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I believe the game has changed.

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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 09:47 PM
Original message
I believe the game has changed.
I believe that after a series of elections stolen in various ways, resulting in a small group of incredibly frustrated, angry, but very determined people (present company included first and foremost), today's action by the Obama campaign requesting that the special prosecutor for the U.S. Attorneys scandal include the GOP's co-ordinated effort to whip up a "voter fraud" scandal regarding Acorn indicates that the terrain has changed.

Obama and his exemplary campaign aren't the battered spouse. They aren't going to shrink from complaining about illegal activities because they don't want to be called whiners, wimps, or sore losers.

In fact, instead of being susceptible to that kind of bullying, they're playing offense, and a strong offense that goes right to the weak (even rotten) parts of the GOP power structure, and reveals the ultimate failure of the real Bush Doctrine, that "political might makes right":

The foundation of the American legal and Constitutional structure, while it can be subverted and bent to ill purposes for a period of time, survives beyond the reign of any person or group, and has consequences.

Obama and his campaign understand that those structures, and their consequences, are on their side. And that an offense based on the Constitution and the foundations of American democracy is a strong one, strong enough even to turn back the institutionalized election fraud we've seen over the last eight years.


One worthy of America, at its best.
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melody Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 09:50 PM
Response to Original message
1. Excellent post, thanks for making it n/t
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glitch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 09:55 PM
Response to Original message
2. K & R most excellent post. I suspect, hope and pray you are correct! nt
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:02 PM
Response to Reply #2
4. glitch, we're beyond suspecting, hoping, and praying.
We're even beyond just believing.

We can see it. There's a new sheriff in town, thanks to citizens like us.

:thumbsup:
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glitch Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:13 PM
Response to Reply #4
5. God it's been a long 8 years! Make it so... :) nt
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texpatriot2004 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 09:58 PM
Response to Original message
3. Well said Bleever. I agree. I believe. nm
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:15 PM
Response to Reply #3
6. Just think, texpat, of how much powder has been kept dry,
out of acceding to the "national consensus", and not challenging bogus SCOTUS pronouncements, or systematic partisan violations of election law.

The GOP is sitting on a huge pile of flammable, criminal timber. McCain just brandished his lighter, and Obama was ready and waiting for it.

:hi:
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texpatriot2004 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 10:09 PM
Response to Reply #6
23. That's alot of dry powder Bleever. It took me awhile to think
about my reply to this. I haven't thought of anything remarkable or extraordinary to say. I do think it speaks very highly of many Americans, especially Democrats who someone managed not to ignite the powder given all the heinous and criminal actions of the cabal that will, God willing, soon be out on their collective bottoms. It really is ironic that the GOP are screaming about fraud in regards to this election. I know that their grievance is technically "voter fraud" but after the election fraud and voter suppression that they have committed...they have some nerve! As you stated, they are sitting on a huge pile of flammable, criminal timber. Do they really want to go there? Bring it on.

I am grateful that Obama is awake and aware and being proactive about this issue.

What was that quote, "the wheels of the gods grind slowly but they grind exceedingly fine." Who said that?
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Oct-19-08 12:20 AM
Response to Reply #23
32. Every little theft they do is tragic,
Every little grift just brings it on.


American democracy is fundamentally about providing a fulcrum, whereby the exercise of raw power will ultimately be judged in balance with the activity of a population conscious of their inalienable rights, and willing and motivated to make sure those rights persist for themselves and the generations to come.

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Gregorian Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:31 PM
Response to Original message
7. Yes. I believe Obama's alternative cultural composition plays a role.
I hope that doesn't come across wrong.

I strongly believe that the fact that Obama was raised on the other side of the tracks, forgive me, has given him something the other politicians simply do not have.

I don't know how to state this in terms that aren't offensive.

He's Harvard educated, and he's an African American.

And what you said. This cycle is over.

Recall Bush...oh, never mind. Don't recall Bush. I was just going to point out that Obama has common sense, and knows how to use it.
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:39 PM
Response to Reply #7
9. You are correct, sir.
America is, when you look at it, a crazy kaleidoscope of cultures and peoples, going back to before the Europeans even got here.

In our day and age, Obama comes from too many parts of our national spectrum to be easily separated into a "them" that "we" should be afraid of. They've been trying pretty hard, but it can't stick, because he has family that is black and that is white, he grew up sometimes being fed thanks to food stamps but has also become well-off because the books he wrote sold so well, and he's known Kansas and the south side of Chicago, with a little time at Harvard Law.

So you're talking about America's composition, and you make a great point.
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Beregond2 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:38 PM
Response to Original message
8. Obama's status as a constitutional scholar is a big factor here.
He sees how the system is being gamed, and he knows how to reveal and subvert that.
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 10:41 PM
Response to Reply #8
10. Yes.
"He sees how the system is being gamed, and he knows how to reveal and subvert that."

Very well put.
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Doodler71 Donating Member (263 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 08:47 PM
Response to Reply #8
20. Yes.
This is correct.

The notion that Obama is not a fighter or will not be "strong" is laughable. He is not going to look away. He will look the problem in the eye and say, "Let's fix it."

Unlike McSlime who can't look anyone in the eye and has the nervous laugh to cover his incompetence.
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Oct-19-08 12:15 AM
Response to Reply #20
31. Welcome to DU, Doodler71.
:hi:
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Doodler71 Donating Member (263 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Oct-19-08 12:52 PM
Response to Reply #31
33. thanks... I'm still learning the ropes. (nt)
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Lifelong Protester Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 11:09 PM
Response to Original message
11. I, for one, got a huge lift tonight when I heard about this
on KO. I am so happy to have an expert in Constitutional Law running for president, not a smarmy puppet being put up for office by a bunch of nefarious and evil backroom puppetmasters.

