"Bitter" in the mail...Fall Preview

Of course, how it works in a GOP primary isn't quite clear. Shaner tries it like this:

"And although Republicans don’t have a competitive race for President, you can send a loud and clear message back to Obama by coming out and supporting candidates who share our values."

My thought is this...when is the last time the "Guns and God" voter cast their vote for a Democrat? So is this really that big of a deal? It could be if it helps bring more Republicans out to vote but the real question is...how do Independents react to the "Bitter" comment?

Debate Reaction

In a severe case of bad timing -- just days before the Pennsylvania primary -- Sen. Barack Obama gave his worst performance in a debate so far last night. It's not that Sen. Hillary Clinton "won" the debate, but Obama clearly lost it.

If you missed it, check out the "bests and mosts" from CQ Politics.

Chuck Todd: "Overall, with the spotlight on him very bright, Obama didn't step up. He got rattled early on and never picked his game back up. Clinton wasn't very warm (outside of he first few minutes), but she didn't have the spotlight on her very bright. And as we've noted here quite a few times, whenever the spotlight is on one candidate, the other seems to benefit. Last night, the spotlight was on Obama, and for a short period of time, expect Clinton to benefit. But the question is whether she can sustain any benefit since as the negativity goes on, she pays a bigger price than Obama. Let's see what Pennsylvania decides in five days. A big Clinton victory and this debate will be seen as an important turning point. But a narrow victory (less than five points) and she could find herself facing more calls to get out."

Walter Shapiro: "This was not an evening that will shimmer in Obama's memory book."

Andrew Sullivan: "It was a lifeless, exhausted, drained and dreary Obama we saw tonight. I've seen it before when he is tired, but this was his worst performance yet on national television. He seemed crushed and unable to react. This is big-time politics and he's up against the Clinton wood-chipper. But there is no disguising the fact that he wilted, painfully."

Marc Ambinder: "Keeping the score card, there's no way Obama could have fared worse. Nearly 45 minutes of relentless political scrutiny from the ABC anchors and from Hillary Clinton, followed by an issues-and-answers session in which his anger carried over and sort of neutered him. But Hillary Clinton has a Reverse-Teflon problem: her negatives are up, and when she's perceived as the attacker, the attacks never seem to settle on Obama and always seem to boomerang back on her."

Josh Marshall: "I don't think this debate will have much effect on the direction of the race. In fact, I've learned from past... experience that the candidate who wins on points in a debate often doesn't come out with the best result."

Joe Klein: "My guess is that Obama, simply by pointing out the dopiness of the questions in the first half of the debate, probably emerged from this better than Clinton did."

Justice Stevens' change of heart

(Q) Justice John Paul Stevens, the Chicago native who once was part of a Supreme Court majority that reinstated the death penalty in America in 1976, Wednesday indicated for the first time that he believes capital punishment is unconstitutional.

Writing to concur in the court's judgment in Baze v. Rees, the case out of Kentucky that questioned whether the method used for executing prisoners was unconstitutionally harmful, Stevens said he had become convinced that the death penalty no longer served a legitimate societal function.

Stevens noted that that when the Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, it did so by identifying three purposes served by capital punishment: 1) incapacitation of the offender; 2) deterrence and 3) retribution.

He wrote that with the advent of longer prisoner sentences and the option of a life term without parole made incapacitation a weaker rationale. He then questioned whether the death penalty deters crime, long a subject of debate among researchers. "Despite 30 years of empirical research in the area, there is no reliable statistical evidence that capital punishment in fact deters potential offenders," he said. Continue reading @ Swamp Politics

Bush and big crowd greet pope on his birthday

(Q) Pope Benedict XVI chose to address bluntly the sex scandal that has torn at the church here even before he landed Tuesday on his first official visit to the United States, saying he was “deeply ashamed” by the actions of pedophile priests.

His comments aboard his plane, in answer to a written question submitted by a reporter and selected by the Vatican, appeared to soothe many Catholics but left others demanding more action than words.

“It’s difficult for me to understand how it was possible that priests betrayed in this way their mission to give healing, to give the love of God to these children,” the pope said, adding that the church would work to exclude pedophiles from the priesthood.

“It is more important to have good priests than to have many priests,” he said.

The words were his strongest ever on the issue, one he clearly wanted to emphasize as he arrived on a six-day visit to Washington and New York. His comments were in response to the first of four questions he answered on the plane — chosen from 20 the press corps had submitted in advance.

It was unclear whether these would be the last words from Benedict on the issue, which ruptured the faith between parishioners and priests and has cost the church some $2 billion, or whether it was an opening signal of both reconciliation and more to come. Church officials have said they expected the pope to address the scandal more than once during his visit, and there is speculation that he may even meet with some victims. Continue @ NYT

Sunday Cartoon

Joseph Stiglitz On The Economy

(Q) An interview with Joseph Stiglitz, the Columbia Professor who is a Nobel Prize-winning economist, with his overview of the economy.

Stiglitz recent books include Globalization and Its Discontents (2003) and Making Globalization Work (2006).

The professor pulls no punches -- about the economy, President Bush, and Fed Chair Bernanke.

Same Ol', Same Ol'

CORPORATE WELFARE UPDATE....The housing bill easily passed the Senate on Thursday:

The most expensive item is a tax break for homebuilders and other money-losing businesses that would cost the federal government more than $25 billion over the next three years. Missing entirely: A new mechanism to aid borrowers who can't afford their mortgage payments and, due to falling home prices, owe their banks more than their homes are worth, the group most at risk of foreclosure.

One of the bill's chief sponsors, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), called the measure "a major, positive step in the right direction," but he acknowledged that the package offers little in direct aid to the nearly 8,000 families thrown into foreclosure each day.

I'm totally conflicted on foreclosure aid. Is it a good idea because lots of people are hurting and need help — and if Wall Street is going to get help, why not the little guys too? Or is it a bad idea because it just helps to prop up housing prices, extending a bubble that needs to be allowed to pop?

