Michelle Malkin is horrible

I Think I am Going to Be Sick

If you had any doubt that Fox is a crooked evil right wing talking point generator watch the following:



F*ck You Fox!

Follow up by the voice of reason Keith Olbermann

Youtube: Wealth of Knowledge

Walking on Fire

I have been following this storyline throughout the primaries and was wondering when somebody(anybody) would finally start pointing this out. I think it could be a major issue and might have some minor effect on a few voters at least.

Clinton's past is not through haunting her by Roger Simon

One of Hillary Clinton’s last lines of defense against the onslaught that is Barack Obama is the notion that she has been “vetted” and he has not.

All the bad stuff that can be thrown at her already has been, she argues, and that gives her an advantage over Obama.

As Clinton said this week in a televised Politico/WJLA interview: “One thing you know about me is that I have been vetted. I’ve been through this. I understand exactly what is coming at me, and there isn’t any new information. I mean, it’s just more of the same. It’s been recycled over and over again. I don’t think we can say that about my opponent.”

And, indeed, on Monday, Mark Penn, her chief strategist, released a memo saying that Clinton’s having “withstood the full brunt” of the Republican attack machine is “one of the key arguments for Hillary’s candidacy.”

I think that may be wishful thinking.

First, even if one assumes all the old accusations about Clinton have been put to rest — a dubious point — she keeps raising new questions about herself.

Take the matter of her tax returns. Obama has released his, and Clinton won’t release hers, she says, until after she is the Democratic nominee.

Why? She gives no reason. She says she files an ethics statement with the Senate, which is true, but so does Obama, and yet he also has released his tax returns. Clinton refuses to do so until after the Democratic convention.

Does this make sense to anybody? If she is going to do it eventually, why not do it now, while Democrats are still voting on her?

Keeping the returns secret just raises doubts and suspicions and kicks a hole in the case that she has been fully vetted.

But Obama also suffers from a little wishful thinking in believing that everything in his past has been fully explored and responded to.

“Look, I have been written about, I have been scrubbed, I have been vetted over the last year,” Obama said on “Meet the Press” in December.

But he really hasn’t. Nobody has. And that is because, in presidential politics, you never get “scrubbed.”

Your past is dug up, reshaped and used against you.

Just in case the name no longer rings a bell, Willie Horton was a convicted murderer who was granted 10 weekend furloughs from prison in Massachusetts under the administration of Gov. Michael Dukakis.

The 10th time, Horton fled to Maryland, broke into a home, repeatedly slashed a man with a knife and beat and raped the man’s fiancée. Horton was caught and sentenced to two consecutive life terms plus 85 years.

By the time Dukakis ran for president, he had already been “vetted” and “scrubbed” on the matter of Willie Horton and was sure it could not be used against him. The Lawrence, Mass., Eagle-Tribune had done more than 200 stories about it in 1987. And when Al Gore raised the issue in a New York primary debate against Dukakis, the Democratic crowd booed Gore and applauded Dukakis.

The issue never came up again in the primaries. But it sure came up in the general election, with a new spin. “The Horton case is one of those gut issues that are value issues, particularly in the South,” Lee Atwater, who was George H.W. Bush’s campaign manager, told me at the time. “And if we hammer at these over and over, we are going to win.”

Similarly, John Kerry’s Vietnam War service on a Swift boat had been raised against him for decades, and nobody gave it any credence. But it resurfaced in a new and virulent way when he ran for president.

The point I am making is that in a general election, no candidates get a pass on the past. They only think they do.

If John McCain gets the nomination, we are going to hear that he was turned into a “Manchurian candidate” when he was a prisoner of war. If Obama wins the nomination, we are going to hear a lot more about Tony Rezko and the Exelon Corp. And if Clinton is the nominee, get ready for a reprise of Whitewater and her cattle future trading, to name just two.

In presidential politics, the past is not just prologue. It’s ammunition.

Administration of Lies

This is from an email for Rep. Wexler's office today:

Today, in hearings on Capitol Hill, I confronted Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on her role in the lies, exaggerations, and misdirection that led us into the Iraq war.

During my questioning, Secretary Rice falsely stated that she never saw intelligence casting doubt on the Bush Administration claims that Saddam possessed weapons of mass destruction. This unbelievable statement is flatly contradicted by numerous government reports and CIA testimonials.

