will mean giving the Republicans more power.

(This same dynamic, in reverse, seems to be a good part of the Republicans’ appeal to their voters)

What really baffles me about the Democrats is not just that they say “Our candidate is shit, please vote for her”, but that they actually get mad at the people who say, “Yeah, I don’t really want to support a shitty candidate, thank you.”

So, OK. Martha Coakley is a really, really bad candidate. Neither words, numbers nor hieroglyphs can describe how terrible she is.,,,,,

Worst. Fundraising pitch. Ever.

I’d rather withstand Scott Brown for 6 years than accept a Prosecutor who refuses to admit when someone is innocent into the Senate.

Yeah, and Bill Clinton executed a retard to prove his manliness on crime, and Al Gore nominated Joe Lieberman for VP and spent an entire series of months openly attacking American workers via NAFTA until passing it with Republicans against Democrats and I would still prefer either one of those sonsabitches than their hideous righter wing counterparts.

I don’t give a shit about any voter’s “conscience” or how they “feel” about candidates. When it comes down to actual voting time — and there’s a near eternity between those days — you either allow one person to get elected or another. That’s it. There’s no “elect your conscience” option, ever.

The really fortunate ones in the US are the millions of people who want to buy health insurance but can ‘t afford it without the setting up of exchanges, regulation of the industry and hundreds of billions in subsidies. At least if the bill fails they’ll be saved from being suckers like the many more millions who voluntarily buy health insurance from evil corporations today. Like, I’d bet, the great majority of front-pagers and commenters at FDL and such who are lobbying to kill the bill. Thank FSM for white, liberal professional types who know best. Plus the uninsured will continue to live with the excitement of operating without a net.

Sorry, guys. Can’t do it. Look, I’m a yellow dog Democrat. If I could get him on the ballot I would, as the definition goes, literally vote for my yellow lab Buddy over any Republican.

So please appreciate the weight and significance of my saying that I’d rather vote for Scott Brown, douche bag though he is, over Martha fucking Coakley. I live in MA and I personally know her. This woman is dangerous and I have some compelling personal reasons for not wanting to see her succeed Ted Kennedy.

The real problem, as usual, is fucking sensible liberals who act like Republicans.

I’m not sure who you mean. I don’t consider the likes of Baucus and Blanche Lincoln to be liberals. Could you name some names?
~

Anybody that drags out the old “President John McCain” chestnut is hereby invited to lap my rumpled nutsack. What do you think this is, a fucking episode of Star Trek where they go back in time and history is different? Come on.

Sorry, we have President Obama, who was the second-weakest specimen available.

Also, trolls? We’re having some sincere feelings here, so please leave. When I’m soaked in a mixture of sarcasm and chota pegs, as per usual, you may return.

What trolls? Fake Gary doesn’t count.

I’m paranoid, on top of the rest of it.

Remember that this is not so much a matter of getting more or less ponies from the Democratic party. Rather, it is a question of having to eat more or less shit sandwiches.

http://www.sadlyno.com/archives/27340.html

Realist said,

January 16, 2010 at 15:11 (kill)

the decent, loyal democrats

Name one.

I’ll give ya two: Jim McDermott in the House and Patty Murray in the Senate. Decent people who are trying to do the right thing.

And Lester, I’ll lick your balls right after you give me Happy Ending. To paraphrase one of the egregious assholes from the last decade, you go to the polls with the candidates you have, not the candidates you want or might wish to have. The Primaries is when you get to have your purity tests.

And to any Massachusetts voters who might be hanging around here, just go look at Scott Brown’s positions before you decide to stay home or vote for him. HCR as it is isn’t what any of us had hoped for but it’s a fuck of a lot better than status quo.

El Cid, congratulations on taking the moral stance that you care more about HCR reform and Obama’s electoral future than you do about doing your duty as a citizen and prevent sociopathic whack-jobs from entering the Senate.

Don’t you get indignant with me. This … Thing gave a campaign contributors son a pass for rape, and then he went right out and did it again. With a hot fucking curling iron. She covered up her predecessors misconduct, and PERSONALLY intervened to keep an innocent man in prison to prevent looking ‘soft on crime’.

I’m so glad this party has a the wisdom of men like you to guide us away from the moral marsh of protecting children and safeguarding the innocent. Clearly, the fact that someone has a ‘D’ in front of their name is SOOOOO much more important than what kind of human being she is or the fact that this will essentially give her a lifetime pass because people like you don’t give a shit about anything but partisanship.

To misquote the late great HUnter S. Thompson, any political party that can’t cough up better than this DESERVES every beating they get.

