possibly one for every congressional district in certain politically important states

Might I suggest a few extra in Connecticut?

This is what is needed, coordinated movement to get things done. Republicans have steamrolled Dems for years in this same way. The problems in America are too deep to be addressed in the traditional way. Look at the CW forming already, "Obama has to move to the middle" and "He should give republicans a say" as if we say anything like that the last 8 years. Time to Rock them 'Bamas!

Well, now we know what's happening to the 50 State Strategy. Another way to read this is that Obama is going to co-opt all on the left he can, and marginalize the rest. The message seems to be that Progressive equals Obama, even when Obama doesn't equal Progressive. Put this together with the earlier story on his dinner with Will, Kristol, Brooks and Krauthammer (where was Grover Norquist?) and it starts to look a little creepy. I don't remember any of those guys at the rallies.

If this huge organization manages to take back the Congress even slightly from the special interests who own it now, and reverses the drift towards fascism, it will have achieved a miracle and rewritten the political handbooks.

The strategy sounds great. But let's see what it produces.

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Obama's strategy is a great idea for Americans to continue contacting their representatives and senators and be HEARD. Every American can be heard. Not just in an election year.Perhaps this will help the politicans to remember it's Americans who vote them to office.

ericfree: Another way to read this is that Obama is going to co-opt all on the left he can, and marginalize the rest.

Well, yes--if you're looking to continue your pattern of often flatly untruthful hysterics about the DNC rather than to get something significant done as Democrats, which was, to those paying attention, the whole point of the 50-state strategy. But why worry about tangential stuff like passing health care reform when you can use that time and energy to keep fretting about imaginary slights against you?

Well, this may be what is being imagined from the top, but my local Obama grass-roots spin-off group has been meeting on our own since the election, and we imagine ourselves to be a bit more independent than what has been described. Yes, we'll do some of that, but we have our own agenda, and the flow of energy may be in the *other* direction!

Perfect! Spineless congressional and house dems need their collective ass kicked. For the people- we'll show you for the people.

shortstop: I notice you're never around except to post ad hominem attacks against others. Aren't you capable of discussing issues, or do they not interest you? Are you shilling for David Plouffe or Grover Norquist, or is it all about you?

I've had doubts about Obama for over a year, ever since he said he wanted to "go beyond" the partisan struggles of the Sixties and Seventies, and had such kind words for Ronald Reagan in the Richmond (Cradle of the Confederacy) Times-Dispatch. Not having been through it, he may not realize that one side, the one favoring civil rights and peace, was right, and the other, representing American exceptionalism, warmongering, the Klan and murder of its opponents, was wrong. We can get beyond that only if one side admits its crimes and changes; otherwise, they'll just keep on. Currently, my hope is in people like Varecia, who, like me, worked for Obama (in my case, for the country, and in spite of my misgivings) but keeps his/her independence. I respect any group who doesn't ask me to check my brain at the door.

But I realize all of this is just a little too intellectual, and not enough about you. What's your problem? Compensating for something? Whatever it is, there must be a 12-Step group willing to listen to the tragic details of your fascinating life. I'm not. Knock it off.

This explains why my invite to the inauguration contained yet another plea for money.

"Republicans sound kind of jealous."

Well, they do still have the churches, don't they? /snark

Ericfree: the strategy you propose (unite with the Democrats for the election, but stay independent of them and criticize them from the left for 3+ years out of the four year cycle) was the strategy implemented by the CPUSA and other leftists for decades. The results were that it neither pushed the Democrats to the left, nor did it build an independent leftwing force of any power. Mostly it retarded the progressive movement and contributed to rightwing dominance. It discouraged grass roots progressives from building a grass roots Democratic party, and allowed the official Democratic party and office-holders to become free-floating Washington insiders beholden to corporate interests. It was a strategy that was based on a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now is the time to concentrate on splitting the Right, not splitting the Left.
The right is crumbling right now. Obama meeting conservative columnists for dinner is a sign of their disarray, and their media stars co-optation. If the liberal media leaders ate with Bush, people would think it showed Bush's strength. If the right's media stars eat with Obama, does is still show the left's weakness?

Are you shilling for David Plouffe or Grover Norquist, or is it all about you?

shortstop traveled from her own town to knock on doors for Obama in my adopted city of Indianapolis.

If that's "shilling for Grover Norquist," I'm Groucho Marx.

Jackass.

We can get beyond that only if one side admits its crimes and changes

I disagree. The modern conservative / neo-Confederate movement will never admit its crimes -- about the past eight years of this criminal, and criminally incompetent, Administration, let alone about civil rights and McCarthism. Redefining reality and rewriting history is what they're all about, in case you haven't been paying attention.

