Lessig

I saw John Edwards speak yesterday at a small party thrown by a friend. He was extraordinary. It was just a simple stump speech -- a bit long, and a bit rambling. But it was moving in a way I have never before seen in a politician.

Today is a key deadline in this absurd system for raising money to run for president. There are a lot of great Democrats out there (so far, only one Republican so we don't need adjectives). If you're eager to see this become an interesting race, contribute something by today. Here are some useful links:

Edwards
Dean
Others

UPDATE: Apparently, this plug put Edwards over the top. Wow.

In a paper on Innovation released by the Lieberman campaign today, Senator Lieberman writes,

"Ensure that the Internet continues to provide an open platform for innovation: The Internet is different from the phone network and radio and broadcast television in important ways. It is easier for individuals and small organizations to be producers as well as consumers of information. The Internet allows for "many to many" communication as opposed to the "one to many" communication of broadcast television. Innovation can occur at the edge of the network. A student, an independent software developer, or a small high-tech company can come up with an idea for a new application, protocol, or kind of content. If enough people find it useful or worthwhile, this idea can spread like wildfire. Even as the Internet evolves, it important to ensure that it continues to provide an open platform for rapid and decentralized innovation, and for the exchange of ideas."

End to End has gone presidential.

UPDATE: the link, changed, has been fixed.

John Edwards has joined the long list of opponents to Chairman Powell's plans to relax media ownership rules. His letter to Powell is posted below. Notice, appropriately, the punchline is a question about the FCC's mandate: We should ask, exactly who elected Chairman Powell, and upon whose mandate is he pushing this change?

May 28, 2003

The Honorable Michael K. Powell
Chairman, Federal Communications Commission
Washington, D.C. 20554

Dear Chairman Powell:

I write to urge you not to increase the national
broadcast ownership cap and not to proceed with the
rulemaking scheduled for June 2.

Diversity in the media is enormously important to our
democracy. As consumers, Americans should have
choices in the music they can hear and the television
programs they can watch. As citizens, Americans
should have access to different ideas and points of
view. The government has a responsibility to foster
this diversity of expression. Unfortunately, the
FCC's new rules are likely to undermine it.

The effects on rural America could be particularly
harmful. People in rural communities and small-town
America have distinctive interests, and local stations
offer programming that responds to these interests. In
recent years, local stations in rural North Carolina
have offered prime-time broadcasts of Atlantic Coast
Conference basketball games, Billy Graham crusades,
and muscular dystrophy telethons. All Americans can
appreciate the importance of offering local
programming tailored to local concerns. By
undercutting this diversity, the FCC's new rules will
do a disservice to all Americans.

I have heard you suggest that with the growth of cable
and satellite television, broadcast diversity is no
longer important. That may be true in some affluent
communities, but many Americans do not have cable and
satellite television, especially in rural areas.
These Americans depend on broadcast news and
programming, and their programming should offer real
choices that are responsive to their interests.

I am especially troubled that your agency is
implementing these proposals without permitting
further public discussion. The FCC does not have a
mandate to make controversial decisions without giving
the public a full opportunity to comment. The fact
that two Commissioners have requested a delay should
signal to you that the prudent course, at the least,
is to postpone the vote and permit open public
discussion.

Thank you for you consideration of this request.



Yours sincerely,
John Edwards

cc: Commissioners Abernathy, Adelstein, Copps, and
Martin

So loyal Dean supporters have been emailing me about Howard Dean's Blog for America, and indeed, it is a great blog. Simple, minimalist, with access to real content, and a nice blog roll of the scores of Dean blogs out there -- but for the absense of a Creative Commons license, it is brilliant.

As is much in the doctor's campaign. There is a passion and a clarity to Dean's message which mixes well with the passion and, um, ok, just passion of the web. An extraordinary number have volunteered for his campaign because of the web. And Tuesday's MoveOn.org primary will demonstrate any power that this means might have.

The experts say Dean can't win. I'm no expert, so what do I know. So far I've only met the one man Karl Rove seems most afraid of -- Edwards. As I've blogged, I think a great deal of the Senator. Indeed, he is the first politician to inspire in a very long time.

Edwards' campaign is run by a bunch of experts. They resist the fads of the net. They have a fancy website that feels like a 4th of July commercial. There is relatively little direct contact. There is very little of a bottom-up feel.

That's all part of the strategy, they say, and again, who am I to question it. The plan is that Edwards should place in the first two primaries. But because he will have more money than anyone, he will sweep the next 20. So going slow, saving resources, etc., is the strategy. And he is sticking to the plan.

That may be right. But I would think what the campaign against President Bush needs is the passion and commitment that is spilling out everywhere on the web -- mainly for candidates other than Edwards. How much could it cost to open a channel to enable this bottom-up rally? How bad would it really be to give Madison Avenue a rest?

It just seems weird to me: between the son of a mill worker, and the son of an investment banker, which would you expect to run the populist campaign, in style if not in substance?

If it were mine to call, I'd build a million from the bottom up, focusing on values that are common to us all -- truth (as opposed to lies); right (as opposed to wrong).

But what do I know. I've never won anything wonderful, save the love of the mother of our (soon to be born) boy.

The great thing about the early stages of a presidential campaign is that the candidate and campaign have time to put together real messages of substance. This speech by Edwards on economic policy is a perfect example of this contribution of substance. It is extraordinarily good.

I hate politicians who pander. I consider myself a member of the anti-pandering crowd. So it is refreshing to see a politician pander to the anti-pandering crowd by taking a strong stand on a matter of principle that will earn him negative votes and dollars from an important constituency.

This week's anti-panderer is Edwards. As Clay Risen writes in the New Republic, Edwards has come out strongly in favor of the expensing of stock options. This will hurt Silicon Valley firms (who wanted to record such options on balance sheets, and thus make it seem as if the firms were more profitable), but Edwards is plainly right about the policy. This issue is symptomatic of why Silicon Valley has been so awful at lobbying: TechNet, for example, has made this its primary policy objective. Yet of all the policies that would spur growth and innovation, special tax deals are the last that the Valley should be pushing.

Bravo for right policymaking, Senator Edwards. Maybe the Valley will learn something about what battles they ought to be fighting.

Yesterday, I completed a draft of a new book. Tomorrow, Bettina and I leave for our first vacation in a very long time (and, as we expect, the last vacation the two of us will take alone in a very long time).

So it is time for me to take a break from this space too. But I've arranged for a much more interesting guest blogger while I'm gone: former governor, and presidential candidate, Howard Dean.

This is, I believe, the first time a presidential candidate has been a guest blogger. But it is an obvious extension of blogs and the process of becoming President. Campaigns are all about meeting different groups and talking about ideas. Where better than a blog?

I have great respect for Governor Dean, and especially the clarity of his voice. I have even greater respect now that I see the doctor makes house calls. So Governor, welcome to this tiny server at Stanford: You'll find perfect acoustics provided by MovableType, and an interesting mix of views provided by the readers.

And to everyone else, enjoy the week of something totally different. Dean is on starting Monday. I should be back the week following.

One ground rule: I've had a policy of not editing comments of others, regardless of abusiveness. That is not my policy for my guests. You may disagree with the views you read here. But if you are reading them here, then you at least should respect the fact that they are being expressed here. It is important to me that blog-space everywhere become a place where more of this kind of conversation can occur. So trolls, please save your abuse for my return.

Hello from the Dean for America campaign. Governor Howard Dean will be posting later today, here and at the official campaign blog, Blog for America. It's our policy that whenever Governor Dean posts anywhere on the Internet, his posts will also be crossposted to our site.

The post below is from Governor Howard Dean. You can check out the crossposting and commentary at www.blogforamerica.com and read more about Howard Dean at www.deanforamerica.com. Thanks!-- Matt, Zephyr and Nicco, Dean Internet Team

I recognize that the blog entries have been quick. I�m new to blogging, a little tired, and have been on the road. This is the first time this week where I�ve had a little more time to really sit down and digest some of the comments.

I'm really impressed by the candor on this blog, and the complexity of the discussions.

Someone asked which parts of the Patriot Act I thought were unconstitutional. I have real problems authorizing the FBI to obtain library and bookstore and video store records simply by claiming the information is "sought for" an investigation against international terrorism. It's also clearly unconstitutional to detain indivduals and deny them access to a lawyer.

As to Digitial Millenium Copyright Act and other copyright issues, we're still developing a policy on these items. I appreciate everything you have had to say on these issues, and encourage you to continue to tell my campaign how you feel we should best address these complex issues.

Finally, one of you asked if there would be a White House blog. Why not?

Thanks again, Howard Dean

Governor Dean won't be able to post today due to scheduling, and Joe Trippi is still on an airplane, so it looks like he won't either. Thanks for all your comments -- every visitor here is welcome over at Blog for America, our official campaign blog. The conversation here is riveting.

Tomorrow is Governor Dean's last day here, so feel free to keep making suggestions and hashing it out in this thread. We're all big Lessig fans on the Internet Team, and it has been, as many have said, an historic week. Lessig quotes EFF founder Mitch Kapor as saying "Architecture is politics." For me, what is so powerful about this campaign is how the Internet is completely changing the architecture of politics. We talk alot about how the energy and momentum is bottom-up, but I think what sometimes gets lost is how the innovation is bottom-up and person-to-person as well (or e2e as Lessig might say). The results of self-organizing are not only more people, but more ideas about how to do local politics. The idea of sending 30,000 letters to Iowa at the last Dean Meetup came from the grassroots, and that has been reported. What hasn't been reported is that most of the Dean flyers that people are passing out at farmers markets and summer fairs around the country are put together by grassroots organizers working through the Net. Independently of the official campaign, a Seattle group thinks of a flyer idea, which a New York group designs, which they circulate through the Dean listservs, which gets stapled to a Bulletin Board in Missouri by a group of Dean supporters who met through the Internet. A Georgia group designs "Dean Cards," which are now spreading around the country. 10 years ago, so many of these ideas would have stayed just that -- the person with the flyer idea would have turned to her spouse, mentioned the idea, and gone to work. Now that same "mention" - except through the Net - can lead to tens of thousands of flyers all over the country. We've still got a long way to go in terms of building an architecture that allows even more person to person to group connections - and the resulting innovation - but what's amazing about this campaign (from the inside) is how Joe Trippi and the entire campaign is not only willing to allow that innovation to thrive, but believes it is essential to restoring our democracy.

Zephyr Teachout
Internet Team, Dean for America

EdCone has a brief and interesting interview with Senator Edwards. With one more step, he'd be in blog land. I'm not quite sure what's holding him back. For a man who has defended affirmative action across North Carolina, this would be easy.

Next week I'll be working offline to finish a book ("Free Culture") before my wife finishes carrying our kid. (And on that subject, check out this). But the blog will continue with Congressman, and presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich. Congressman Kucinich has had a blog for a while (made free under a Creative Commons license). I'm happy to welcome him to this space starting Monday. More on this before then.

As announced last week, Congressman Dennis Kucinich, candidate for President, will be guest blogging this week. He'll be posting his first post in about an hour, but in a bit of a change from the last presidential visit, he'd be eager to see questions from you that he can frame his posts around. He'd like to address at least (1) copyright policy, (2) media consolidation, (3) privacy, and (4) electronic voting, so please post questions to this entry about those issues, or any other issues you'd like to see discussed.

Thank you to the Congressman for continuting this experiment. Thanks to you for making it worthwhile for him and you.

I would like to thank Professor Lessig for inviting me to begin a dialogue with you.

Wherever I travel throughout America, including here, the issue of corporate media and media accountability arises in every question and answer session. The American people are deeply concerned about the erosion of democracy, notably the impairment of free speech which has occurred through the increased concentration of market power in corporations which own newspapers, radio and television stations.

I’ve spent a great deal of time studying this issue. I hold bachelor’s and master’s degrees in speech and communication from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. During my academic career, I studied the Failing Newspaper Act, which provided for joint operating agreements (JOA), which presaged the death of afternoon newspapers in America. In my own lifespan, I’ve seen the city of Cleveland go from 3 daily newspapers, the Cleveland News, the Cleveland Press, and the Plain Dealer, to just one. I’ve studied the Federal Communications Act of 1934, which set specific responsibilities for broadcast license holders to serve “in the public interest, convenience, and necessity.” H.L. Mencken, the famous critic, once wrote “freedom of the press is limited to those who own one.” Indeed, the Constitution is liberally interpreted when it comes to the government having any role in directing what goes into print. And that is as it should be (that is not to abandon questions of horizontal and vertical market concentration). However, holders of broadcast licenses have specific responsibilities to the public. It is the public which owns the airwaves. The public provides a license in exchange for service. At the same time the definition of media has expanded to include interactive services, the requirements of service have been largely abandoned as media monopolies have grown more powerful. Community groups struggle for recognition, social and economic causes which run counter to vested interests are marginalized, and our politics are corrupted by having to raise huge amounts of money from one set of corporate interest to buy airtime from another set of corporate interests.

As the next President of the United States, I intend to address this issue directly. First, the Justice Department will engage in an ongoing dialogue with major media over how the public interests can be better served. Second, I will sign an executive order which will require all broadcast licensees to provide free time for all federal candidates. Third, additional funds will be appropriated for the support of public television and public radio. Fourth, community cable systems will receive guidance as to how they may more effectively enlist community participation in the airing of broadcast media programs. Fifth, a White House conference on the protection of the First Amendment and its relationship to media concentration will be formed to enlist the participation of academics, activists, and the industry, in order to facilitate a broader and more effective understanding of the central role which media plays in the life of our nation.

Your comments and suggestions are appreciated. It is through such dialogues on democracy that we can fulfill our responsibility to form a more perfect union.

