Salsa Scoop> tag: ”blog:online2offline“

Surge Protection

With the young emperor set to cart more bodies to the Sumerian charnel house, we would be remiss to make no comment on the issue of the day, to which so many of our users are lending their energy. We've been spotlighting on the home page the outstanding house party event that True Majority is running through our Distributed Event tool. (And note their comprehensive Event Kit -- putting organizing material like that in the hands of would-be local activists in conjunction with the signup pages is what really makes a house parties action rock.)* More importantly, it's a response to the mad and unpopular "strategy" of more, deeper, and alongside tomorrow's Day of Action to Shut Down Guantanamo (scads of DIA types among the sponsors) represents a critical test for that netroots we keep hearing about. Liberal bloggers beating the drums for Democrats bought themselves a piece of the Iraqi debacle with the party's November sweep. The party (no surprise) shows scant appetite for the parliamentary fisticuffs necessary to actually prevent this escalation, much less to de-escalate. Though capitulation in the near term from the loyal opposition is all but foreordained, the question of whether to get serious about forcing Democrats to shut down the misadventure or whether to get serious about a messaging strategy for '08 while riding two years deeper into the quagmire and buying body bags in bulk decides who's against this war and who's an apparatchik. You can just feel the disillusionment brewing. Out now, and no excuses not to play every card, force every lever, and punish every recalcitrant. *There's another DIA meetup event happening later this month sponsored by Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America to press for more mental health funding at VA hospitals. It's less firebreathing, but no less urgently needed.