I'm not sure. But that $25 billion tax break? No conflict there. It's right up there with ethanol subsidies in the pantheon of outlandishly rapacious corporate welfare legislation. Daniel Gross explains:

The technical term for this is a tax-loss carryback. But it should perhaps be known as a bubble-head tax break....Homebuilders argue that they need relief because their sector, which provides a great deal of domestic employment, is on the ropes, and they're finding it more difficult to raise capital. Which is as it should be. After bubbles pop, those who screwed up really badly fail and get taken over by creditors or opportunistic investors. Those who have sound underlying franchises but merely got a little carried away can survive if they take painful restructuring moves. This is what is known as market capitalism.

....The proposal to give new tax breaks to homebuilders and banks is yet another example of the pernicious trend of privatizing profit and socializing losses, which is gnawing away at faith in the system. Dilute the shareholders, not the taxpayers.

The "he gets it" quote is "the pernicious trend of privatizing profit and socializing losses"
The old addage, Americans dislike socialism is a falsehood.
I grant, socialism for the individual goes against the grain of American ethos in Individualism but Corporate Welfare has been rife for over a hundred years and Thursday's bailout of Corporate Financial America is just another example in a long line...Lee Iacocca

Will Clinton Over-Reach?

Courtesy Andrew Sullivan
The "bitter" spat is gold for Morris-Rove politics, which is why Clinton is exploiting it so baldly. It is exactly the kind of debate that has constructed American politics since Vietnam; it is exactly the kind of politics that Obama has been trying to transcend. Clinton will use anything at this point to destroy Obama's candidacy and message; but by adopting Rovism at its reddest, the Clintons do risk looking too obvious. Check out the comments in CNN's Politicker. At some point people will realize that the Clintons represent a continuation of the kind of politics that has made a serious engagement with this country's profound problems impossible. Or is acknowledging profound problems now unpatriotic?

Is this election about how to salvage the least worst option in the Iraq disaster? Is it about restoring some kind of fiscal sanity? Is it about doing all we can to unite Americans in a war against Islamic terrorism? Is it about restoring America's compliance with the Geneva Conventions? Or is it again about red-blue culture wars? We know what the professional political class is comfortable with. We know what Rove and Bush and Penn and Clinton believe. What we will find out soon is if Americans want more of the same. It's a free country - and people can vote. Goodbye to all that? Or hello again - for yet another cycle? A reader writes:

I am a rustbelt native. I live near Gary, Indiana and have never lived anywhere else. I’ll probably die here.

I read and, more importantly, listened to Barack Obama’s response to the Clinton cacophony after his remarks about blue collar/regular people/rustbelt voters. The difference between the two politicians is amazing. One is thoughtful and unafraid while defending a politically risky yet righteous position. The other is just noise.


My husband and I already have one child and grandchild living thousands of miles away and I fully expect the other to leave within a few years. I don’t blame them. In fact I always encouraged them to leave because I wanted them to realize the full measure of their talents and abilities and that isn’t possible here.

Obama’s right about guns and religion in that there simply isn’t much to do in an economically depressed area but hunt and pray. There’s nothing insulting or elitist about this, but people can be easily persuaded that an elitist has indeed insulted them.

That’s what worries me. People will forget their interests, will forget that their children are moving away en masse, will forget the political idiocy of the Clintonian hypocrisy that inspires Howard Beale-like angst in all of us. They may forget all of that just for the misguided privilege of feeling insulted.

And that's their right. Americans have had the presidency they deserved these past four years; the war they voted to continue; the debt they voted to increase; the incompetence they decided to reward. They also get to pick who comes next. If they want more of the same, they know who to vote for.

AP Confirms ABC News

Torture latest:

Bush administration officials from Vice President Dick Cheney on down signed off on using harsh interrogation techniques against suspected terrorists after asking the Justice Department to endorse their legality, The Associated Press has learned. The officials also took care to insulate President Bush from a series of meetings where CIA interrogation methods, including waterboarding, which simulates drowning, were discussed and ultimately approved.

A former senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the meetings described them Thursday to the AP to confirm details first reported by ABC News on Wednesday. The intelligence official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly discuss the issue. They knew what they were doing. The law was "fixed" to back up what was already decided.

The parallel to WMD intelligence - the Downing Street memo - springs to mind.

And now more...Courtesy Andrew Sullivan

While the blogosphere explodes dissecting how big a snob Obama is, the president of the United States cops to authorizing torture:

Bush also said in an interview with ABC News that he approved of the meetings, which were held as the CIA began to prepare for a secret interrogation program that included waterboarding, or simulated drowning, and other coercive techniques.

"Well, we started to connect the dots, in order to protect the American people" by learning what various detainees knew, Bush said in the interview at the presidential ranch here. "And yes, I'm aware our national security team met on this issue. And I approved."

The remarks underscore the extent to which the top officials were directly involved in setting the controversial interrogation policies.

Bush suggested in the interview that no one should be surprised that his senior advisers, including Vice President Cheney, would discuss details of the interrogation program. "I told the country we did that," Bush said. "And I also told them it was legal. We had legal opinions that enabled us to do it."

Notice that for this president, the law is an obstacle to be overcome with opinions he orders up from his underlings. Also, can't you just see the president really wants to tell the people "you can't handle the truth!" Whether it be wrong or right....

Obama: No Backing Down!

One thing I like about Barack Obama is that when he hands himself lemons, he tries to make lemonade as you see in his response to those who criticized his characterization of the public mood in Pennsylvania. Recall that the whole meetings with the political leadership of rogue states started as a gaffe, but eventually became a synecdoche for willingness to move beyond the conventional wisdom of a broken establishment.

I have no idea whether this particular response to this particular controversy will "work" but it's still the correct approach and one that shows, I think, a more sophisticated grasp of media dynamics than we've seen from most Democrats over the past few years. Courtesy Matthew Yglesias
Barack Obama's original San Francisco statement here

Obama Closing in on Clinton in Pennsylvania

Sen. Barack Obama is catching up with Sen. Hillary Clinton in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary, according to a new Quinnipiac poll. Clinton now leads by just 6 points, 50% to 44%, among likely voters.

Last week Clinton had a 9 point lead in the poll.