Well, we had this little thing called a PRIMARY which she won. She wasn’t my choice, but I be damned if I’m going to do anything that helps Scott Fucking Brown.

No, you just want to let a sociopath win this seat because she a ‘D’ in front of her name. Who gives a shit that she’s FAR more corrupt than Scott Brown. Tribalism! Who gives a shit if she gave a baby-rapist a pass because his daddy was her friend, She’s a Democrat! She HAS to be better than a Republican. Even if she isn’t.

You people disgust me.

I have a couple of thoughts here.

First, I do not remember any filibuster, just the threat of one. Have I missed something?

Second, the democrats have managed to accomplish to much with 60 senators, we certainly don’t want to lose even a single vote, now do we.

Third, the party leaders will blame the messengers/ liberals if there is a loss in Mass. (they’ll simply ignore it if it’s close). These people have absolutely no ability to look at themselves and their policies in any critical way at all. Let’s face it if they could Rham would have never been given any kind of leadership position at all after 1994.

Yeah, because there’s just NO WAY anybody could disagree with Brown’s positions or think she’d better serve the state or the country. Vote the way you want, but you’re not a fucking mind-reader so quit playing like you are.

Blerf!

This Coakley person needs to understand that “Going Full Aspie” as a campaign motif doth not an electoral triumph guarantee. Yo.

if greedy insurance companies make the plan cost the taxpayers too much, then we have a chance, down the road, of a public option or a single-payer system.

The fact is, you even have that chance if they don’t go gouge-happy, once you can educate enough people about all the many gratuitous peripheral advantages of those innovations – it’s a goofy little thing I like to call evolutionary democracy – it’s tax-free, a good source of fibre, not illegal yet & contains no preservatives.

There isn’t going to be another 20 more years. This is it. Call if the last best chance or the last worst chance, but it’s the last.

Congratulations, Grace Nearing, this Free Internets is for you! Wear it in good mettle!

Given how batshit-far-right we were in the early 20th century (i.e., drug prohibition was largely pioneered not by Ness, Anslinger or Hoover but by a Canadian lady (heh) who wrote a lovely little fairytale of cultural morbidity yclept “The Black Candle” – & South African apartheid was literally modelled after our Native reservation system), Canada really hit the fluke motherlode having a hardass hero like Tommy Douglas to help us get ours.

America is too many decades behind in getting theirs, & hoo-boy, living next door to that level & scale of ugliness is a real bitch.

If you`re ever do finally swipe our Medicare system, please feel free to clone our chartered banks while you`re at it *COUGH FUCKIN` COUGH* … no, really.

Do that.

We have precisely the government we deserve. What’s odd is that I don’t recall skullfucking any paraplegic orphans.

Who gives a shit that she’s FAR more corrupt than Scott Brown

That’s basically my sentiment — I really don’t give a shit that she’s far more corrupt than Scott Brown if the actual likely impact of the policies she supports is less horrible than the ultra-horrible ultra-right wing shit of the Republicans. And I don’t give a shit if that ‘disgusts’ someone, and you’re not more left than me either.

I rate for El Cid.

Also. Brad.

Also. Tintin.

Then — maybe, possible, probably not, but what the hell — Americans will figure out it’s time to change the way Washington is operated.

You think the last eight years wasn’t lesson enough?

Defending a political personality is so ten minutes ago. We must defend our government. Against the republicans, who want to destroy it. So the only choice is to vote Democratic, while the independents and libtards wring their hands and dither and moan.

Well, OK, living off the smell of the farts of feculant oligarchs is also an option. Historically, very successful. It’s that Pact With the Devil thing.
A pretty good deal all around – live large now, get to ram a pitchfork into Pat Robertson for the rest of eternity.

One party would do everything to get waterboarding back. One would not.

Superfuck anyone forever who isn’t capable of recognizing the importance of standing up to evil.

“Boohoo this democrat is X and this did Y and aarrrghh!” – I’M WITH YOU. But we still need to keep these people away at the ballot so we don’t have to do it with guns later. For fucking fuck’s sake, are you people seriously not feeling the importance of voting against the wishes of Mark Steyn!?

Always vote against the people who hate you. Always. This is no longer your average kind of election and political conflict.

That link to the anecdote about Coakley and the day care director really makes me feel a lot better about the possibility she’ll lose.

What we have here is a conflict between short, medium and long term priorities. In the short or medium run, it might be better to have coakley in the Senate than Brown. In the long run though, liberalism is not served by promoting despicable people like Coakley.

This is the problem with the Democratic dominant states. A lot of despicable and ambitious people who otherwise would gravitate to the Republican party pick the Democrats as the easier route to power.

