Losing the war

This post at the Left Coaster, notwithstanding its questionable grammar, just about captures my thoughts exactly:

Ambivalent about the idea of a vacation in the middle of the one chance we have to save the country, I’ve now come to the conclusion giving up any chance to drive the media narrative and checking out of a presidential race is a terrible idea, the whole campaign went to mush and everyone is bored as hell. The semi-official media (as Billmon calls them) is terrible at political coverage, McCain and the Republicans will deliberately lie about it and ruin it, so doing nothing is just asking for trouble.

Trouble we have, Krugman saying he can’t believe the economy is not a central narrative and Drum bullet pointing suggestions for attacking McCain. Just the very existence of these two posts is outrageous, it almost defies belief they ever could have come into existence at all. Rich writes that the Obama campaign is “excessively genteel” and Digby that “they don’t want to be involved in negative campaigning.”

Ten days off sure worked some magic, eh? I am furious, seriously angry to yet again see a Democratic candidate taking a high road to oblivion as he’s chopped to bits and reduced to ridicule in an environment he doesn’t understand.

Or does he? Josh Marshall reports Obama came out swinging on his first day back, but we’ll see what’s on the news tonight, it will take more than one day of fighting to get the narratives back on a more favorable ground. Yeah, NBC FirstRead, you’re not the only one to wonder if Obama is having a “Jon Lovitz-as-Dukakis SNL moment.”

Senator Barack Obama,☼ you are campaigning with the future of the United States, and likely the planet, with this election. Not one more minute off, sir, everything has been handed to you in the environment for this federal contest, you get the fuck out there and fight with everything you have, Jesus, it’s not about you!

I think back to Ned Lamont, who went on vacation right after defeating Holy Joe Lieberman in the primary and lost the war after winning the battle. It's looking like Obama wants to follow in those footsteps.