The campaign moves on to Oregon, to the Pacific, to the West. The symbolism of having it end in Oregon is huge.

Let me count the ways. It took around five months (just like the primaries) for a family to complete the 2000 mile trail (Independence, to Oregon City). Stragglers took six or seven months (but most made it, come on Hillary & Co.)

And what was it like?

Exhausting, boring, dangerous, frightening, and exciting...

Boredom came from the daily routine of breaking camp, walking, making camp again in the evening, and eating the same thing day after day, all in the midst of a cloud of dust and grit thrown up by the wagons and animals.

Sound familiar, then read on becuase lives depend on it ...

In our leaders we are looking for something singular.
 An ability to see things we cannot see
 An ability to do things we cannot do

So I’m looking for examples of Strategic Brilliance fore each candidate.
Not just good ideas, they litter the ground in forums like these
Not just tactical brilliance, like Roves "attack an opponents strength"  
Something that transcends the issue, that cleaves the Gordian knot.

Some examples after the break ...

In other primaries, the candidates have spent time addressing the particular concerns of each constituency; NAFTA in Ohio, immigration in Texas, corn in Iowa.

So if there was to be a super delegates primary what are the key issues for that group? I would love to hear Clinton and Obama talk to the party insiders on the topics close to the insider's hearts.

Those topics might just be different slants e.g. not health care, but how health care gets passed. My bet however is for topics not on voters top three lists e.g. lobbing reform and winning the house and senate. I would love to here open debate on those aimed at political insiders. I think this would make for a great phase of the debate.

There doesn’t have to be an "official" primary for that to happen. One campaign just has to show up in Washington for a few days and campaign openly for their votes on the issues. I’d actually enjoy that.

Time, topics and a poll after the break.

slightly modified from the orginal with thanks to Robert Frost.

Two roads diverged in a Californian wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
With just one vote, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having I believe the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference

for all fellow walkers on the road less traveled.
it does make a difference.

An interesting and moving article in the UK Guardian on Obama and Jessie Jackson, complete with a quote from Marx.

Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under given circumstances directly encountered and inherited from the past

The article starts with Jackson describing his campaign experience in 1988.

In Wisconsin, a state with a black population of just 2%, white people were handing him their babies to kiss. "Look, something is happening up here," he told one of his aides. "And I'm not quite sure what it is. But this outpouring of affection wherever I go, it's for real. It's real, I'm telling you, it's there. I know when it's there."

You don't have to agree with everything it says to see a connection. The babies that Jessie Jackson kissed 20 years ago: shit me not, they are going to the polls.

    Perhaps the day has come.

Once asked about advancing world peace, the Dalai Lama first responded by asking

"What is world peace?" and answered himself, "It is the total sum of all the peace in the hearts of all the people in the world. That is world peace"

So there is something I can do today to truly, specifically and personally advance world peace: it is to be peaceful. To set aside as much as I am able ill will; to not argue with my partner, but to do as she requests.

Certainly there are other ways to advance world peace, but for me there is no greater memorial to death by violence, that a day of peace. And no greater way to contribute to a day of peace, than by being peaceful.

It may not be easy: irritation, frustration, impatience all arise unbidden. But for the lives of a million dead, I vow to set my heart and mind to the task.

             May we be at peace.

As we despair, rage or re-gird I found inspiration in these words form Mountains beyond Mountains, and book by Tracy Kidder about Paul Farmer. Paul has spent his life fighting for healthcare for the poor from Haiti to the gulags of Russia.

Paul says

... How about if I say, I have fought for my whole life a long defeat. How about that? How about if I said, "That’s all it adds up to is defeat? A long defeat."

I have fought the long defeat and brought other people on to fight the long defeat, and I’m not going to stop because we keep losing. Now I actually think sometimes we may win. I don’t dislike victory. . . . You know, people from our background - like you, like me - we’re used to being on a victory team, and actually what we’re really trying to do in [Partners in Health] is to make common cause with the losers. Those are two very different things. We want to be on the winning team, but at the risk of turning our backs on the losers, no, it’s not worth it. So you fight the long defeat

Now we know where the famous "undisclosed location" is - and it explains much. VP Cheney has been holed up in a bunker deep in Denial.