I guess we need to be better at filtering out their sort at the primary level.

So, from what it’s sounding like, if Coakley loses the Republicans will suddenly have a majority and John McCain will be president? Because that’s what I seem to be reading — either she gets elected or the teabaggers will win the right to personally dip their balls in Obama’s mouth?

If not, why is one senate seat worthy of such blistering vitriol against people who aren’t motivated to work to keep it? Why isn’t character worth taking into consideration? If Coakley is such a mercenary, preening bastard — and I haven’t read anyone argue yet that she isn’t — what’s to keep her dutifully in that +1 Dem slot which is all anyone seems to care for her to fill?

Just because there’s a Democrat in the Senate doesn’t mean that Democrat is going to vote on the side of the angels. I’d think that Nelson, Lieberman (pre ’06), Landrieu, Lincoln, etc. would have proved that to everyone’s satisfaction.

And I know Brown would be worse. I’m not saying anyone should or shouldn’t support Coakley, because I’m on the opposite end of the country. I just don’t see the world-shaking urgency of letting the Democrats keep a highly theoretical filibuster-proof majority when enough of that majority is excrement in human form who will cooperate in making anything that does pass reek of fetid shit.

The Democrats have had the opportunity this session to fix the filibuster process by bringing back the floor filibuster. It would have been politically feasible (I suspect most Americans think of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington when they think about filibusters anyway) and it would have shown that the Democratic leadership is actually interested in passing a good bill. They did not. Thus, I don’t see how 59 + Droopy Joe should mean anything to me or to Massachusetts Democrats, either.

We have precisely the government we deserve. What’s odd is that I don’t recall skullfucking any paraplegic orphans.

But you probably thought about doing it, which is enough to make the baby Jesus cry.

We’re fucked.

I say, Brad, isn’t it Tom Brady Month? Let’s post that video again; that should cheer you up, yes?

@Axel Edgren:

One party would do everything to get waterboarding back. One would not.

If you think waterboarding has stopped then I have a bridge to sell you.

One party will go out of its way to torture people. The other party will do literally nothing to prevent it from happening.

Is there really that much difference between a party that does evil through deliberate action and one that permits evil through deliberate inaction?

@TruculentandUnreliable:

We’re fucked.

Yes.

Djur said,

January 16, 2010 at 20:26

So, from what it’s sounding like, if Coakley loses the Republicans will suddenly have a majority and John McCain will be president? Because that’s what I seem to be reading — either she gets elected or the teabaggers will win the right to personally dip their balls in Obama’s mouth?

Djur, that’s exactly the message that has already assimilated and is being broadcast through our “liberal-biased MSM”. (Corporate propaganda toadies, to be more precise.)

You can check Krautiehammer’s Friday column for an example. I’m not going to link it. This is what Digby is talking about.

g said,

January 16, 2010 at 19:47

Then — maybe, possible, probably not, but what the hell — Americans will figure out it’s time to change the way Washington is operated.

You think the last eight years wasn’t lesson enough?

g, who has learned what lessons? People like David Brooks and Fred Hiatt have learned that you can be spectacularly wrong, and still get paid. As long as long as you’re wrong in the favor of the corporate/tycoon class.

Be right, like Robert Scheer and Phil Donahue, and you’re out on the street.
~

I don’t give a shit about any voter’s “conscience” or how they “feel” about candidates. When it comes down to actual voting time — and there’s a near eternity between those days — you either allow one person to get elected or another. That’s it. There’s no “elect your conscience” option, ever.

So, essentially, we have a sham democracy in which you must always choose the lesser evil, not because that evil will do anything at all for you, but because the lesser evil will use lube when he fucks you up the ass. There is no option to not get fucked. And there is, of course, no compelling reason why the system couldn’t be redesigned to not deliver a constant stream of ass rape.

So who are you angry at? Not the bumfuckers, not the system that ensures you get butt fucked every time, no, you’re pissed at the people who aren’t working hard enough to get you that lube.

I will never, ever understand this attitude. To me, it’s a little like saying the Holocaust was caused by the Jews not fighting back hard enough.

It’s not the fact that people vote for the lesser of two evils that bothers me, it’s the fact that they see it not as a defensible choice, but as a moral imperative, as the ONLY choice.

I’d say this is one of those situations with no happy choices. How the hell did somebody as patently awful as Coakley even manage to win the primary?

So, essentially, we have a sham democracy in which you must always choose the lesser evil, not because that evil will do anything at all for you, but because the lesser evil will use lube when he fucks you up the ass. There is no option to not get fucked. And there is, of course, no compelling reason why the system couldn’t be redesigned to not deliver a constant stream of ass rape.

