It's time to take stock of the landscape. The American political system, as conditioned by corporate cash, the corporate press and legal obstructions to independent candidacies, is designed to eliminate any threat to business as usual. In the case of the Democrats, the winnowing process is working well. Mike Gravel, by far the most vivacious and radical of the party's candidates on substantive matters of war and empire, was swiftly marginalized. I've seen very few Gravel buttons.

Dennis Kucinich seems to have a lock on those Democrats prepared to stay true to a hopeless outsider. I don't understand this loyalty to the Ohio Congressman. The point of hopeless outsiders is to give us hope. It's a dialectical thing. They convince us that their cause is not hopeless, is worth fighting for. Kucinich gives me no hope. He has barely shouldered his way into single digits. His signs and buttons and stickers already look as though they're collectibles on eBay.

The three major Democratic contenders for the nomination are all unalluring. John Edwards is offering us a populist package, with homilies on fair trade, gaps between rich and poor, corporate greed and so forth. Decent people, including many labor organizers, are working for him. I don't believe a word he says. His record on war and empire is bad. He has poor judgment. Why spend $400 to have a hairdo that makes you look like a slick lawyer with a fancy haircut?

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