Said pollster Clay Richards:

"With two weeks to go, Sen. Barack Obama is knocking on the door of a major political upset in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary. Obama is not only building on his own constituencies, but is taking away voters in Sen. Hillary Clinton's strongest areas - whites including white women, voters in the key swing Philadelphia suburbs and those who say the economy is the most important issue in the campaign."

Jayhawks Defeat Tigers In OT For First National Title in 20 Years

Click to see ESPN Video

Obama On Patriotism In Montana

More, please:

I love this country not because it's perfect, but because we've always been able to move it closer to perfection. Because through revolution and slavery; war and depression; great battles for civil rights and women's rights and worker's rights, generations of Americans have shown their love of country by struggling and sacrificing and risking their lives to bring us that much closer to our founding promise. And as long as I live, I will never forget that I am only standing here because they did... That is the country I love. That is the promise of America.

Our Daily Bread

(Q) The NYT reported on the price of rice last week:

The price of rice, a staple in the diets of nearly half the world’s population, has almost doubled on international markets in the last three months. That has pinched the budgets of millions of poor Asians and raised fears of civil unrest.

Paul Krugman devotes his column today to the rising price of grain worldwide:

Governments and private grain dealers used to hold large inventories in normal times, just in case a bad harvest created a sudden shortage. Over the years, however, these precautionary inventories were allowed to shrink, mainly because everyone came to believe that countries suffering crop failures could always import the food they needed.

This left the world food balance highly vulnerable to a crisis affecting many countries at once — in much the same way that the marketing of complex financial securities, which was supposed to diversify away risk, left world financial markets highly vulnerable to a systemwide shock.

Courtesy Andrew Sullivan

Top 14 Reasons Mark Penn Coulda/Shoulda Been Fired by Hillary

(Q) Courtesy Mark Halperin
1. He insisted on a message of “experience” in a “change” election.

2. He brought his near absence of visible professional humanity to a candidate that needs humanizing more than most.

3. He treated his colleagues with disdain.

4. He refused to give up his lucrative private sector work, even for clients who were politically toxic within the party.

5. He billed the campaign premium rates for his firm’s services.

6. He had little or no experience in winning Democratic nomination battles.

7. He simultaneously served as pollster and chief strategist — and no campaign should have as its
chief strategist its pollster or admaker.

8. He was an off-putting and gaffe-prone television, conference call, and post-debate surrogate.

9. He was a lightning rod for media and labor criticism.

10 He fought against the good ideas of his colleagues about how to reshape Clinton’s image.

11. He fostered a sense of ill will and distrust with virtually all of Clinton’s other top advisers, stifled creativity, and blurred lines of authority.

12. He can be a temperamental, often immature presence.

13. He appeared to refuse to take any responsibility for Clinton’s losses.

14. His work and strategic advice highlighted many of Clinton’s greatest perceived weaknesses: accusations of a say-one-thing-do-another ethos; charges of being too centrist; support for the Iraq War; coziness with Washington lobbyists and special interests; ties to certain less-beloved aspects of her husband’s presidency.

The story reads:
Mark Penn, the pollster who has advised Bill and Hillary Clinton since 1996, stepped down under pressure on Sunday as the chief political strategist for Mrs. Clinton’s struggling presidential campaign after his private business arrangements again clashed with her campaign positions. Read full story at New York Times

McCain keeps up with California talk

(Q) It's no secret that the McCain camp hopes to expand the map past the old red/blue divide, but the candidate himself seems to have one state in mind that most strategists in both parties see as being in safe Dem hands: California.

When I asked McCain last month in New Hampshire a general question about competing in left-leaning states, he immediately cited California (even though we were standing in a much more attainable blue state).

And now this morning, when asked by Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday" about his intent to appeal to non-traditonal GOP voters, McCain pivoted again to the Big Enchilada.

"California can no longer be written off in my view," McCain said. "And that means going to all parts of that state and reaching out to Hispanic voters, independents, others."

Now, whether McCain will be speeding up and down The 5 on the Straight Talk Express in late October is an open question.

But it's apparent that the candidate — who has a place on Coronado and has been called "the third senator from California" — wants to at least give it a shot.

Something that, in early April, offers much more upside than not for somebody trying to persuade donors in the state to part with their cash.

An Amazing Story...

Please take a few minutes (6:51) to watch this story.

Soldier survives RPG hit.

Air Drop Bloopers

Bless you, men of Op For, for uncovering this genius video showing what happens when air drops go wrong. a "stupid gold mine," they proclaim. And what gold it is.

And Finally...the Tax Returns

Long-awaited, they arrive — when else — at 4:00 p.m. Friday.

The Clintons' joint returns show them earning more than $109 million over a period of seven years.

The biggest source of income is Bill Clinton's speeches — source of $51 million. He made another $30 million from books; Hillary made about $10 million from her book.

Spokesman Jay Carson says, in a statement:

The Clintons have now made public thirty years of tax returns, a record matched by few people in public service. None of Hillary Clinton's presidential opponents have revealed anything close to this amount of personal financial information.

What the Clintons' tax returns show is that they paid more than $33,000,000 in federal taxes and donated more than $10,000,000 to charities over the past eight years. They paid taxes and made charitable contributions at a higher rate than taxpayers at their income level.

You can download them, and see a summary, here. They include detailed returns for 2000 through 2006, and the request for an extension for last year.

If you're poring over them, let me know what you find.

ALSO: The returns went early to Drudge — who has been extremely hard on Hillary for months — as good proof as any since the time of Machiavelli that it's better to be feared than loved.

UPDATE: The interesting part, of course, is the roughly $18 million that the summary doesn't account for -- (though it is accounted for in the returns).

Sobering Statistics...from the Other Track

(Q) The average black person in America is 447 percent more likely to be imprisoned than the average white person, and 521 percent more likely to be murdered. Blacks earn 60 cents to the dollar compared with whites who have the same education levels and marital status. The black poverty rate is nearly twice the white poverty rate. Blacks tend to die five years earlier than whites; the infant mortality rate among black babies is nearly 1 1/2 times the rate among white babies. And because of long-standing patterns of inheritance, blacks and whites begin life with substantial disparities in family wealth. To read the article...Unequal Perspectives on Racial Equality

Obama Raises More Than $40 Million in March

Sen. Barack Obama announced that he raised more than $40 million in March from more than 442,000 contributors across the country. More than 218,000 donors contributed to the campaign for the first time, and the average contribution level was $96.