Yes and no.

First, we don’t have a democracy, we have a republic. So there’s that.

Second, if your only input to the process is when you go to the polling booth, you’ve ass-raped yourself. Well, let’s say shot yourself in the foot.

Finally, I must point out that equating all buttseks with pain and dominance/ submission is st00pid. Quite a few people, not least some who inhabit these environs, have a different take.

“Finally, I must point out that equating all buttseks with pain and dominance/ submission is st00pid. Quite a few people, not least some who inhabit these environs, have a different take.”

Yeah, PeeJ but we all know that it’s you gay guyz who are destroying the country.

But not lesbians. They’re totally HAWT.

We are all Holocaust victims now!

Finally, I must point out that equating all buttseks with pain and dominance/ submission is st00pid.

That’s a generous way to put it.

We need more parties. Our two-party system is broken.

Yeah, PeeJ but we all know that it’s you gay guyz who are destroying the country.

One does one’s best.

As I was smoking outside just now, it occurred to me that I would (have) like(d) to also say something about conflating buttseks with gay. Thanks so much for opening that door, WC*. We have all known for some time about “pegging”, but until my recent perusal of a certain sexually explicit sub-Reddit, I had no idea just how very popular it (apprently) is among teh str8ts.

*Nah, I understood perfectly – not a problem.

So this Coakley person, she is worse than Joe Lieberfuck?

To The Tragically Flip;

“Honestly this might all be Kennedy’s fault. He was the first to lower taxes, we had conservativism tamed and trained to not shit the carpets and JFK gave them a taste of bloody meat.”

I think that’s overstating things. Tax cuts aren’t inherently bad and 90% tax rates on the super-rich aren’t always necessary – there’s nothing wrong with doing it if it’s for a good reason. The problem of the last thirty years isn’t tax cuts per se so much as the size of said cuts (from 70 to 30 percent at the top) and, especially, the fact that they’ve become a goal in and of themselves, no matter what else gets fucked up in the process. For that ethos, I still blame Reagan.

To El Cid;

“No agreement yet exists among social scientists as to sources of naziism’s sudden electoral surge in 1930 and 1932. One widely held view, stressing the importance of the “outcast and apathetic,” has been sharply challenged by S. M. Lipset, who argues that electoral support for Hitler was essentially a middle-class phenomenon. But on the basis of a new analysis of the voting returns, I conclude that a combination of former non-voters and traditional Rightists gave naziism its first great success, and the bulk of the middle-class vote went to Hitler only after the Nazis had established themselves as the largest non-Marxist party in Germany.”

Yeah, I’ve been reading Hannah Arendt over Christmas and was also struck by the parallels between Nazism and Stalinism and… the modern teabagger conservative movement. Ironic since they’re supposed to be libertarians. But then Stalin and Mao weren’t exactly perfect Marxists either.

To Mari;
“There’s good reason to work to prevent the GOP from seizing control of the WH or Congress.
Is there any good reason to work to help the Democrats preserve a supermajority that they only use to deliver regressive policies that are no different from the median GOP position a decade ago? I don’t see one.
Unless the Democrats decide to deliver, there’s no reason to lift a finger to do help them do anything more than keep the GOP in the minority.”

See to me, that’s reason enough. The Democrats are best compared with the Weimar Republic – horribly inefficient, torn between different factions, centrist at best and with little innovative spirit, but better by far than the much vaster evil hanging over them. As we said in my other country (France) when the National Front won second place in the first round, vote for a crook, not a fascist.

And to Christopher;

“So, essentially, we have a sham democracy in which you must always choose the lesser evil, not because that evil will do anything at all for you, but because the lesser evil will use lube when he fucks you up the ass. There is no option to not get fucked. And there is, of course, no compelling reason why the system couldn’t be redesigned to not deliver a constant stream of ass rape.”

I think the point is that there’s no such thing as a politician who will agree with you 100%, and even if there was, political compromise and maneuvering would force him to give up some of the things you wanted. E.G. I am pro-life, but I think the Democrats are either right or less wrong than the Republicans on just about everything else, so I vote for them. Does this mean we’re a sham democracy? No, it just means we don’t have any party that stands for exactly what I stand for. That’s pretty much just life.

Other than the impact of Coakley’s/Brown’s election on national policy, I don’t have a dog in this fight. None the less, I gotta say you Massholers obviously screwed up royally in the primary.

So, essentially, we have a sham democracy in which you must always choose the lesser evil, not because that evil will do anything at all for you, but because the lesser evil will use lube when he fucks you up the ass.

Yes.

There is no option to not get fucked.

Nope, not really.