Secretary Rice’s responses demonstrate once and for all that we need aggressive oversight over this out of control Administration. Unfortunately, the Bush Administration has ignored the constitutional right of Congress to provide such oversight.

It is time Congress took aggressive action to assert our rights on behalf of the American people.

The House of Representatives must immediately hold former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten in contempt of Congress for their failure to respond to congressional subpoenas.

I have been aggressively lobbying Members of Congress to support a vote on contempt, and I am thrilled to report that Speaker Pelosi told me directly that she agrees it is well past time to vote on contempt. I am anticipating that the House will shortly vote on resolutions of both civil and criminal contempt for both Miers and Bolten.

No one should be immune from accountability and the rule of law.

A New Low

Republicans disrupt Lantos memorial service by John Aravosis


Even the dead are political pawns to the Republicans (then again, we already knew that post-September 11). House Republicans, at the bidding of the Bush White House, are upset that House Democrats are voting on contempt citations for Harriet Miers and Josh Bolton today. So the House GOP members are disrupting proceedings in the House today, calling for "protest votes" and the like that eat up 15 minutes of the day at a time. Well, they just called one such protest vote in the middle of recently-deceased Democratic Congressman Tom Lantos' memorial service, which they certainly knew was taking place. This is akin to forcing people to leave a wake on purpose. The House Republicans and the White House couldn't wait for Lantos' service to be finished before forcing everyone back to the House floor to vote for something silly. They intentionally disrupted a dead man's memorial service for political gain. But as was already noted, the Republicans have been abusing the memory of 3,000 dead for seven years now, so why expect anything new and better from them now.

McCain: Maverick No More

Thanks to Think Progress:
Today, the Senate brought the Intelligence Authorization Bill to the floor, which contained a provision from Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) establishing one interrogation standard across the government. The bill requires the intelligence community to abide by the same standards as articulated in the Army Field Manual and bans waterboarding.

Just hours ago, the Senate voted in favor of the bill, 51-45.

Earlier today, ThinkProgress noted that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), a former prisoner of war, has spoken strongly in favor of implementing the Army Field Manual standard. When confronted today with the decision of whether to stick with his conscience or cave to the right wing, McCain chose to ditch his principles and instead vote to preserve waterboarding:

Mr. McCain, a former prisoner of war, has consistently voiced opposition to waterboarding and other methods that critics say is a form torture. But the Republicans, confident of a White House veto, did not mount the challenge. Mr. McCain voted “no” on Wednesday afternoon.

The New York Times Times notes that “the White House has long said Mr. Bush will veto the bill, saying it ‘would prevent the president from taking the lawful actions necessary to protect Americans from attack in wartime.’”

After Bush vetoes the bill, McCain will again be confronted with a vote to either stand with President Bush or stand against torture. He indicated with his vote today where he will come down on that issue.

John McCain: He was against waterboarding before he was for it.

I personally lost some respect for John McCain today. I at one time fashioned myself a follower and potential voter for McCain but after caving today to right wing conservatives I have ruled that option out. I don't get how someone who opposed torture after being through it himself and speaking out on behalf of banning it...VOTES TO KEEP IT...i am disgusted.

Amen...

Dear Senator Clinton, Please Step Down by Erin Kotecki Vest

This is a very hard letter for me to write, so please bear with me.

I'd like to ask you, with all due respect and humility, to step down as a Democratic candidate for president of the United States.

Please understand this is not because I believe you can not or should not lead this nation. Please understand that I find you qualified, capable, and worthy. Please also understand I want nothing more than to see a female as the leader of the free world. I would be pleased and honored if you were that female.

However I am finding, right or wrong, many citizens of this country seem to react to you on an emotional level. Emotional, not practical. They can't seem to see your record. They can't seem to see your policy. They just hear or read "Hillary" and venom or praise spews.

I thought that with your candidacy, would come reason. I thought that you would be able to get a fair shake by mainstream media, by voters, by sexists, and by soccer moms. I thought over time people would begin to see that you really are an effective politician.

I was wrong.

Tonight, I'm typing as I watch you speak in El Paso, Texas. I'm sad. There really is no other way to put it -- I'm sad.