Since the Clinton campaign isn't expected to come close to that figure, it's unlikely the campaign will announce anything until the mid-month filing deadline.

HRC's 20Pt. Lead in Pennsylvania...Gone

A new Quinnipiac poll in Pennsylvania finds Sen. Hillary Clinton leading Sen. Barack Obama by nine points, 50% to 41%, among likely Democratic primary voters.

Clinton held a 12 point lead two weeks ago.

Polls released yesterday from Rasmussen and SurveyUSA also found Clinton's lead narrowing in the last few weeks.

White House unveils Wall Street overhaul

(Q) The Bush administration Monday proposed the most far-ranging overhaul of the financial regulatory system since the stock market crash of 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression.

The plan would change how the government regulates thousands of businesses from the nation’s biggest banks and investment houses down to the local insurance agent and mortgage broker.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson unveiled the 218-page plan in a speech in Treasury’s ornate Cash Room, declaring, “A strong financial system is vitally important — not for Wall Street, not for bankers, but for working Americans.”

The plan, which would require congressional approval for its biggest changes, seeks to trim a hodge-podge collection of overlapping jurisdictions that date back to the Civil War.

It would give the Federal Reserve more power to protect the stability of the entire financial system while merging day-to-day bank supervision into one agency, down from five at present.

Read More @ Plan to move more oversight to the Federal Reserve

Dems, GOP agree Obama tougher foe for McCain

Here’s something both Democrats and Republicans might agree upon:

Barack Obama could give John McCain a tougher contest in November.

That’s what the Gallup poll has found.

Gallup’s daily tracking pver the weekend portrayed Obama, senator from Illinois, with a 10-point advantage over Clinton, senator from New York, among Democrats. Today's results of the latest daily track show Obama up eight points. The Pew Research Center has found a similar margin.

But with numbers that are certain to add fuel to Obama’s pitch to those superdelegates on whom Clinton counts to turn the nomination her way, Gallup has found this as well:

In a March 24-27 survey of 1,005 people:

Democrats were asked whether Clinton or Obama has the better chance of defeating McCain in November: 59 percent said Obama does, and 30 percent said Clinton does.

Republicans were asked whether McCain has a better chance of defeating Clinton or Obama. Sixty-four percent said McCain has a better chance of beating Clinton, 22 percent said Obama.

March Madness

And then there were ones.
Four No. 1s, that is. The Jayhawks will play overall No. 1 seed North Carolina on Saturday, and UCLA and Memphis will round out the party at the Alamodome.

Obama Says He'll Throwback To Bush 41, Reagan

Barack Obama promised that his foreign policy would be a return to what he says was the realist approach practiced by George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan.

"My foreign policy is actually a return to the traditional realistic policy of George Bush's father, of John F. Kennedy, of in some ways Ronald Reagan," he said Friday. A voter at the town hall in Greenburg had asked Obama to respond to charges that his foreign policy was naïve.

"It is George Bush who has been naïve and it's people like John McCain and unfortunately some democrats that have facilitated him acting in these naïve ways that have caused us so much damage in our reputation in the world," Obama said.

Drawing on the example of the first Gulf War, Obama said that the first President Bush had "conducted a Gulf War with allies that ended up costing twenty billion dollars and left us stronger because they were realistic."

"Remember, people were saying why didn't you go into Baghdad and overthrow Saddam Hussein? The realists understood that that would be a nightmare. And it wasn't worth our national interests," Obama added.

He described this President Bush's world view on foreign policy as a big stick approach.

"Certainly George Bush's foreign policy has been dominated by the idea that because we are so militarily powerful we can dictate events around the world," he said. "If people don't like it doesn't matter because we are the biggest, toughest thing on the block. Now that is naïve."

Obama claimed that since 9-11, the way foreign policy was viewed had turned from one that understood the limits of military power and had placed a greater emphasis on diplomatic and economic strength to one that placed its sole emphasis on country's military might.

He described the conventional thinking in Washington on foreign policy as "bipartisan" and this "both ideological and highly political."

That foreign policy he argued operated from the assumption that United States could act "as a lone super power" and said that "Senator Clinton is as captive to it in some ways as John McCain and George Bush."

"I do think that Senator Clinton would understand that George Bush's polices have failed," Obama added. "But in many ways she has been captive to the same politics that lead her to vote for the war in Iraq. Since 9-11 the conventional wisdom has been you have to look tough on foreign policy by voting and acting like the republicans. And I disagree with it."

Sadr Calls for Cease-Fire?

Great news, potentially. According to the AP, "Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said Sunday that he was pulling his fighters off the streets nationwide and called on the government to stop raids against his followers and free them from prison."

The Iraqi government quickly welcomed al-Sadr's apparent move to resolve a widening conflict with his movement, sparked Tuesday by operations against his backers in the oil-rich southern city of Basra.

Al-Sadr's nine-point statement was issued by his headquarters in the holy city of Najaf and broadcast through loudspeakers on Shiite mosques. It said the first point was: "taking gunmen off the streets in Basra and elsewhere."

He also demanded that the Iraqi government stop "haphazard raids" and release security detainees who haven't been charged, two issues cited by his movement as reasons for fighting the government.

Followers handed out sweets in Baghdad's main Mahdi Army militia stronghold of Sadr City.

"In exchange for brokering the cease-fire, al-Sadr demanded that the government give his supporters amnesty and release any of his followers that are being held," CNN says.

Sadr's forces still appear to be in control of "wide swaths" of Basra. But "the Mahdi Army has suffered major losses," notes Bill Roggio, just back from Iraq. "The Mahdi Army has not faired well over the past five days of fighting, losing an estimated two percent of its combat power, using the best case estimate for the size of the militia."

A look at the open source press reports from the US and Iraqi military and the established newspapers indicates 145 Mahdi Army fighters were killed, 81 were wounded, 98 were captured, and 30 surrendered during the past 36 hours.