And there is, of course, no compelling reason why the system couldn’t be redesigned to not deliver a constant stream of ass rape.

As long as money talks, and politicians owe to their careers to how much money they can get from as few sources as possible, and mass media is concentrated in the hands of a small, wealthy elite, then talking about redesigning the system is just airy-fairy bullshit. Everybody wants a pony, but getting all pissed off and threatening to stay in your room and pout because you can’t find one buried in all the horseshit is a childish response.

PeeJ sed: Thanks so much for opening that door, WC

Damn. I wish I had seen what I *could have done* there. WC, door, ..? Only boring euros would get it?

Other than the impact of Coakley’s/Brown’s election on national policy, I don’t have a dog in this fight. None the less, I gotta say you Massholers obviously screwed up royally in the primary.

Fucking Emily’s List.

Damn. I wish I had seen what I *could have done* there. WC, door, ..? Only boring euros would get it?

W.C. Fields was a closet homo?

PeeJ:

.First, we don’t have a democracy, we have a republic. So there’s that.

This point always makes me grit my teeth when I read it. By the grade-8 civics definition of “democracy” this employs there has never been, nor could ever be a “democracy” – how could a society function if they voted on everything? Every democracy is a republic in some form, so it isn’t really useful to make this point to justify any particular ills of the US model. Until Borg technology makes measuring the “collective” will a feasible possibility, I guess.

FWIW, the Red State Trike Farce is advocating their members pose as call center volunteers and / or jam the phone lines for the Coakley call center.

Here is what I’m being told if any of you want to go by tomorrow and laugh:

Organizers are asking for volunteers to be at the IBEW address before 9 am to hear from Coakley and Vicki Kennedy tomorrow morning.

The IBEW HQ site is where most of the Boston area locals are organizing GOTV.

IBEW [hall & address]

It is, in effect, labor GOTV HQ. That is why Coakley and Kennedy will be there tomorrow to kick things off. All other sites are for support.

SEIU is running phone banks at [addresses and times given]

Yeah. Go by and ‘laugh’. Yeah. I’m sure that’s what a bunch of Red State Teatards would do at a Democratic phone bank. Because Republicans are not at all willing to play a dirty tricks campaign against any Democrat, even the conservative ones.

This point always makes me grit my teeth when I read it. By the grade-8 civics definition of “democracy”

I make the distinction not merely to indulge my penchant for pedantry. The importance of the distinction is that we don’t vote for or against _issues_ but for (or, obliquely, against) _representatives_. The phrase “sham democracy,” as I generally find it used, represents a muddy, fuzzy understanding of what’s actually going on.

Which is not to downplay the delight’s pedantic bastardryness.

Argh. It’s my fingers! I just can’t type for shit anymore so I keep making corrections and “‘”‘s just fucking jump in from nowhere. fuckity fuckety fuck fuck.

At least it’s not as bad self pwnage as actor212’s….

I’ll be glad to give money to help elect a Dem, but could the fucking Dems start acting like Democrats instead of pussyweak center-right pigfucking goddamn corporate whores so FUCKING BLATANTLY? Jesus fuck already.

Even the “would you rather have President McCain” excuse doesn’t forgive Timmy Geithner, Secretary of the Department of Assraping your Wallet for His Buddies son Wall Street.

regressive policies that are no different

you have a very short memory

Finally, I must point out that equating all buttseks with pain and dominance/ submission is st00pid.

Yeah, and equating anything not-rape with rape always makes me go “blerg,” however good the accompanying point may be.

The Democrats are best compared with the Weimar Republic – horribly inefficient, torn between different factions, centrist at best and with little innovative spirit, but better by far than the much vaster evil hanging over them.

I think this is an accurate and scary comparison. If the democrats can’t prove themselves to be effective governors and leaders, where the fuck does that leave us?

Coakley knowingly kept innocent people in prison for decades to further her career. Let’s check her political affiliation to see how we feel about that. Right, gang?

“Damn. I wish I had seen what I *could have done* there. WC, door, ..? Only boring euros would get it?”

Heh, Didn’t see the WC part, I was thinking back door.

But only in the most heterosexual way possible, of course.

More srsly for a sec, I’m too ignert about how gay men roll to have understood that gayness doesn’t (always) = welcoming penetration. Yay, I’ve learned something today!

And back ontopic, please elect the awful Democrat; she’s still better than the Republican on the face of it and with luck will be trainable. So PeeJ, you and I as left-coasters also have a dog in this fight even if we can’t vote.

Boy, that last sentence doesn’t fit anywhere.

FWIW, the Red State Trike Farce is advocating their members pose as call center volunteers and / or jam the phone lines for the Coakley call center.