I truly believed you would be the best person for the job, and I had this nagging thought in the back of my mind that is now at the forefront. The thought that drove me on Super Tuesday to Vote for Senator Obama and the thought that is the driving force as I write tonight: Senator Hillary Clinton divides this country.

It's not fair. It's not right. And under just about ANY other circumstance I would go to the mat for you. However we are a wounded and deeply divided nation. We are a nation at war. We are a nation at odds with each-other. It's ugly. I thought you could get people past it. I really did.

When I told myself it was gender that got people going, I refrained from asking and wanting you to step aside. Simply on principle, I wanted to see you run and win because they said it couldn't be done. Because it was my belief, this was all about being a girl.

It's not, and I was wrong.

I firmly believe while the gender issue has given you a handicap I hope we all one day overcome, it is NOT the reason people have a gut reaction to you or your campaign or your legacy.

Enter the Senator from Illinois, and what I think could be your true legacy. If you were to step aside now, shockingly early and shockingly un-Hillary-like, you could galvanize an entire nation behind your party. If you were to throw your weight, and your tremendous political clout behind Senator Obama you could still change the world and make your mark in a way no one would expect and everyone would admire.

I don't want to see you throw in the towel because the fight is too hard or the mountain too tall. I am asking you to throw it in because history is on the line. It is not the history either of us expected, however it is an equally important, momentous, earthshaking change in this country we sorely need.

Do something no one would ever expect. Do something extraordinary. Do something that changes politics as usual and changes history.

I could have never predicted having to chose between what my husband called "the lesser of two goods, not the lesser of two evils" when it came time to cast my vote.

It was agonizing.

But in the end, with no major policy difference and valid reasons on BOTH sides, I had to go with the candidate who I thought could best bring our nation back together. Who could cross party lines and gender lines and racial lines.

I wanted it to be you, but it's not. For some reason you still get people very riled up, and not in the good way.

There is no way around it-it sucks. But after 7 years of nothing but fighting and head shaking and feeling like we're living in two Americas, I can't do it again. Not even if my team is in office.

I really hate asking you to do this, but I want you to please step down and let this nation heal.

We've been too angry for too long and your history and your name brings a suitcase of anger to the White House front door.

With the full weight of the Clinton name, behind the scenes, your true legacy could be written. With the full weight of the Clinton know-how you could help orchestrate the next chapter in American history where an African-American leads our nation.

It is this time in history your nation needs you.

As nations go, ours has never been one to do things the way we predict. Who could have seen when we finally get our first, legitimate, female front runner we'd see our first, legitimate front runner of color?

Our nation and it's people need you to do what is best for this country. We need you to be true to what you say on the stump and bring us back together.

If you firmly believe that there is still time for you to change the hearts and minds of those rude and stubborn Americans who are voting with their gut when they see "Hillary" on the ballot-then please, prove me wrong. I'll be at the Democratic National Convention come August and I'll hold up my Hillary sign loud and proud and fall in line.

But I think you've tried. You tried with everything you had to overcome that Clinton-emotional reaction. Here we are, moving into Texas and Ohio and Pennsylvania-and it's not you winning over hearts and minds, it's the Senator from Illinois.

Let's end the division in this country now. Right now. Let's start with the Democratic Party early and provide a united front against the GOP months ahead of schedule.

Let's take back this country for the people, with you playing a much different role than you envisioned.

Make history. Make us one. Step down now.

Sincerely,

Erin Kotecki Vest

voter, mother, woman, feminist, writer, dreamer, and Hillary fan

And this little piggy went....

Clinton Spinning Into Twilight Zone by Paul Jenkins

It all started in Iowa: Hillary Clinton was the underdog, her husband told us as the polls were tightening, because she wasn't as well known in the state as John Edwards and Barack Obama. Clinton, one of the most famous women in the world (including Iowa), had an awareness deficit against a failed former vice-presidential candidate and a freshman Senator from a neighboring state. It wasn't her organization, her positions, her character, the campaign told us. It was that people didn't know her. And also that she hadn't REALLY tried in Iowa (as opposed to New Hampshire, where she made sure we realized how hard she had worked). She came in third, but Bill reassured us that she had expected it all along.

No one is asking Clinton or Obama to look gloomy every time they lose a state or to publicly excoriate themselves and their campaign when polls are down. But when facts are so blatantly and verifiably the opposite of what is being said, one enters the Bill O'Reilly zone, and that is a very uninspiring place to be. As with everything else, the Clintons don't know when to stop with the spin, and their campaign's pronouncements now often veer into a bizarre alternate universe that is funny, yet vaguely Stalinist in its denial of the most transparent truth.