But as Steve Benen points out, we don't need the Republicans to admit they're wrong; demographic trends, to say nothing of the manifest failure of their policies and bankrupt philosophy, is rapidly rendering them irrelevant.

And their very failure to admit their wrongness is going to guarantee that irrelevance, alienanting young voters in their desperation to appeal to a shrinking minority of southern white males.

So let them refuse to admit their crimes and changes. I'll gladly exchange the satisfaction of an "I told you so" moment for the schadenfreude of seeing the modern Republican Party reduced to the impotence of Mark Foley and Larry Craig at an all-girl slumber party.

Rather than antagonize Democratic congresscritters (CC) who might be inclined to oppose some of Obama's policy due to the makeup of their districts, this organization can work to change the attitudes of the districts. That would help make the CC feel a lot better about doing what they should be doing anyhow. Another function it could serve is to push Obama's policies in the direction they should go, such as initiating prosecutions for crimes committed during the last eight years. For some reason the DOJ comes to mind.

Gregory, it is most definitely true that the neo-Confederates will never admit their crimes, but it is adequate that everyone else admit that those crimes were committed and do whatever is necessary to make up for them. Remember that the Nazis never admitted they had done anything wrong during WWII, but afterwards Germany as a whole tried to compensate for what they'd done. We need to do the same.

Thanks, Tom in Ma and Gregory (second post), for the great feedback. Tom, I agree, but there are several differences. For CPUSA, which demanded conformity, the line "I respect any group that doesn't ask me to check my brain at the door" applies; conformity, combativeness and, particularly, an adherence to Stalinism were their historic mistakes. That's why I favor dealing with issues over personality, with respect for those, like Dean, Edwards and Dodd, who are best on the issues. As you say, nonMarxist progressives, attacked from both sides, were both discouraged and then marginalized along with the loons.

But that's one of the fears I have about Obama: that he wants to mold a centrist or even nonpolitical charismatic group answerable only to hiim, ignoring those who've worked for change since before he was on the scene and concentrating on deals rather than change, reinventing the same Democratic Party we've come to know and wretch at. As Gregory points out, we don't need the right and our best strategy is to keep fighting them until they're down to Norquist size. So why is Obama treating them better than those to his left? My hope is for the very sort of grassroots organization Tom mentions, aligned with the Democrats but as intellectually independent as necessary. I think we're going to need it just to keep them honest.

And as for shortstop, how would I know who this is? All I've ever heard from him/her is attack, which functions only as a comment on the intellectual/emotional state of the attacker. With all respect, I return the "jackass" compliment to its originator, and the one whom he/she defends.

and had such kind words for Ronald Reagan in the Richmond (Cradle of the Confederacy) Times-Dispatch.

ericfree, quite simply, anyone who continues to characterize what Obama actually said about Reagan as "kind words"--and beyond that, anyone who is as consistent in shamelessly manipulating actual events and statements for his own ends as you are here--doesn't have a lot of credit in the bank when accusing others of ad hominem attacks. When you consistently exaggerate, you get called an exaggerator; when you lie, people are going to point out that you're lying, your attempts to move the goalposts notwithstanding.

There are plenty of people here and elsewhere who make reasoned and fully supported criticisms of Obama's actions. You're not one of them.

Now is the time to concentrate on splitting the Right, not splitting the Left. The right is crumbling right now.

A nice point in an excellent post.

it is most definitely true that the neo-Confederates will never admit their crimes, but it is adequate that everyone else admit that those crimes were committed and do whatever is necessary to make up for them

And we can do that without the Republicans admitting their faults -- which we probably agree will never happen anyway -- simply by leaving them and their loathsome Confederacy-Gilded Age-Randian philosophy behind on the garbage heap of history.

it is most definitely true that the neo-Confederates will never admit their crimes, but it is adequate that everyone else admit that those crimes were committed and do whatever is necessary to make up for them

And we can do that without the Republicans admitting their faults -- which we probably agree will never happen anyway -- simply by leaving them and their loathsome Confederacy-Gilded Age-Randian philosophy behind on the garbage heap of history.

And as for shortstop, how would I know who this is? All I've ever heard from him/her is attack

shortstop is a long-time commentator, and if all you've ever heard from her is attack, it says a lot more about your ignorance that it does about her. Implying she's a right winger, though, marks you as a fool who doesn't know what he or she is talking about.

which functions only as a comment on the intellectual/emotional state of the attacker

Or a comment that the argument or individual being attacked isn't worthy of anything but contemptuous dismissal.

What of it? Not to speak for shortstop -- who more than capably defends herself -- but she is not one to suffer fools of any political persuasion gladly, and neither am I.

