"The Democratic Party has moved so far to the political Right ..."

More nonsense! I've heard LONG discussions and explanations about the last several decades by experts who do more than toss out unfounded generalizations. (I wish I had direct links to the detials)

The Democratic party has largely stayed just where it was, while the Republican party has been doing all the shifting to the right. Even the Republicans and rightist pundits are using this situation to 'claim' that the Democrats are becoming more LEFT...leading to stupid remarks about "Marxist" etc...

Cowardly anonymous "Guest" asserts: "Note how the Obama speechmakers have also neatly co-opted what was actually a *Russian-led initiative* ...."

The 'initiative' has been brought about piecemeal by various people, including Putin. He and Obama compared ideas on the basic idea at the G-8. Why does Obama's agreement and cautious optimism with Putin's engagement have to be spun as "co-opted"? THEY are, for slightly different reasons, trying to defuse the situation and avoid wider conflict.
If they succeed, I don't really care who gets the credit.... but many doubt that much would BE happening without Obama's warnings. He & Putin obviously come to the issue from different perspectives, and neither could easily put pressure on Assad alone.