Rudy Giuliani, who for months managed to convince the mainstream media that all was well with his one-delegate campaign, and Fred Thompson, who didn't have to work that hard (which he liked) to get billing as Reagan's 21st century heir, are sad amateurs compared to Clinton. Not a day goes by in the thick of this campaign when we don't ask ourselves: do her press people and assorted endorsers really think we're that stupid? Yes, they do, and perhaps we are. Isn't the increasingly noisy drumbeat about the warped primary system coming from the Clinton campaign finding its way hourly into hundreds of blogs, articles and broadcasts? And aren't there only occasional, and remarkably mild, qualifiers about how recent the Clintons' conversion is to a "fair" primary system?

Immediately after Iowa, the Clinton campaign questioned the validity of the state's caucuses in stark terms (this was a short-term, possibly desperate tactic, considering the importance of the swing state in November as well as in January). This was quite a jolt, as the Clinton crowd never complained about caucuses (and certainly not about Iowa) until she started losing every single one of them.

Nor, of course, did Clinton disavow the Democratic National Committee for its stance on Florida and Michigan until she desperately needed the delegates from those "contests," where she was essentially unopposed after the DNC deemed them illegitimate. Then, she said, those states' voters were being disenfranchised, a particularly explosive claim in Florida. Surely Clinton knows that it is impossible that the January votes in those states will be counted, and either she is looking for sympathy (no matter how instrumental she was in depriving the two states of their delegates) or she is looking for a scandal that will make the Supreme Court's 2000 presidential election decision in favor of George W. Bush look fair and balanced.

Nor did Clinton snub her nose at the proportional representation rules in the Democratic primaries and caucuses until she won the bigger states by relatively small margins and lost all others by landslides. The race would have been over, Clinton campaign pollster Mark Penn said, had the primary been a winner-take-all system (not only is this inaccurate, true to form, but it is also a mystery how a GOP-style system would have made the contest more democratic). We were also told that this whole delegate thing was terribly unfair, as Clinton was winning the "popular vote;" that was barely true on Super Tuesday (48.7% to 48.4%), but five days later, that too, proved wrong when four states overwhelmingly voted for Obama (in caucuses and, yes, primaries). Given the twisted and blindingly diverse ways of counting votes, it's hard to judge who is winning the popular vote, but if Clinton was ahead by so little on Tuesday by that measure, it's fair to say she is now behind.

The spinning absurdity reached a paroxysm (at least so far) as Super Tuesday results started pouring in. Georgia, which Obama won by 36%, was irrelevant, the Clinton operation told us, because she hadn't campaigned there and Obama had a "consistently [...] wide poll lead" in the state. Left unsaid was the fact that both Clintons were in Georgia days before the primary and that Clinton was well ahead in the state just weeks before the February 5 contest.

It seemed like it couldn't get any worse, but then her campaign claimed that Clinton's Oklahoma win (the first of the evening for her) was important because it was the only state so far where both candidates had "competed fiercely." Oklahoma, as it happened, was the one state in which Obama had not campaigned (he was last there in March 2007, it seems), and one in which polling had showed he was consistently behind by 20 or 30%. The breathtaking inanity of the statement undermined anything else Clinton achieved that night, starting with her strong wins in Massachusetts and California (and no, Obama wasn't expected to win those, but he was expected to do better than lose by double digits).

The Clinton spin finally spiralled out of control that night when her campaign claimed Missouri, an "important swing state," presumably demonstrating her ability to carry such states. Sadly for her, it turned out to be a loss, presumably demonstrating that Obama can carry, well, "important swing states."

There is a stark contrast between the two campaigns in setting expectations and spinning results. The Obama crew, buoyed by huge crowds and infectious enthusiasm, is not good at dampening excited anticipation, but it also doesn't patronize us after the fact. Conversely, the Clinton campaign and its supporters have been much better at managing prospects, albeit with some misfires. One foolish Clinton blogger thought he'd set the bar really high on February 9 by publishing outlandish predictions for an Obama win, until the predictions were exceeded in every single one of the states. And who can forget Clinton campaign manager Terry McAuliffe's post-Iowa statement that "this thing will be over by February 5?" Perhaps he was implying that it would be over in favor of Obama, a case of really lowering expectations for his candidate? In which case, that must mean the momentum is with Hillary, as she has now managed to pull even with Obama-The-Frontrunner!

