Just when it seemed that the scandal involving Detroit’s embattled mayor, Kwame M. Kilpatrick, who is facing assault and perjury charges, could not not grow any more bizarre, it did.
On Thursday morning a judge ordered that Mr. Kilpatrick, a Democratic superedelegate, be allowed to attend the party’s national convention this month in Denver and be freed from his electronic tether, a second judge overturned the ruling hours later after prosecutors appealed.
August 14th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Marc Ambinder reports that not only is it now likely that Senator Hillary Clinton’s name will be placed in nomination at the Democratic convention but some of the conventional wisdom floating around the Internet and media has proven to be flat-out wrong:
1. In reality, reports of “strife between negotiators for Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama are exaggerated and the two sides are nearing an agreement on how Clinton’s delegates will participate in the formal nominating process at the Democratic National Convention, according to advisers to both Democrats.”
2. Those who saw a Clinton conspiracy to try and push to be nominated were wrong. That includes a lively New York Times columnist named Maureen Dowd. In fact, Clinton herself wasn’t too sure she wanted her name to be placed in nomination.
Although Clinton had resisted pressure from donors, allies and supporters to accept demands to allow her name placed in nomination, she and aides to Obama seemed to realize independently that doing so would be the best way to incorporate and welcome Clinton’s supporters into Obama’s general election campaign, both symbolically and practically.
According to several people who have spoken with her, Clinton originally believed that if her name were included in the roll call on Wednesday, August 27, she would inevitably wind up with fewer delegates than the 1896.5 she earned from the primaries. That would look bad and could demoralize her supporters.
In negotiations this summer with Obama’s campaign, Clinton’s team did not ask for Clinton’s name to be submitted.
So the clamor and demand for Obama to put her name in nomination, and the claims that Obama’s side had been arrogantly insisting her name not be placed in nomination proved as accurate as the assertion that ” just buy an SUV and it’ll save you lots of money on gas!!”
But, Ambinder reports, there was a major Clinton change recently:
But within the past week, Clinton advisers informed the Obama team that many of Clinton’s staunchest supporters felt strongly that something had to be done, and that Clinton had concluded that, in part for the sake of unity, their wishes ought to be respected. They heard back immediately: the Obama campaign had always been open to having her name placed in nomination alongside his.
If Ambinder is to believed — and he rightfully enjoys credibility as a solid reporter –the pressure has come from Clinton’s supporters. So the theory that the Clintons were planning to use the convention spotlight on them to implode the Obama campaign looks more limp every day. In theory, Obama’s delegates could be stampeded away from him and nominate Clinton. But if you believe that, I can sell you THIS for $75.00. (Hurry now, these prices won’t last!)
Moreover, Ambinder reports that Clinton never used her clout with delegates to try to bargain with Obama.
Ambinder’s post is eye-opening because it shows just how easy it is for new and old media to get caught up in the conventional wisdom of the moment and write about what other people are writing about as fact. He offers this:
On August 6, Clinton told donors at a private fundraiser that she thinks “that people want to feel like, O.K., it’s a catharsis, we’re here, we did it, and then everybody get behind Senator Obama. That is what most people believe is the best way to go.”
The reality, he says, is that talks between the two sides have been “as relatively free of acrimony. Obama’s convention managers and his political are acutely aware of the fact that at least 45% percent of delegates were stalwart backers of Sen. Clinton during the primary.”
Currently, the motive for the murder of Arkansas Democratic party chair Bill Gwatney is unknown. (NYT) Gwatney, a supporter of Hillary Clinton and a superdelegate to the Democratic National Convention, was shot in his office at Democratic party headquarters in Little Rock. (NYT) He was rushed to the hospital, but died several hours later.(NYT)
The police said that the gunman was Timothy D. Johnson, 50, of Searcy, Arkansas. (NYT) After going to Democratic headquarters he asked to meet Gwatney. (NYT) After they’d introduced themselves, Johnson shot Gwatney several times. (NYT)
After leaving Democratic headquarters, the suspect was eventually killed in a gun battle with the police:
August 13th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
A new Pew Poll illustrates how the pundit’s conventional wisdom has been now turned on its head: the poll shows the Presidential race essentially tied because Republican Senator John McCain is regaining his party’s base while Democratic Senator Barack Obama is not unifying his party sufficiently.
One continuing strand in many polls and stories now is how some supporters of Senator Hillary Clinton are balking at supporting the Democratic ticket. You can see it in the Pew results. And another bit of bad news for Obama: McCain is making greater strides than the Illinois Senator in convincing Americans that he has leadership qualities.
With less than two weeks to go before the start of the presidential nominating conventions, Barack Obama’s lead over John McCain has disappeared. Pew’s latest survey finds 46% of registered voters saying they favor or lean to the putative Democratic candidate, while 43% back his likely Republican rival. In late June, Obama held a comfortable 48%-to-40% margin over McCain, which narrowed in mid-July to 47% to 42%.
Two factors appear to be at play in shifting voter sentiment. First, McCain is garnering more support from his base - including Republicans and white evangelical Protestants - than he was in June, and he also has steadily gained backing from white working class voters over this period. Secondly and more generally, the Arizona senator has made gains on his leadership image. An even greater percentage of voters than in June now see McCain as the candidate who would use the best judgment in a crisis, and an increasing percentage see him as the candidate who can get things done.
