I didn't call you a neocon. I said that if you are a neocon fuck off, otherwise, we need to be a little more pragmatic in our stances.

I tried to explain, here and elsewhere, why taking this stance at this moment is a no-win situation and I am sure Obama sees that as well.

I am also saying that this All or Nothing mentality of progressive activists is what has kept us in the political wilderness for at least a generation.

I think that we need to use this moment to win, not to score political points that are immaterial in the grand scheme of things. There is nothing the Congress is doing right now that can't be repealed or amended later. There is also a chance it could be taken to the Supreme Court as unconstitutional.

Doesn't it make sense that Obama has a pretty good idea of what it will take to win? Also, he has a much better idea than you or I about how things are done in the Senate. It is a complete clusterfuck in Congress right now and an evil bully has the pulpit.

FDR didn't win by running on the New Deal. Jimmy Carter didn't win by promising to stick solar panels on the White House roof.

Win first, then govern. That is the way the system works right now. Come November I will be right there with you, demanding change and being very wary of any compromise that doesn't move the ball forward on our most pressing issues.

FISA doesn't bother me in the least. I literally don't give a moment's thought. Fucking Equifax is way more hazardous to me on a daily basis than Verizon or Sprint. DC Mayor Adrian Fenty asking Fort Washington residents to sign a waver for their 4th Amendment rights to allow a search of their homes is a much more pressing issue for me than data-mining by the federal government. Local police acting like Gestapo and dressed like SWAT team members pisses me off more than some intelligence analyst at the NSA looking at my emails.

Think of the amounts of data we are talking about here. We can't even search for a post on this website. What makes you think that the NSA is capable of compiling a dossier on millions of people conducting billions of electronic communications each and every day. It's ridiculous. I say more transparency is the antidote to secrecy. I say let them see everything. Give them a data deluge. Let's see how effectively they manage that surveillance program in that atmosphere.

I have exactly nothing to hide and if my angry words gets me arrested in the dead of night and hauled off to GITMO, the FISA bill will be the least of my worries. Which is why I was much more concerned, in the short term, that the Supreme Court upheld habeas corpus than for anything the Congress is doing.

Again, you may or may not be an Agent Provocateur stirring up trouble, but if you are truly a concerned progressive than I would hope that you could at least step back from the tree long enough to see the forest.

It does not. The only immunity is with regards to civil suits. If a court finds their actions to be criminal, this "act" won't help a bit.

Well, if you read Zinn's book and didn't consider it Earth shattering then I am not sure what else we have to talk about.

I think you are missing the basic message (and that of Zinn as well) if all you think she was saying is that the FISA shit is inconsequential because others have endured worse. The point was to have a little perspective when thinking about substantive and systemic change.

We have been dealing with issues like this since the country was founded. To think that a single bill or a single vote or even a single election will make 230 years of heinous shit go away over night is naive. It isn't in keeping with how change happens. It's even less in keeping with how change happens in our current environment.

Most Americans don't read blogs. Most Americans are scared shitless by "terrorists" because that is what the media and the police and our leaders in Washington have been shoving down their throats for the last 8 years. Before that, it was the Soviets. Before that, some other imaginary evil. We have been brainwashed for generations. Just because a few people have woken up to the scam doesn't mean everyone has.

This is going to be a multi-generational effort. We are the newest in a long-line of progressives to take on this challenge. The country wasn't ready for Jimmy Carter to go all Progressive Warrior once he was elected. I submit that the country is ready for Barack Obama to do the same, but only once he is elected and able to manage the national narrative.

It seems unreasonable to me to expect some huge, monumental change in the middle of a general election. That is how the neocons distract voters. That is how they win. I am guessing that Barack sees this way more clearly than most of us. He already warned us that we wouldn't agree with every decision.

Based on his books, his history, his legislative record and his upbringing, I am convinced that Barack has a strategy that is way deeper and broader than we can see right now. He also smart enough to know how to win this race.

How about we hold him accountable for his promises after he is elected and not before?