Well, if we learn nothing else from this exercise in democracy, at least we finally know your real first name.

Run, Bobby, run!

Good luck Mr. Kaus, from someone who would vote for you if he could. (I’m libertarian, and I think you’re totally wrong on Obamacare, but you have shown you can both listen and think , and then write an engaging piece on why you’re thinking what you’re thinking. I’ll take that over the Demotrons and Republibots any day of the week.)

This description of democratic orthodoxy is, like Kaus himself, at least fifteen years out of date. Jerry Brown himself touts his Oakland charter schools as his signature educational achievement. Nationally, our Secretary of Education (democrat) supports pay-for-performance and charter schools. Perhaps more challenging is: what in the world does Kaus propose to actually DO about education? The State occupies just one rung of a local/state/national ladder of regulation and funding.

And it’s news to me that immigration is an issue of lockstep democratic orthodoxy. Immigration is an issue of low democratic concern. It’s been sad to watch Kaus try and whip up alarms about Obama’s eventual, sneaky amnesty. Obama has given no sign that immigration policy is a priority in the slightest.

I think what is saddest about this candidacy is how nonresponsive it is to the actual problems of California. Lets assume that teacher’s unions and immigrants are actual problems. They would still rank incredibly low on any ranked list — California’s issues are debt, spending, unemployment, infrastructure, an ossified political structure, and etc. These are all actual, immediate emergencies. For Kaus to expect anyone to care about his ancient, low-priority war of the late 1990s is just petulant and awkward.

Kaus: the LA Times doesn’t cover things that aren’t news. That’s why the Santa Monica Gang Wars didn’t merit an article.

Doubts are all well and good.

What are your solutions?

So, are you going to raise any money?

Those democrats do not exist. Because to do so would be to admit, even in some small way, that Republicans could be right about something.

And *that* is a sin that will not be countenanced. In a world where Bush cannot simply be wrong about Iraq, he has to be Hitler himself, there is no room for political quarter of any kind.

Dear Mickey,

I rarely agree with you, but I do personally wish you luck. You’re going to need it, because Hell hath no fury like a Boxer scorned.

“Is there really no place in the Democratic party for voters who believe in “affirmative government”–including health care reform– but have doubts about the power of public employee unions, including the unions that protect bad teachers?”

No. No place. Rep. Dingell let it slip: it’s all about control, all about power.

The Other Side is only a little bit closer to common sense (cf. Thomas Paine).

On the Democratic side: Jerry Brown: no chance. The rest: even less.
On the Republican side: Poizner: at least I recognize the name. Whitman: a possible – she may be able to buy her way in. I thought Fiorina was in there.)
On the Green side: they’re running a Student. No contest.
Libertarians: they don’t vote (“it only encourages them”): no contest.
Peace and Freedom: The Communists haven’t come close since the 30s.
Lieutenant Governor: Gavin Newsom. ‘Nuff said.

The National Democratic Party and the California Democratic Party is today the Socialist Marxist Democrat Party and has no room for decent against Marxist Dogma. Anyone dissenting will be politically marginalized and destroyed.

The sooner common sense American Democrats realize this the better. Today’s Democrat(ic) Party is not democratic, it is totalitarian and Marxist in dogma. I hope this hopey, changey arrangement is ok with you folks who voted for Obama.

Although I am one, I won’t be voting Democrat. There are two main problems with California: 1) Pubilc Unions have ruined this state 2) Democrats have ruined this state.

Electing you will not fix either. Democrats can’t fix this state except by resigning. I am. I’m registering to Republican, but that’s just to pick primary candidates. Most importantly I’ll be voting conservative from now on.

If you use the kind of systematic, well developed and well documented reasoning you portrayed in your “The End of Equality”, I believe you will be far more compelling than the briefer, though piquant, blurbs of the blogs. It is true that our most common modes of communique are cyber-sound-bite-ish, but I think there is room for the kind of well reasoned and sometimes slow moving but solidly based reasoning of which you have shown yourself capable. I think that the “is there no place….” form of rhetoric did not invoke, at least in your first few days of comment, as positive a response as your intellect deserves. As a non-Californian but someone who has had a periodic interest in your argumentation over the years, I would recommend you resume the kind of reasoning and expression thereof which served you so well in hard print, and presumably Harvard and Harvard Law. More Essay, less blog…..just a suggestion from a long term observer…..

Attention: Californians: Speaking from the heart of Waxman Country, we declare that where ever you affiliate, a Kaus candidacy is worth the effort of switching party registration to Democrat…Kaus Democrats would be worth voting, even fighting for!