It is in defeat that the Clinton PR fails, sounding awkwardly bitter and blaming everything from the caucus system to sexism, to open primaries, to independents, to black women, to white men, to red states, to young people, to educated people, to rich people for their loss. This was silly after Iowa, and is plainly ridiculous now: at one point or another in his 19-state winning romp, Obama has prevailed in primaries and caucuses; among white men and white women; states in the South, Northeast, Midwest and West; rural states, urban states and suburbs; college kids and working class retirees. It has been a remarkably encompassing and national success so far for Obama, the Clintons' race-baiting jabs notwithstanding (Jesse Jackson won in South Carolina too, Bill helpfully emphasized).

The Clinton operation's dismissive attitude towards the states that she loses ("didn't campaign there," "caucus!") feels uncomfortably like a post-facto snub by the aggrieved party in a break up ("she's not really my type anyway;" "he snores SO loudly;" "did I tell you I cheated on him once?").

Even the campaign finance rules, under attack by Bill just a few weeks ago, are now the Clinton campaign's new best friend, as the couple are suddenly grateful to be able to pump (ie, loan) millions of their, ahem, hard-earned post-presidency cash into a suddenly impoverished enterprise. We may not need their unreleased tax statements after all: it should be clear soon enough exactly how much money they have made in the past eight years when they spend it on advertising in Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania.

It's a great idea to challenge the primary and general election systems, which are dreadfully undemocratic. But why now? Hillary and Bill Clinton have been running for the presidency for nearly 20 years, and are aware of the rules, have agreed to them, fully endorsed them, were instrumental in creating them, and thrived on them until last month. That they want to upend the process this very minute is a powerful statement about their lack of faith in her ability to win.

I Think the Media and Public is Catching On

I hope we continue to see this trend and I hope the media and Obama focus more on this: Clinton cannot defeat McCain because of Independents


Obama Bests Clinton Against McCain

(CNN) — It's a question both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have raised since John McCain's initial surge in the polls: Which Democrat can best take on the Arizona senator in a general election match-up?

A new Time magazine polls seems to suggest the answer is Obama.

The poll, conducted over the three days leading up to Super Tuesday, shows Obama beating McCain by 7 points, 48 percent to 41 percent. Clinton ties McCain at 46 percent.

The difference between the two candidates, according to Time, is where the Independent vote goes: The poll indicates a larger share of those voters will chose to support McCain over Clinton than McCain over Obama.

Exit polls taken from the early primary contests have indicated that both McCain and Obama have strongly benefited from the support of Independents. In combined surveys of the 22 states that voted on Super Tuesday, Obama beat Clinton among Independents by roughly 20 points. McCain, meanwhile, beat rival Mitt Romney among Independents by nearly 15 points on Super Tuesday.

Responding to the poll's findings, Clinton Communications Director Howard Wolfson touted the New York senator's vast differences with McCain on a host of issues, and pointed to a recent CNN poll that showed Clinton beating McCain by 3 points. Though that same poll found Obama beating McCain by eight points.

CNN's Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider says the biggest difference between Obama and Clinton is their support from male voters. In the CNN poll, Obama and McCain were nearly tied among male voters, but the polls shows men breaking for McCain over Clinton by nearly 20 points.

"Obama argues that he can reach across party lines," Schneider said. "And he does do a little better than Clinton with Independents and Republicans. But the big difference is that Clinton doesn't draw very well with men. Obama does."

– CNN Producer Alexander Mooney

Anyone see a Pattern?

Well the folks over at Fox News are at it again, they find someone they don't agree with and "accidently" the magical little 'D' shows up next to there name...

Sign of Intelligence from Some Dems...

Obama Stronger Candidate Than Clinton Against McCain
It is risky predicting what will happen months before an election but at this time I believe that the next president will be either Barack Obama or John McCain. In other words it comes down to what the Democrats do. Nominate Obama and they have a fighting chance of winning. Nominate Clinton and it’s all over. One way or another the Bush/Clinton dynasty ends this January.