Actually the northern mountains of Denial are riddled with such bunkers: dark, dank, disconnected places where literally thousands of reality's refugees try to hide.

The few passes into and out of Denial are often blocked by makeshift barriers or concrete walls put up by the residents, who are renown in the neighboring states for their wall building fervor.

Lots going on, all round the country. Who’s going to actually make it happen? Who’s actually going to get us out of Iraq and get us decent healthcare?

Who is our Strongest Team?

The Senate:  Harry, Jim, Ted, Patrick and Co.
The House:  Nancy, Charlie, John, Henry and Co.
The Governors:  Eliot, Brian, Deval, Ted and Co.
The Pres Candidates:  Hillary, Barack, John, Bill & Co.
The Orgs:  Kos, Move On, the Democratic Party, Drinking Liberally and Co.

poll and more after the jump ...

Nobody believes Bush/Condi/Snow any more.
Most believe that politions add a partisan spin to their statements.
The media are failing as watchdogs
Yet the America people need the facts on Iraq, reliably delivered.

So I propose a Webb-Warner “Unofficial Office of Iraq Facts”
                  (yeah, I'd love a better name too, thanks)

Acting in concert, they take on the role of public communicators, sidelining the Executive branch, who are on probation till they stop lying for at least 14 consecutive days. They don’t have to agree on everything, just communicate together.  

I liked Nancy Pelosi's recent comment on impeachment - it would be a circus and would let the Republican congress of the hook. So what's our framework then? Investigation is too open-ended for me. I like probation. We are putting the Executive branch on probation over their serial failures in Iraq.

The definition of probation.

- A trial period during which your character and abilities are tested to see whether you are suitable for work or for membership
- A trial period during which an offender has time to redeem himself or herself
- A way of dealing with offenders without imprisoning them.

A course of action and poll after the jump.

According to Red Herring it looks like the Telecom Bill is dead, with net neutrality being the victor.

US Telecom Bill Is DOA. Net neutrality kills long-overdue legislation, as new Internet lobby force rises on Capitol Hill.

Thanks are due to to Ron Wyden

Supporters of the bill will need 60 votes in the full Senate to defeat a "hold" placed on the bill by Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), a Net neutrality supporter of the bill.

And thanks to ... us

The Internet is the new lobbying force in Washington, D.C. Despite losing all of the battles for network neutrality safeguards in both the Senate and House of Representatives, the Net neutrality forces, assembled primarily on the web, seem to have won the war, for now.

The take away - never give up. The minority party can have it's say. And Oregonians, don't forget to send Ron some love

Cheers

Let us call the engineers and designers and auditors of this country to service.
Lets us pour our skills and passion into the foundation of our democracy

If we can have a competition for the freedom tower we can for a new e-voting system. (Nominate you competition judges now.) It would have open-source software and auditable archives. Let the hardware be built - at cost - by someone like Apple. Someone who understands everyday users. Let's have public usability testing; any team can test it and retest and publish results whenever they want. Let the voting interface be as familiar as Quicken. Let us Google the results ourselves.

There are people all over the USA who have the neccesary skills and pride in their work, who understand the concept of open systems. Let us call them to service.
  -    Let the best design and human factors team serve
  -    Let the best software engineers serve
  -    Let the best hardware designers serve
  -    Let the best training companies serve
  -    Let the best archiving and auditing companies serve.

Besides Iraq - that all-rending, violent, bloody hell - let's campaign on Bush's Twin Poisons. Crony capitalism and fanatical government are deliberate Bush philosophies and are slowly rotting the nation.

They have done enough damage to private companies and public institutions that Average Joe can smell the rot. Even traditional conservatives are holding their noses. It's not just incompetence that got us here, its a deliberate poisoning of national infrastructure.

Examine the roots of Katrina, Enron, Terry Schiavo, Jack Abramoff and Tom Delay, Iraq Reconstruction and you will see the rotten puss-filled symptoms of crony capitalism and fanatical government. However, just because something true and devastating our nation - can we campaign and win on this? I say yes, see my reasoning after the jump.