Dennis J. Kucinich
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

This entry and my personal blog are licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Yesterday, Rob asked several questions:
1) It is almost certain that you will be working with a Republican-controlled Congress at least initially during your tenure. Given that, do you believe it likely that you will be able to get the Congress to pass bills authorizing programs for national health care, withdrawal from NAFTA and WTO, reversal of the Bush tax cuts (which will probably be permanent by then), and dealing with other hot-button issues that the Republicans have been so steadfastly against. You can't just declare these things by executive order; and I don't see how you can get such "radical liberal" programs passed. That makes many of your 10 key issues non-starters.

My nomination will set the stage for a Democratic Congress. In 1932, when president Franklin Roosevelt was nominated, he ran on a platform of broad economic reform, which excited people to come out in vote in their own enlightened self-interest. As a result, FDR led a Democratic sweep, which resulted in a pickup of 90 House seats and 13 Senate seats. This was accomplished because he represented profound change. He represented jobs, he represented rebuilding America, he represented a hope for popular control over predatory corporations. My nomination will reverse the results of the 1994 election when the Democrats were unable to regain the House and lost the Senate principally because the parties' ties to corporate interests muted the differences between the parties and discouraged the Democratic base. My nomination will excite the Democratic base, will broaden the reach of the party, and will engage third party activists to join us in a mighty effort to reclaim our government.

2) You state that one of your first acts as President will be to unilaterally withdraw the U.S. from NAFTA and the WTO and institute a regime of "fair trade agreements." Do you believe that our global trade partners will be receptive to such a regime, given that almost by definition those agreements will be fairer to us than to them? Or will we instead see a return to the bad old days of preferential tariffs and trade wars, which the WTO was created to try to prevent? Or even worse, would withdrawal merely accelerate the migration of trade from our country to other countries with more open trade practices? Would we not then be hoist by our own petard?

We are now being hoisted on the petard of NAFTA and the WTO. America's trade policies have been dictated by powerful multinational corporations whose flag is not red white and blue, but green with a dollar sign. Our nation is approaching a $500 billion trade deficit, which represents a genuine threat, not only to our economy, but to our Democracy. Global corporations have used the United States to help create a multinational trading arrangement which denies both American workers and workers of other nations the protections of basic labor law. NAFTA and the WTO were written specifically to preclude the enforcement of rights to organize, collective bargaining, strike, rights to safe work place, and right to a secure retirement. This enabled corporations to move jobs out of America to places where workers have no protections. NAFTA and the WTO have facilitated a race to the bottom in terms of wages and workers rights generally. The WTO essentially locked in the NAFTA trading regime by making any attempts to modify the basis of trade WTO-illegal.

The question is not whether or not America trades with the world, the questions are what are the rules of the game. And America is claimed by rules which are rigged against us. I have said that I will cancel NAFTA and the WTO in order to return to bilateral trade, conditioned on workers rights, human rights, and environmental quality principles being written into our trade agreements with other nations. The is the only way that we can stop corporations from coercing wage concessions or breaking United States unions. This is the only way that we can re-empower the hopes of people of all nations for a better standard of living and for control of the institutions of their own governments.

This issue reflects not mere differences of opinion within our party but a great divide. On one side of the divide stands global corporations and their political supporters. On the other side stands workers and their supporters. I stand resolutely with America's workers and with those peoples of the world who are also striving for human dignity. I will continue to challenge all other Democratic candidates on this issue to see whose side they stand on so that the American people can clearly see whose side they're on. It's not enough to say you're going to fix NAFTA and the WTO, the only way to fix it to exercise the withdrawal provisions of both laws and return to bilateral trade, conditioned on workers rights, human rights and environmental quality principles.

Dennis J. Kucinich
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

This entry and my personal blog are licensed under a Creative Commons License.

I was reading Gilmore's reply to Lessig's earlier post and the conversation it stirred, and it moved me to share some of my own experiences with our fellow bloggers.

I have to admit to a feeling of resentment at the extent of the security searches every time I travel by air. The armed guards, the x-ray machines, the metal detectors, the pat downs, the search of luggage and personal effects, the removal of shoes, and for some, I suppose, the explanation of prosthetics, pacemakers, and appurtenances, constitutes a massive invasion of privacy. We have just come to accept this as a natural state of things because, like Gilmore, we're all suspected terrorists. I find myself having to explain to people why I, as a Presidential candidate, am repeatedly shuttled off to that special line of selectees identified by the SSSS stamped on my ticket. The transportation security agents inform me that a computer has made this decision. I want to know who programs the computer. Is it John Ashcroft?

Even though I don't feel as though I'm getting special treatment or that I'm entitled to special treatment, it makes me wonder how much of a threat I must be since I really do intend to replace the entire government. So when people occasionally recognize me getting the magic metal detector wanding and dutifully submitting to searches of my person, extending my arms and my legs spread-eagle, I explain with a smile, "I'm running against George Bush."

What I've been able to determine from an informed intelligence source (oxymoron) is that I tend to get selected because I buy one-way tickets. This poses a dilemma. Should I change my campaign and do round trips say in a continuous loop from Seattle, Washington to Washington, DC in order to avoid greater suspicion or do I plan a practical itinerary from Seattle to San Francisco to Austin to Oklahoma City to Des Moines to Cleveland to Manchester and gain near public enemy status? The real reason that people who travel point to point instead of round trip are more likely to be subjected to a search is because, I'm told, that the hijackers bought one-way tickets. This is an interesting type of profiling that goes on. One which seldom invites an iota of self-reflection about America's role in the world or about the basis for the murderous grievances which misguided individuals may have against us. It would be useful to have a national dialogue about our democracy and the manner in which it has been undermined since 9/11. The alternative is to proceed, robot like, and submit to metal detectors, x-ray machines, magic wands, pat downs, and the shuttling of point to point travelers to a point by point inspection.

It seems to me that the Bush Administration, with its moral obtuseness, its inconscience on matters of civil liberties, and its craven attempts to demolish the Bill of Rights has prepared for the American people a one-way ticket of sorts. When it comes to the quality of our democracy we are traveling on a road to nowhere.

Airline security is, as we have learned, a deadly serious business. The traveling public deserves assurances that they and their loved ones will be safe in the air. But when does security in a democracy morph into something profoundly anti-democratic. This is a discussion we need to have. And the answer, as Gilmore knows, cannot be simply "search me?"!

Dennis J. Kucinich
On the road to Des Moines

This entry and my personal blog are licensed under a Creative Commons License.

I thought it would be appropriate in Lessig's blog to discuss what led to my adoption of the Creative Commons License and the GNU General Public License for our work on the Kucinich presidential campaign.

As a good friend of many artists and engineers, I understand and support their need to make a living. As a father, I don't believe our government has any business locking up kids for sharing files on the Internet. As a Congressman, I have taken an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States, which states very clearly in Article 1, Section 8, that "The Congress shall have Power: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

"Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic. But will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom?" -- Thomas Jefferson in a letter to John Adams

The framers knew the importance of the progress of science and useful arts. Their intention was clear. Unfortunately, corporate interests have intruded on our process of government. The overwhelming influence of political money from corporate interests has corrupted the ability of Congress to protect science and the arts. Today, much of our science and useful arts is coming forth from sources independent of monopolies, thanks to people like you. Yet Congress continues to try to limit certain activities of inventors and artists in order to preserve corporate power and domination. We must, once again, move to reclaim the promise inherent in Article 1, Section 8.

In my case, I have chosen the free content and free software licenses because I believe they will promote these important goals better than more restrictive "proprietary" licenses. On my presidential campaign, we are currently developing a policy requesting that our supporters license their works to us and others under free license as well. This is valuable because it will provide a body of work to be used by grassroots activists to create their own tools to promote individual and community based expressions of democracy. For example, anyone will be able to take photos, video, audio, or software and reuse it to create their own materials -- without hiring an attorney to negotiate rights (sorry Larry). In this spirit, feel free to rip, mix, and burn my work here.

This is what the American Revolution was all about!

Dennis J. Kucinich
Des Moines, Iowa

This entry and my personal blog are licensed under a Creative Commons License.

With and estimated 50 million Americans and Canadians left without power and in some cases water, common sense requires us to reflect on the absurdity of deregulation of public utilities. In the first case, the right of utility franchise is vested in the people. We give utilities permission to operate, and enable them to set up a profit making business in exchange for the promise of affordable and reliable service. In 1992, investor owned utilities pushed the Democratic House to pass HR776 which granted electric utilities broad powers. The bill was supposed to restructure the electric utility industry to spur competition.

Utilities used deregulation to effect a series of mergers limiting competition. In order to accelerate profits, cost cutting ensued, involving the layoff of thousands of utility company employees, including some who were responsible for maintenance of generation, transmission, and distribution systems. A number of investor-owned utilities stopped investing in the maintenance and repair of their own equipment, and, instead, cut costs to enhance the value of their stock rather than spending money to enhance the value of their service.

A prime case in point is FirstEnergy Corp, late of Ohio. FirstEnergy formed through a merger of utility companies which owned nuclear power plants which often were neither used nor useful, and as a result incurred huge debt. FirstEnergy's predecessor, The Cleveland Electric Illuminating Company (CEI) in the 1950s and 60s was a high performing blue chip stock until they invested in nuclear power. FirstEnergy has tried without success to keep online a very troublesome nuclear power facility at Port Clinton, Ohio, the Davis-Besse plant. Davis-Besse is currently shut down and has been for some time. FirstEnergy and federal regulators failed to properly monitor the operations of the plant, resulting in conditions where the plant's reactor vessel was threatened with a breach when boric acid ate into the head of the reactor.

When I was growing up, Dennis Kucinich was something of a political hero. I was in high school when he was elected mayor of Cleveland -- the youngest mayor of a major city ever. I was also very involved politically. I say "something" of a hero, though, because then I was then a right-wing loon (chairman of the Pennsylvania Teen-Age Republicans, youngest member of a delegation at the 1980 GOP convention). I admired his drive and strength of character; I had little patience for his politics.

I've grown-up a bit in the last 25 years. I'm now, well, not a right-wing loon, and now not at all involved politically. But I am still an admirer of Dennis Kucinich -- indeed, now more than ever. I don't (yet?) buy the anti-free trade stuff. But his is a powerful and right voice in this amazing election.

I am of course a bit biased by his embrace of Creative Commons -- which has been a part of his blog from the start. But the test for me is always character, and the measure of character for me is whether someone can say what's right, regardless of consequence, just because he believes it is right.

This is Edwards defending affirmative action in North Carolina; this is Dean opposing he war. This is Kucinich, here and elsewhere, articulating views that he believes right, whether or not they are views that will win him favor.

The post about Gilmore was the example here. I have been astonished by the debate around that event. It made me realize how that there are two sorts of people out there when it comes to civil rights. The question that divides us is not whether we believe in civil rights -- obviously, everyone (interesting) does. The question is how we believe in civil rights. (1) One sort believes that when someone else acts -- either intentionally or carelessly -- to infringe a right, it is right (or even maybe a duty) of the person whose rights have been wronged to defend the right regardless of consequence. (2) Another sort believes that when someone else acts -- at least carelessly -- to infringe a right, the right thing to do is to decide whether, all things considered, it makes sense to defend the right.

Type two sorts are the majority of us. We're the "reasonable" ones. Apple doesn't make commercials about us. We do what everyone would. I'm sure in the right context, I would have to fight all of my instincts to resist being a type two sort. There have been a couple times in my life when I have succeeded, but just a few.

Gilmore is type one -- in this context, and many others. (He once, for example, scolded my wife for inviting him to a party with an Evite because it was wrong, he believed, to demand he give up his privacy just to respond to an invitation.) And while I don't agree with the underlying values that he sometimes pushes (for example, I not only thought it wrong for him to scold my wife, I think Evite is great), I do admire the ability to be type one in a world of type two's -- especially when I agree with the underlying value (as I do w/r/t the British Airways incident).

Thus, I agree with Kucinich, Gilmore is a patriot. At a time when reasonableness by those in power must be taught, his was a patriot's act (unlike the other Patriot Act). And I admire Kucinich's willingness to say that here -- in a space where some of the most well reasoned contributors (and some others as well) have strongly taken the other view. This is the (only) part of Reagan I continue to admire; it is the part of Kucinich I increasingly admire; it is the part in these candidates we should all respect: the willingness to say what's right, regardless of consequence.

Thank you, Congressman, for taking time in this space. And thank you for the character of your campaign.

I've been talking to a bunch of people about blogs and their effect for a book I'm supposed to be finishing this week. This is an interview with Governor Dean's campaign manager, Joe Trippi. Feel free to use it as the Creative Commons Attribution license permits. And corrections appreciated.

(pdf)

Deanlink is a cool new tool for identifying others around you who might be into the politics of your flavor. I love these examples of new technology to achieve what old organization was supposed to achieve. Are there other good ones?

Senator Edwards has launched a blog. Built on Slash, with ratings, and a special icon to signal staff postings, the site has local (well, state) blogs linked to the national blog as well.

David Brooks' column in the Times is an interesting reflection on the battle for the soul of the Democratic Party. Edwards' is said to have the most "persuasive theory" for pervasively interesting reasons.

I've been an admirer of Senator Edwards for sometime now. Next week, he'll be guest blogging here. I know he has a number of issues he wants to discuss, and in the comments here, feel free to suggest others. But I'm honored to welcome him. As I've written, there is an integrity and passion to Senator Edwards in person. This campaign could use more of that.

I'm grateful to Senator Edwards for spending some cycles on my blog. I am particularly grateful given his willingness to say a few things about the sort of things Democrats don't talk about enough -- IP and Free and Open Source Software. As obvious as the issues of balance and choice are to the likes of many who hang around here, I think we should not underestimate just how politically difficult it is to say the obvious. In particular, I read the comment about the importance of a level playing field for software to be a clear rejection of the move pushed by, e.g., Congressman Adam Smith to ban GPL within government research. (Apparently Adam Smith was named by the same guys who named the Patriot Act). To side with, e.g., the Free Software Foundation (which also opposes mandates, but endorses competition) and against Microsoft (which gave Adam Smith his bad idea) is not to side with power against right.