Since the fighting began on Tuesday 358 Mahdi Army fighters were killed, 531 were wounded, 343 were captured, and 30 surrendered. The US and Iraqi security forces have killed 125 Mahdi Army fighters in Baghdad alone, while Iraqi security forces have killed 140 Mahdi fighters in Basra.

Courtesy Danger Room

Cash-strapped Clinton fails to pay bills

Reports her campaign has been putting off paying $8.7 million in hundreds of bills and some companies are warning others to get payment upfront when doing business with her.

If she had paid off her tab, “the cash she would have had available at the end of last month to spend on television ads and other up-front expenses would have been less than $2 million.”

Indiana Now a "Must Win" For Clinton

"Mrs. Clinton's aides said they could see no circumstance in which she would withdraw unless she lost Pennsylvania on April 22. Two senior advisers and one close ally said they would urge her to quit the race if she lost Indiana two weeks later, on May 6." New York Times

Hillary as the Black Knight...only a flesh wound?

Fighting Spreads Across Baghdad

The fighting between Iraq's Shi'ite factions appears to be metastasizing. What started in Basra and jumped to Baghdad's Sadr City has now spread across the capital, eyewitnesses tell Iraqslogger. Here's one set of reports, just from the Sha'b district.

Clashes erupted again on Thursday in the Sha'b area, including Thursday afternoon in the Sabah al-Khayat square of the northeastern district. Three cars carrying at least five Mahdi Army gunmen armed with rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and PKC launchers passed through the square in front of an Iraqi forces checkpoint, security sources said. The militiamen fired into the air as they approached. Iraqi forces returned fire and a clash ensued. Three militiamen and one policeman were killed in the firefight, along with five militiamen and one policeman injured.

At 1:00 am in Sha'b on Wednesday night, more than 70 Mahdi Army fighters attacked a police station. Two policemen were killed along with seven Mahdi Army members, and eight militiamen were injured in the fighting. Locals also report that a sound bomb had landed in Sha'b's main market Wednesday, forcing people to close their shops. Some suspect that Mahdi Army elements may have been involved in the attack as a way to force Iraqis to observe the "civil disobedience" called for by the Sadrist leadership.

On Thursday evening, a Sahwa [neighborhood watch] checkpoint was attacked in Sha'b, locals say. Two cars filled with armed men approached from different directions firing Kalashnikov rifles at the installation, then a gunman in one of the vehicles fired an RPG rocket. Sahwa forces returned fire and forced the attackers to run...

In the last two days, as Sahwa checkpoints have drawn attacks from Mahdi Army militiamen, locals say that several of the installations have been merged together to make them more defensible. Iraqi authorities also brought reinforcements from other Sahwa councils into Sha'b on Thursday. Locals say that Mahdi Army militiamen have targeted the residences of some Sahwa members in the area.

Read more at Danger Room.

Obama on Indiana

The Start of a Drum Beat?

Leahy Urges Clinton to Quit Race

Is this the start of a drum beat?
Following yesterday's declaration by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) that Sen. Barack Obama has already won the Democratic presidential race, Vermont Public Radio reports that Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) is calling on Sen. Hillary Clinton to drop out.
Said Leahy:

"There is no way that Senator Clinton is going to win enough delegates to get the nomination. She ought to withdraw and she ought to be backing Senator Obama. Now, obviously that's a decision that only she can make frankly I feel that she would have a tremendous career in the Senate."

Courtesy Political Wire.

Growth Nearly Halted By End of 2007

New numbers released by the government Thursday highlighted the continued weak performance of the national economy, with the Commerce Department reporting an anemic 0.6 percent increase in the gross domestic product in the final three months of 2007.

The GDP, which measures the value of all goods and services produced within the United States, was expected to perform even worse in the first three months of 2008, but final numbers will not be available on that until late April.

One positive number to come out Thursday could be tied to the continued weak value of the American dollar compared with other currencies. Sales of U.S. goods and services to other countries grew at a 6.5 percent pace. That was better than the 4.8 percent growth rate previously estimated.

Thursday's report underscored the damage to the economy from the collapse in the housing market, which has crippled housing prices, forced many homeowners into foreclosure and weakened consumer confidence in their finances.

Reaction from the campaign trail...

Republican standard bearer Sen. John McCain, who has said the government should only intervene to address systemic problems in the economy, dismissed both Democratic senators addresses in a statement Thursday.

"There is a tendency for liberals to seek big government programs that sock it to American taxpayers while failing to solve the very real problems we face," McCain said.

Obama countered that McCain's plan to assist the economy "amounts to little more than watching this crisis happen."

Climate Change...

The Wilkins ice shelf is collapsing:

A chunk of Antarctic ice about seven times the size of Manhattan suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk, scientists said Tuesday.

....British Antarctic Survey scientist David Vaughan attributed the melting to rising sea temperature due to global warming.

....Vaughan had predicted the Wilkins shelf would collapse about 15 years from now.

All the usual caveats apply. However, this is one more data point suggesting that global warming may be happening faster than our current models predict, not slower.
Courtesy Los Angeles Times

N.C., Line in the Sand?

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s dwindling chances to be president may hinge on what happens in North Carolina.

Jerry Meek, the chairman of the N.C. Democratic Party, laid out Clinton’s problem in the national delegate totals.

“I think it’s very, very unlikely that if Obama won both the popular vote and the pledged-vote count, that the nomination would go to Clinton,” said Meek, who has not endorsed either candidate. “The public outcry as a result of that would be so intense that it would not happen.”

A poll released yesterday by a Democratic polling firm in North Carolina showed Obama leading Clinton by 21 points in the state. A week ago, another poll by the firm, Public Policy Polling, showed Obama with a lead of just 1 point.

Tom Jensen, an analyst with Public Policy Polling, attributed Obama’s large jump in the poll to a change in the sample of voters that was polled and to the media attention he received last week from his visit to the state.

If Obama gets a resounding win in North Carolina, it could help clinch the nomination for him, said Pearce, the Democratic consultant.

“Unless either she or he wins a state they should not win, I think this thing is probably over after North Carolina,” Pearce said.