A poll from Time still leaves some hope for the Democrats to win with Clinton, but the odds are sure a lot better with Obama. Here are the two match ups.

Obama 48%, McCain 41%
Clinton 46%, McCain 46%
Independents account for the different results:

The difference, says Mark Schulman, CEO of Abt SRBI, which conducted the poll for TIME, is that “independents tilt toward McCain when he is matched up against Clinton But they tilt toward Obama when he is matched up against the Illinois Senator.” Independents, added Schulman, “are a key battleground.”

Besides the loss of the independents, a match up against McCain will be very difficult for Clinton. Some of her success in the Democratic primaries has been based upon the myth that she has meaningful experience. This won’t do her any good in a campaign against McCain. With Clinton as the candidate, the Democrats also lose the advantage of having a consistent anti-war candidate. McCain will come off as the straight talker compared to a candidate such as Clinton who has already been exposed for taking considerable liberties with the truth. While McCain has admitted to little knowledge of economics, the alternative with Clinton is actually worse. A little knowledge as Clinton has in the hands of a big government junkie like Clinton is a dangerous thing. Her economic proposals do not stand up to close scrutiny, such as with the many flaws in her plan to deal with the mortgage crisis. If Clinton goes into the race with only a tie against McCain, her chances of maintaining it are poor.

Written by Ron Chusid

Hillary's New Problem

When I first heard that Hillary had loaned her own campaign $5 million I thought, where did she get $5 million. What made me even more curious was she said it wasn't Bill's money. Very troubling for someone that has been serving the people for 35 years, which we all know doesn't pay well. Marc Cooper had an interesting article on the subject.


Hillary's $5 Million Dump Truck by Marc Cooper

Now that's what one might call a heckuva coincidence. A handful of weeks ago, Bill Clinton disentangles his investment partnership with billionaire Ron Burkle, producing an estimated $20 million windfall. And now we learn that the suddenly flush Clintons are loaning Hillary's campaign $5 million from their joint assets to bridge it through a funding rough patch.

Talk about windfalls. This is a veritable bonanza not only for enterprising reporters and snoopy researchers, but also for any Republican candidate that could potentially face Hillary in November -- if she wins the nomination. That is, if she doesn't first drown in a sea of sleaze of her own making.

This newest episode in the Clinton finances opens up a field of questions that could make Whitewater and Hillary's long-forgotten but near-magical touch in commodity trading look like kid's stuff. And with a lot of time to kill between now and November, there's going to plenty of opportunity to rake through it all. Make that, parse through it, as it is the Clintons we're talking about.

It puts front and center the question of just how rich are the Clintons, and how did they get so rich? Current estimates of their joint wealth range from $10 million up to $50 million or more, a long way to come from when they first got married and they struggled to make the $14,000 mortgage on their first modest Arkansas home.

Quite a nice pay-off for a supposed career of 35 years, as Hillary repeats every day, "working to bring positive change to people's lives." While Clinton touts her decision to come out of law school and work not for Wall Street but rather for the Children's Defense Fund, the truth is that she spent only a year there. (And then omitted her mentor Marian Wright Edelman from among the 400 others she mentions in the acknowledgemets of her autobiography because Edelman had broken with her when Bill Clinton abolished the federal welfare saftey net in 1996).

For half of her professional career Clinton really worked not at all for The Little People, but rather for Arkansas'most elite business-connected law firm, representing big corporations and serving on their boards.

In fairness, though, the bulk of the money earned by the Clintons has been acquired since Big Dawg left office and started socking away huge book, speaker and, um, consulting fees. Indeed, their entire fortune has been made since leaving the White House. Renting out the Lincoln Bedroom was but a Ma and Pa operation compared to what came in its wake.

Let's be very clear about this. We're not just talking about Bill cashing in by smoking some cigars and telling some good stories to a bunch of banquet goers. It also means such smelly deals as him serving as an "advisor" to Dubai, when he coached their government on how to swing a port deal with the U.S. (that failed). That's after the oil sheiks shelled out $300,000 in 2002 to have Bill address one of their summits (There was also a direct link between Dubai and the investment fund with which Burkle and Clinton were partnered).