Most candidates seem to think it better to just stay quiet about these issues. They might be right. It might be better, politically. God knows, the Democrats can't upset the content industry. But character takes small steps such as these -- regularly, as part of the routine. And it doesn't suprise me to see such character here.

Thank you again, Senator.

I'm sure this happened all the time before, but now we've got a name for it. Dean in New Hampshire.

Dave Winer has rightly and nicely called for the presidential candidates to say something clear and strong about the internet and how they would propose to keep it free. And he's right that we don't yet have clear and strong positions from anyone about issues that are important to preserving the internet's freedom. On this blog, Kucinich, Dean and Edwards have all questioned the media consolidation. But only Kucinich and Edwards have tried to wade into the intellectual property debate (and what both have said is useful and good).

That took some courage. Yet to many in the Democratic party, it showed foolishness. I've had literally scores of people write me to tell me not to push Dean or anyone else to speak clearly about issues related to IP (note to readers: fear not, all my demands of candidates for the presidency are ignored) -- "don't do anything to scare away Hollywood."

This always spins me down. I'm just returning from a conference in Italy where a totally establishment collection of leaders from political parties, and business, were describing the progress to spread open and free software throughout Europe -- not to the exclusion of proprietary software, but as an equal competitor -- and describing the importance of balance in IP. It was a meeting totally unimaginable in the US. Meanwhile, back in the US, the leader of the New Democrats (Adam Smith) is promoting legislation to ban the GPL from government research, and the Democratic party is afraid to say anything balanced and sensible about IP related issues.

What made this campaign fun at the start was the thought that finally, a Democrat would wage a campaign where he said what was right and true, as the only way to win the passion of a generation. Yet apparently, cautious and careful have returned. Maybe that's necessary to win a campaign -- I have no clue about that. But if that is so, I am sorry it is necessary.

Christopher Lydon (who became famous to me when he hosted The Connection (search on Lydon) and who has collected an amazing group of interviews from people blog related) has added Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi to his collection. The interview is excellent, though my favorite Lydon remains the Creative Commons Flash!. Stay tuned for a new Flash!, with more Chris Lydon.

The hardest yet most important thing to keep in focus about this presidential campaign is not the positions, but how the candidates got positioned. Dean is where he is because he used the Internet in the best way it could be used: to organize people around movement. That movement was born in his clear and strong message about the war. Some joined because of that message. Some joined because they believed anyone with such strength about that issue will show strength elsewhere too. Both groups started to organize around this long-shot candidate. Less than a year later, the long-shot is the front runner.

Dave urges the campaign to take one step further. As he writes, "Dean only reports to and about people who are already Dean supporters." He has a point (though I'll confess, they've never demanded a loyalty oath from me). I share the view that it would be something truly amazing to see it done well: Imagine these spaces reporting on and reporting to people other than Deaners. What should it look like? A blog with threads reporting criticism, with space for the criticism to be debated? Simple pointers to contrary views? At a minimum it should include bloggers on the bus who are not Dean bloggers. But what beyond the minimum?

I can well understand the hesitation. Campaigns are not about giving space to the opponent. And the key to Deans' successful use of the net is not the replication of /. for politics, but using the net to get people to do something in real space. Nonetheless, it would fit with the theme of this open source presidential campaign that forks are allowed -- indeed, encouraged -- as a way to demonstrate the commitment that remains.

In the buzz of disagreement about particular policies or particular quips, it is this that should be remembered: whatever the twist of views and positions is that carries one to 1600 Pennsylvania, there is only one candidate so far who has demonstrated a process that is different. And only one who has demonstrated a process that could translate into government that is different as well.

On the "Dean is the new McGovern" FUD: Dave has a very nice post.

I've been on dial-up in the old country, and finally found a broadband connection, so catching up: Dan's got a great piece on the great Gore news.

I don't think I've ever read a book by a candidate running for president, so I'll confess upfront I don't know anything about this genre. But I wanted to read Edwards' book, Four Trials, because the premise seemed so implausible: How could a candidate for president believe that telling stories about life as a trial lawyer is a good way to win votes in America today?

So I've taped but not yet watched the Democrats' debate yesterday, but thanks to Jim Garrison for pointing me to this exchange. According to this Washington Post transcript, Lieberman had this to say about trade:

I think we've got to reject the extremism of George Bush and the extremism of Democrats who would put back walls of protectionism. And what's the extremism of George Bush? He just sits back and lets foreign countries break the rules of trade, rip off patents, copyrights, take American jobs, play with the currency.

There is, of course, something that you could criticize the President for -- farm subsidies -- though not if you're running for President in Iowa (General Clark?). Here again, Lieberman was the only one to mention subsidies. His words: "So yes to subsidies as they are now, and yes to trade."

So I get so much s*it for my few words of praise for a candidate who has not yet proven himself but whom I greatly admire -- Edwards. Alone in a foreign city, abusing the free wireless broadband, I think I've got it: It's not just that he is a lawyer proud of what the law can do (and here, from Code is the chapter where I first confessed irrational affection for such sorts (search on "Cates")), who looks like Kennedy but talks like my mom, and who could debate Bush better than anyone else on the floor of the Senate, it's also that he is, fundamentally, great suits notwithstanding, a populist. Watch.

O'Neill on Bush on the decision to invade Iraq, "days" after entering office in January 2001, months before 9/11 (as if 9/11 had anything to do with Iraq).

The book is barely born and the author is retreating: O'Neill retreats from his claim about the war. Wow.

Good luck to my favorites in Iowa. As I've indicated a bunch of times, I'm a split Democrat -- admiring most the movement Dr. Dean has built, and the passion and power Senator Edwards has. I am reassured that more in Iowa see the latter; I am worried that we all (Democrats at least) don't forget the importance of the former.

CBS is said to have refused to run MoveOn's winning ad, citing its policy not to run commercials dealing "with controversial issues of public importance." CBS will instead run ads from the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy -- apparently an issue of public importance that is not controversial. Who would of thought an ad criticizing a $1 trillion deficit was more "controversial" than an ad about the war on drugs?

Here's what the true libertarians have been saying for a long time -- the biggest reason to worry about concentrated media in a world where media is regulated is exactly this.

So is this right? Seems to me that since Lincoln, the only candidates for president to ever defeat a sitting president are "outsiders" (e.g., like Dean) or plausible outsiders (e.g., like Edwards). Never since Lincoln has a Washington insider defeated a sitting president. Am I missing an example?

Cleveland beat Harrson

McKinley beat Cleveland

Wilson bear Taft

FDR beat Hoover

Carter beat Ford

Clinton beat Bush

This is the stuff I thought I saw with Edwards, apparently spotted by a few in Iowa as well.

So we have a front runner -- a great Senator with an extraordinary career of service. He's found the message -- a "positive" campaign "against special interests." (In the great tradition of Walt Disney creativity, it is a message that builds upon the culture around him. See, e.g. Edwards, Dean). And while I have no doubt the Senator would make a far better president than the current, I worry whether the message ("against special interests") will ring true with a man who has been in DC for so long.

This was the part that came naturally to Dean, and even Edwards. When Edwards describes "the way Washington works," it's like a doctor describing the spread of a virus. But that will be a hard sell for this powerful, if consistently right, senator from Massachusetts.

And as for fighting "special interests": As far as the copyright debate goes, the Senator seems to have heard only from the special interests. His technology discussion twice mentions copyright, only to urge even more IP extremism. And while there's a vague tilt to "WiFi", there doesn't seem to be anything else to signal the Senator has even seen the other side.

E.g.

"...THR: The RIAA recently filed suit against several hundred file sharers. How far should copyright holders be allowed to go to protect their products? And do you think that file sharers should be held liable?

Kerry: I think any kind of mass file sharing that goes beyond the normal
college-dorm, room-to-room, person-to-person, friend-to-friend kind of
sharing is a violation of the law. I believe in copyright. I think we would
have complete disorder in the marketplace if you don't enforce copyright.
Copyright is the way you create order out of chaos in the marketplace.
Otherwise, you diminish the value of intellectual property and artistic
property, and you wind up not enforcing the rules by which people are
compensated for their work. I think the U.S. has been very lax in dealing
with China and other countries on intellectual property regulations, and I
have long argued that we ought to be enforcing those measures very, very
strictly. Now, I have worked hard with the industry to try to find some ways
to create an appropriate technology that allows people to share. The
problem, obviously, in a digital world, is that one tap of a button on a Web
site and you can transmit to millions of people a perfect copy. So I think
we have to find a technological fix, and frankly, it has been economic
self-interest that has prevented people at arriving at an appropriate
compromise..."

I've never spoken to a Kerry-ite (except his wife whom I used to campaign with when I was chairman of the Teenage Republicans and she was married to the late-Senator Heinz). So I'd love to be proven wrong about this. Are there pointers to stuff that demonstrates a more charitable read?

From today's NYT: "You're going to see a leaner, meaner organization," Dr. Dean, who has asked his 500 staff members to skip their paychecks for two weeks, told reporters on an 8 p.m. conference call. "We had really geared up for what we thought was going to be a front runner's campaign. It's not going to be a front-runner's campaign. It's going to be a long war of attrition. What we need is decision making that's centralized."

Yes, centralized. Fire someone who built the most extraordinary grass-roots organization in history, and hire a Washington lobbyist in his stead. Now we're making progress.

The critical question for the Democrats will be whether they can continue the passion that created Dean. I received a copy of this letter, reprinted with permission, sent to MoveOn by one of Dean's supporters:

Dear MoveOn.org:

I am a Dean supporter who signed your petition to CBS, though
I'm not a member, yet. I would like to ask your help.

Dean supporters are apprehensive that the Democrats are
attempting stifle Dean's presidential campaign because it is a
grassroots campaign at heart. The DNC (DLC), Clinton and
Congressional Democrats are seeking to create a monolith with
only 2 primaries completed.

I and others like me at the "Conversation with America" at the
Dean forums (Click Forums at BlogforAmerica.com) would like
tips on how to publish an Open Letter to the DNC in a
national publication. I'm not rich and I'm not affiliated
with the Dean Campaign. We just feel that we represent a
sizable voting block of the new Progressivism. And it seems
that there is a concerted effort lead by Democrats and
parroted by the media, to disenfranchise us.

Any tips you may have would be appreciated. If Moveon.org
could put me in touch with a like minded PAC, individual or
organization, we would be so happy. Although I have no
experience with this kind of activism, I am willing to learn.
I have been a quiet Democrat all my life and this is new to
me.

David Isenberg has a troubling post about the new manager at the Dean campaign.

Meanwhile: 35 million spent? Wow.

Dave accuses me (in the most constructive way possible) of thinking too linearly about responsibility and Nader. I'm sticking to my line, because it is precisely the line Nader (rightly) took when arguing against, e.g., car manufacturers.

So Ted Hearn has a piece suggesting Kerry would be a big plus for big cable. I'm skeptical. Indeed, I'm positively encouraged by two facts friends have helped me see: (1) despite the pressure of his best buddy, Senator Hollings, Kerry did not support the Fritz chip, and (2) this letter to the FCC pushing the FCC to insist upon non-discrmination in the context of the AOL merger, long long before non-discrimination was the way others were framing the question.

Aaron thinks I've "forgott[en] the First Amendment" in my criticism of Mr. Nader. I'm quite sure I haven't, as I try to explain below.

I gotten many angry by criticizing (here and here and here) Ralph Nader. Some even think I've violated the constitution. Anyway, my final replies are in the extended entry. I'm sure there's more to be said on both sides, but Mr. Willem forbids me from taking anymore time from him to say anything more.

This is a powerful flash on the Nader issue.

Ralph Nader has apparently decided to run for President. So says his website, votenader.org (which doesn't seem to render well on Mac browsers, but which my Dad reports renders quite well on a Windows machine. Don't look for Ralph's presidential campaign at Nader2004.org. That domain has been captured by a pro-Nader Nader-critic (which I count myself as), and is a graphic version of the argument I made earlier.)

This is obviously depressing to folks like me who, while admirers of the good that Nader did in the world, and admirers of more of his policies than the other candidates in the race, believe the consequence of his being in this race will simple be to increase the probability that President Bush will have a second term.

So two questions for Mr. Nader:

(1) Do you agree that even if it would be best if you were President, it would be second best if a Democrat were President rather than President Bush?

(2) If so, then will you promise that if 2000 repeats itself -- if it is clear that you are not going to be elected president, but probable that votes for you will deny the Democrat of the Presidency -- then you will ask your supporters to vote for someone else?

Because if Mr. Nader can answer both questions "yes," then I'm all for his candidacy. His views, his integrity, and (except for one important gap) his judgment certainly deserve to stand on the stage with any Democrat, and with President Bush.

Are there equivalent quotes on the other side missing from this?

I've received literally 30 requests from people I know to contribute to the Kerry campaign. That must mean something good about the campaign's organization. But I remain skeptical about whether the Senator can muster the message.

Obvious disclaimer: I know nothing about how elections are won, and I'm sure Kerry's got the very best in the world helping him build the strategy that defeats amazingly powerful politics on the other side.

But as I watch Kerry (as opposed, e.g., to MoveOn) define the issues in this campaign, he still feels inside-the-beltway-tone-deaf. One by one we get "new initiatives," Christmas tree lists of things Kerry will do when president, much like Clinton would rattle off lists of gifts in his State of the Union Addresses (for hours and hours and hours). Each new initiative gets a flurry of attention, some praise, some criticism, and then disappears. The result is at best a slight good-idea victory, but more likely a draw. But people, the professional pols say, care about the economy, or their jobs, or taxes, or education. So a campaign must stick to addressing those issues.

Maybe. And of course, Clinton won largely because he kept on message (It's the economy, stupid.)

But to this know-nothing writer, this election seems different. The Clinton/Gore days felt very different. It was a time when Nader could say that there "was no difference" between Bush and Gore -- and of course, with respect to many issues, there was no real difference apparent.

