If McCain closes the gap, moving right is NOT the answer.

We've clearly established that our candidate has tacked far ENOUGH to the center. The fact that McCain has seemed to gain in recent days show that that doesn't work.

What is needed now is reiteration of the progressive basis for this campaign.

The troop withdrawals from Iraq must not be compromised. Any sign of switching to "we can do it better" has to hurt us.

We need to take a hard look at whether staying in Afghanistan is a good choice in either electoral or strategic terms. Our "allies" there(none of whom are secular or pro-democratic, all of whom are antiwoman and anti-free speech)are not worthy of the support of a Democratic president.

We need to hold our base and reach out to the working-class voters with economic populism.

And we need to make it clear that Obama will nominate STRONG progressives to the Supreme Court. No wishy-washy centrists.

The path to victory is through confidence in our ideals and our values. We can only win if we finally stop acting like this is a permanently right-wing country.

We are not the same as our grandparents or great grandparents' generation. I think we have forgotten what it was like during the Great Depression. We have grown too deferential to authority and too comfortable and decadent with the current order of things, and we have forgotten what things used to be like.

The people who lived through the Great Depression and World War 2 were a hardy bunch. I fear the Democratic leadership will not field another FDR until after America has been tossed into another Great Depression.

It's our job to get people ready to listen when a progressive candidate speaks.

But having our candidates show that confidence makes our work a lot easier.

What NEVER works is having them act like the things we stand for(and I'm not saying Obama does this) are embarassing and disgraceful.