If you are a going to be a candidate you have a lot of things to do, but there are even more that are not yours to do at all. That is kind of a cryptic way of saying you have to know your role and stick to it if you are to achieve your goal of being elected so you can make the changes that the people need. How much you need to delegate depends on the size of your race, but make no mistake unless you are running for Dog Catcher of a one dog town, you are going to need other folks to help you.  

It is Friday, so it must be time for a Constitutional! Welcome to the 16th of the Dog’s series on the United States Constitution. It is hard to believe that the Dog has been writing about the Constitution for 4 months now, but as the Dog’s Mom said (with infinite and constant repetition) anything worth doing is worth doing correctly (she has a bit of a proper English fetish, the Dog blames the Nuns). If you have not been reading this series or missed any of them, you can find all of the previous ones at the following links:

Sorry, the Dog is still having some technical difficulty with the links to the previous installments in this series, he does promise to resolve it one way or the other by next Friday!  

Mr. President, have I been rolled? I write today to ask this question, because it is truly, critically important to me as a citizen and a voter. All my life I have derided single issue voters, after all can’t they see that there is a bigger picture beyond their issue? That they find it compelling and are sincere in their commitment is not in doubt, but there has to be a balancing of the issues in any democracy. Now, I find myself in the position of being a single issue voter. It is due to the fact that there is finally an issue that is so overriding, so critical to the very notion of what it means for all of us to be Americans that I find myself in this position. That issue, Mr. President, is the extra legal holding, rendition and torture of prisoners in the so-called War on Terror.  

This post may fall in the “teaching your grandmother to suck eggs” category, but today the Dog would like to talk about strategy vs. tactics. It is really important to know the difference, not just for your quest to take over the world (h/t Pinky and the Brain) but so that you don’t make yourself crazed in our expanding and information dense political discourse. One problem is that no one (with the exception of some of the Republicans that don’t understand that Twitter is really public) is going to tell you when they are acting tactically or strategically. Hopefully by the time the Dog is done pounding 1,000 words or so, you will be able to spot the difference.  

Happy Friday and welcome to the 15th installment (does this feel like a 30 year mortgage to anyone else?) in the Dog’s series on the United States Constitution. This series is taking a layman’s look at the Constitution and talking about what each part means. If you have never read the whole thing before, the Dog recommends that you do. After all it is the foundational document of our entire system of law, so it is worth knowing. If you have not been following this series you can find the previous installments at the following links;

Um, The Dog is having some technical difficulties this week, so there will not be any links, hopefully by next Friday we can get this resolved.