Then there was that revoltingly sleazy little deal revealed by The New York Times in which the former president served as a broker/fixer between a Canadian mining entrepreneur and the dictator of Kazakhstan, greasing through a multi-billion dollar uranium deal. Mr. Clinton's fee? A previously undisclosed "donation" of more than $30 million to his charitable Clinton Foundation from the grateful Canadian capitalist.

A honcho at a Canadian bank specialized in mining said the deal was a result of a "fantastic network" with Bill Clinton at its top.

None of this illegal, we think. And the money given to Clinton's foundation is not supposed to be the same personal funding that was used as a bridge loan to Hillary's campaign. And there's nothing against the law about a former president serving as a high-end errand boy for Arab Sheiks. Nor is it illegitimate to make a stack of dough fronting for dictators, pushing ghost-written books, or serving as hired jester for private corporate banquets. Except with the Clintons, of course, there's always the slippery questions of definition. Whose money is whose? Where does Bill's end and Hillary's begin? What's the line between personal funding and political funding? Charitable versus political donations?

One might also argue that what Bill does is not necessarily what Hillary does. Except that Hillary has based her entire campaign on being a faithful offshoot of his legacy.

What we know for certain is this: When Barack Obama said yesterday that we can expect Republicans to find a "whole dump truck" of dirt on Hillary, he knew what he was talking about. She just pumped $5 million worth of fuel into its tank.

Billary...odd indeed

Apparently Im Not Alone in my Thinking

Obama Likely to Defeat McCain. McCain Likely to Defeat Clinton. by Miles Mogulescu

Picture this: It's January 20, 2009 and John McCain is being sworn in as president, promising in his inaugural address to make the Bush tax cuts permanent and keep American troops in Iraq for 100 years. If you're a Democratic voter on Super Tuesday, you must vote for the candidate who makes this scenario least likely. That candidate is clearly Barack Obama.

Sunday's Washington Post/ABC poll shows Obama defeating McCain 49%-46% while McCain beats Clinton 49%-46%. Sunday's Cook Political Report/RT Strategies poll shows Obama defeating McCain 45%-43% and McCain defeating Clinton 45%-41%. Both polls give Obama a 6 point advantage over Clinton in a match-up with McCain.

These most recent polls are consistent with numerous polls taken over the past year, most, but not all, of which show McCain defeating Clinton. A January 10-12 Financial Dynamics poll shows McCain defeating Clinton 48%-45% and Obama defeating McCain 43%-42%. A December 12-14 Zogby Poll shows McCain defeating Clinton 49%-42% and Obama defeating McCain 47%-43%, a 10 point advantage for Obama over Clinton.

If you're not a big believer in polls, let's look at some more practical factors. John McCain is unpopular and distrusted by a substantial portion of the conservative Republican base. Rightly or wrongly, that base hates Hillary Clinton with a passion. The only thing that can unite the Republican party around John McCain and guarantee a massive Republican turnout is the desire to keep Hillary Clinton out of the White House. Barack Obama does not generate the same kind of negative passions among Republicans -- many of them who do not much like McCain would likely stay home in November if Obama is the Democratic candidate, and some would even vote for Obama.

Moreover, neither the Democrats nor Republicans have a majority of registered voters. To win the presidency, a candidate must garner a large number of independents. Both Barack Obama and John McCain have shown a far better ability to attract independents than has Hillary Clinton. In a Clinton/McCain match-up, McCain is likely to pick-up the majority of independents. Obama has the ability to attract large numbers of independents, and even some disaffected Republicans.

Frank Luntz, one of the top Republican strategists and the author of the Contract With America, said on Bill Maher Friday night that he does not know how to come up with a Republican strategy to defeat Barack Obama.

Finally, a completely anecdotal piece of evidence: My brother-in-law, a lifetime Massachusetts Democrat, told me on the phone Sunday that if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee, he will vote for John McCain. I promised him that if Hillary is nominated, we'll be having another discussion on the subject before November and I hoped, in that event, I would be able to change his mind. Still, I don't think my brother-in-law is unique in his thinking.

So, as you ponder your vote on Super Tuesday, even if you truly believe that Hillary Clinton would make a somewhat better president than Barack Obama, it's still vital that you vote for Obama to guarantee that the next president will not be John McCain.

So Today Is a Big Day...A Super Day

Well we have been waiting for this day for a long long time. If you love politics as much as I do, today is like Christmas. I am so pumped and excited to see how people react, how the media will portray the results. Ultimately we might find out if the Democratic Party will shoot themselves in the foot AGAIN!

