“A few days ago I was at a dinner party of Seattle liberals – people who usually sing in tedious harmony on every issue from Iraq to the crying need for universal healthcare – when a small war broke out at the top of the table.

Recounting a conversation with a friend, a white woman said that, after so many decades of the struggle for women's rights, it was disheartening and unfair that Hillary Clinton's historic candidacy was in danger of being derailed by that of the first-term junior senator from Illinois.

As she spoke, I saw her neighbour, a retired black professor, staring grimly at his plate. Face averted from her, still looking down, he said: “Anyone – anyone – who equates the situation of women in this country with the struggle for civil rights by blacks is talking bullshit.” That was an utterly unexpected word from him – a man of graceful and formal manners – and the shock of it reverberated down the table.

I wondered how many leftish-leaning dinner parties across America were at that moment fracturing, like this one, along the lines of race and gender, not to mention the lesser ones of age and class. …”

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentato…

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/10/opinion/10dou…

Where are the spending reductions? Not merely reductions in growth, but absolute reductions?

“The villagers, the established bureaucracy, the legislators, and the NGO's will all work to protect their positions.”

Don't forget who likes McCain — the business community, who wants to protect the flow of immigrants into the USA to keep labor costs low. I'm sure they'll be happy on immigration with either Dem candidate, though taxes and regulation will annoy to alarm them as much as it would Americans in general.

Your immigrant-driven doomsday scenario, SD, will take longer to materialize than you currently expect.

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/729/united-states-p…

Meanwhile, Calderon is visiting from Mexico and what does he want? “a wider vision and a peaceful, objective analysis, less emotional and more rational about the phenomenon of immigration” … “bridges of cooperation and understanding instead of building walls”

In other words, he wants more lax US immigration controls, more income heading to Mexico (some of which no doubt will be redirected to Mexican government officials), and a bigger, better safety valve for Mexico. Will our next President move in this direction?

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/730/young-voters

Yes, they are — many of them are just starry-eyed, naive idealists (and groupies).

There won't be much change (much less greater government interventionism and activism, what grown-up Americans reject wholeheartedly), not as much as they imagine. And no, we don't have faith in a bunch of “Whiz Kids” following Obama to Washington.

However, if we do get Obama in the White House, there is at least potential for that “shake-up” at least of personnel, if not of much policy, and that is welcome.

Change, or at least a departure from business as usual, is sought. Don't forget also that even Clinton supporters want to see a Democrat in the White House. While so much of the record Dem turnout in elections is obviously due to the Obama phenomenon (and look at the crowd in the photo Shaun posted to begin this thread), don't neglect the Clinton supporters. I've checked current truly-conservative sentiment about McCain and the GOP's chances in November lately by viewing Town Hall, the conservative site (fortunately, not had to field much garbage on this liberal site about such a thing), and those who have had the stomach to view the reader remarks there will have noted an occasional warning posted by readers, that everywhere, Demoratic voter turnout has been enormous. This looks to be a massive Democratic vote-wave this November, by all observations to date.

As long as the government has trillions of dollars and 100,000 of pages of regulations, the culture of Washington, DC will remain the same. As an Obama Administration tries to nationalize healthcare (single payer healthcare) and starts a national industrial policy (greenhouse gas regulations) the problems in DC will get worse instead of get better.

Specifically,

The idea of raising taxes by 400 billion per year to balance the budget when have huge negative effects on some aspects of the population.

The idea of a the “a permanent political majority” will create a huge amount of corruption. If the political process is cut off to most Americans, they will resort to corruption.

The idea of letting Ivy League trained lawyers run ever aspect of our lives (except drugs and sex) is very Orwellian and will not do anything but make the DC more powerful, more intrusive, and more insider based.

Obama will need to prioritize the needed changes. Our fiscal problems are enormous and if he can balance the budget sometime in the next 4 years that will not only be a great start but probably all that can be accomplished. On the political front, he must try to establish a permanent political majority so that change and gains are not reversed in the next election cycle. I think redistricting reform is an essential place to start. Incombant protection is killing the vibrancy of our democracy.

In short, I am an Obama supporter who recognizes the limitations of what he can accomplish and have counseled fellow supporters to be realistic – it's a couple of decades process we are about to embark on.

However if the Democrats don't close in on 60 votes in the Senate then all of the best laid plans and hopes of Obama may evaporate.

Obama will be sworn in half way through the FY09 fiscal year. It will take him a couple of months to fill all of the political appointment positions. Thus, no getting out of Iraq in 60 days or starting any major policy decisions for several more months. He will also likely step on at least one political land mine (such as Clinton did with homosexuals in the military).

The villagers, the established bureaucracy, the legislators, and the NGO's will all work to protect their positions. Also, Obama will have to translate his vague, generic positions into actual policy positions and will immediately lose the support of people who have misinterpreted what he said on the campaign trail.

All correct.

These are the insiders whom Atrios derisively calls the Villagers. They are the permanent, self aggrandizing inside the beltway clique for whom change, except for the abstraction of a stump speech or television commercial

Would I be correct in assuming that the antecedent to “the insiders” is “the media bigshots, consultants and other camp followers”? That's the way it makes the most sense although one might assume that the referent was to the nearer clause, i.e. “Obama’s army of bright-eyed idealists”, which makes little sense.

I think you need to add one more group to “the villagers”: the career Congressmen, elected for life by virtue of the phenomenon of safe seats.

These are the people who bid fair actually to decide who the candidate will be. I continue to think that Obama will need to take some big states e.g. Ohio or Pennsylvania by substantial margins in order to gain their support. Otherwise I think they're more likely to stay with the devil they know. And fear.