Yet I can't believe anyone is going to get excited about this election by being given a list of policy initiatives. I have views about policies, but I don't keep a checklist to decide who I'm going to vote for. Instead, the passion and anger that bubbled Dean to the top was focused on something much more fundamental: a basic corruption of government. Not corruption in the banana republic sense -- money to politicians. But a corruption of basic integrity. Deception about the war. Obstruction of access to information about influence (e.g., Cheney and the oil companies). Coddling to corporate criminals. (Yea, I know, you'll whine about that, but it sounds so good). And persistent Nixonian attacks on critics.

This is the basic, apple-pie message that I would bet would win. That we have gone back on basic American values -- or those values we believe we believe. "Truth, Justice, and the American Way" was not meant to distinguish "Truth and Justice" from the "American Way." And I would think a constant beat reasking the same question -- Who have we become? -- would slowly erode any passion for reelecting this President.

Or alternatively, focus on kids. Look at the first three winning entries from the Bush-in-30-seconds ad campaign. These "conservative" policies will have one single consequence: to burden our children. With debt -- as Bush races us to the largest deficits ever. With insecurity -- as another generation of fanatics focuses on just one idea: kill Americans. With corruption of our basic values -- as the two americas reality becomes clearer and clearer.

Something like this would have been Dean's message, though he was weakened for other reasons. It would have been close to the clear message Edwards had refined. But it's not yet been the message that has come across from this candidate.

The government in the Rumsfield v. Padilla case, as quoted in the Times: "[I]n situations where there is a war ... you have to trust the executive to make the kind of quintessential military judgments that are involved in things like that."

And when "the executive" breaches that trust? What then? If -- as this "executive" believes -- there's no judicial review, then there's only one review left: elections.

If you're in a pro-Kerry mood and in SF on June 19th, then check out this Grotto event. And as I'm being hassled to get people to go, please give the lessig blog some credit for the link.

Edwards would be a wonderful choice.

Bravo, Senator. Edwards is a brilliant choice.

Some ideas about how the news might improve politics.

A question that should be asked: Would a Kerry Adminstration veto the Induce Act?

Finally, the Kerry campaign gets some passion in response to the attacks.

It is the nature of the net that just about the time you think, "there ought to be ...," there is. Here's a site with a collection of films relevant to the election. It would be better were there more that were clearly from the other side. Ideas?

That's certainly how the GOP convention seemed to me, though maybe I'm just too "sensitive." But this certainly was a different convention from the GOP convention at which I was a member of the Pennsylvania delegation (indeed, the youngest member of any delegation) in 1980. That the was the Party of Jack Kemp. This is the Party of Zel Miller (!).

So, shamefully, I've contributed to this irrelevant question blog ("Mr. President, how many times have you been arrested?"), but I can't begin to describe fully how depressing this presidential campaign has been.

Why do we waste attention on these ridiculous questions?

I'm sure Mr. Bush's record was nothing to be proud of -- his drinking problem is well documented, and these things go together. But I'm also sure he is no longer that man -- and for anyone who has seen someone overcome that demon, you know the courage this requires. So I really don't care how many times he was arrested, I don't care if he used power to escape his obligations in the Reserve -- whether he should be our President depends only upon whether the policies he will pursue are good for this nation.

Likewise, re Mr. Kerry: I am sure he demonstrated unimaginable courage in volunteering to serve his country in an unpopular war, and then mustering the courage to articulate brilliantly the reasons why that war was wrong. But we're not electing a captain for a military unit -- if shots are fired, he will follow orders, not give them -- and while it would be great if he could find a way to articulate why this war was wrong, the presidency is not a reward for great Senate testimony. Whether he should be our President depends upon whether the policies he will pursue are good for the nation.

So why can't we actually talk about the conflict in these policies? I'm confident about that choice, but I would love my view to be challenged by real arguments, and a focus on real issues. CBS almost seems proud of their idiotic story. Shame on CBS. Shame on us.

Making Torture Legal, a story by Anthony Lewis about an issue that ought to be an issue in this issueless campaign, is the best of its kind that I've seen. I was referred to it by an Israeli friend. As he said to me, "of course there is torture in Israeli prisons, but there is nothing remotely as bad as this."

Truth, and justice. May it again be the American way.

So as I reported earlier, two people whose integrity I would not question told me that Bruce Lehman had told them that he, Lehman, was now advising the Kerry Campaign on IP policy. Now two people, whose integrity I would not question and who have direct connections to the campaign, tell me that is not correct. Let's hope.

According to an article in the National Journal Tech Daily (9/23), Bruce Lehman claims he is on the Kerry Technology Committee, but is "playing a relatively minor role." The article quotes an unnamed source that he "is not part of Kerry's core group of tech advisers."

But whether core or fringe, why is he part of "tech" advisers at all? Lehman's policies did more to encourage the war on technology that these past 8 years have seen than anyone else in DC. Let him serve on the "last century protectionists" committee. Indeed, make him the chair.

Lehman says he finds it "really sad -- pretty sad" that I had criticized him on this blog. (No confirmation which.) And just to show how effective I've been in getting my point across, Lehman is quoted as saying: "[Lessig] seems to believe you can have a post-industrial economy without any copyrights." Oh yes. That's exactly what I believe. I'm also a Marxist, and commune regularly with Chairman Mao. With insight such as this, I can see why he'd be such a valuable member of the Kerry team.

Sorry about the slow posting this week. But just so you don't think I'm lazy: I spent the week debating William Tucker in the Legal Affairs debate club.

So CBS thought it was appropriate to run a stupidly irrelevant story about what the President did 30 years ago. It got busted by the bloggers when it turned out that its sources were bad.

Now CBS has decided that it is inappropriate to run a story about the Iraq War so close to the election.

So let's see what CBS believes the word "appropriate" means:

It is appropriate to run a story that has nothing to do with the President's current ability to run the nation, and that offers nothing at all helpful or informative about policy decisions we Americans are supposed to make.

But it is inappropriate to run a story about perhaps the most important policy decision the President made, which, if people understood more, would directly affect their judgment about the President's ability to run the nation.

Why CBS thought the guard story appropriate, I have no idea. But they could only think it inappropriate to run a real and relevant news story if it is as false and ridiculous as the guard story.

If it is a false story, then they should never run it. But if the story is true, then the failure to run it is the purest act of cowardice. Just the sort of "news" we get when the media is controlled by a few suck-up giants.

I saw only part of the debate last night, but the part I saw was consistent with this Gallop poll indicating Kerry won the debate, 53% to 37%. Yet according to "US Press": the debate was a tie.

Was it a tie? Or is it just impossible for the press to appear anything but "neutral"?

Update: Here's a report from The Times (UK) with a nice summary of different views, some neutral, others not.

Julian complains that he can't find a copy of the debate on any p2p network he's looked for. Does anyone know of one?

Here's an eDonkey link:2004
Presidential Debate (John Kerry and George Bush).avi

This is the impression I got from the debate. Click on the video here for a wonderful remix of the debate.

Just watched this film by Robert Greenwald, who I worked with on Outfoxed. It is a fantastic film, which reminds us of what we know, but have forgotten about the last three years. Get it here.

From the Vice-Presidenial debate last night (transcript):

"VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY: Well, the reason they keep mentioning Halliburton is because they're trying to throw up a smoke screen. They know the charges are false. They know if you go, for example, to factcheck.com, an independent website sponsored by the University of Pennsylvania, you can get the specific details, with respect to Halliburton."

There is a cool site factcheck.org which does have a factcheck about the debate.

I know everyone (including this one) was so into the .com/.org mistake by the Vice-President. But the statement that is really the most bizarre to me was the following:

(Cheney to Edwards): "The first time I ever met you was when you walked on the stage tonight."

So did Cheney really just misspeak (we used to call that lie), or could it be that this man, one heartbeat from the Presidency, could forget something as simple as this?

So I've been whining for a while about the lack of interesting conservative remixes. I knew this would happen, and have stalled a bit in reporting this (bias confession: the obvious one), BUT:

Here's a clever anti-Kerry remix.

This('n that) is brilliant.

This remix of George Bush on "hard work" is wonderful.

(I should have been doing this before, so forgive the unkindness before but: Thanks, John Driscoll!)

I'm looking for a volunteer web designer, for a quick but short project that needs to be completed by Sunday. The frame is built, but the pretty stuff needs to be added. The project will support a cool nonpartisan presidential election tool. If you're (1) fast, (2) free, and (3) free, email me and I'll give you the details. Thanks

Update: I got a ton of replies within hours, and I think we're set now.

Isn't the net great? Bush on Bush.

As reported in Doonesbury, President Bush's hometown paper has endorsed Kerry. It is the weird thing about this election -- the most pertinent news comes from the comics. (And speaking of which: Have they kidnapped Stewart? How can there be reruns before an election!)

p2p-politics.org went live this morning. This was an idea a couple of us had last week. I blogged for a web designer on Thursday. J Christopher Garcia was among the first. Aaron did the backend design.

The idea is simple: Send a message. There is a pile of clips to select among. Select some that best express a point you think a friend should hear. Put the friends address into the email box. Add some text yourself. Click send. Your friend will receive an email, with links back to the clips, and also an invitation to do the same to someone else. Anyone can upload relevant content to the site, though for obvious copyright and other reasons, all entries must be reviewed before going live.

MoveOn was able to give us the initial content -- 150 ads from the BushIn30Seconds contest. The Kerry campaign has added some of its own. I've invited, through a number of channels, the Bush campaign to add something. No reply yet.

The Internet Archive is hosting the content under a Creative Commons license. Thanks to Brewster, J Christopher, and Aaron for pulling this together so amazingly quickly.

So lots of great reaction to p2p-politics.org today, and we've modified in response. In particular:

(1) We've changed "Nader" to "Other" so as to encourage other (actually more prominent) candidates to be included without adding too many tabs;

(2) Adding a comment link to each ad, so if you have a view about an ad you'd like to express, there's a wiki page to do it;

(3) Adding the option to upload audio as well as video;

(4) Adding RSS/Atom feeds, so you can subscribe to new content.

Still no response from the Bush campaign. And of course, throughout, "we" here means the tech sorts, and today, that meant Aaron.

Laura Bush: "No need to apologize."

A campaign to oppose the draft.

To balance the silence from the Bush administration, p2p-politics.org now enables you to ad links, without uploading content. Add a link here.

Congressman Tim Ryan (D-OH) on trust. Recently added to p2p-politics.

Declan's got a nice piece about a crack in the IP extremism that seems to define both candidates in this campaign. As he explains, Kerry has signaled a willingness to rethink the extremism in the DMCA. This, combined with the great news from the Sixth Circuit in the Lexmark case must make the IP extremists very sad. Poor IP extremists -- at least if Kerry pulls this off.

George Bush has apparently endorsed John Kerry for President, advising America that we don't want as commander in chief "a political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts." True enough, Mr. President. How much better off we would have been had you not jumped to conclusions (re WMD) without knowing the facts.

Much better, no doubt, is a commander in chief who bases conclusions upon the facts, or, even better, acts when he learns of the facts (as this Administration did not do when it learned, in January, of the mistreatment of prisoners in Iraq and Cuba).

In a huge signal of conservative scepticism, the Economist, after endorsing Bush in 2000, and Dole in 1996, has endorsed Kerry.

And the videos are getting quite mean. Just saw this on p2p-politics. (Warning, if you're from Bush's base, you will be offended by this).

Remember his statement on Good Morning America (3-18-03) (at least according to Warren Zevon):

I said on my program, if, if the Americans go in and overthrow Saddam Hussein and it's clean, he has nothing, I will apologize to the nation, and I will not trust the Bush administration again."

So any endorsement yet?

So 24 years ago, I was the youngest member of a delegation to the GOP Convention that selected Ronald Reagan as its candidate. I had gone to the convention a Bush supporter. I left a Reagan supporter. Within 5 years, I was a supporter of neither.

But it's great to feel a revival of Reagan support. Check out this straight-talking Ron Reagan on Crooks and Liars. Bravo, Ron.

The Internet Vets for Truth have created a site that collects the Election 2004 classic clips, from the Kerry testimony in 1971, to the Pet Goat thirty years later. The site is extremely well done.

It is no surprise to readers of this blog that I would endorse John Kerry for President. I've been harshly (sometimes unfairly) critical of the President (though the Secret Service has not questioned me about my criticism), while I've withheld criticism of John Kerry, save for questions about his campaign, and anxiety about his views on IP (and subsequent events have calmed both fears).

But every blog owes it to this space to state its case one way or the other, however briefly, so that the reality of November 3 doesn't distort the views of where we are today.

Update: Dave's taken the idea of endorsement and made it bloggable. Check out the options here.

So Newsweek reports the Nation rallying behind the President, partly in response to bin Laden's attack on Bush (in particular, his mentioning of this scene of Bush immediately after the attack on 9/11.

We are an astonishingly manipulable people.

It is astonishing to me how hard it is to talk to friends and family about this election. It must have been easier before we entered the age of the broadcast. People must have expected it. But today, politics is religion � and neither are to be discussed among people who disagree. We feel free to stuff envelopes at an election headquarters. Or even to blather on in a blog. But the act of directly confronting someone else -- at least if you know them -- and asking them to explain their vote is as rude as asking them to explain their heart.

Most of the time, that doesn't bother me. But in elections like this, it depresses the hell out of me. My family has had a vicious, extended debate through our mailing list about this election. I never understood how families were torn apart by the Civil War. I understand it now. Yet despite the bloodiness, it feels to me a duty. I swayed just one vote in that exchange with my family; I never expected to sway any. But the expectation of failure is not a reason to concede -- see, e.g., the free culture movement.

I think this a duty we all share. We should learn to do it civilly. We need better tools. But if we're ever to become a democracy that is immune from the spins of the likes of bin Laden and Rove, we need to rediscover, or just discover, the ethic of reasoned persuasion.

