If Obama had bee running in Oregon, Massachusetts and California, he would be much much further to the Left than he is now or that I am asking him to be. I am not silly enough to believe that a Democrat in those states has the same priorities or opinions than a Democrat in Ohio or North Carolina, two states that are now on Obama’s list and I am thus certainly not arguing that Obama should pretend he is campaigning to be Mayor of San Francisco or go back to all the very liberal positions he took on that 1996 questionnaire.

But there are obviously gradations of progressivism, and I do think there is a huge space between where a Democrat running in California positions himself and where Obama is positioning himself when he is voting for FISA, going back on his March rhetoric on NAFTA or approving of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard being labeled a terrorist group. You are acting as if there is no such space and as if there is a black-and-white choice to be made between San Francisco values and Mountain West moderation. And, as I said, I consider the FISA bill such a capitulation to what Bush has been asking for that I refuse to view this so-called compromise as something any moderate Democrats ought to embrace.

My point is that Obama is running as if we were in 2000 or 2004, ignoring the fact that many independents now identify themselves as Democrats and are looking to vote for a Democrat. The Gore/Kerry-an move to the center is even more foolish than it was four years ago. Yes, Guy, it is important to not alienate these independent voters; but why did they move to the Democratic Party if not out of disgust for the Bush Administration? Was it then sound to embrace the FISA bill, which exemplifies Bush’s insistence on conducting a politics of fear and strengthening executive authority? Democrats muddying differences from 2000 to 2006 did not serve the party; it only strengthened the Republican talking-points that Democrats started using, making it more difficult for (1) any Democrat to win on liberal ideas and (1) for Kerry to run an issue-based campaign.

Right now, Obama is cutting off potential lines of attack by McCain. While personally, I hate the FISA “compromise”, the fact is that McCain calling Obama a flip-flopper is a much less potent an attack than calling Obama weak and impractical on national security. It’s the difference between Obama possibly losing Ohio because there’ll be enough that are afraid of “t’rrists” or him winning that state and Virginia and Colorado because people see him as pragmatic enough to make hard choices, while being infinitely better than McCain on domestic issues.

Again, 90% of the Democratic vote in California and Oregon will not put him in the White House, and personally, I’ll trust him to close the domestic spying loopholes (and stop CIA torture) way before I trust McCain.

Also he was right to go for the Independents because they will help solidify his lead in the coming months.