With a medical procedure and Family arriving looming later this week, can't really write up a decent post on this--but hey, I've been collecting links and screenshots on this Dude for several weeks.

I began doing this after I discovered that [along with her email server] the DLC archives have also been wiped clean of "New Dem" bios, etc. (Which meant that a lot of my info from the DLC organization's website--is no more.)

Gotta hand it to them--they leave no stone unturned.

Anyhoo, as soon as it looks like O'Malley's going to announce, I'll begin to post some of the articles, links and screenshots--even if they're just comments.

Per the piece below, it appears that O'Malley is attempting to position himself--in spite of his years and years of DLC affiliation/membership--to run as the 'left alternative' to FSC, since Warren, and probably even Sanders, won't run.

One article I found not only had O'Malley's glowing assessments of FSC when she ran the first time, but mentions that he was a "stand-in" for her in New Hampshire when she ran in 2007/2008.

And even more ridiculous and unconscionable, as the excerpt below illustrates, the Dem Party apparatchiks, including union heads, are fostering the sham that O'Malley is a progressive.

[Unless one buys that the neoliberal corporatist Dems are liberal or progressive.]

Here's the account of one union member (who apparently knows nothing about him), after she hears O'Malley speak in Iowa:

Council Bluffs, Iowa (CNN)

Marcia Keefer watched Martin O'Malley methodically work the room at a recent Democratic fundraiser in Davenport, Iowa, and readily acknowledged she knew nothing about the former Maryland governor.

"I have to ask, is he running for something or is he something already?" said Keefer, a retiree attending the Scott County Democratic Party's fundraiser.

That confusion crystallizes the central challenge O'Malley faces if he decides to pursue a long-shot run for the Democratic presidential nomination. He must find a way to dent the Clinton political machine and prove that he's a competitive candidate -- not just a backup for progressives who would rather see Elizabeth Warren in the White House.

And it's in Iowa where O'Malley must stake his ground. Failure here would almost certainly doom his campaign. But if he manages to do better than expected -- or even stage an upset -- O'Malley could emerge as a real challenger for Clinton.

Given his reception here this past weekend, there could be a sliver of an opening.

After O'Malley delivered a red meat political speech to a room packed with union workers, Keefer left with several O'Malley political signs tucked under her arms.

"He said a lot of things that I wanted to hear and got me all revved up to get out there and get the vote out for Democrats," said Keefer, who noted that O'Malley had given her second thoughts about who she might support in next year's Democratic caucus. "He was wonderful tonight. Just wonderful and I never heard of him."

A similar scene played out several times over O'Malley's two-day trip to Iowa this past weekend, as he criss-crossed the state, meeting with influential early Democratic voters.

He entered many rooms as a blank slate and often walked out to favorable reviews.

My words: That's exactly the problem--the Dem Party will easily manipulate much of its Base.

It happens every time.

*Sigh*

And, here's an excerpt from Wa-Po Op-Ed that he wrote with ultra-right wing Dem (TN) Harold Ford, Jr., a former Chair of the DLC:

Our Chance to Capture the Center

By Martin O'Malley and Harold Ford Jr.
Tuesday, August 7, 2007

. . . the temptation to ignore the vital center is nothing new. Every four years, in the heat of the nominating process, liberals and conservatives alike dream of a world in which swing voters don't exist. Some on the left would love to pretend that groups such as the Democratic Leadership Council, the party's leading centrist voice, aren't needed anymore.

But for Democrats, taking the center for granted next year would be a greater mistake than ever before. George W. Bush is handing us Democrats our Hoover moment. Independents, swing voters and even some Republicans who haven't voted our way in more than a decade are willing to hear us out.

With an ambitious common-sense agenda, the progressive center has a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to win back the White House, expand its margins in Congress and build a political and governing majority that could last a generation. . . .

Contrast the collapse of a conservative president with the success of the last centrist president.

Bill Clinton ran on an agenda of sensible ideas that brought America a decade of peace and prosperity. He was the only Democrat to be elected and reelected president in the past seven decades, and he left office more popular than almost any other president in recent memory. . . .

. . . That's why they have begun putting forward smart, New Democrat plans to cap and trade carbon emissions, give more Americans the chance to earn their way through college, achieve universal health care through shared responsibility, increase national security by rebuilding our embattled military and enable all Americans who work full time to lift themselves out of poverty.

A New Democratic president will have the chance to unite Americans around solutions that will make all Americans proud of their country again.

For the sake of the hardworking Americans who are depending on us to fix Washington and put our country on the right track, we pray that Democrats set out to build a majority that can last.

[Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, is governor of Maryland. Harold Ford Jr. is a former Democratic representative from Tennessee and chairman of the Democratic Leadership Council.]

BTW, there is a 2007 diary at DKos mocking this same Op-Ed.

It will be interesting to see what they say about O'Malley, this time around.

Anyhoo, I look forward with relish to their announcements!

Mollie

(This is sorta a disjointed mess--interrupted several times, and a bit pushed--sorry!)