We built p2p-politics to ease people into this practice. Despite its brilliant technical implementation, the idea was a bust. Billions came to the site to watch the clips; scores of great clips were submitted; but precious few used the tool to send to someone else an argument, or a reason, or even a clip.

Whatever your tool, make this a duty of citizenship. Not always, maybe not in every election. But at least in this election. I spend a huge part of my time (insanely, my friends say) engaging with people I don't know who email all sorts of questions and abuse (and even some words of praise). So this might seem more natural to me. But citizenship must mean explaining why. At least this time, it must. We are divided, and furious. We should use that anger for some good.

So translation is the hardest thing in the world to do well, so no criticism of the translator intended here, but: There's something very weird about the translation of bin Laden's speech.

As Aljazeera has translated it, near the end bin Laden says this:

And for the record, we had agreed with the Commander-General Muhammad Ataa, Allah have mercy on him, that all the operations should be carried out within 20 minutes before Bush and his administration notice.

It never occurred to us that the Commander in Chief of the armed forces would abandon 50,000 of his citizens in the twin towers to face those great horrors alone at a time when they most needed him.

He goes on to refer to the Pet Goat incident, so we know he's referring to the morning of September 11. But what does "carried out within 20 minutes before Bush and his administration notice" mean? Is bin Laden saying he gave the US warning ("notice") before the attack -- which would explain the weird look on Bush's face before he was told the attack had actually occured?

Is there someone out there who can do better with the translation?

Dave took a word and turned it into a site: Presidential Enblogment 2004. According to the numbers as of now, Kerry's running 85% to Bushs 11%, and Nader's 4%. And now there are 248 links on Google for "enblogment." There were none two days ago.

When this story broke, my reaction was the same as Begala's on Crossfire: There was no way that Bush cheated like this in the debates. And just because Doonesbury believes it that doesn't make it true.

But now Salon says a NASA photo analyst has concluded that he did. I know on the scale of things -- unnecessary war, torture, trillion dollar deficits, the environment -- this sin is tiny. But is there anything more pathetic than cheating in a debate? WBSH -- George "radio man" Bush. Powerful and effective, so long as he keeps the channel in tune.

Old news: The President of Zogby on Thursday predicted Kerry. That may be because of this new news: As its headline reports,

Young Mobile Voters Pick Kerry Over Bush, 55% to 40%, Rock the Vote/Zogby Poll Reveals: National Text-Message Poll Breaks New Ground

This is the South Korea factor: Unpolled voters, with a radically different view from the norm. You can read Zogby's press release here.

It took me too long to finish this book. A very close friend had recommended it, writing to me in an email "it is an interesting lesson in how idealism and rationality can become naive in Washington."

That comment is as depressing as is the book. O'Neill is no idealist. He is, as I described before, a policymaker. He had had decades of experience in Republican administrations; he is a buddy of Greenspan, and had came to the Treasury from ALCOA, where he was Chairman and CEO. He joined the administration believing in the need for a tax cut. But he also believed that the Reagan administration had taught us one important lesson: That irresponsible tax cuts don't pay for themselves; they instead control the domestic agenda for decades.

O'Neill framed a tax cut to fit the facts as they existed when he arrived. He continued to recommend changes to those policies as the facts changed, and the surplus was eroding into astonishing deficits. But as he pushed reality-based policymaking, he was increasingly resisted by politics-based aparachicki. When the facts became useless, the facts were forgotten.

This is the essence of O'Neill's criticism of the administration. That they didn't do the work. They chose policies that drove us into this astonishing deficit, willfully ignorant of the consequences, because to know of the consequences they would actually have to confront the facts. But the Rove-types are allergic to policy-related facts. And the President is painted throughout the book as he always seems throughout: totally incapable of thinking through complicated, factual questions about what should be done.

O'Neill's portfolio was economics. But as a senior cabinet member, he watched the same evolve with the War. In a particularly depressing end, he watches as the President announces war on Iraq. As Suskind writes:

O'Neill listens to the speech and feels disembodied, as though the world he'd long known was untethered from its moorings. The President is showing conviction, but from what source? A little later, he attempted to make sense of it. 'Conviction is something you need in order to act,' he said to me. 'but your action needs to be proportional to the depth of evidence that underlies your conviction. I marvel at the conviction that the President has in terms of the war. Amazing. I don't think he has the personal experience ...' His voice trails off as he distills it one last time. 'With his level of experience, I would not be able to support his level of conviction.'"

"O'Neill ... was deeply fearful about the United States 'grabbing a python by the tail ... Trust me, they haven't thought this through,' he said. He was still hoping there would be 'a real evidentiary hearing and a genuine debate' before troops were committed. He knew that wasn't likely. 'When you get this far down the path ... you want to have a heavy weight of evidence supporting you. If the action is reversible, or if a generation can erase its effects, it's different than if you bring the world to the edge of a chasm. You can't go back.'"

And this, then, is the depressing part about my friend's email. Is it really "naive" to expect that senior policymakers would use facts to do policy? Has reality become "idealism"?

Recall Suskin's piece in the Times:

The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''

Count me in the "idealist" camp. The sort that believes in "reality-based" policy making.

And count this as yet another Orwell moment.

So this site is a brilliant example of the brilliance of amateur (as in the Olympics) news on the net. And just today I realized: This is run by Andrew Tanenbaum.

Wrong, wrong, yet again, I was, we are, wrong. I was on an airplane last night, from SFO to London, so at least I didn't suffer the minute by minute awfulness of this result. But it's 5am PST, and we should remember some principles: When Bush "lost" in 2000, we said it was because (1) he had lost the popular vote, and (2) he had short circuited the count in one state to win in the College.

Bush has won the popular vote. And it would take a freak of nature to imagine the 220,000 provisional ballots would fall strongly enough to shift Ohio. He will win the College. He is our President -- legitimately, and credibly.

Our criticism of this administration must now focus narrowly and sharply: on the policies, not on the credibility of the man.

In a comment to this post, adamsj writes:

I�m going to spend time these next few days looking for the America in my heart. It may be a while before I see it anywhere else.

So it's not quite as red and blue as they say, or so summarizes this site with a collection of election maps and cartograms (licensed Creative Commons).

So this is the beginning of some fascinating data. The graph represents the "shift" from 4pm exit poll data to final results. The puzzle is why the shift is so biased. It is an "academic" puzzle because it won't matter to this election. But it should be explained.

The most extraordinary exchange at the McCain event last night was an exchange with McCain prompted by a question by Jonathan Zittrain. Zittrain had asked whether McCain had ever changed his mind. McCain answered that his core philisophies hadn't changed, but that he had made mistakes that he had acknowledged. He then told the story of his debacle in the South Carolina primary in 2000, when he had said that the use of the Confederate Flag by South Carolina was a matter of states rights.

McCain said that after he lost the primary, he realized this was a mistake. More than a mistake, it was, as he said last night, a "bald face lie" that had ruined him in South Carolina, even though he had told it because he thought it would help him win South Carolina. And he described how he had returned to South Carolina to apologize for the mistake after the election.

What was so striking about this was, of course, not that he had made a "mistake." But that his mistake was in telling a "bald face lie." Had Z had a chance at a follow-up, I would have loved to hear the answer to: "So were there any 'bald face lies' that worked out for you? Or are you still open to telling 'bald face lies' that might help elect you?"

So one of the weirder things I've heard people say is that they believe/want Oprah to run for President. Nutty friends, here's a clue: Her production company is threatening to sue a website trying to promote her candidacy.

John "Its the substance, stupid" Edwards has a fantastic call for more reliance on prizes, not patents for certain drugs. I know there's lots that's changed about the Edwards candidacy this time round. But I'm very happy the focus on smart, careful policy recommendations has not.

A great speech by Mr. Obama about limiting corruption in government. The fact sheet has lots more substance in it. This is great progress, though recommendation (2) is a bit funny. I would think the right way to avoid the revolving door is to forbid employment a certain number of years after working in the Administration. If you tie it to the life of the Administration, then there's not much protection for the last years of the term.

"DON'T DO THIS!" a friend wrote, a friend who never uses allcaps, a friend who cares genuinely about what's good for me, and who believes that what's good for me depends in part upon how easily I can talk to the next administration. "He is NOT going to win. She has it sewed up. DON'T burn your bridges before they're hatched -- so to speak."

So was my suggestion that I come clean publicly about what many here will have intuited long ago -- tha I support Barack Obama for President -- met by my friend. But I said as much in March, 2004, though I expected this year would be four years later. Barack was a colleague from way back. I've supported every campaign since the first. And from the very first moments I knew the guy, I thought that he was precisely the sort we should be able to elect as President.

Friendship, however, isn't the most compelling reason (for at least others) to support a candidate for President. I was therefore relieved and very happy that on substance, too, this is my candidate.

The closest leading competitor for my loyalty is of course Edwards. He's got great views about technology and privacy. He's got a fantastic commitment to changes that might well address the corruption that has become my focus. And he's come around to the right views about the war. I've long admired his passion and conviction. And but for fears about his flirting with protectionism, he would, in my view, make a great President.

The other front running Democrat, however, is not a close call for me. (Saying this is what terrified my newly allcaps friend.) She supported the war, but as my support of Edwards last time round indicates, I can forgive that. The parts I can't get over all relate to the issues around corruption. I signaled as much in my comments about her comments about lobbyists. We see two radically different worlds here. And were she President, I'd bet everything that we'd see radically little change.

But the part that gets me the most about Senator Clinton is the eager embrace of spinelessness. I don't get this in Democrats generally. I never have, but I especially don't get it after two defeats to the likes of George Bush (ok, one defeat, but let's put that aside for the moment). Our party seems constitutionally wedded to the idea that you wage a campaign with tiny speech. Say as little as possible. Be as uncontroversial as you can. Embrace the chameleon as the mascot. Fear only that someone would clearly understand what you believe. (Think of Kerry denying he supported gay marriage -- and recognize that the same sort of people who thought that would win him support are now inside the control room at ClintonHQ).

All politicians of course do this to some degree. And about some issues, I even get it. But what put me over the line with Senator Clinton was the refusal to join the bipartisan call that presidential debates be free. Not because this is a big issue. But because even on this (relatively) small issue, she couldn't muster the strength to do the right thing.

Her failure here was not because her campaign didn't know of the issue. I spoke directly to leading figures (or so they said) in the campaign. The issue was discussed, and a decision was made. And the decision was to say nothing about the issue. You can almost see the kind of tiny speak that was battered around inside HQ. "Calling for free debates might be seen as opposing copyright." "It might weaken our support among IP lawyers and Hollywood." "What would Disney think?" Better to say nothing about the issue. Better to let it simply go away.

And no doubt that was the safe bet, highly likely and politically sensible. But the issue of course didn't go away. The legal threats that motivated us to launch this call for free debates materialized in a threat against Senator McCain. But that again gave the Senator an opportunity to say something true and principled and consistent with values she certainly ought to hold dear: That Fox should not not silence McCain, even if his words were an attack on her. Again, there was an opportunity for principled, and strong character. Again, it was frittered away by tiny speak among the very same sorts who frittered away 2000, and 2004.

We (Democrats) and we (Americans) have had enough of this kind of "leadership." That (plus the Lincoln Bedroom) made it impossible for me, honestly, to support Senator Clinton. No doubt I would prefer her to any Republican (save, of course, the amazing Ron Paul). But I can't support the idea that she represents the ideals of what the Democratic Party must become.

And that leaves Barack -- an easy choice for me (except for the "trailing Clinton" part) for lots of reasons.

First, and again, I know him, which means I know something of his character. "He is the real deal" has become my favorite new phrase. Everything about him, personally, is what you would dream a candidate should be. Integrity, brilliance, warmth, humor and most importantly, commitment. They all say they're all this. But for me, this part is easy, because about this one at least, I know.

Second, I believe in the policies. Clearly on the big issues -- the war and corruption. Obama has made his career fighting both. But also on the issues closest to me. As the technology document released today reveals, to anyone who reads it closely, Obama has committed himself to important and importantly balanced positions.

First the importantly balanced: You'll read he's a supporter of Net Neutrality. No surprise there. But read carefully what Net Neutrality for Obama is. There's no blanket ban on offering better service; the ban is on contracts that offer different terms to different providers for that better service. And there's no promise to police what's under the technical hood (beyond the commitment already articulated by Chairman Powell): This is a sensible and valuable Net Neutrality policy that shows a team keen to get it right -- which includes making it enforceable in an efficient way, even if not as radical as some possible friends would like.

Second, on the important: As you'll read, Obama has committed himself to a technology policy for government that could radically change how government works. The small part of that is simple efficiency -- the appointment with broad power of a CTO for the government, making the insanely backwards technology systems of government actually work.

But the big part of this is a commitment to making data about the government (as well as government data) publicly available in standard machine readable formats. The promise isn't just the naive promise that government websites will work better and reveal more. It is the really powerful promise to feed the data necessary for the Sunlights and the Maplights of the world to make government work better. Atomize (or RSS-ify) government data (votes, contributions, Members of Congress's calendars) and you enable the rest of us to make clear the economy of influence that is Washington.

After the debacle that is the last 7 years, the duty is upon the Democrats to be something different. I've been wildly critical of their sameness (remember "Dems to the Net: Go to hell" which earned me lots of friends in the Democratic party). I would give my left arm to be able to celebrate their difference. This man, Mr. Obama, would be that difference. He has as much support as I can give.

(Oh, and to my allcaps friend, this was my reply: "Don't be ridiculous. This isn't about misplaced courage. Barack is going to win this one easily.")

It now looks like there's a very good chance that Iowa will do the American democracy more good tomorrow than any election has done in the last generation.