Even former president Bill Clinton, campaigning for his wife on Friday, alluded to North Carolina’s importance, saying, “This whole thing could come down to what you all decide to do in North Carolina.”

Comic Relief

Erin Jackson is a DC-based comedian doing big things. She's part of the Black Comedy Project family and will be coming soon to Comedy Central's Live at Gotham series.

McCain: Let's Add $4 Trillion More To The Debt

According to his website, McCain wants to do the following:

(a) Repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax.
(b) "John McCain will fight the Democrats' crippling plans for a tax increase in 2011." That "tax increase" is what is more commonly known as "letting the Bush tax cuts expire on schedule."
(c) "Cut The Corporate Tax Rate From 35 To 25 Percent."
(d) "Allow First-Year Deduction, Or “Expensing”, Of Equipment And Technology Investments." From the Gordon/Kvaal report:

"Under current law, corporations must generally deduct the cost of an investment over that investment’s useful lifetime, a tax and accounting practice known as depreciation. McCain’s proposal will allow corporations to depreciate the entire cost of investments in the first year of the purchase, a practice known as expensing. This would create extra incentives for business investment by letting corporations claim these tax breaks immediately."

There are a few other tax proposals, none of which would do anything to offset the cost of these.

The Gordon/Kvaal report estimates the cost of these changes at $2.17 trillion dollars over ten years. They think their estimates are conservative: for instance, they do not count increased spending on debt service.

The Wall Street Journal, everyone's favorite bastion of radical leftism, writes: "In all, his tax-cutting proposals could cost about $400 billion a year, according to estimates of the impact of different tax cuts by CBO and the McCain campaign."

That would make the cost over ten years $4 trillion.
Read more of Andrew Olmsted

Signs your campaign is in trouble...

Apparently retailers haven't heard the electoral votes theory.

The Impact of Obama's Speech

The latest CBS News poll on the Wright speech suggests that Obama scored well. 71 percent thought he did a good job explaining his relationship with Wright, with 24 percent saying a poor job. 63 percent mostly agreed with his views on race. The poll shows no real shift from the speech in voters' intent to vote for him or not vote for him.

Which Evil Anti-American Racist Demagogue Said This?

"God didn't call America to engage in a senseless, unjust war. . . . And we are criminals in that war. We've committed more war crimes almost than any nation in the world, and I'm going to continue to say it. And we won't stop it because of our pride and our arrogance as a nation. But God has a way of even putting nations in their place...[God will say:] And if you don't stop your reckless course, I'll rise up and break the backbone of your power."

Answer Click Here
To read more check out E. J. Dionne Jr.

State Dept. Employees Targets Obama

The State Department says it is trying to determine whether three contract workers had a political motive for looking at Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's passport file. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that for now it appears that nothing other than "imprudent curiosity" was involved in three separate breaches of the Illinois senator's personal information, "but we are taking steps to reassure ourselves that that is, in fact, the case."

Bill Burton, a spokesman for Obama's presidential campaign, called for a complete investigation. "This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years," Burton said. "Our government's duty is to protect the private information of the American people, not use it for political purposes."

"This is a serious matter that merits a complete investigation, and we demand to know who looked at Senator Obama's passport file, for what purpose and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach," he said.

The breaches occurred on Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and March 14 and were detected by internal State Department computer checks, McCormack said. The department's top management officer, Undersecretary Patrick Kennedy, said certain records, including those of high-profile people, are "flagged" with a computer tag that tips off supervisors when someone tries to view the records without a proper reason.

In answer to a question, Kennedy said the department doesn't look into political affiliation in doing background checks on passport workers. "Now that this has arisen, this becomes a germane question, and that will be something for the appropriate investigation to look into," he said.

The disclosure of inappropriate passport inquiries recalled an incident in 1992, when a Republican political appointee at the State Department was demoted over a search of presidential candidate Bill Clinton's passport records. At the time he was challenging President George H.W. Bush.

The searches may violate the federal Privacy Act, and Kennedy said he is consulting State Department lawyers. The State Department inspector general's power is limited because two of the employees are no longer working for the department. McCormack said it was premature to consider whether the FBI or Justice Department should be involved.

Today, Sec. of State Rice says she called Obama to apologize for passport file breach.

Doug Hattaway, a spokesman for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady who is challenging Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, said of the current breach: "It's outrageous and the Bush administration has to get to the bottom of it."

New Mexico's Richardson endorses Obama

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation's only Hispanic governor, is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president, calling him a "once-in-a- lifetime leader" who can unite the nation and restore America's international leadership.

Richardson, who dropped out of the Democratic race in January, is to appear with Obama on Friday at a campaign event in Portland, Ore., The Associated Press has learned.

The governor's endorsement comes as Obama leads among delegates selected at primaries and caucuses but with national public opinion polling showing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton pulling ahead of him amid controversy over statements by his former pastor.

McCain Downplays Mideast Gaffe

A Southern Bystander in Cobb County Georgia

A man waiting for a car repair sees the Obama speech on TV. People come and go and watch. Not everyone in this country is like the National Review crowd:

I haven't had that many "standing around with strangers watching events unfold" moments in my life. In roughly chronological order, the Challenger explosion, the OJ verdict, 9/11, the Red Sox winning the World Series. Maybe one or two others scattered through my 33 years. But not many. Most events are, I suppose, not big enough, not loud enough, not important enough to make people stop and just watch. Today was another one of those days.

I've watched the speech again since this morning, and it didn't disappoint, but just at that moment I stopped watching it ... and started watching the people around me. The young black man. The elderly white couple. The two white women, one college-aged, one in her late-20s. One middle-aged white woman. Two white men, one college-aged, one in his late-30s. One Asian couple. All of them were watching the speech. Rapt. Nodding.

Gradually, the twentysomething white woman went back to her laptop, but kept smiling when Obama would say something important. The elderly white couple whispered in their Southern accented way: "He's really good... He's saying good things... He's a good young man..." The young black man chuckled when Obama said that Sunday morning was the most segregated hour in America, but was otherwise simply watching. And at one point, the middle-aged white woman asked one of the dealership folks, in another thick, thick Southern accent if she wouldn't mind turning up the volume, because she really wanted to hear this speech.

