Dude, retire as a prognosticator. Obama is going to get hammered, Barbie is going to be the biggest hit since Abe Lincoln, now this.

Jerome -- Tin ear, speaking as a white working class guy. She's more a hit with the guys than the gals, so that's one off right there, but a lot of guys will feel emasculated as this develops. The women in my family see her game viscerally and are getting a pretty good hate on. She is a smart cookie, no question there, but she missed her moment -- her team is on the decline. I agree that she is stealing the show and making this election about her, but that is not good for McCain.

If the Republicans lose the election, she will be considered as a good part of the reason. If she and hers take over the party, game on -- New Deal territory and out in the wilderness for a generation.

Ok, I'm a 59 year old teacher at a vocational college in a larger town than yours, some 250,000 citizens. I argue that maximum enfranchisement is an unalloyed good. Democracy simply means the right to organize and make your case to decision makers. Sure, all these fresh and transient voters have the potential to screw up the school bonds and WalMart votes. Unorganized, they will probably break approximately like their parents, ideologically speaking.

The great thing about college, though, is that it is a time of personal ferment, growth, and change. With even modest prodding, any progressive cause will get its share of advocates and voters.

Case in point. In 2006, the wingers put a gay marriage and civil union ban on the Wisconsin ballot state-wide. The carried it too, 60%-40%. But young people throughout the state rallied behind FAIR Wisconsin to oppose it and carried the day in every college town in the state, including small ones like Platteville (population 10,000). Four Senate seats flipped Dem, enough to change the majority, and good gains in the Assembly.

Election day registration is vitally important for robust turnout. We have it in Wisconsin and it was something to see in action in 2004. My union sent me to a student precinct as a vote protector and told me not to break a sweat getting there too early, students are late risers, you know. Hah! When I sauntered in half an hour after polls opened, there was a line 200 yards long, several hundred people. And by God, they were a disciplined lot and they were going to vote. It put a lump in my throat. That line itself became a problem, as we worked with well-intentioned officials to speed it up, asked them to break the master voter list into two to break the bottleneck (A - M and N - Z). No problem! Line cleared up in a couple hours.

One of my jobs was to oversee the new registration table, where maybe 15% of the voters came. They needed a picture ID linking the person to the face and a piece of incoming mail linking the name to the address, which had to be in the precinct. Then they signed an affidavit. That precinct went 80% for Kerry and it was a massive turnout, the old-timers said they'd never seen anything like it. Kerry took the state by 11,000 votes. There is no question whatever that he would have lost this state by tens of thousands of votes, maybe 100,000, without same day registration.

Saw the video at her site earlier today and was duly impressed. Am going to send the YouTube link to a few family members (and Hilary is my third choice).

I got a pitch from this freak in the mail and it's creeping me out, because it's the first one I've ever gotten from a Republican presidential candidate in fourty years, just don't travel in those circles. Looks pretty slick too -- several pieces, including one glossy with Mitt against a flag background. Guess what flag. "Romney for President, Inc.", it says.

Maybe from being the registrar of a domain name? Don't know, but he appears to be reaching recesses never visited by these creeps.

This has been aired enough to show decisively that Chait is a dishonest apparatchik and it is starting to look like navel-gazing. I can only assume you and Atrios and everyone have good reason to believe the little dick merits this kind of attention. I would guess 90% or more of your readers wouldn't touch TNR if it was on fire and threatening the neighborhood. True of me anyway. If they're that fucking influential, let's hear some strategies for taking them down.

I had no idea the path you'd followed before watching the video. Circa 1970 the Teaching Assistants Association in Madison was a major recruitment ground for labor and political activists and we sent many of them forth -- guys like Bob Muelenkamp, our strike leader in 1970. I still have a soft spot for the TAA.

Although maybe I shouldn't be so hard on him, being very little acquainted with the man or his works. Takin' it on your say-so Matt, as thousands will. What, he has a column or something? Who gives a rap. It's like reading an essay of Lord Macaulay about some long forgotten statesman and you are kind of fascinated by all the in-and-outs and what a fine job the great one does tying him to his time, his peers, and all that was important around him. But the man himself? An utter cipher.

Just as well, continue to build the new power center. Next time you tap us, I'm in for $300.

You're operating at a level of sophistication apparently a few light years ahead of some of these boneheads. I like John Edwards fine, probably better than the others right now, and agree that it is essential to elect a Democratic president, exactly for the reason you suggest, the dangerous authoritarianism / cultism that has infected the Republican Party.

Seeing you favorably highlight Richardson, I thought "Perfect, this is the way to bring other candidates to the light, and it's the best time to do it."

You do wonder sometimes what some people think politics consists of.

Why don't you STFU.

Agreed, and Glenn's time is coming.

It is gratifying to watch these bastards twist in the wind, stunned that something they did as a matter of course up till the day before yesterday is now going to get their sorry ass fired. Not just did it, but built a whole persona and audience-grabbing strategy around it.

Each one that falls makes the next campaign that much easier.

There's another factor in play. My right wing friends use the Internet plenty to spread the word and advance their agenda, much like you'd use a shotgun to stop someone who just busted down your door and is screaming about killing you; that is, as a ready tool that's close at hand and does the job.

Endlessly forwarded Email, bone-headed Power Point presentations, and so on -- these are the methods of earnest but unsophisticated types who have not mastered much about technology and don't want to, probably feel a little queasy about the whole thing. They are always going to be a few years behind, because newer technologies aren't something they naturally or inherently embrace.

Chris's term entrepreneurial is at the heart of it. It's a cultural attitude and willingness to adopt new communications technologies early, not just for their instrumental uses, but because it's fun experimenting with them. This is related to age as well. When something comes up, my attitude and my daughters' as well is "Let's start a blog on it, whatever". I don't see that on the right.

And vitally important it is. I was a vote protector in a student ward in Madison in 2004 and maybe 20% of voters registered on the spot. They had to have a picture ID and a piece of mail adressed to themselves in the precinct and sign an affidavit. Then go vote. 80% of that precinct voted for Kerry, who won the state by 11K.

It was moving watching democracy in action, people waiting up to an hour and a half, determined to vote. My ACT and Union handlers were all too casual -- "Don't feel you have to get there too early, they're students, they're used to getting up late." Hah! There were hundreds in line when I got there.