If the polls are to be believed (or if caucusers turn out according to the polls), then a majority of the Democracts will be voting for a candidate that places fixing the corruption that is Washington at the very top of his agenda. Both Edwards and Obama have made this their core message (Populist hero Edwards more than new generation Obama), and if the majority of Democrats in Iowa ratifying that message gets understood, we may see this election go a long way towards fixing the problem that I think is the single most important problem facing government today.

As I've said before, I don't think this is a Dem/GOP issue. But it is the case that the only credible campaigns attacking it are now from the Democratic side of the isle. The grotesqueness of the last 7 years perhaps leads the GOP to ignore the issue. The allegiance of the establishment Democratic candidate (HR Clinton) leaves an open field for the "less experienced" Obama and Edwards.

But in that charge ("less experience") lies all the promise of these two reform candidates. If you were asking how best to reform a corrupt Police Department, would anyone think that someone experienced inside the department was likely to be an effective reformer? I'm not saying it's not possible: Someone living inside that corruption could finally boil over with revulsion at the system that they are living within. Precisely that revulsion is what many of us were looking for Clinton to demonstrate. But we got none of that. Instead, we got a full throated defense of lobbyists. Thus, even if it is possible that an "experienced" politician could reform the system, the experience of HR "Lincoln Bedroom" Clinton is not likely to manifest that zeal for reform. She and her husband prospered from that system. Why would they ever work to dismantle it? She asks in her final 2-minute plea to Iowa: "Who is ready to be president and ready to start solving the big challenges we face on day one?" That's not the question. The right question is this: "Who sees fixing the corruption that is government as the most important challenge we face on day one, and who is likely to have the will to do it?"

Edwards and Obama are different from Clinton in this respect at least. Both are single term Senators -- in it enough to be revolted by the system, both aching to force change upon it. I concede it may be hard for some to choose between them. I think it is a moment of celebration that the Dems have two with this ethic at their core. And while I would not criticize anyone who caucused for Senator Edwards, as I've already indicated, my pull for Obama comes not just from knowing him a bit personally, but also from the aching desire that we let, to borrow from JFK, the torch pass to a new generation. Imagine what America looks like from the outside when this mixed race American (a redundancy, to be sure), who opposed this horrible blunder of a war from the start, is sworn in as President. And imagine what America looks from the inside, when all those under 50 see a man who doesn't actually remember Woodstock defining for a generation those things worth remembering.

It is a hopeful moment. Please, Iowa, make it real.

"Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans."

post-NH update:

This was the first of many, before the final in November. As John Edwards put it, "The status quo lost."

From the "[old] generation of Americans": "I'm not dead!" (See The Holy Grail, The Dead Collector)

Thank you, Iowa.

Senator Clinton says: "We're all advocating for change. We all want to change the status quo, which is George W. Bush and the Republican domination of Washington."

Really? Is that the "change" being called for by Edwards and Obama? Because I heard their call for change to be bigger than this. To be more fundamental. We've not made progress if change gets us to a world where lobbyists influence Democrats rather than Republicans. It's not "change" if we get back to a world where the Lincoln Bedroom goes to a leading Democratic fundraiser rather than a Republican. If the only "change" at stake here is a change in the party in control, then there's no much to get excited about.

Update: Some have misread this to be a kind a Nader-esque post -- that three's no difference between the Dems and Republicans, etc. I don't mean that at all. I think there is a hugely significant difference between the DEMs and GOP, and between Obama/Edwards and Clinton, on the single issue that I care most about -- whether we will see any progress in reforming the corruption that is Congress.

For the first time since March, Obama is ahead of Clinton in the Iowa futures market. And for the first time ever, he's above 50%. 53.2% to be precise.

Senator Clinton was given a great opportunity Sunday to explain what she means by "change." In an exchange on Meet the Press, she was asked about President Clinton's pardon of Marc Rich. Remember, Rich was the very rich man charged with tax evasion. Rather than fight the charge in court, he fled the jurisdiction. Not all his money fled, however, or at least lots came back -- in contributions to the Democratic Party, for example. Hours before leaving office, President Bill Clinton pardoned him.

Here was the exchange:

MR. RUSSERT: You say you've been deeply involved in the eight years of the Clinton administration. One of the powers given to a president is the power of pardon. At the end of the president's second term, he granted 140 pardons, including one to Marc Rich, someone who had been convicted of tax evasion, fraud and making illegal oil deals with Iran. Were you involved in that pardon?

SEN. CLINTON: No. I didn't know anything about that.

MR. RUSSERT: No one talked to you whatsoever?

SEN. CLINTON: No. No. Unh-unh.

MR. RUSSERT: His ex-wife gave $109,000 to your campaign.

SEN. CLINTON: Well, no one talked to me about it, Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: Nobody?

SEN. CLINTON: Nobody.

Later, Senator Clinton committed to following Justice Department "guidelines on pardons."

So this is a fantastic area to focus on in defining how Washington would "change" under the new Clinton rather than the old. Indeed, as her husband's administration was charged with essentially selling nights in the Lincoln Bedroom, and with this, selling pardons, it would have been a perfect opportunity for her to make clear just how different things would be.

In this question, she could have done that quite directly.

First, she could have taken the tough, though possibly right, path of speaking the truth despite how it is perceived. Certainly President Clinton thought there nothing wrong with the pardon. And indeed, when the Prime Minister of a major ally asks the President to pardon someone, especially one who has given so much money to one's political allies, one could well argue that it takes real courage to actually grant the pardon, given the totally predictable charge that the pardon was bought.

Second, she could have taken the responsive, change signaling path of acknowledging a mistake and indicating how she would do it differently. Giving large donors special access and privilege in an administration is exactly the kind of behavior many say should change. Senator Clinton could easily have marked this as one of the things that would change.

She did neither. Instead, she deflected responsibility, pointed to the Internet, and promised to follow "guidelines."

Not surprising. But not signaling, imho, "change."

I guess it's a good thing to see that Democracts can learn something about how to run (and hence, win) campaigns. It's a bad thing when what they learn is Swiftboating. Maybe it was Kerry's endorsement that cued the Clinton camp into the idea, but it is the other extraordinary thing about the Meet the Press. Here's the quote:

And let me address the point that Bill was making. Because, again, I think it's been unfairly and inaccurately characterized. What he was talking about was very directly about the story of Senator Obama's campaign, being premised on a speech he gave in 2002. And that was to his credit. He gave a speech opposing the war in Iraq. He gave a very impassioned speech against it and consistently said that he was against the war, he would vote against the funding for the war. By 2003, that speech was off his Web site. By 2004, he was saying that he didn't really disagree with the way George Bush was conducting the war. And by 2005, '6 and '7, he was voting for $300 billion in funding for the war. The story of his campaign is really the story of that speech and his opposition to Iraq. I think it is fair to ask questions about, "Well, what did you do after the speech was over?" And when he became a senator, he didn't go to the floor of the Senate to condemn the war in Iraq for 18 months. He didn't introduce legislation against the war in Iraq. He voted against timelines and deadlines initially.

So the "Swiftboat" strategy here is to take a quality that is a strength of your opponent, and turn it into a weakness. Kerry was a Vietnam war hero compared to President Bush, but the strategy of the Republicans was to completely neutralize that comparison, by raising ridiculous questions about his service. They knew that few would stop to notice the obvious fact: whatever questions you had about his service, at least he served.

And so too does the Clinton campaign now think: Swiftboat the anti-war issue, and people will forget that it was Obama alone among the leading candidates in this race who opposed the war from the start.

Here's the point to keep in view: Whatever your view about whether the war was right or wrong, how you vote after we entered the war is a different question from whether the war should have been waged in the first place. Ask Howard Dean, the last consistent opponent to the war. He didn't plan to cut funding to the troops, and pull out immediately. That's because, once the mistake was made, we had to deal with the mistake. So the fact Obama didn't vote to cut funding, or said he agreed with the way Bush was waging the war, is not "inconsistency." It is a different answer to a different question.

Don't belittle the credit one deserves for doing what Obama did in 2002. Whether or not he was contemplating running for President, no doubt he understood that opposing the war hysteria of the time would weaken his chances politically. That's the same understanding Clinton, Edwards, and every Republican had. But of the leading candidates, only Obama served us, by opposing an unjust war.

And regarding the "facts" in the attack: (1) Obama's first website in his candidacy for the Senate stated his opposition to the war. (2) The "2002 speech" referred to was a speech at an anti-war rally in Chicago. I don't know what Clinton could mean by saying it was "off his website." As you can see here, the "website" of a State Senator doesn't seem to have a place for speeches. The U.S. Senate campaign site, launched in 2002, does have a copy of the speech in the "news" section. That format continued for a time into 2003, but changed in 2003. But throughout 2003, Obama continued to promote the fact that "was the only Illinois senate candidate to publicly oppose President Bush's plan to pre-emptively attack Iraq." (3) Nothing in the original speech or in anything I've seen from that time indicates to me Obama promised to vote to cut off spending in Iraq. Instead, his promises then seem just as sensible now. This is from his website, December 2003:

Now that our troops are in Iraq, Obama will work toward ending deception that has shrouded our policies and forging international coalitions to share the burden of rebuilding. Obama will push for a full investigation of the intelligence provided to the Administration regarding the existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction and Iraqi efforts to obtain nuclear materials. He will also fight the cronyism and secret bidding that has resulted in billions of dollars in contracts going to large corporations close to the Administration. Obama will strive to restore truth and transparency to our policy in Iraq.

So essentially every important charge in the Clinton Swiftboating here is false. Aka, "swiftboating."

(I find now that Dick Durbin made the same charge against the Clintons. Smart guy, that Dubin).

I've seen lots of references to Obama's October, 2002 speech at an anti-war rally in Chicago. I've not seen copies of the speech. Using Brewster's Wayback machine, I was able to find a copy of the speech on Obama's 2002 site. It is as follows:

Obama: I'm not against wars but

COLUMN FOR THE HYDE PARK HERALD FOR WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2002
by Senator Barack Obama, D-13

The following is a speech that I gave at a recent rally regarding the situation in Iraq. The rally was downtown at Federal Plaza and several Hyde Parkers attended:

Good afternoon. Let begin by saying that although this has been billed as an anti-war rally, I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances.

The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil.

I don’t oppose all wars.

My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, fought in Patton's army. He saw the dead and dying across the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow troops who first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka. He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil, and he did not fight in vain.

I don’t oppose all wars.

After September 11th, after witnessing the carnage and destruction, the dust and the tears, I supported this Administrations pledge to hunt down and root out those who would slaughter innocents in the name of intolerance, and I would willingly take up arms myself to prevent such tragedy from happening again.

I don’t oppose all wars.

And I know that in this crowd today, there is no shortage of patriots, or of patriotism.

What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perles and Paul Wolfowitz and other arm-chair, weekend warriors in this Administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.

What I am opposed to is the attempt by political hacks like Karl Roves to distract us from a rise in the uninsured, a rise in the poverty rate, a drop in the median income to distract us from corporate scandals and a stock market that has just gone thru the worst month since the Great Depression.

That’s what Im opposed to. A dumb war. A rash war. A war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics.

Now let me be clear: I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power. He has repeatedly defied UN resolutions, thwarted UN inspection teams, developed chemical and biological weapons, and coveted nuclear capacity. He’s a bad guy. The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him.

But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history.

I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences.

I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the middle east, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of Al Queda.

I am not opposed to all wars. I’m opposed to dumb wars.

So for those of us who seek a more just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear message to the president today.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s finish the fight with Bin Laden and Al Queda, thru effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security program that involves more than color-coded warnings.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to make sure that the UN inspectors can do their work, and that we vigorously enforce a non-proliferation treaty, and that former enemies and current allies like Russia safeguard and ultimately eliminate their stores of nuclear material, and that nations like Pakistan and India never use the terrible weapons in already in their possession, and that the arms merchants in our own country stop feeding the countless wars that rage across the globe.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to make sure our so-called allies in the Middle East, the Saudis and the Egyptians, stop oppressing their own people, and suppressing dissent, and tolerating corruption and inequality, and mismanaging their economies so that their youth grow up without education, without prospects, without hope, the ready recruits of terrorist cells.

You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to wean ourselves off Middle East oil, through an energy policy that doesn't simply serve the interests of Exxon and Mobil.

Those are the battles that we need to fight. Those are the battles that we willingly join. The battles against ignorance and intolerance. Corruption and greed. Poverty and despair.

The consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay the wages of war. But we ought not we will not travel down that hellish path blindly. Nor should we allow those who would march off and pay the ultimate sacrifice, who would prove the full measure of devotion with their blood, to make such an awful sacrifice in vain.

Watching the debate last night, I wondered what happens when we become as bad as they. (WE=Dems; THEY=Karl Rove GOP). For there was a cheapness and dishonesty in the exchange last night that I haven't quite recognized before. Why I hadn't registered this before is an obvious question -- for of course, cheapness and dishonesty in presidential politics has been with us for a long time. But I recognized something about it last night I hadn't recognized before.

Let's start with the disappointment: Debates are not Obama's forte. If he were running for Prime Minister, I'd have second thoughts. I can't understand why he isn't better prepared for the obvious exchange that was going to happen. It took way too long to get to (w/r/t the Reagan absurdity): "I obviously don't agree with his ideas and never said I did, and indeed, I worked against them." It took way too long to get to (w/r/t the "present vote" issue): "In the US Senate, voting present would be bad Senatoring. In the Illinois Senate, it is how the system works. My 180 votes out of 4000 is just the same as ...." And w/r/t health care, he never got to "my plan IS universal because it is made available, in an affordable way, to everyone. I just don't believe in fining poor people. I believe in helping them." Again and again, the echo of Obama's message was "it's legitimate for us to disagree about ..." What good is that line doing -- especially given the completely illegitimate charges raised against him by HRC? Someone has go sit him down and force him to spit back 10 second responses to these questions. It isn't rocket science. It is practice and training.