She, this white Southern woman from the suburbs, wanted to hear this speech, delivered by a Black man with a funny name running for President. And she was nodding.

But she wasn't the only one.

A Change of Seasons

Obama's Speech on Race

Sen. Barack Obama's speech on race this morning showed off exactly why he's become the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination. He's absolutely willing to challenge the conventional way of how politicians approach controversy. In my opinion, it was the best speech so far in this campaign.

Andrew Sullivan: "I have never felt more convinced that this man's candidacy - not this man, his candidacy - and what he can bring us to achieve - is an historic opportunity. This was a testing; and he did not merely pass it by uttering safe bromides. He addressed the intimate, painful love he has for an imperfect and sometimes embittered man. And how that love enables him to see that man's faults and pain as well as his promise. This is what my faith is about. It is what the Gospels are about. This is a candidate who does not merely speak as a Christian. He acts like a Christian."

Charles Murray: "Has any other major American politician ever made a speech on race that comes even close to this one? As far as I'm concerned, it is just plain flat out brilliant -- rhetorically, but also in capturing a lot of nuance about race in America. It is so far above the standard we're used to from our pols."

Ben Smith: "A smart colleague notes that this speech is the polar opposite of this year's other big speech on faith, in which Mitt Romney went to Texas to talk about Mormonism, but made just one reference to his Mormon faith. Obama mentions Wright by name 14 times."

First Read: "His tone throughout was quiet and thoughtful. The same speech could have been delivered in a fiery tone. But Obama chose one that was quiet and thoughtful. It did little to lessen the impact and may have added to the weight of his words."

Marc Ambinder: "How it plays will determine how it plays. If the media focuses more on the Wright defense-by-renouncements and then juxtaposes them with clips of Wright's comments, then I think the trouble remains. The seeds of doubt about who this guy really is may be nourished. I know that Obama believes that a discussion about race plays to his benefit, no matter what people think about white working class voters and their latent feelings. Perhaps this is the beginning of his opportunity to lift the veil and get everyone -- not just himself and the media -- to talk openly."
Courrtesy: Taegan Goddard's Political Wire

Florida: No Revote

Letter from state party chair says: “We researched every potential alternative process – from caucuses to county conventions to mail-in elections – but no plan could come anywhere close to being viable in Florida.” Read letter here. Courtesy Mark Halperin

Clearance from the Trib

Chicago Tribune indicates that it's satisfied with Obama's account of Rezko.

U.S. Sen. Barack Obama waited 16 months to attempt the exorcism. But when he finally sat down with the Tribune editorial board Friday, Obama offered a lengthy and, to us, plausible explanation for the presence of now-indicted businessman Tony Rezko in his personal and political lives.

The most remarkable facet of Obama's 92-minute discussion was that, at the outset, he pledged to answer every question the three dozen Tribune journalists crammed into the room would put to him. And he did.

My take on this one is that while it's not going to go away, and while both Obama's judgment and his slow disclosure are legitimate issues, the missing piece is an indication that Obama reciprocated with valuable favors, something that hasn't been shown.

Senator Obama on Olbermann

Obama Denounces Controversial Remarks

7 Days and Counting

Sen. Barack Obama leads Hillary Clinton among Democrats nationally, 50% to 44%, according to the latest Gallup tracking poll.

Obama has led in this poll for seven consecutive days.

Quote of the Day

"She did not sit in on national security meetings. She did not have a security clearance. She did not attend meetings in the situation room. She conducted no negotiations. She did not manage any part of the national security bureaucracy."

-- Former Clinton White House aide Greg Craig, in an interview with the National Journal, adding that Sen Hillary Clinton has "in serious ways overstated, if not grossly exaggerated, the nature of her experience."

What "A Fighter" Means...

A reader of Andrew Sullivan writes about Hillary Clinton's strategies and her possible presidency.

One thing that both Hillary Clinton and her supporters say is indisputably true: she is a fighter. Clinton and her supporters believe that she will fight her opponents to accomplish her goals. But what does that mean?

Right now, her opponent is a man with whom she agrees on nearly every issue; a man she says she respects and is honored to campaign against. Despite the undisputed stature and dignity of her opponent, Clinton "fights" him with the most divisive and negative methods she can find. Instead of simply convincing the American people that she is the better candidate, she feels compelled to throw every possible negative charge against him and see what sticks.

Now, imagine this "fighter" in the White House, attempting to actually achieve the goals she says she'll fight for: universal health care, bringing troops home from Iraq, etc. If these are the methods she uses to "fight" an honorable opponent with whom she generally agrees, can you imagine what she'll do as president to opponents with whom she disagrees?

If this is the level of negativity we see when she fights a supporter of universal health care who wants us out of Iraq, just try to envision what she'll throw at anyone from any party who actually disagrees with her goal, or her method of accomplishing her goal. If this is how she treats someone with whom she is "honored" to campaign, imagine how she'll behave with someone she thinks is wrong, or evil?

The divisive politics would continue and Main Street Americans would have a government that does not function.

Could She Ever Win The Popular Vote?

The logic behind this seems inescapable to me:

For the record, Senator Obama came out of the Mississippi primary with an advantage of 99,000 votes over Senator Clinton, more than I had predicted based on his edge in Alabama. That puts his margin in the nationwide popular vote -- by a measure that includes Florida but not Michigan -- at more than 500,000.

As I noted yesterday, it will take a colossal victory, almost 60%, for Clinton to get a 200,000 vote edge out of Pennsylvania. And if she does that, there is no plausible scheme under which she could pick up the remaining 300,000 votes to gain even the dubious moral claim of an edge in the popular vote.

Courtesy The American Prospect

The racial stuff is a sign of desperation. The Clintons have to find a way to destroy Obama in the next month or so or his claim on the nomination will be democratically irresistible. Obama needs to chill and fight fairly on. It's his to lose - unless they get into his head, and everyone else's, with the kind of emotional hoopla that Ferraro represents. Eyes on the prize...

