Thanks. I needed that.

The last few days I have fallen into a blog-funk. It's not easy trying to ally with those who now identify themselves as "Progressive." The perfectly good word Liberal has gone out of fashion, a passe throwback to the Cold War...and we all know the Cold War is over and we won.

Right.

The Russians are a bit jumpy about yet another installation of missiles near their borders and they don't buy the notion that they are strictly defensive. We're telling you, fellows, that the birds in your cherry tree are only eating worms. They aren't there to eat cherries. Ya'll are getting all jumpy over nothing....

But I digress.

A swelling tide of tadio talk show influence and a level of public indifference to serious problems almost got me down. The impact of Cindy Sheehan's tent folding and NPR's handling of Michael Moore (He had to smack them around a little...) had a subtle impact. Here are two links this morning before I'm off for work. Both gave me a lift just knowing that not all of us have thrown in the towel.

Cernig's collection of links from Monday are like a six-pack of cold beer on a hot afternoon. It gives me great satisfaction to read stuff like this...

And so we find ourselves now with an administration and a party that puts its own gain and its own power not just ahead of the good of the nation, but supplanting the good of the nation, so that this country is now nothing but a fiefdom for the corporatocracy, to be plundered by those who seek ever more power and ever more money -- even if it means taking the entire country down.

And yet, Americans are still more interested in who the next Top Chef will be, or how Paris Hilton is doing in jail, or whether Angelina is pregnant again than they are in the world in which their kids will live.

Sometimes I wonder why people with children don't seem more engaged in the process, and why they don't seem to care about the crimes that their government is committing against them and their children. Is it really just about being too busy holding two jobs and taking the kids to soccer practice or is it something more? Is it a willful ignorance because to acknowledge what's happening is to be obligated to do something about it? Isn't part of being a parent and protecting your children protecting their future from those who would destroy it in the name of self-enrichment and the amassing of power?

.
And finally, Deborah White's personal insights tell me that some of us are still out there doing the spadework and coming to terms with staying involved. Her recent contacts with the Clinton and Obama camps show a substantive difference in two approaches to campaigning that merits watching. I understand and appreciate both, but the part of me that is still young and idealistic leans toward Obama.

Read the whole piece to understand this conclusion.

I can enthusiastically support either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama in 2008. And truthfully, I haven't yet decided which Democrat I'll vote for in California's primary next February.

But this I can tell you: Barack Obama is taking a big gamble, relying on a youth-oriented grassroots movement to create a groundswell to carry him to the White House. Like it or not, this campaign strategy rarely wins federal elections in the U.S.

Bob Dylan may have warbled "The times they are a'changing," but the country elected Richard Nixon as president in 1968.

But here's the thing: Obama owns ALL the 2008 buzz. And in a few weeks, it'll be revealed that he has the biggest bucks, too. And by a healthy margin.