I understand Kevin Drum’s feelings as expressed in this link.  I share them.  But the damn challenge is that the worst possible response, essentially the impermissible response, is divorce from political participation and activity.  Yet there is a great risk that many on the left, who have their own frustrations to cope with, will do that come election time.  Despite everything, things could be worse.  Sitting on one’s hands and not participating in getting good people elected and re-elected will lead to our discovering something about how much worse they could be.

http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/07/my-empathy-problem