Olbermann on Ferraro Uproar

New Poll in Pennsylvania

While a new poll among Pennsylvania voters shows Clinton leading by 18 points, both Obama and her lose to McCain in head-to-head match ups. According to the Strategic Vision (R) poll, which will be released tomorrow, Obama fares better in a contest with McCain.

In the Democratic contest in the Keystone State, Clinton leads Obama outright in Pennsylvania, 56%-38%.

But in hypothetical match ups for the general election...see below...Maybe the party elders and media need to be watching these numbers over the next six weeks as we head into a date with Pennsylvania voters.

If the election for President were held today and the choices were John McCain, the Republican, and Hillary Clinton, the Democrat for whom would you vote?

John McCain 48%
Hillary Clinton 42%
Undecided 10%

If the election for President were held today and the choices were John McCain, the Republican, and Barack Obama, the Democrat for whom would you vote?

John McCain 47%
Barack Obama 44%
Undecided 9%

John McCain's Iraq Problem...

Grim new evidence of our miscalculation:

An exhaustive review of more than 600,000 Iraqi documents that were captured after the 2003 U.S. invasion has found no evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime had any operational links with Osama bin Laden's al Qaida terrorist network.

The Pentagon-sponsored study, scheduled for release later this week, did confirm that Saddam's regime provided some support to other terrorist groups, particularly in the Middle East, U.S. officials told McClatchy. However, his security services were directed primarily against Iraqi exiles, Shiite Muslims, Kurds and others he considered enemies of his regime.

McCain has two problems if he wants to pursue President Bush's policy in Iraq. How is he going to fund the occupation for another 10, 25, 50 years? Second, how is McCain going to bring in more troops into the armed services because as the Pentagon states we cannot maintain the armed services with our current numbers and stay in Iraq...these are bad times for the United States in trying to retain soldiers and recruit them. Will John McCain propose raising taxes and implemeting the draft once in office? Serious questions need "straight talk" from both sides of the political aisle.

The Streets of Los Angeles

Jamiel Shaw was just three doors from his house on March 2. His father told the 17-year-old high school football star to be home before dark. That is exactly what he was trying to do when, just before dusk, gunshots rang out.

Gang members pulled up in a car and asked Shaw if he was in a gang. Shaw didn't have time to tell them "no." He was mowed down before he could answer, police say.

His dad heard the shots from inside his house and immediately called his son's cell phone to warn him to stay away. But within seconds, the father realized what had happened.

"I just ran down there," Jamiel Shaw Sr. told CNN.

His son was wearing the same shirt his dad had pressed for him that morning. "He was laying on the ground and his face was so peaceful. I knew he was dead."

"For three hours, I was just completely blacked out walking."

More than 7,500 miles away, Army Sgt. Anita Shaw was serving her second tour in Iraq. Her commanding officer called her into his office and told her to sit down next to the chaplain. He then informed her that her son had been killed on the streets of Los Angeles.

"I freaked out," she said. "I wanted to run out of the room. I was screaming and kicking. I was shouting, 'No.'"

Anita Shaw is now back in Los Angeles to bury her son. Hundreds of family members and friends are expected to attend the funeral Tuesday for Shaw, a standout running back and sprinter at Los Angeles High School who had good grades and stayed out of trouble despite his rough neighborhood. Among the schools recruiting him was Stanford University.

"He was a Christian and I thank God for that because I know he's in a better place," his mom said, trembling as she sobbed. "He'd just try all the time to do the right thing. He was so good."

Shaw is one of several innocent victims in a horrifying three-week spate of gang-related shootings around Los Angeles. A man was gunned down as he held a 2-year-old baby in his arms. A 13-year-old boy was shot to death last week as he went to pick lemons from a tree. In another incident, a 6-year-old boy was critically wounded when he was shot in the head while riding in the car with his family; two gang members have been arrested in connection with that shooting, according to police.

"I think what is particularly unnerving for all of us is just the random nature of these shootings," Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said last week.

Mississippi takes center stage

Today, Mississippi Democrats "are deciding the last in a series of presidential contests between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton before the two rivals settle in for a six-week battle to win Pennsylvania" the Bilxoi Sun Herald reports.

Turnout is expected to set a record, according to the Clarion Ledger.

"Mississippi is one of those rare Southern states that might be in play in the general election if Obama becomes the nominee. One Dem statistician tells First Read that there are three red states that could swing if African-American turnout was ever maximized (both in registration and in actual turnout): Georgia, Louisiana and, yes, Mississippi. So don't assume this is just one of those untouchable red states for the Dems when watching returns roll in tonight."

Thirty-three delegates are at stake. Polls closed at 7 p.m.

Obama Counters Clinton Veep Talk

Mehlman, Rove boost McCain campaign

John McCain is getting much more than President Bush's endorsement and fundraising help for his campaign. He’s getting Bush's staff. Courtesy Politico

It’s no secret that Steve Schmidt, Bush’s attack dog in the 2004 election, and Mark McKinnon, the president’s media strategist, are performing similar functions for McCain now.

But other big-name Bushies are lining up to boost McCain, too.

Ken Mehlman, who ran Bush’s 2004 campaign, is now serving as an unpaid, outside adviser to the Arizona Republican. Karl Rove, the president’s top political hand since his Texas days, recently gave money to McCain and soon after had a private conversation with the senator. A top McCain adviser said both Mehlman and Rove are now informally advising the campaign. Rove refused to detail his conversation with McCain.

Rove explained that he and McCain “got to know each other during the 2004 campaign.”

Where did the Maverick go I fear this may not help McCain with Independents this fall. This only enhances the slogan, McBush

Obama, Back In The Saddle in Wyoming

“Wyomingites are pretty independent,” Mrs. Dunn said. “We like somebody who speaks like him.”

Obama led rival Sen. Hillary Clinton at 58 percent to 41 percent, with 91 percent of precincts reporting.

The caucus thrust the state, which has only 12 delegates, into the spotlight because the close race between Obama and Clinton means that every delegate counts.

Although Wyoming typically is not a stop for Democrats looking for delegates to clinch the party's presidential nomination, its numbers could make a difference this year because of the delegate deadlock.

With slightly more than 600 delegates left at stake, every remaining contest is crucial to both candidates.