Today's the last day that a contribution to a candidate running for office will make any real difference. If you've been thinking about kicking down, now's the time, and even $20 can help.

Last night I went out with my partners for a Larrupin' dinner, and this morning I dropped the same amount on Jerry McNnerney who's down South, a PhD in Math, a Wind-Power expert and running against greasy-oilman Dick Pombo. That $200 contribution (ouch!) is enough to get me on the FEC's lists. Yeehaw.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconier
Things fall apart, the center cannot hold
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Win or lose, there's going to be a brief window for political types to some formin', stormin' and normin' before they have to start performing again in the great dance of 2008.

On my side of things, there are lots of fights waiting to break out, some of which flare up already.

There's a huge brewing battle in the incoming wave -- not my people, but the 30 and 40-somethings -- over slices of the pie, positions of influence, credit and blame. I also think there's a reckoning coming with the men from the women, who have not been that well represented lately.

There's also an internet fight waiting to happen between the younger, smaller, more hungry and open companies (like mine, but also a lot of others) and the existing biggies of online campaigns, none of whom are really exemplary. That should be fun.

Over on the other side, with the prospect of power slipping away, it would appear that there's blood in the water. I don't have much insight, but since I know our fight is going to be real and hard and brutal for a bit, I certainly hope they clobber one-another too, and maybe even bust up some of their hellish coalitions for a while.

Will be intersting to watch and be a part of. I'm not really directly engaged in this national election -- although local issues are piquing my interest. In truth I'll probably get more engaged afterwards, when the course-charting for '08 begins.

Billmon has a soul-searching post up, provoked by the first post in months from Iraqi blogger Riverbend which is in itself a vital read. His post reflects on our moral responsibility for the depth of the carnage in Iraq, which is what I want to talk about for a second:

I opposed the invasion -- and the regime that launched it -- but I didn't do everything I could have done. Very few did. We may have put our words and our wallets on the line, but not our bodies. Not when it might have made a difference. In the end, we were all good little Germans.

I also opposed the invasion, but I want to point out the logical and moral trap that comes from "you can always do more." It's true. You can always do more, but you can't always win.

Let's take Billmon's point that we didn't "lay our bodies on the line" seriously. Let's assume that the 2.5M or so people who protested here in the US were all ready to throw down. Would lying down in traffic have stopped the war? Would a mass hunger strike? Would violent resistance?

I'm pessimistic about all those options. The only way to imagine Bush not being able to launch that war would be to re-imagine the last 12 years of political history, starting with how the aftermath of the first Persian Gulf war went down, and the lessons learned there. The truth is I have no doubt that at zero-hour, or even in the Summer of 2002, mass resistence from 2.5 million Americans wouldn't have stopped the war. In fact, it may have deeply worsened the situation.

At that time, it could have led to mass arrests, and those arrests would likely have been applauded by enough people. Political leaders would have been pressed to denounce the resistance. It would have made the vaguely fascist overtones of 2006 America look like the summer of love.

If you're into or curious about Net Neutrality, Watch Bill Moyers tonight. His show will include a live (east coast) debate between Lying Telco Shill Mike McCurry and Ben Scott, policy director of Free Press.

McCurry was truly scurrelous the one time I saw him in a debate, back in May at the Personal Democracy Forum. Like, maddening. By the end I was heckling from the crowd. I don't know how Ben Scott is, but I've been pretty disappointed that none of the reps on our side can seem to make a convincing argument that doesn't get lost in legal or technical mumbo jumbo.

It's fucking simple: do you want the future of the internet in the US to be up to individual people, or up to huge, monopolistic, slothful corporations?

Sadly, this is an issue with very little public profile, so it will likely be decided internally by congress, which gives the edge to the corporations and their sweet sweet campaign contributions.

Anyway, the show's at 10, but I won't watch it. Just get my blood pressure up, and anyway I'll be at the Vagabond Opera show down at Humbrews.