I collaborate with Husseini, providing technical support, and I also watch the shows. This morning I noticed that Clinton repeated a myth about the start of the Afghan war that the Institute for Public Accuracy, where Sam is the communications director, called-out in a press release earlier this week.

The appearance of both Clinton and Gates was pre-taped earlier in the week, otherwise I’m sure Sam would have tried to question her on it if she stopped for the press gaggle.

Sam did have some interaction with Senator Feingold which is now posted at The Washington Stakeout.

Husseini asked Feingold about the legitimacy of the Afghanistan war, Israel’s nuclear weapons (of which official acknowledgment might catalyze a different calculus in the US’s non-proliferation actions with regards to Iran, India, as well as, of course, Israel), and, in essence, how much due diligence was actually done in exploring the feasibility of Single Payer health care.

Are Obama and Clinton Being Honest About How Afghan War Began?

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RAHUL MAHAJAN: … It’s not clear how well President Obama and his advisers know this history, although it was all documented in Western newspapers at the time; what is clear is that his suggestion that the Taliban refused to negotiate is not primarily about justifying the war post-9/11 — that still remains unquestioned in mainstream U.S. politics — but rather about justifying his current position that strenuous anti-Taliban efforts in Afghanistan, including the recently announced surge, are a necessary part of ensuring U.S. national security.

I’m not sure how one can make a fair extrapolation of those states’ primary election results because of the conditions they were held under.

I’m not partial to either of these candidates, and I am not a Democrat. I am befuddled by what seems like a fanciful wish by more than just Hillary Clinton to extract a legitimate number from a process that was officially abandoned.

The Party punished those two states, fairly or unfairly, and secured pledges from its presidential candidates not to campaign there. Clinton had a higher profile by default, and did project an additional presence there more than Obama, although technically not campaigning there (she seemed to just hold fundraisers and getting more media attention for it, if Obama did the same he didn’t benefit the same).

Whether the rules are fair or not is moot at this point — they were put in place and agreed to. People made decisions and overt commitments based on these rules.

Obama, wishing to compete effectively and obeying the rules, spent his money and time elsewhere so as to not even get on the ballot in one case. If he had made an effort there, had the rules allowed, there almost certainly would have been a different outcome in those elections. He certainly would’ve succeeded in getting on the ballot.

Clinton doubled-back on her commitment to these rules after the fact and when the overall vote appeared closer and, presumably, her campaign became a little more desperate. She began to join the state parties in overtly agitating for retroactive representation, pleading in the language of democracy. While the disenfranchisement wasn’t so democrat, the re-enfranchisement she has pursued is not any more democratic.

A fair election that presented all the choices did not happen in these two states, and Clinton seems to have acted duplicitously.

I’d say that the party members in Michigan and Florida have valid reason to protest the tactics and rules of their national party, but I don’t see how the vote that happened under the circumstances it did could be considered fair and anything to base a delegation count on with any credibility. If the party decides to give the states representation at the convention, and assign delegates based on those primary votes, I would think it would only secure in many minds that this party is even more schizophrenic or a farce.

The capital-D Democrats seem to have little to do with democracy. (And this is hardly the first cause to inspire that observation.)