And linking to Bush’s bio make your case how? See, this would be the part where you mistakenly assume that all conservatives slavishly worship and adore Bush and everything he says and does. Thanks for proving my point.

Quit pining for the mythical pony nominee that’s never coming.

In other words, we don’t care that you don’t like, respect or agree with him/her, shut up and support the candidate that your party betters have deigned to shove down your throat.

I’m sure you would still feel the exact same way if Clinton was the Dem nominee.

As far as I know, Hoffman’s work in those movies had no effect on my privacy and didn’t do anything to help criminals violate the Constitution.

And this idea – on both sides – that somehow the nominees don’t reflect the people is the biggest load of bull. Both sides had big turnout in the nomination process, and on the Democratic side unprecedented turnout and a long and brutal nomination. Quit pining for the mythical pony nominee that’s never coming.

Sean D. Martin: Word. Even if he still has my vote, he’s lost my cash and a significant amount of my willingness to campaign for him.

Welcome to the world of conservatives (I mean the real one, not the mythical one full of evil, stupid, racist, warmongering, Dobson-following Bushbots that Oliver so loves to characterize). Why do you think that McCain is having so much trouble getting support from the conservative base?

Sure would be nice if the respective parties could offer up candidates who truly represented change and a new wave in politics, rather than the usual politicians more interested in saying and doing anything they need to garner votes rather than sticking to their positions and principles.

Word. Even if he still has my vote, he’s lost my cash and a significant amount of my willingness to campaign for him.

Neither have I. But, then, I’ve always voted for someone I wanted in office. I’ve never voted for a lesser evil.

That may not necessarily be true.

Yet, it’d be good to look at the practical implications of when you vote, rather than just “party purity”. I’ve never felt guilty from votes I’ve made.

The defense issue has been shifting to the Democrats side with more people thinking the Dems are better at national security than Repubs.

Not only that, but the ability and willingness to make that argument was supposed to be one of the main things that made Obama a better candidate than Clinton! Certainly it was one of the biggest reasons why I supported him (second only to seeing the necessity of cleansing the party of the Clinton mafia.)

I am getting so tired of being told that I have to vote for the guy who doesn’t stand up for what he claims to stand for because at least he’s better than the other guy.

I’m getting so tired of being told that I can’t complain about a candidate because it plays into getting his opponent elected.

I’m getting so tired of being told that I have to wait until someone is in office before criticizing them as if they will suddenly become more of what they claimed to be AFTER elected despite history showing the exact opposite to be the case.

As noted by others, voting for this version of the FISA bill is just plain stupid. It isn’t popular, it isn’t right, there is no upside to the Democrats for voting for it and significant upside can be made of their voting against it.

Can anyone give me one legitimate reason why Democrats voting FOR this bill makes real sense? So they won’t look weak on defense? I call BS. The defense issue has been shifting to the Democrats side with more people thinking the Dems are better at national security than Repubs. They aren’t going to maintain that by adopting the Rebup view and looking like a bunch of capitulating spineless liars yet again.

And I think the money is better spent on ActBlue anyway- theirs is the kind of effort we need to get a Congress that will stop pulling this kind of shit, and without which even the most progressive President can accomplish very little.

What we cannot do is just sit back and accept that this is the best we can ever expect from the party.

Well good. You’ve got a pragmatist in there after all. Do you think ‘protest votes’ for candidates that have no shot also feed that ‘rightward ratchet’ you spoke of earlier? I agree that when only two people have a chance, that’s a crap system, but there has to be a better way to change it than giving one’s vote away. It seems to me that in the past, the only American third parties of any relevance have been when somebody who was already a major player split off to form a third. They don’t really seem to grow that well from the bottom up.

It’s also irrelevant because he HAS my vote, sadly on the usual “least worst” grounds (same as with Gore). And whoever still wants to give him money, knock yourself out. But I have very right to withhold mine and I will do so.

I can’t help but fall in with Alterman on this one.

By the way, this was also really dumb politics. No polls show the public clamoring for this nonsense. Pelosi and Hoyer asininely split their own caucus (a majority of which voted no) to hand the Rethugs everything they wanted in their wettest dreams. Obama would not be diminishing his prospects by doing the right thing, quite the contrary. That’s exactly what makes this so inexplicable and offensive.