I don't expect we'll see any actions worth lauding out of Congress any time soon.  It has hit critical mass for people who have no motivations besides keeping their seats.

The problem is most people who feel Congress is doing a bad job either like their own Congressperson and feel the rest of the bunch is the problem, or hate them but don't want to give up their person's power.

And as long as there is a critical mass of do-nothings, each individual Congressmember can always blame all the others for their collective ineffectiveness.  It's the inaction of a crowd effect, writ national.  

This is funny.  While I don't really disagree with Obama here, it's not usually a good idea to say you're ashamed of Americans ...

i for one am sick and tired of seeing hillary still trashed! the meaness is way over the top and needs to stop.

The basic sentiment is uncontroversial. Of course we should learn other languages. But the implication is a little condescending, and unfortunately, it's not the first time that Obama has expressed a dim view of a large class of Americans at once.

I understand that some Obama supporters believed their candidate was different and would keep his promise to filibuster any bill containing telecom immunity.  I think it is relatively common for supporters to trust their candidate to keep his word.

rumors that Clinton will vote against the bill

But if the Obama movement suddenly became something it wasn't and could see that Clinton staying in the race helped Obama, then who knows?

Otherwise, you seem to be just trying to provoke something.

1.  everything about this season was extraordinarily large.  There isn't a past campaign that you can really compare this one to.

2. debt was accumulated late in the campaign because despite what Obama supporters and pundits constantly said, Clinton did still have a chance to win the support of the super dels.

4. if the Obama supporters would STOP the bashing there wouldn't be any worst of the worst to report, would there.  The Obama supporters can't seem to wrap their brains around the fact that they want Clinton supporters to vote for Obama.  It's not the other way around.  They need to do the reaching out, they need to be nice to Clinton supporters.  We have votes they want.  They don't have anything we want.

1.  They campaigned in all 50 states in an historically close primary season, both sides broke spending records, so that point is irrelevant.  If the reversed had happened, I would support paying off Obama's debt, it is both traditional and wise.  BTW, he needs her votes.

2.  They can grumble all they want, but we are being told that we are McCain supporters if we don't mutely fall in line.  If they want unity, they may not get everything that they want and they may have to do things deep down they don't want to do, that is what compromise is all about.  BTW, he needs her votes.

3.  His staff, web associates and media men ran a very hardcore campaign against Hilary.  Olbermann spent 10 minutes of air time claiming she wanted him killed!  They kept saying their tactics were fair, and that "politics ain't bean bag."  Now we are all supposed to forgive and forget being called the names we were.  He should have thought about Unity when he was so determined to win at any cost.  And oh yeah, BTW, he needs her votes.

4.  This point is less clear (I don't mean that as a slam) but the MSM never mentions blogs except to condemn them as the rightful threat they are to them in the future, but not quite yet.  People bloviating on blogs will have little impact on the race overall, we are not nearly as important as we think we are in the Blogosphere.  Most people blog about their pets and other fun things, most blogs are not political at all.  Plus, as always, he needs her votes.

5.  True enough, of course it won't solve all of our problems with him, but mending this breach will be a slow step by step process and I know that I can be converted to him if he starts to show some grace, and especially if he picks Hilary as his running mate.  He still does have a (small) chance for my vote, I sometimes get goaded into anger and say the word never, but he does have the chance for it.  He and his supporters need to quit taking victory laps and pretending that they have already won the Presidency and quit taking votes like mine for granted, it is a serious mistake.  I don't HAVE to vote for President you know, I can leave it blank as the default position is NOT voting for McCain, but voting 3rd party or not at all.  Oh, and big surprise coming here, BTW, he needs her votes.

IMHO at least.

More important to Obama is the way this could benefit his fundraising.  Doesn't he need the backing of her larger donors who have maxed out their contributions to her campaign?  

As for your other points:

1)    The debts are extraordinarily large, unlike previous campaign debts.

Previous campaign debts were smaller because running for office didn't cost as much as it does today.

2)    Some Obama supporters would donate, but others would still criticize where the money's going (Mark Penn) and why debt was accumulated late in the primary.

I have the same objection to the government funding faith-based programs: the more money the government gives them, the more of their own money they can use to prosyletize.

3)    Formation of PUMA groups make unity seem less likely now.

These kinds of groups were formed because people were offended at being instructed to unify when the party had failed to listen to anything other than the sound crisp $100 bills make when they are being counted.

4)    The continued attention on the conflict and the publication of the worst of the worst opinions on the blogs would be bigger news and get more attention than the donations.

Sorry, I don't follow you on this one.

5)    Criticisms of Obama's policies, and lack of policies, movement to the right and outreach to Republicans are all reasons for not voting for Obama.

Here's my 2 cents: each person's vote is his or hers, and the reasons for voting or not voting or how to cast that vote are not for others to judge.  People have been known to not vote for someone because they just didn't "like" them - is that a silly reason?  Not to the person who makes the decision.

For me, I no longer see the point of voting for someone just because he or she is a Democrat.  There's got to be more, and it has to measure up to MY standards; this lesser-of-two-evils thing is a crock.  

Some leading Clinton supporters are starting new Web sites or political action committees aimed at prodding Sen. Obama on issues

And the Dems think I'm coming home to the sheepfold in November?  Good luck with that.  

   When asked about Supreme Court ruling against the use of the death penalty in instances of child rape today at a news conference in Chicago, Obama answered, "I disagree with the decision. I have said repeatedly that I think that the death penalty should be applied in very narrow circumstances for most egregious of crimes. I think that the rape of a small child, six or eight years old is a heinous crime, and if a state makes a decision that under narrow, limited, well-defined circumstances, the death penalty is at least potentially applicable. That does not violate our constitution."

    He continued, "Had the Supreme Court said, `We want to constrain ability of states to do this to make sure that it's done in a careful and appropriate way,' that would've been one thing, but it basically had a blanket prohibition and I disagree with that decision."

I'm not surprised he came to his conclusion, though. Cass Sunstein seems to be his guy on this. I'm not impressed by Sunstein, either, at least in the case of the death penalty.

I think that any acceptance of the deterrence argument for the death penalty is at best problematic. At worst it's a rejection of Constitutional principles.

Sunstein seems to think that deterrence should be considered, he hems and haws about this, of course.

I know I'm not a "scholar" but any acceptance of the validity of any deterrence argument seems counter to Constitutional principle and, of course, accepted precedent.

Obama seems to have even rejected the very foundation of death penalty precedent in his little statement, "evolving standards of decency" being especially important.

This isn't the kind of thinking I expect from a candidate who claims being a law professor in his CV.