Wow, the prospect of Red State Teabaggers being pummeled by union construction workers and building porters is a hilarious one.

Trike Force, ACTIVATE!!!

I don’t know if I trust the polls on this one. I made calls all day this morning for Coakley–because I got scared shitless about the prospect of Brown winning–and, like, 70% of the people I talked to say that 1)They ARE voting, and 2) They’re voting for Coakley.

That said, I’m still going to make more calls tomorrow.

Congratulations, Grace Nearing, this Free Internets is for you! Wear it in good mettle!

Jim: Is there a cash award with that?

Congratulations, Grace Nearing, this Free Internets is for you! Wear it in good mettle!

Jim: Is there a cash award with that?

It’s the Internets, the award is a big stack of porn!

The importance of the distinction is that we don’t vote for or against _issues_ but for (or, obliquely, against) _representatives_.

Plus, these definitions allow you to draw a distinction between states that lean more towards democracy (in the form of more referenda) and those that lean more towards a republic (fewer referenda). California, for instance, has a truly amazing amount of propositions on just about every ballot; North Carolina doesn’t. You don’t have to have a “complete” democracy or a “complete” republic for these distinctions to be useful.

Decision Tree said,
January 17, 2010 at 0:43
Coakley knowingly kept innocent people in prison for decades to further her career. Let’s check her political affiliation to see how we feel about that. Right, gang?

Yes, isn’t amazing the number of Democrats who are actually looking at the candidate and questioning their support. Debating that very dilemma.

As opposed to:

“Brown Justifies Denying 9/11 Rescue Workers Aid: ‘We Had To Take Care Of Our Own Priorities First’ ”
==
During the same month Brown was voting down efforts to support 9/11 rescue workers, he was pushing a bill to appropriate a tax-subsidized bond to build a golf course in Norfolk, a city in his district.

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/01/16/justify-denying-911aid/

Republican candidate Brown; of course, will never have to worry about his constituency making any kind of effort to hold him accountable.

Funny how that works isn’t it Decision Tree?

Well, I’m a liberal democract who lives in Boston. Coakley got my vote already, went in to vote absentee. She gets that just for having a “D” next to her name.

I had a full time job working on campaigns in the 04 cycle, and volunteered a lot of time in 06 and 08. Working together, we got the super majority that the Democratic leadership has been begging for for decades. And, well, at this point, to get me to work, either her or the party have to give me something, anything to work for. Card check, single payer, immigration reform, woman’s health, reduction of the military budget, something, anything. Just one clear cut victory, like the Dubya tax cuts. Show me that my time and money are worth it!

I volunteer twice a week at court (once at housing and once at family/probate) to provide free representation for low income people. I really don’t have time to do more volunteering. So political work would cut into that. And they haven’t shown me that it would be.

She gets that just for having a “D” next to her name.

I imagine, “Dan”, the primaries are just a living hell for you?

So, um, my ill-advised metaphor aside, how does my reluctance to support a candidate everybody agrees is terrible transform into a demand that there must always be in every race a political candidate who is 100% perfect in every way? When did I ask for that?

I’m saying I would like to hear one -just one- reason to support a candidate that doesn’t amount to “They’re terrible, but the other guy is terrible AND horrible!”

You know, along the lines of “You should help Martha Coakley because there is good reason to believe she will help us with issue X”

How the hell did that become a super-high expectation that only the most selfish of people could possibly have? (And by the way, if the expectation that a candidate should do something positive for you is unrealistic, then we’re living in a sham Republic. Happy now, Peej?)

Oh come on, Christopher.

“I’m saying I would like to hear one -just one- reason to support [Coakley]”

It’s already been said. Brown has vowed to be vote #41 to kill HCR. You might not like it; I certainly wish it was better, but it’s something. Beats the shit out of, “Can’t afford healthcare? Tough shit.”

And I, by the way, have mine. I just left off the “fuck you” part. Because I can actually recognize that people who are not-me might suffer without heahthcare.

…went off half-cocked, there.

“…suffer without healthcare.” And I’d be willing to swallow my desire for the perfect in order to get what is possible right now.

And I’d be willing to swallow my desire for the perfect in order to get what is possible right now.

Unfortunately the cowardly Dems in office have no interest in doing what’s possible right now and more interest in just sitting with their thumbs up their asses kowtowing to corporate interests.

Memo to HTML Mencken;

“The real problem, as usual, is fucking sensible liberals who act like Republicans. Frame this as the class issue it actually is, you’ll peel off from the tea baggers every clueless red state dullard whose tastes and social attitudes you hate but is poor or lower middle class just like you.