I say this because its all but certain that John McCain will be the Republican nominee. I admire the man tremendously and actually agree with him on many items, definitely not Iraq, but many other issues. Now back to the foot shooting. We must look at who likes McCain and who votes for him. He gets moderate republicans and independents. Two very powerful groups, plus add he will get the conservative voters by default even though they despise him as the lesser of two evils, there numbers might be down a little but consider the alternatives.

IF democrats push for Clinton I have very few reservations that come November there will be a republican in the White House again. Clinton is a decisive person with great political qualities, but she is also damaged goods as everyone in the world knows her. She has a ceiling of support. She attracts democrats and nobody else. Hell even inside the party there is some strong anti-Clinton votes. She does not attract independents. The simple math says that she cannot mathematical win with only democrats.

Some secondary consideration. A lot of the voter turnout this year has been youth vote and first time voters. They overwhelming go towards Obama which is a great thing for our democracy. Yet if his movement is broken I don't see these new voters coming out in November for Clinton...they will feel like the lost, it would be the individual vs. THE MAN fight where the individual always get screwed. Many may just stay home and say they gave politics a shot, and they got it shoved right back in there face.

Also we must consider the two candidates and what they mean to the future. Obama is actually increasing the size of the Democrats pie. Hillary is dividing up the same old pie. If they want to build life long members and a long term majority they must increase the size of the party, because come November no more Bush to drive people to them.

So please I beg of you, vote today with a vision for the long term future of the Democratic Party in mind, because we all know what happens when a Clinton is out front...feasting time for the Republicans.

Yes We Can!

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A Funny Comparison

Obama's a Mac, Clinton's a PC by Doug Kendall

With John Edwards out of the race, Democratic voters must squarely confront a choice this election season every bit as stark as that facing millions of Americans each year as they replace their outdated computers: Mac or PC.

We have all seen the ads, we know the right thing to do is to buy a Macintosh, but we hesitate. Will I be able to open all my PC files? Will it be able to run Outlook? Am I really going to make those photo albums and movies anyway? Am I cool enough for a Mac?
Obama, like the Mac, seems almost too good to be true. He's young, hip, inspiring, and promising to do for Democrats what Ronald Reagan did for Republicans, assemble and maintain the working majority in Washington desperately needed to enact changes in foreign policy, health care and energy security. And in soaring moments at the podium -- at the Democratic Convention in 2004, in Iowa at the Jefferson/Jackson dinner, at Ebenezer Baptist over the Martin Luther King holiday weekend -- Obama appears ready and able to make good on these grand promises.
But Democrats are still deeply divided. Having been in the political wilderness for much of the last 30 years, we are, understandably, a risk adverse bunch. We cling to Hillary like that old-reliable PC that we keep on our desks. We respond to her message: she's tested, able to handle every dirty trick Republicans will throw at her, ready on day one.
All true, but there's also the darker side of the story. As the hipster in the Mac commercial loves to point out, a PC isn't actually all that reliable: reboot, reboot. We all experienced the rollercoaster ride that was the eight years of Bill Clinton's presidency: we should be confident in voting for Hillary only to expect the unexpected. And PC owners just try to forget about the whole "blue screen of death," melted hard drive thing, just like Democrats put Monica, impeachment and disbarment as far from their minds as possible as they contemplate pulling another voting lever for a presidential candidate named Clinton.
Still, what if the alternative is worse? We think we know what we'll get with Hillary -- more of that '90s show -- and right now that doesn't seem bad. Plus no one is better at bare knuckles politics than the Clintons, and that may still be required to win the White House. What if Obama loses a foreign policy fight with John McCain, then where will we be. What if he can't navigate the slings and arrows of Washington, and ends up slinking back to Chicago in 2013 the way Jimmy Carter slunk back to Plains in 1981. No Democrat can afford that.
But we can't afford another four years of Washington infighting where nothing gets done either. For me, Macintosh sealed the deal last week when they introduced that new paper-thin, feather-light laptop. After clunking around my 10 pound, 2 inch-thick Windows job for the last 8 years, enough is enough. Perhaps for Democrats, seeing Obama trounce Clinton in South Carolina -- after taking everything the Clintons' could throw his way -- will have a similar effect.