UPDATE: Even moreso, what Justin says:

And at that time, a number of collaborators seemed paranoid when they were nervous about infiltrators...we were asked a number of times how we would deal with agents provocateur. I'm happy to say that we didn't give in to that type of fear in our planning...but it's odd to realize that in our photos and videos from that week, there are probably a few faces we never saw again, once they returned to NYPD HQ.

In addition to feeling like our privacy was invaded and our loyalty questioned by this senseless spying, I also smile a little...our movement has such a level of transparency, what did these police spies think they were going to find that we weren't already advertising over every list-serve and blog that would have us?

This is a really important point vis-a-vis my Vanguard thoughts below. To the extent that there is organizing going on which has credibly "revolutionary" potential (sorry, the wanna-be Maoists aren't that), it's being done with an unprecedented degree of transparency. This is actually a major difference vs. most power-organizing schools of thought of the past, and beyond just being novel, may actually represent a major step forward in our capabilities to undermine, subvert, collapse or control entrenched and malign power-structures. Here's hoping.

What Mike says:

It wouldn't surprise me to find MFA, myself, or people I know in those files. Sometimes thinking about where we're at as a country can get a little abstract... this article today hit me a lot harder than a blog or article about the latest administration scandal ever could.

The Bush administration much have some kind of wardrum 808 going, with DJ Dick Cheney on the wheels of steel.

The political calculus is slick. Everyone "supports the troops," whatever that means. It gets standing ovations from the full house. If the warmongers can successfully create the perception that Iranian arms are being used to kill the troops, they can then make the case that those who oppose bombarding Iran aren't "supporting the troops."

The kool kids call this casus belli.

It's garbage, but so was last time. JMM says "it's a distraction" like this wasn't also true before. I worry that they'll still do it. Bombing is a lower bar to clear than invading -- though it would still almost certainly have terrible consequences. These people are, if anything, worse than Nixon, who did bomb Cambodia (next door to Vietnam) without really asking or telling anyone in Congress.

I don't know what I'd do if this happened.

I disagree with most of my friends. I think the Health Care plan John Edwards proposed yesterday is a massive dud, and I'm very disappointed.

Here's Candidate Edwards looking and sounding pretty good on the issue:

But here's a summary of his plan, which also remarkably light on specifics and isn't available as HTML (wtf?):

• Require businesses and other employers to either cover their employees or help finance their health insurance.
• Make insurance affordable by creating new tax credits, expanding Medicaid and SCHIP, reforming insurance laws, and taking innovative steps to contain health care costs.
• Create regional Health Markets purchasing pools to ensure that every American has a way to purchase an affordable, high-quality health plan, increase choices among insurance plans, and cut costs for businesses offering insurance.
• Once these steps have been taken, require all American residents to get insurance.

Emphasis all mine, but notice the difference? Candidate Edwards says the word "insurance" exactly once: to attack a sick and parasitic industry which combines the worst aspects of Socialist Bureaucracy and Capitalist Profiteering, and is rightly loathed by virtually all Americans.

His plan, on the other hand, is all about making insurance affordable and creating new markets and choices for insurance. Oh, and also tax credits for insurance too.

This is a huge mistake, for a couple reasons.