Speaking of which, I never said we don't need the right -- I said we don't need the right to admit their faults. To the contrary, we progressives do need reasonable conservatives in the interests of checks and balances, to curb excesses, as the Founders intended. Currently, we don't have many reasonable conservatives, unless you count most Democratic Congresscritters.

By the way, the Nazis didn't admit they were wrong, but their wrongness was proven after their ultimate defeat, will-they or nil-they. So should it be with the modern conservative movement.

Another way to read this is that Obama is going to co-opt all on the left he can, and marginalize the rest. The message seems to be that Progressive equals Obama, even when Obama doesn't equal Progressive.

Please give it a rest. When the far left has enough people to win an election we'll talk. For now, get realistic. Coopting of various groups is called "politics." You can look it up.

We are rogered roundly and reversing course is not going to happen overnight. It has to be incremental if for no other reason than the social chaos that would result from radical change. (See China, Cultural Revolution. No thanks.)

I am more interested in making progress and getting something done as a Democrat than I am in pitching a fit over the things that I wish were being done differently. They guy hasn't fucked up yet. You think he's suddenly going to lose his mind? Please.

I doubt that Obama's grass roots machine would have gotten as far and as fast as it did without Howard Dean's trail blazing campaign in 2004. Dean was the first one to give me hope, which was promptly dashed by the Party Pols when they tapped John Kerry instead of Dean.

Obama praised Reagan as one who "changed America," in ways Carter and Clinton were unable to do. If he'd said Reagan damaged
America so seriously we may never recover, it would have been an accurate, courageous statement. Saying what he did, in an area that's still full of CSA flagwavers, was a lot too much like pandering. So is hanging out with Charles Krauthammer while he snubs Howard Dean. Obama won against a weak candidate and an even weaker previous administration, and if he thinks he doesn't need all the support he can get, he's wrong. But, as I keep saying, we'll see. So far what I've seen hasn't reassured me. In the meantime, there's a website allied with Democrats.com called Change.org which is dealing with all the questions Change.gov, Obama's site, ignores.

And if shortstop, your "longtime commentator," who must have taken a longtime vacation or been so missable I never noticed her, has always shown the same sort of intelligence and emotional reason she's displayed in the last few days, I know who I'll be ignoring. Any relation to AKA Smith, Joan Walsh's attack dog?

Corrected for accuracy: Obama [called] Reagan...one who "changed America," in ways Carter and Clinton were unable to do.

Guy. This is a fact, an objectively true statement. Do you understand the difference between a factual statement and a moral judgment? (Just kidding, pal; we know you don't.) Now you may feel, as I do, that that kind of statement was open to misinterpretation and thus ill considered. Or you can keep mischaracterizing it because a) you're not honest or b) you truly don't have the ability to understand what you read.

Implying she's a right winger, though, marks you as a fool who doesn't know what he or she is talking about.

Hell, I don't mind; it's not the worst thing I've been called--wait, come to think of it, is is, but I still don't mind. No, the totally revealing part of that statement was ericfree assigning equivalence to David Plouffe and Grover Norquist. What do you do with someone whose perspective is that far off? Nothing. You go about the business of governing and leave him to his "intellectual" soliloquies.

This explains why my invite to the inauguration contained yet another plea for money. -- John Petty, @11:12

As did my -- today's -- "official goodbye" from Dean, who asks that we stop kvetchin' and keep on pushin'. Behind Obama and Kaine. Oh, and he promises he ain't goin' anywhere and will be right there, with them. And us.

To the apparently altitudinally, and certainly attitudinally, challenged shortstop: Your "correction for accuracy" was to change my adjective "praised" to "called," substituting your take for mine and terming it accurate. I don't mind your viewing it differently; I do mind your failure to allow me my own characterization. Sounded like praise then, does now even more.

But quoting someone else's description of you as if if I had said it? (Or whatever it was -- don't feel like being argued with again, but it makes no syntactical sense, although I guess it made you feel good) Please. For someone who's so quick to challenge the honesty of others... well. You know.

I guess we can assume by now that you're not shilling for Grover Norquist, at least not directly. As for Plouffe, met him, didn't like or trust him much. Not crazy about Obama, either. He strikes me as arrogant and a little too superior to the common person to really be in touch with what's good for America. But he's what we've got, and he's smart enough to be capable of growth, if he has the character for it.

The difference between me, you and your friends, however, is that I don't mind being wrong. In fact, I hope I am; it just doesn't appear to be working out that way. And for Howard, that's just what I expected him to say. Classy guy. I'll wait for what Jim and he say next. Keep reading.