WhazzamatterwithKansas still applies, but you didn’t make good on your side of the equasion. Why shouldn’t yokels vote on their side of the culture war when the carrot Dems allegedly offer them — dollas in the form of health care and infrastructure — not to do so is, in fact, illusory?”

Several problems with this. First, if that was true, the “yokels” wouldn’t be voting Republican; they wouldn’t be voting at all. Because the culture war carrots the Republicans dangle in front of them are even more illusory than Democratic carrots on health care and infrastructure. When the hell was the last time the Republicans orchestrated a strong push against abortion? When was the last time they even tried, in any way comparable to, say, the stimulus package or the current health care debate?

I’m a pro-life voter. I consider myself a Christian. So trust me, I’ve been following this kind of thing at least as closely as any of the “yokels.” And I have never, ever seen a nationwide Republican campaign that treated the culture wars as anything other than a tool to be dropped like a hot potato as soon as they make it into office – then reluctantly pick up again two years later when they need the votes again.

Which brings me to point two. Why do the “yokels” vote Republican, and why are they pissed at Obama and the Democrats? If what you’re saying about class war is true, you’d think they’d be rallying around some kind of Bull Moose platform (populist economics, socially conservative) to draw the GOP away from the libertarians. That’s not what’s happened. Instead, they rally around the teabaggers, who don’t give a damn about the culture wars – their rallying cry against Obama, insofar as there is one, is against spending.

Not even against taxes; against spending. That’s right; the centrists who voted for Obama because they wanted him to “fix the economy” are now rallying en masse behind the teabaggers because he’s “spending our money.” These guys aren’t protesting because the stimulus was too small, they’re protesting because there was a stimulus at all. They’re protesting the only thing Obama’s done for them so far, not because “he’s not doing enough.” These guys don’t want class wars. They don’t want “real” carrots. Anytime either of these things are suggested, they’re the ones who recoil and go “Ewwww, tha’ss socialism!” even if they asked for it in the first place.

Third; look at the timing. The teabagger protests started at the beginning of last summer; at the time, no one had a fucking clue what the health care bill would look like. They didn’t know if it would be “illusory,” and they didn’t care; they were against any kind of reform at all. Same thing on a larger scale going back to the eighties. The “yokels” didn’t abandon the Democrats because the Democrats moved to the center; the Democrats moved to the center because the “yokels” abandoned them. In fact, the only Democrat who’s had any success appealing to the “yokels” since Reagan was a dedicated centrist (Clinton).

If there are any more of you “yokels” out there, here’s a couple thoughts; 1) Stop associating with a teabagger faction that doesn’t give a flying fuck about you and isn’t on your side in the class war OR the culture war. 2) The next time a health care bill like this comes up, don’t gather in the streets and scream about spending. Scream “Democrats, give us MORE,” not “Democrats, don’t give us anything at all, tha’ss socialism.” 3) Get organized and take back your own party from the Gilded Age economists. For God’s sake, “culturally conservative but economically big government” is the most sought-after demographic in the country. It’d be the easiest thing for you to position yourselves as a swing vote and play the parties against each other. But for that, you’d have to get organized and start advocating YOUR views, instead of reflexively lining up behind the libertarians like you have been for the last year (or arguably the last thirty years).

You know, here’s a thought. My political donations are better spent on good candidates in my own state rather than terrible candidates in some other state. I’m not rich, I only have so much money to contribute to political campaigns.

I’m sorry, I was always under the impression that Massachusetts was a liberal state, and that certainly a Democrat was going to win the late Ted Kennedy’s seat. If it looks like that is not the case, why am I going to send money to the losing campaign of someone I don’t like who isn’t even in my state?

Seriously, it’s not like there aren’t tons of good places to donate money, even if I ignore charitable donations like Haitian Earthquake Relief and focus purely on political donations. Why send the money to Coakley and not the NAACP, ACLU or Planned Parenthood? Or I could donate to Doctors Without Borders or Meds and Food for Kids if I’m disgusted by the poor health care so many people must suffer from…

It just seems that telling me how terrible someone is but saying “donate money anyway” isn’t a convincing argument.

While I will agree that Martha Coakley is not a very good campaigner, I do think she’ll be a very good senator. And certainly much, much better than Brown, who would be a total disaster for MA.

As a lifelong MA resident, I have seen much from these candidates over the years, and I am appalled that people are even considering Brown for US Senate. People need to seriously spend some time of the internet(s) checking these people out before Tuesday, and we don’t have the luxury of staying home IMO.