But disappointment is one thing; (this word sounds too harsh, I know, but) disgust is something else. For there was a basic lack of integrity in the Clinton show last night. As a former friend of Clinton put it to me last night, "I now understand just why people hated the Clintons so."

For example: The absurdity about the Reagan comments (and slowly the press is coming around to the recognizing the absurdity in the comments, at least if you believe the Obama survey of the sources).

First, when I heard about this, it struck me as a perfect example of the generation gap that is this campaign. The ridiculousness of people who think they need to continue to attack Ronald Reagan is simply a reflection of a different generation. For anyone under 50, it is obvious Reagan is a towering figure. And for people over 50 who would reflect upon the matter for a second, it should be obvious that Reagan transformed how politics and government is considered. Reagan's was obviously a transformational presidency, in exactly the ways Clinton's was not. Those of us who worked to elect Clinton hoped he would be the Dem's Reagan. But it wasn't a month into his administration when he signaled as clearly as he could that transformation based on principle was not his game (remember selling out the gays in the military issue? Reagan would never have done the equivalent).

So Obama said the obvious (that Reagan's administration was transformational). And he also said that the GOP pushed a set of ideas in the 1980s that quickly captured many Dems (including, let's not forget, Clinton (see, e.g., welfare reform)). That too was obvious. But just as it's obvious to anyone with integrity that when Time names Putin as "Person of the Year" (or Hitler for that matter), Time is not endorsing the positions of Putin or Hitler, so too is it obvious (to anyone with integrity) that Obama was not endorsing Reaganomics. (Krugman, in my view, has that integrity. But he's just gone off the deep end here. There's no myth about the success of "voodoo economics" (as Bush the First put it) to be debunked). Indeed, as Obama pointed out in the most flashy line of the debate, he was on the streets of Chicago organizing against Reaganomics. His statement about "ideas" was simply identifying the kind of leadership he wanted his presidency to aspire to. That's precisely the leadership I want a president to aspire to too.

Yet HRC repeated the slander that Obama was endorsing or recommending those policies. I understand the political gain from creating that impression in people. But someone who does that in that way betrays a basic lack of integrity.

So too with the extraordinarily cheap shot of saying Obama worked for a "slum lord."

As Hillary Clinton of the Rose Law Firm (remember Whitewater?) certainly knows, even assuming (falsely) that Obama represented this "slum landlord," that one gives a client a defense does not mean one has endorsed the ethics or values of the client. And more certainly, the fact that as an associate at a law firm, one spent 4 hours working on a memo does not signal that one has endorsed the ethics or values of the client. Pt the partner of the client. As the Washington Post Factchecker reports:

William Miceli, Obama's supervisor at the law firm, said the firm represented the Woodlawn Preservation and Investment Corp., a nonprofit group that redeveloped a run-down property on Chicago's South Side with Rezko. He called Clinton's assertion that Obama represented Rezko in a slum landlord business "categorically untrue."

"He was a very junior lawyer at the time, who was given responsibility for basic due diligence, document review," said Miceli, adding that Obama did what he was told by the firm. According to Miceli, that was the only time Obama worked on a Rezko-related project while at the law firm.

But of course the irrelevance of this to Obama or his values is not obvious to people outside of legal practice. That means it was an effective charge politically. Clinton knew the truth. It was a plainly unethical charge for her to make. (Recall Advice and Consent: "Sir, have you no shame?")

But what about Obama's Walmart comment? (In responding to the charge that Obama endorsed Reagan's economic program, Obama said he was organizing in Chicago to fight those programs during a time when HRC was sitting on the board of Walmart).

Obama's reply must have been fun. It certainly got attention. It was in my view unnecessary. But even if unnecessary, it was certainly not unethical. His point was about his commitment to values that Clinton said he didn't have. Showing his "experience" in contrast to hers was fair, and it was true. It created an impression that accorded with the facts, unlike the Reagan comment, or the "slum lord" slander. Thus ethical, in my view, but unwise.

We've heard this about the Clintons from the start: they would do anything. But watching her utter words she knows are false, or words which even if technically true, create a plainly false impression, was, again, disgusting. Just how small is this person now apparently leading the Democrats? Just how small have we become?

Now of course I am totally open to the charge of naivete. But I don't think it just naivete. When you think about all the virtues that Obama plainly has over HRC -- indeed, in some ways, the Reaganesque ability to inspire, set a vision, speak across divides, etc. -- this cheapness feels different. The loss seems greater. Bush was small and deeply unethical when he allowed Karl Rove to destroy McCain in 2000 in South Carolina with totally false rumors. Many Republicans rightly thought the better man had been defeated by that dishonesty. We are soon to be in the same place with our nominee unless some measure of integrity surfaces in this campaign.

Caroline Kennedy, A President Like My Father. Finally hitting the theme that should be everything this campaign is about:

Most of us would prefer to base our voting decision on policy differences. However, the candidates' goals are similar. ... So qualities of leadership, character and judgment play a larger role than usual. ...

And when it comes to judgment, Barack Obama made the right call on the most important issue of our time by opposing the war in Iraq from the beginning....

I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them. But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president — not just for me, but for a new generation of Americans.

Read all about it.

I wasn't going to do this, but then someone ask me to do it, and someone else told me (to my horror -- not that it would be insane for anyone, but insane for her) that she was for Clinton. So consider this my precinct captain duty for the lessig blog.

Watch or download the high-quality video here (torrent). Or read it here (thanks Chris!).

about the potential for this man to bring together a nation, to signal change, to inspire, that he is literally the only candidate for whom something like this can look real. Thank you to Will.i.am and friends for showing us this.

A second, shorter video, about whether Hillary should win (and whether that should matter). Here both at blip.tv (which has better quality) and youtube.com, as well as a link to download the original.

Original file here.

From ObamaVideo08.

Both Dems say they are for "change" in Washington. One (the one who believes lobbyists represent "real Americans") is the leading recipient of earmarks. From "day one," business as usual. That's "change" in Washington-speak.

That Olbermann gets television time is the best evidence that free speech lives.

I'm going to be speaking at an Obama rally at the University of Pennsylvania (my alma mater) on Saturday, March 29, at 5pm, in Huntsman Hall - 3730 Walnut Street (or 38th and Locust Streets).

Though I've made slideshows for Obama (first, second), I've never done this. If you're around, or have friends who are around, come!

My talk at UPenn about Barack. Download other formats at blip.tv.

If you're near Philadelphia, and you're interested in tech policy in an Obama administration, some key figures will be talking about it at the Wharton School. Saturday, April 12, at 5pm. Read about it here.

I grew up in Pennsylvania, and went to university at Penn (as did just about everyone on my Dad's side of the family). I spent a couple days near where I grew up about three weeks ago, speaking at Penn State and Bucknell, and then travelled to Philadelphia to speak at an Obama event at Penn.

It is surprising how home never quite leaves you, no matter how far away you may be. And so as I saw PA leading up to a primary, I thought about writing a letter. Pennsylvania was the last place where I dreamed about life as Superman (at the age of 7); here's 9 minutes asking PA Democrats to become super-delegates.

(There's a version at YouTube, but the quality is astonishingly poor. I don't get the reason for the difference -- it is the same file uploaded in both places. But the sync is way off.)

Longtime HRC supporter Hilary Rosen on Hillary Clinton:

I am also so very disappointed at how she has handled this last week. I know she is exhausted and she had pledged to finish the primaries and let every state vote before any final action. But by the time she got on that podium last night, she knew it was over and that she had lost. I am sure I was not alone in privately urging the campaign over the last two weeks to use the moment to take her due, pass the torch and cement her grace. She had an opportunity to soar and unite. She had a chance to surprise her party and the nation after the day-long denials about expecting any concession and send Obama off on the campaign trail of the general election with the best possible platform. I wrote before how she had a chance for her "Al Gore moment." And if she had done so, the whole country ALL would be talking today about how great she is and give her her due. Instead she left her supporters empty, Obamas angry and party leaders trashing her. She said she was stepping back to think about her options. She is waiting to figure out how she would "use" her 18 million voters. But not my vote. I will enthusiastically support Barack Obamas campaign. Because I am not a bargaining chip. I am a Democrat.

From Huffington Post.

As with many of my friends, the last couple weeks have brought decisions I would wish went the other way. Whether or not Obama can raise all the money he needs from small contributions, candidates for the House and Senate can't. So I am worried about a decision that makes public funding for them less likely. I understand it. But I worry about it. Likewise, with the FISA compromise. Or at least, likewise in the sense that I don't like the FISA compromise. Or at least, the telco immunity in the FISA compromise. I can't begin to understand why in a war where soldiers go to jail for breaking the law, the US Congress is so keen to make sure telecom companies don't have to fight a law suit about violating civil rights. Obama doesn't support that immunity. He promises to get it removed. But he has signaled agreement with the compromise, which I assume means he will not filibuster immunity as he had indicated before he would. I wish he had decided differently.

But the key thing we need to keep in focus is what the objective here is. This is a hugely complex chess game. (Or I'm assuming it's complex, since how else can you explain losing twice (ok once) to this President.) The objective of this chess game is to keep focus on the issues that show America why your candidate should win. Keeping focus (in this media environment, at least) is an insanely difficult task. But one tool in that game is picking the fights that resonate in ways that keep focus on the issues that show America why your candidate should win.

That doesn't mean you (as a candidate) should change what you would do as President. Or change what you would fight for. But it does me that we (as strong supporters of a candidate) need to chill out a bit for about five months.

We (and I think that means all of us) can't afford to lose this election. When we win, we will have elected a President who will deliver policy initiatives I remain certain will make us proud. If he doesn't, then loud and clear opposition is our duty.

But that is then. This is now. And we need to remember now: you don't sacrifice a pawn because you want to kill pawns.

[breaking my "focus" injunction]:

All signs point to an Obama victory this fall. If the signs are wrong, it will be because of events last month. These events constitute a so-far-unnamed phenomenon in Presidential campaigning -- what we could call "self-Swiftboating." To understand "self-Swiftboating," you've got to first understand "Swiftboating."

Some use the term "Swiftboating" to refer to harsh, even vicious attacks on an opponent. I use the term in a more restrictive sense: "Swiftboating" is (1) attacking the strongest bits of a candidate's character, with (2) false or misleading allegations. That was what Kerry suffered -- attacking his courage as a soldier, the characteristic that distinguished him most from Bush, with misleading (at least) allegations by some who knew him when he served.

Self-Swiftboating is to Swiftboat yourself: For a campaign to do something that has the effect of undermining its own candidate's strongest characteristic, with actions that are (at best) misleading. The Obama campaign has now self-Swiftboated candidate Obama.

(1) An attack on a core characteristic: There are at least two views about what makes Obama so compelling. One that he happens to have the mix of positions on policy questions that best matches the public's. The other that he is perceived by the public as "different," and hence (given the public hates politicians so) someone the public can like, or more significantly, get enthusiastic about.

I'm strongly in the second camp. It seems to me nothing more than consultant-think to imagine people choosing a President with a checklist of issues, finding the one to vote for the way they pick a place to vacation. It seems to me nothing less than obvious that people are passionate about Obama because he strikes them as a different kind of candidate -- one that stands for his beliefs, that speaks clearly and directly, that can be trusted to stick by his beliefs, that says what he believes regardless. Such a creature, in most people's minds, is "not a politician." Such a creature (i.e., "not a politician") is what people want in a President.

Democrats never seem to get this. The last two campaigns were lost (in my view) because the campaign was working overtime to bob and weave to match the program of the candidate to the pollsters' latest work. That the shifts would signal that the candidate was nothing different just didn't seem to compute. Better, for example, to have people believe the candidate (Kerry) was against gay marriage than to worry that most would see the position as a political ploy.

Republicans, on the other hand, seem obsessed with this. It was the defining feature of the success of Reagan that he made it appear as if he did what he believed, not what the polls said. It was the part Bush v2 mimicked best. It is the clear dream of the McCain campaign to do the same. "You may not like what I say, but at least you know where I stand" is the signal virtue in a GOP campaign. It is the signal blindness of a Democratic campaign.

I am not saying that Republicans are consistent and Democrats not. I am saying something very different: that Republicans believe appearing consistent/principled/different is the key to victory, where as Democrats (apparently) do not.

The Obama self-Swiftboating comes from a month of decisions that, while perhaps better tuning the policy positions of the campaign to what is good, or true, or right, or even expedient, completely undermine Obama's signal virtue -- that he's different. We've handed the other side a string of examples that they will now use to argue (as Senator Graham did most effectively on Meet the Press) that Obama is nothing different, he's just another politician, and that even if you believe that McCain too is just another politician, between these two ordinary politicians, pick the one with the most experience.

The Obama campaign seems just blind to the fact that these flips eat away at the most important asset Obama has. It seems oblivious to the consequence of another election in which (many) Democrats aren't deeply motivated to vote (consequence: the GOP wins).

Instead, and weirdly, the campaign seems focused on the very last thing a campaign should be doing during a campaign -- governing. This is not a try-out. A campaign is not a dry run for running government. Yet policy wonks inside the campaign sputter policy that Obama listens to and follows, again, apparently oblivious to how following that advice, when inconsistent with the positions taken in the past, just reinforces the other side's campaign claim that Obama is just another calculating, unprincipled politician.

The best evidence that they don't get this is Telco Immunity. Obama said he would filibuster a FISA bill with Telco Immunity in it. He has now signaled he won't. When you talk to people close to the campaign about this, they say stuff like: "Come on, who really cares about that issue? Does anyone think the left is going to vote for McCain rather than Obama? This was a hard question. We tried to get it right. And anyway, the FISA compromise in the bill was a good one."

But the point is that the point is not the substance of the issue. I'd argue until the cows come home that in a world where soldiers go to prison for breaking the law, the government shouldn't be giving immunity to (generous campaign contributing) companies who break the law. But a mistake about substance is not why this flip is a mistake. I agree that a tiny proportion of the world thinks defeating Telco Immunity is important. The vast majority don't even understand the issue. But what this perspective misses is just how easy it will be to use this (clear) flip in policy positions to support the argument "Obama is no different." Here, and in other places, the campaign hands the other side kryptonite.

