My bet is that this seat goes red and stays red for a while.  Too bad.  It's been blue since '86.

OT Trivia: Kent Conrad held this seat from '86 to '92, then switched to the other seat.  Only true junkies remember why/how.

Nixonland!

Fair enough.  I'm ranting at the Dem leadership in general, and one of my three doesn't fall at Pelosi's feet.  To her credit, tho she's personally guilty of looking the other way on Obama's bad moves and on Murtha, she has parted with other Dem leaders on torture investigations.

I just don't want us to start acting like Republicans, defending our party leaders no matter what they do.

She works for us, not vice versa.

She deserves our support when she does good things, and our criticisms when she does bad things.

Not challenging Bush or Obama on torture and secrecy -- bad thing.  (Hey, folks, let's not pretend abuse of prisoners stopped on January 20 just because we like our president.)  Blocking investigations of who knew what and when just because it might expose Dems -- bad thing.  Blocking ethics investigations for crooked Dems like Murtha -- bad thing.  (Dirty is dirty, and it's always bad.) etc etc etc

If our support for these leaders is unconditional, there's no reason for them to stop doing bad things.

I won't support Dem leaders who just want to beat the Repubs at their own games.  The whole point of 2008 was to change the game.

Jonathan and Jerome--

I still don't see that this has anything to do with US national interests, particularly US national security interests.

There is no difference between these parties in their positions on issues that matter to US interests.

Why should in the US we pay attention to this election instead of the blockade, rockets, invasion and war?

I didn't ask him to report from Gaza.

I asked him to talk with a broader array of people, including Palestinians and Israelis who think these attacks are a bad idea.  He can do those things from within Israel.

We in the US are doing ourselves no favors by only listening to one faction from one side of this conflict.  That is one of the lessons of Iraq, if we could stand to learn it.

(BTW, rather than "no reporter is allowed into Gaza," it would be more accurate to say "the IDF is defying the Israeli Supreme Court by refusing to allow reporters into Gaza."  Maybe the IDF could "embed" reporters.  That worked out so well for informing the US public about what was really going on in Iraq, right?  I'm sure FOXNews would be happy to do it.)

. . . with people working in Palestinian politics?  Or with reporters covering it?

I'm not sure why you are only discussing views of people on one side of the conflict.  Or, I would note, the views of people on that side who support what their government is doing.

Curiosity only about the views and experiences of one faction on one side of a conflict is what got us into the mess in Iraq, with all its disastrous consequences.

After the FTW display last night by the Senate Republicans, all of their non-Southern incumbents will be vulnerable to challenge.

It was an amazing display, a genuine Thelma and Louise moment, with McConnell et al driving the Cadillac over the cliff.  Literally dozens of YouTube moments for 2010.

They think American workers are being paid too much.  They'd rather let the economy fail than pass up a chance to break the unions.

Repeat after me: Reckless, corrupt and incomptent.  Reckless, corrupt and incompetent.  Reckless, corrupt and incompetent.

Bushes, Murkowskis, stuff like that.

We were supposed to hate this hereditary dynasty stuff a few months ago because it was undemocratic.  Now we're supposed to love it because it brings connections and public support.  It's so hard to keep track.

If you miss the Oceania reference, go read Orwell's 1984.

I would think that eight years of W would prevent anyone from ever saying things couldn't get worse.

Good people and good intentions are not good government.  Good government is good government.

I have.  Meh.

Celebrities and hereditary rule are great for TV, and Roman myths make for righteous rhetoric, but Cincinnatus didn't have to staff a Washington office, or set up a constituent service operation.

He didn't have to learn the jurisdictions of his subcommittees and learn from scratch how to write legislation.

He didn't have to vote dozens of times a week on matters that span the full reach of a huge government serving 300-million people and struggling to help a globalized economy recover from its greatest crisis in 75 years.

I can't imagine the people of New York will like waiting a year or two for their Senator to learn how to do her job.

I wouldn't call this a proud moment in the history of American representative democracy.    It's Lisa Murkowski all over again.

This kind of thinking always amazes me.

You'd want a person with no experience in public office to represent you?  Why on earth would you expect they could represent you effectively in the US Senate?  You think just any smart, good-hearted person can do this job?

Would you ask somebody off the street to perform brain surgery on you?  To put out a fire in your house?  To teach your kid algebra?  To build your car?

Jerome, I agree that I/P is important to peace in the region.  My point is that there's nobody, no major party in either Israel or Palestine who shows any semblance of an interest in doing anything that has any prospect of resolving issues of concern to the United States.

There is also no evidence that any major leader or party in either Israel or Palestine cares about the United States except as a funder of Israel and an unfortunately unconditional guarantor of Israel's security.

Certainly the August war demonstrated that the current Israeli government has no interest in US national security.

I'm not arguing that you shouldn't pay attention to the election.  It's your site, and you can do with it what you want.  I'm just saying that the conduct and outcome of the Israeli election aren't going to change anything that matters to us in the US.  If MyDD is going to turn its attention to parties, campaigns and elections abroad, there are places you could focus on where things are actually happening that matter to the US.

Also, the comments upthread suggest that most readers of MdDD who will pay attention to the Israeli election are more interested in a food fight than anything of productive substance.

about this.  How many people actually live in Israel/Palestine, after all?  How many dozens/scores of countries around the world have more people in them?

The problems in I/P are intractible.  Nobody with any power there seems to have any interest in solving them.

We in the US (and MyDD) could spend our time/money/attention elsewhere, with greater constructive impact.

Let's.

The details change, but overall the song remains the same.  We've had close elections going all the way back.

Some stars like HHH and Mondale won their offices easily, but mostly it's been back and forth.

We've also always had strong rightys and strong leftys, and some oddballs thrown in.

Maybe it's just a cry for attention... But everybody's watching now, right?