Howard is getting pummelled by "fat cat" supporters of Hillary who are disappointed that they haven't been able to buy wrap up this nomination. Big donors are asking for their money back.

From the NY Times:

Pushing to seat the Florida delegates, at least one top Clinton fund-raiser, Paul Cejas, a Miami businessman who has given the Democratic National Committee $63,500 since 2003, has demanded Democratic officials return his 2007 contribution of $28,500, which they have agreed to do....

Christopher Korge, a Florida real estate developer who is another top fund-raiser for Mrs. Clinton, held an event last year in his home that brought in about $140,000 for the national party, which was set aside in a special account for the general election battle in Florida. But he told committee officials this week that if Florida’s delegate conundrum was not settled satisfactorily he would be asking for the money back.

Whenever I think that the hotheads around here have gotten an unfortunate, if temporary upper-hand, and especially when I myself commit the sin of  hotheadedness and emotional outrage, I always mosey on over to TPM to see what the ever-analytical, cool-as-a-cucumber Josh Marshall has to say.

Well tonight, the Gerry Ferraro flap got my Irish up to the point of being able to boil my own potatoes on the vitriol that was coming out of my mouth and fingers:  Yet another political/feminist heroine from my youth was revealing her "mind of clay".

Needing a good calm-down, I headed over to TPM for my dose of "non-prescription Valium". Josh not only calmed me down, he scored a deadly blow against the race- and gender-baiters.

From Chuck via the DSCC email server:

I’m outraged.  President Bush commuted Scooter Libby’s prison sentence wiping away two and half years of jail time with the stroke of a pen.  President Bush ignored Libby’s felony conviction for lying to investigators, ignored the jury’s guilty verdict, and ignored the rule of law that governs our nation.  

We expect more from our President.  We expect honor and integrity, we expect moral leadership.  We expect our President and his staff to be held to a higher standard.  

Tell President Bush that you are appalled by his actions.  Sign our petition today letting President Bush know that this outrageous conduct won’t be tolerated by the American people.

I couldn't help myself ...

I'm a privacy nut. It's probably in my genes. I was that way long before I started working in the software privacy/security business. When I started in that business it only exacerbated the problem.  

I am very polite but firm.  I state very firmly that I don't donate money over the phone and encourage all 501(c)3 groups to mail me the information. I am always happy to give them my mailing address.

But then today I met my match ...

But I cannot disagree more.

I may be unpopular for this advice ... but I think that no response is the best response.

Read beyond the flip as to why ...

My husband and I have a dear friend who is an interfaith minister who does most of her work in the HIV/AIDS community and works on an international level bringing AIDS awareness and the knowledge of ways to promote a healing ministry to various religious organizations around the country and the world. She asked my daughter to read a letter from an African child that expressed her experience with the pandemic.

One of the most striking aspects of attitudes to HIV and AIDS in the world at large is the stigma manifested as superstition and paranoia in different cultures that have been forced to confront the problem.

Below the fold is an excuse for me to be proud of my kick-ass, bleeding-heart liberal daughter, with some thoughts about the tyranny of society.

Reading the latest spin, I suddenly realized that my mother has been sneaking out in "male drag" and ... is ... Karl Rove!

And all that contrariness spelled (much like Rolaids) "Relief"! All that negative energy that oozed from the very pores of my mother's being has found a career path. Hallelujah! Maybe she'll leave her children alone!

Visit me on the flip ...

One of the most treasured times of day for me, is the 1+ hour schlep I take from my home office to pick up my daughter at her school. We live in Manhattan and don't use our car except to get out of the city, so the vicissitudes of NYC public transportation generally make for a long five mile round-trip.

I've gotten the trip to the school down to a science: it's just 30 minutes if I leave the apartment at or before 29 minutes after the hour. It's 10-15 minutes longer if I'm late. The trip back is much more erratic and unpredictable but it's always longer. Even so, it is the trip to the school that is the more irritating and stressful. I could do without it.

But it is the unpredictable trip back home with my 9-year-old daughter that is the delight of my day. It wasn't always this way. But I'm about to lose these precious moments that I have only within the past two years begun to treasure.

This is the 1st of 2 diaries that grew out of  3 synchronistic events:

1. A funny incident that happened this week on one such trip,
   
2. An upcoming event that will end this irrevocably,
   
3. And, of course, this week's "pie wars".

For my morning mental calisthenics, I've decided to play a game of Sherlock Holmes to jumpstart my day. So, with coffee firmly in hand, sitting in my Manhattan home office I take keyboard in hand to get on the case. Please join me, and you can be my Watson. Or better yet, if you're a better Sherlock, I'll be your Watson.

More below the fold ...

Oh ... and please ... don't feel that you have to resist the urge to say either "No shit, Sherlock! or "Bullshit, Sherlock!

link to column

Cohen's first impression of Bolton is based not on Bolton's contempt for the UN, as if that's not reason enough to reject this nominee. No, it is based on watching Bolton in action abusing our allies ...

More below the fold ...

This diary reports yet another set of interrelationships involving GOPUSA. I do not imply that there is any direct relationship to Gannongate or collusion in that scheme. This is merely a suggestion that GOPUSA has far more tentacles than we knew. And it also provides another link, by one degree of separation, between GOPUSA and the Swifties.

More below the fold.

... He is so analytical, level-headed, and knowledgable on so may fronts. He has great insight and can be very sobering on many topics.

But ... I have a confession to make ... I am stalking RabidNation. There... I've said it! ... I expect the FBI to show up any moment.

Over in JamesB3's excellent new diary entry on the state of the DNC (Time to say 'fuck the national party'?), J from VJ posted a link that referenced an entry in Mathew Gross's blog that is a "meal for thought": The Politics of Victimization. This article is a must read. The first 3 paragraph are killers! But the first paragraph is too long for this main entry, so go below the fold ...

I admit my post was very glib and not very eloquent  but I was in a hurry.

I got the very thoughtful reply below the fold from Jonathan4Dean ...

http://www.werenotsorry.com/

I'm just asking, of course!

This site is so pathetic it makes me depressed for America and our world image.  I suppose the site was put up by ...uh ... people of limited worldview ... [you must admit I am really trying to make my message lean to the right! Just like some of the parties auditioning for the DNC Chair ...  but I digress.] It doesn't even make me angry:  they are their own argument against themselves.  It's a MadTV sketch!  

But I must know, what were the suburan drones thinking when they submitted their photos to appear next to the the tootheless wonders with the semi-automatic weapons?

What I've been noting among posters since the horror of 10/2 is the stages of grief all of us have been going through. It appears, at the 10 day mark, that we're all at different stages:
 

More below the fold ...