The issue cannot just be the substance alone. It has got to also be how a change on that substance will be perceived: And here (as with the other flips), it will be perceived in a manner that can't help but erode the most important core of the Obama machine. It is behavior that attacks Obama's strongest feature -- that he is different. It is, therefore, Swiftboating.

Or at least, it is Swiftboating if it is false. So is it? Is the impression that this bobbing and weaving gives a misimpression? Or are we seeing, as the pundits are now beginning to chant, the true face of Obama?

(2) That is false or misleading: It is false. I know it is false because I believe I know the man, and because I know some inside the campaign struggling with these issues. I see them struggling to get it right. They are struggling, in short, to govern. The ones I know at least are not bobbing and weaving for political gain. They're tuning the campaign as governing best requires. The flip on Telco Immunity gave Obama nothing, except the opportunity to do what he believes is right, in light of the compromises in the new bill. He acted to do what he believed was right. So the impression it gives -- of a triangulator, tuning the campaign to the song of the polls -- is misimpression. But that means it fits the definition of self-Swiftboating: The campaign sabotages its strongest characteristic, through steps that are misleading at best.

The campaign needs to stop this. This is not the time for governing. It is the time for making clear precisely what kind of President Obama will be. But in making that clear, it is critical to keep a focus on how actions are perceived. Will they signal a triangulator? Or will they signal a strong, principled man who stands for what he believes.

No doubt, compromise is the duty of anyone within government. But in the ADD culture we live in, compromise is poison to anyone trying to do what every politician now tries to do -- appear not to be "a politician." And thus if the oath to represent Illinois is getting in the way of signaling who Obama is, then maybe it is time to step away from being a Senator from Illinois. This is the time to keep the message focused on who (I know) this man is: someone different.

Hey HQ: You've got a guy who really stands for something (the tall thin guy, the one from Illinois). A man whose word really does matter. You've got to be extraordinarily careful not to give the other side the power to neutralize that.

The hysteria that has broken out among we on the left in response to Obama's voting for the FISA compromise was totally predictable. Some more cynical types might say, so predictable as to be planned. National campaigns are dominated by people who believe a leftist can't be elected to national office. That means events that signal a candidate is not a leftist are critical for any election to national office.

But without becoming part of the cynical plan, some reactions to the outrage.

1. Obama is no (in the 1970s sense) "liberal": There are many who are upset by this who believe this (and other recent moves) shows Obama "moving to the center." People who make this argument signal they don't know squat about which they speak. You can't read Obama's books, watch how he behaved in the Illinois Senate, and watched how he voted in the US Senate, and believe he is a Bernie Sanders liberal. He is not now, and nor has ever been. That's not to say there aren't issues on which he takes a liberal position. It is to say that the mix of views he actually has and has had doesn't map on a 1970s spectrum of liberals to conservative. He is not, for example, "against the market," as so many on the left still make it sound like they are. He is for same-sex civil unions. So if you're upset with Obama because you see him shifting, you should actually be upset with yourself that you have been so careless in understanding the politics of this candidate.

2. Obama has not shifted in his opposition to immunity for telcos: As he has consistently indicated, he opposes immunity. He voted to strip immunity from the FISA compromise. He has promised to repeal the immunity as president. His vote for the FISA compromise is thus not a vote for immunity. It is a vote that reflects the judgment that securing the amendments to FISA was more important than denying immunity to telcos. Whether you agree with that judgment or not, we should at least recognize (hysteria notwithstanding) what kind of judgment it was. The amendments to FISA were good. Getting a regime that requires the executive to obey the law is important. Whether it is more important than telco immunity is a question upon which sensible people might well differ. And critically, the job of a Senator is to weigh the importance of these different issues and decide, on balance, which outweighs the other.

   This is not an easy task. I don't know, for example, how I personally would have made the call. I certainly think immunity for telcos is wrong. I especially think it wrong to forgive campaign contributing telco companies for violating the law while sending soldiers to jail for violating the law. But I also think the FISA bill (excepting the immunity provision) was progress. So whether that progress was more important than the immunity is, I think, a hard question. And I can well understand those (including some friends) who weigh the two together, and come down as Obama did (voting in favor).

3. Obama's shift was in his promise, as relayed by a member of his staff, to filibuster any bill with telco immunity: First, and most obviously, that promise was a stupid promise. However important holding telcos responsible is, certainly there is something more important that Congress could have done. E.g., if telco immunity were tied to a bill requiring a 70% reduction in green house gases by 2015, would it make sense to filibuster that bill?

   But second, even given it was a stupid promise, in my view, it was political mistake to change -- even if it was the right thing to do from the perspective of a U.S. Senator.

   It was a political mistake for the reasons I've already explained: it was self-Swiftboating. This shift is fuel for the inevitable "flip-flop" campaign already being launched by the Right. Their need to fuel this campaign is all the more urgent because of the extraordinary "flip-flops" of their own candidate. So anyone with half a wit about this campaign should have recognized that this shift would be kryptonite for the Barack "is different" Obama image. Just exactly the sort of gift an apparently doomed campaign (McCain) needs.

   But again, to say it was a political mistake is not to say it was a mistake of governance. To do right (from the perspective of governance) is often to do wrong (from the perspective of politics). (JFK won a Pulitzer for his book about precisely this point.) So at most, critics like myself can say of this decision that it was bad politics, even if it might well have been good governance. Bad politics because it would be used to suggest Obama is a man of no principle, when Obama is, in my view, a man of principle, and when it is so critical to the campaign to keep that image front and center.

4. Unless, of course, it was good politics: I actually don't personally believe that this was a decision motivated by politics, because, again, I've seen the actual struggle of some who advised on this issue (and I wasn't one of those few), but we should recognize, of course, that this decision to pick a fight with us liberals may well have been worth more than the campaign would lose by this one clear example of flipping. And here, if you let cynical instincts run wild, there's no limit to the games that might be imagined. For what better way to demonstrate (accurately, again, for remember #1 above) that Obama is not beholden to the left than by this very visible fight that Obama doesn't cave in on. When I received the blast from Moveon, demanding that Obama reverse himself (again), it was absolutely clear that he wouldn't. For how could he reverse himself then, and avoid the tag of being tied to the left? And certainly (more cynicism) Moveon recognized this. What greater gift than a chance to act independently of a movement that (while good and right and true, in my liberal view) is not anymore a spokesman for the swing votes that will decide this election.

5. But assume you reject #4 completely. Then one more thought: Isn't it time for Obama to resign from the Senate? Why should he allow the weird framing of issues that will come from this spineless institution to define his campaign? (Notice, McCain didn't even deign to show up.) Why not simply confess to his constituents that he can't do his job as United States Senator from Illinois while running for President of the United States. That the clarity of message necessary for the latter isn't consistent with the obligation of compromise required for the former?

6. Finally, and 2bc: please, fellow liberals, or leftists, or progressives, get off your high horse(s). More on this with the next post but: it is not "compromising" to recognize that we are part of a democracy. We on the left may be right. We may be the position to which the country eventually gets. But we have not yet earned the status of a majority. And to start this chant of "principled rejection" of Obama because he is not as pure as we is, in a word, idiotic (read: Naderesque).

   That taunt will be continued.

So I didn't make many friends in the Obama campaign when I suggested his campaign was Self-Swiftboating Obama -- acting in a way that undercut his most important character. But (as an Obama supporter), I am really pleased (if as one-time admirer of McCain, saddened) to see that McCain is out-doing Obama in this respect, big time.

Below are a brace of ads by Brave New Film (on whose board I sit) and MoveOn.org that make the substance of the point well. Here's the Self-Swiftboating analysis:

McCain's strongest feature as a candidate was the perception that he was a no bullshitting, straight talking, truth speaking maverick. Though I was an admirer, I never quite saw the image as true. (I wrote about an extraordinary exchange I saw with him and Zittrain last year.) But that's certainly what makes people like and respect him -- and what distinguished him so completely from Mitt "I'm running so I need to be a Rightwinger" Romney, and Rudy "I'm running so I need to be a Rightwinger" Giuliani.

But now, McCain's acting in a way that will turn off this base completely. The absurdity of the flip-flop on off-shore drilling, and the shameful suggestion that this is a solution to the problem of high gas prices (all after he had met with oil execs, and then received a huge influx of campaign cash from the same), and the totally baseless charge that Obama's decision not to visit troops was motivated by the unavailability of the press coverage: Shame on you, Senator. But please, don't stop now!

From Politico:

Asked what work John McCain did as Chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee that helped him understand the financial markets, the candidate's top economic adviser wielded visual evidence: his BlackBerry.

"He did this," Douglas Holtz-Eakin told reporters this morning, holding up his BlackBerry.

Some Stanford alumni have started a travel project for Obama, TraveforChange.org. The basic idea -- use frequent flyer miles to help Obama volunteers get to places where they can do some good.

I was intrigued by Governor Palin's hint in her ABC interview that her experience was comparable to other VPs across history. I was surprised by how incorrect she was.

Here's a mp4 version.

Here's the version at blip.tv.

Here's a version at the Internet Archives.

It has surprised me that this, the tremor before this recent financial disaster, the Keating Five scandal, has not been at the center of this campaign before. But now, apparently in response to Palin's suggestion that the fact Obama knows Ayers is relevant to whether he should be president, the Obama campaign has released this very strong 15 minute documentary about the Keating scandal.

For those not old enough to remember, here's the outline: 5 Senators, all of whom had received campaign funding from Charles Keating, intervene with regulators to get them to overlook criminal behavior by Keating, leading to the collapse of Lincoln Savings, leading to a $3.4 billion bill for Americans. The only one of those 5 Senators to receive both personal and political benefits from Keating: McCain.

Fair? Totally relevant to the question whether the judgment of this candidate is the sort that's needed at this time. Totally relevant to the basic question whether his philosophy -- deregulate -- is what this sector needs at this time.

Wise? Not sure. I'm not sure Americans distinguish between hard-hitting-and-fair criticism (which this is) and hard-hitting-and-unfair criticism (which Palin's is). One might worry that they're "burn[ing] down the house to roast the pig" but I assume they've reckoned that.

But ugly? You bet.

From CBS:

Some of the questioners said they were scared of an Obama presidency, and one woman said she couldn’t trust Obama because “he’s an Arab.”

McCain shook his head. “No ma’am, he’s a decent family man, a citizen, that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues, and that’s what this campaign is all about.”

Yosem's diary on Daily Kos has a transcript of a McCain push polling call. It is extraordinarily depressing to read, especially when you remember that it was this tactic precisely (employed by Bush) that derailed his 2000 campaign in South Carolina.

This is the most important, most profound, more powerfully argued 7 minutes of this campaign.

I awoke in New Zealand today to an article in the New Zealand Herald, and I had a strange sense of deja vu. It is still Monday in America. And like the Monday before the 2004 election, and the Monday before the 2000 election, there is enormous confidence among Democrats that we are going to win this.

But as with 2000, and 2004, I have become a bit terrified about where we’ll be Tuesday. For as presented by the New Zealand Herald, however optimistic the static view of the swing states is, the dynamic view — what is the trend — is sobering, to say the least. As this graph shows, only Florida is trending in the right direction. Every other critical state is trending away from Obama.

Now of course, maybe not quickly enough. Of course, the advantages are significant, especially relative to 2004. And of course, McCain would have to move mountains to overcome the enormous machine that the Obama campaign has built.

But here’s the weird deja vu I feel. In 2004, I got on a plane Tuesday to fly to London. When I got on the plane, I watched every pundit, as well as Kerry’s daughter, speak about how all the polls were with Kerry. The “exit polls” indicated a clear Kerry victory. But then when I landed, I sat it utter disbelief in the United lounge at Heathrow, watching the Ohio numbers go against us, and therefore, delivering 4 more years to Bush.

We Democrats have trouble closing the deal. We have trouble continuing the push to the very last moment. We have repeatedly been blindsided by the fact that the other side votes regardless of the expected result, while we’re more contingent — making the effort if it seems necessary, relaxing when it doesn’t.

Please, don’t let this happen again. Please, if you’re an Obama supporter, do absolutely everything you can in the next 24 hours to make sure every single possible Obama vote turns out to vote. Volunteer for a phone bank, or use my.barackobama.com to phone bank from home. And beyond this, do the sort of things that too few of us ever have the courage to do: Express to your friends, and anyone you know, why you want them to support your candidate. Send an email with a personal story, or an argument important to you, to as many people as you can. Apologize for the intrusion, but intrude nonetheless. (How weird is it that engaging people about democratic issues in a democracy is generally viewed as inappropriate). And don’t let up until 8pm Pacific time.

I’m doing this. I’m exhorting you. I’m writing to everyone on my twitter/facebook/indenti.ca/flickr lists. If I can find an smtp server that will let me, I’ll dump an email to as many of my friends as I can telling them they this is so important. And when my plane lands in the US Tuesday morning, I will join my wife (who is running a phone bank in San Francisco), spending the day on the phone). I will mark myself as weird in doing all this, no doubt. But we can all afford this, if only just once in our life.

I understand the other side has their reasons. I respect them, even if I disagree with them. But I am genuinely afraid about what happens to our side if we let this slip away. There is enormous energy and passion among young people for Obama. There is a passion and hope that makes me cry each time I think about it among African Americans, and those who think about and live the discrimination of our past, and present. There is an energy I have never imagined could be behind any politician. I have known for more than a decade that this man is the real deal. And it gives me enormous hope for this democracy that we are about to vote to make him President.

Unless we don’t. Unless we let this slip by, again. Unless we sit in our comfortable cubicle, and let politics be run by the other side.

Don’t do this. Do something this time. Please at least help spread this message. Make sure everyone who could matter here knows what you believe. And don’t stop until the clock runs out.