WELCOME. And welcome back. It’s been over a year since the last issue of The Blue Line, a year marked by the implosion of the housing market, the freedom of Tibet, and the political future of Eliot Spitzer—or was that just last month? No matter. Actually, it’s possible that the Blue Line missed very little after all. George W. Bush still can’t say “nuclear.” We are still (still?) in Iraq. Oh, and the Democratic nomination fight is still locked in a showdown between two groundbreaking candidates: a black man and a white woman.

We true-blue liberals here at TBL have been struggling with that last bit most of all. We all want to coalesce around a candidate, but of course we disagree on whom. (The divisions are deep and sometimes bitter. Submit guesses to blueline@harvarddems.com.) So we have made it our mission in this inaugural online issue of the TBL to focus not on what divides us, but what unites us: our moral, intellectual, and frankly physical superiority to the Republicans, and of course our desire to win. Here’s to Obanton/Clinboma ‘08: With hope for change, and the experience to get us there.

This issue would not have been possible without, really, too many people to name. But here is a partial list: Sam Novey, who allowed TBL to consume the Communications Committee these past weeks; Garrett Dash Nelson, who answered countless panicked emails and passed on the acquired wisdom of issues past; and, most of all, the board and the Members-of-Large of the Harvard College Democrats, who fed us ideas, submitted articles, copy-edited the errors we were too bleary-eyed to see, publicized our launch with reckless enthusiasm, and dealt with us as we became progressively more stressed-out and unreasonable.

It’s been a labor of love, of words, of caffeine pills and code, conceived in stuffy committee rooms and brought to term over loud music and late nights at Lamont. We present it humbly to the world. Enjoy.

Editor-in-Chief
Elise Liu

Managing Editor
Kristine Beckerle

Series of Tubes Editor
Jon Noronha

Chief Propagandist
Markus Kolic

Political Consultant
Harlan Piper

Ruthless Pollster
Raul Campillo

Associate Editors
Andrew Maher
Christian Garland
Eva Lam

Advisory Board
Jarret Zafran
Indira Phukan
Garrett Dash Nelson
Sam Novey