I’ve been doing phonebanking for Martha this weekend, and even the message she wants us to give potential voters stinks. It’s all about rightwing hate groups, and hardly anything about what a great Senator Coakley will make. But everyone I’ve talked to agrees with me – we have to have her win this one.

I lurked this thread for a couple of days and wasn’t going to wade in, but…fuck it:

So, essentially, we have a sham democracy in which you must always choose the lesser evil, not because that evil will do anything at all for you, but because the lesser evil will use lube when he fucks you up the ass. There is no option to not get fucked. And there is, of course, no compelling reason why the system couldn’t be redesigned to not deliver a constant stream of ass rape.

So who are you angry at? Not the bumfuckers, not the system that ensures you get butt fucked every time, no, you’re pissed at the people who aren’t working hard enough to get you that lube.

I will never, ever understand this attitude. To me, it’s a little like saying the Holocaust was caused by the Jews not fighting back hard enough.

It’s not the fact that people vote for the lesser of two evils that bothers me, it’s the fact that they see it not as a defensible choice, but as a moral imperative, as the ONLY choice.

Maybe it’s never dawned on you that in a two-party political system, your choice will ALWAYS be between “two evils”. Guess what? In a parliamentary system, you get to choose between MORE than two evils, but that not only isn’t the system that we have, it’s also not a utopia where the Care Bears cavort on silver unicorns under rainbows.

So you can go on and be petulant about the fact that the realists around you have long ago recognized that yes, the lesser evil is the only choice you have or will ever have that has any kind of fighting chance of actually winning and doing anything, but I kind of doubt that your tantrum will change a system that’s been with us now for over 200 years and which, compelling reason or no, is not likely to ever be changed due to the institutional hurdles involved in changing it. But please spare the rest of us from hearing about it, because your outrage isn’t going to change it, and in fact, the more people who buy into your take on things and opt out, the less likely it is for things to ever change even marginally for the better. Because like it or not, in the system we have, your only chance at making things better is to support the lesser of two evils, and over time, to push that lesser of two evils into being less evil.

As all of us less-holy-than-thou tools have recognized a long time ago.

Owlbear, usually there is someone in the primaries that gives me something positive to work for. In the recent Senate one, I was actually somewhat torn, because I liked both Khazei (I did Americorps, so loved the fact that he started city year) and Capuano (strong progressive).

But even when there isn’t someone that I actually like, it doesn’t change my attitude. I’ll pick the most progressive Dem, and vote for him or her. And if they don’t give me anything to work for, they get my vote, but not my time or money.

Hardly hellish.

There is some potential upside to a Coakley victory, but the corresponding downside in my view makes heroic efforts to elect her a relatively poor use of limited resources.

The downside is this. For HCR, we had 60 in the caucus, which yielded a badly watered-down result. We would have needed 63 or 64 in the caucus to pass true reform.

Democrats will almost certainly not win 63 or 64 Senate seats in our voting lives.

Or again: if we leave out Lieberman, and exclude the MA seat from consideration, we now have 58 votes (57 Dems + Bernie). Electing Coakley would put us back at 59. At 58 (!) of 100 votes in the Senate, government is deadlocked; at 59, government is possible — in the form of Lieberman ruling by decree.

Now think about the future of the governance of the nation. A caucus which is even a single vote smaller than what we have now would be crippled by Republican filibusters. The Dems’ plan going forward, then, is to rely on having a caucus large enough to win cloture votes — which, having reached this current high-water mark, it now just barely is — and to keep the caucus that large consistently.

It’s a forlorn hope. I’m a middle-aged man, and the caucus is larger than it has been at any time in my voting life. Also, we’re forecast to lose this working supermajority in this fall’s elections.

What this means is that our situation is hopeless. So long as the Senate operates under the current rules, passing a progressive agenda requires an impossibly large caucus. Governing at all, however poorly, requires an extraordinarily large caucus, as in the current rare and likely short-lived instance. Otherwise the government is, for all progressive purposes, broken and useless.

The upside of electing Coakley is that we will be able to limp along for a few more months, perhaps passing further watered-down reforms. This is not nothing.

The downside is that it delays the day of reckoning, when a simple majority of the Senate exercises its power to return the body to majority rule. It can do so at the start of a new Congress (or at any time, using the “nuclear option”).

If Coakley wins, the insanity and dysfunction of the Senate is papered over until the next Congress, when the Dems lose their working supermajority and all hell breaks loose.

If Coakley loses, all hell breaks loose right away, putting pressure on the Senate to change its rules when the new Congress is sworn in.

Once majority rule returns to the Senate, we will not need 59 Democrats just to govern poorly; we could pass a progressive agenda with a caucus of 55 or so. We would be off of the insane treadmill in which we are currently spinning.