TRUTH TO POWER! TRUTH OVER FRAUD! SAY IT LOUD!

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chill_wind Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Oct-17-08 11:23 PM
Response to Original message
12. K & R n/t
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althecat Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 12:40 AM
Response to Original message
13. That is very good news
Hopefully it is evidence that the battered spouse syndrome that seems to have beset parts of the great democractic party is now well and truly on the wane.

I also look forward to a future when the rule of law starts to get a few runs on the board.

It has been a long time coming.

I beleive.

al
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 12:20 PM
Response to Reply #13
16. In the poisoned atmosphere of Atwater/Rove style governance,
all governing is campaigning, and all law exists to serve those who govern.

Hearing Robert Bauer spell out the Obama campaigns reaction to the FBI's involvement in the ACORN nonsense, it is very clear that they are rejecting the influence of the poisoners and planting their feet firmly in the law in a way that turns the poison against its purveyors.

:toast:
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machI Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 06:15 AM
Response to Original message
14. Kick
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felinetta Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 09:18 AM
Response to Original message
15. I feel like I have been in an abusive relationship with my govt
Right after Resident Bush took office, I was listening to him speak on my radio at night and as
I listened to his tone, it just popped into my head that I was in an abusive relationship
with my government. I told a lot of friends that and they said, yeah, that is exactly what it feels like. And of course over the years Repugs keep telling Democrats, that we need to "apologize" for whatever whiny complaint they have. I am sick of them trying to belittle us like spoiled brats. So I am very happy to see you write:

Obama and his exemplary campaign aren't the battered spouse. They aren't going to shrink from complaining about illegal activities because they don't want to be called whiners, wimps, or sore losers.

Thank goodness for Sen. Obama and Sen. Biden.
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Kurovski Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 05:04 PM
Response to Original message
17. I can't help but believe
that a constitutional lawyer's experience trumps that of a moose-hunting mayor.

I just can't help it.

K&R
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 05:24 PM
Response to Reply #17
18. Unless you want the Constitution field-dressed,
I must concur.

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Kurovski Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 05:31 PM
Response to Reply #18
19. It's already gutted.
But that's not the same thing, is it?
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bertman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 09:18 PM
Response to Original message
21. I agree with the part about Obama's campaign not being a battered spouse, but I think
a better analogy is to the battered spouse who is no longer putting up with the battering and has gone to the police just in time to find out that the police and her abuser are in cahoots, so she goes back home and gets beaten brain-dead by the abuser.

These challenges are WAAAYYY too late to do what needs to be done: stop the caging and invalidation of registrations that has ALREADY BEEN DONE to hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of voters and is still going on undetected. Neither does it alter the worst part of the equation which is the ownership and operation of the voting machines by hard-reich-wing Republicans who have already set the equipment up to steal votes in favor of the Republican candidates just like in 2000 and 2004.

I'm glad this makes y'all feel so good, but the failure of the Democratic party to deal with this BEFORE THE LAST MINUTE could be a fatal flaw for this election.

I hope I'm wrong, but the evidence is mounting that the Republicans have their machines (figurative and literal) in place and ready to deliver FOR THEM.


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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 10:29 PM
Response to Reply #21
24. Well I would not give you false hope,
and I appreciate the real concerns you mention.

But I do think that the move by the Obama campaign shows a deeper understanding of the complete process, down to the legal and Constitutional foundations, than your analogy implies.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I think Obama has taken this issue to a higher ground, where the shenanigans and crimes that have worked before are no longer a winning strategy.

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bertman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 11:38 PM
Response to Reply #24
27. How does understanding the "complete process" resolve this? I don't understand.
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 11:53 PM
Response to Reply #27
28. Because what's public now is how the law is applied.
Edited on Sat Oct-18-08 11:55 PM by bleever

Before, as exemplified by the U.S. Attorneys scandal, how the application of the law was determined was under the umbrella of "executive privilege", as applied so exhaustively by this administration.

Now, those legal questions have become part of the public discourse. And the "fundamentals" are strong for our side.

I may be wrong; it's happened before. But this is my sense of things.

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bertman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 11:59 PM
Response to Reply #28
30. Thanks, bleever. I'm still skeptical, but hope you're onto something solid.
GO OBAMA.

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Patsy Stone Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 09:41 PM
Response to Original message
22. K&R!
Here's to the Obama campaign, and believing! :toast:
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 10:30 PM
Response to Reply #22
25. I'll drink to that,
again.

:toast:
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Patsy Stone Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 11:29 PM
Response to Reply #25
26. This year, I'm going to vote on paper. :)
Edited on Sat Oct-18-08 11:36 PM by Patsy Stone
:toast:
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bleever Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Oct-18-08 11:56 PM
Response to Reply #26
29. It makes my red eyes blue.
:toast:
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FogerRox Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Oct-19-08 07:10 PM
Response to Original message
34. kickin, 'cause bleever is right
Best damn run campaign in a damn long time, proactive, with an understanding of timing, events etc.
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jagerbb Donating Member (8 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Oct-19-08 11:21 PM
Response to Original message
35. Ya'll are going to be sorry comment
Why was I told I was going to be sorry if Obama became President?

http://thejagergazette.blogspot.com/2008/10/yall-are-going-to-be-sorry.html
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