……Conversely, Obama has made little progress in increasing his support among core Democrats since June - currently 83% favor him compared with 87% of Republicans who back McCain. The likely Democratic nominee is still getting relatively modest support from Hillary Clinton’s former supporters: 72% of them support Obama, compared with the 88% support level that McCain receives from backers of his formal GOP rivals. Obama’s strong points with voters are in being seen as the candidate with new ideas and as someone who connects well with ordinary people.
The bottom line is neither party can win if it doesn’t (a) unify itself for the battle to come after Labor Day and on Election Day and (b) get a good chunk of independent voters. McCain continues to show strength among independents — and the Democrats are not unifying sufficiently or quickly enough.
QUESTION: If there were a situation where Clinton’s most dedicated supporters managed to wrest the nomination away from Barack Obama at the convention, do they seriously believe Obama supporters would then vote for Clinton? How could she win with so many Obama people staying home?
And if they sit on their hands in November or vote for McCain, and exit polls show Clinton supporters contributed to an Obama defeat, do they seriously believe Clinton will receive votes from the Obama forces in 2012? Increasingly, they resemble the people who kept the Democrats disunited and out in the national election wilderness for years. Democrats have won in years when they wanted it so bad, they could taste it. Some Democrats can’t taste it.
FOOTNOTE: The latest polls show a race still deadlocked. Rasmussen: McCain 43%, Obama 45%…Gallup Daily Tracking: McCain 42%, Obama 47%.
Throughout the primary season, Senator Hillary Clinton has said time-and-time-again that she is a tough fighter who will not surrender until the very end. In about two weeks, we will see how many rounds she will be prepared to go in order to become the nominee of the Democratic Party.
In my columns, I have been consistent in my opinion that this race between Clinton and presumptive nominee Barack Obama is far from over. To this day Clinton has not ended her campaign, it is still merely suspended so she can raise enough money to retire her campaign debt and can be re-organized quickly dependent on what occurs at the Democratic National Convention in Denver.
The group P.U.M.A. is having their convention in Washington, D.C. this weekend. Last week, Senator Clinton made the following statement “I happen to believe that we will come out stronger if people feel that their voices were heard and their views were respected. I think that is a very big part of how we actually come out unified.” Here is the translation for those of who don’t speak Clintonese. Senator Clinton’s delegates will vote for her on the first ballot. This has been the plan as soon as Obama overwhelmingly won on Super Tuesday and the Potomac primaries, and Clinton supporter Lanny Davis, back on February 18th, just about assured us that Hillary’s campaign would not be over until Denver.
The title line “At my signal, unleash Hell” is from the movie Gladiator. Senator Clinton has a role similar to Russell Crowe’s character of General Maximus, a very popular leader who commands an army of followers who will support Obama only if she gives the signal. What Obama has to wonder is, on whom will she unleash Hell? John McCain has to be secretly-praying that Clinton’s forces stay focused on Obama until November.
Has the ‘undemocratic’ nature of the Democratic primaries stained Barack Obama’s candidacy from the start? According to Juan Maria Alponte, who writes for Mexico’s El Universal, the lack of legitimacy of his nomination victory echoes that of George W. Bush’s general election win in 2000, and the notoriously complicated election of John Quincy Adams in 1824.
“The complexities of an electoral system where the historic contradictions between the popular vote and the vote in the Electoral College are even greater for primary elections, with barriers and counter-barriers to direct voting and the explosive paradoxes of delegates and superdelegates. … The great dilemma lies in an ethical conflict between legality and legitimacy. Without doubt, Al Gore accepted ‘legality,’ Read the rest of this entry »
One of the many places where people are chattering about the possibility of an Obama presidency is in the tiny West African island-nation of Cape Verde.
According to this editorial from the newspaper Liberal, those who expect major change from a Barack White House could be sorely disappointed - but the fact that he has a shot at the White House shows something significant has changed in the United States:
“This may come as a bucket of cold water for the many who today think Obama will be what he objectively cannot be: there will be no disruption in the United States’ establishment. He will obviously have the consent of the Pentagon and Wall Street, both still bursting with the apparent narcissism of George W. Bush, who led the country into the quagmire of war for which there is no plausible solution and to the edge of an abyss of serious economic crisis.”
“It may be said that the candidacy of an African-American for the White House was carefully prepared by the media. What was unthinkable for years (’I have a dream’ said Martin Luther King) became something consciously acceptable by the vast majority of North Americans - ‘Whites’ included - ever since television series began in which the protagonist is a ‘Black’ president. A premonition? Evidently not. The Democratic political machine worked on and prepared the way which has permitted the ‘politically incorrect’ to become the ‘politically correct.’”
Translated By Brandi Miller
EDITORIAL
June 4, 2008
Cape Verde - Liberal - Original Article (Portuguese)
It’s Practically certain. With the already-counted delegates for the Democratic Convention, Obama’s candidacy for President of the United States is nearly official. Obama has already said that he is the inevitable winner of that Convention, and even his great rival Hillary Clinton has already thrown in the towel. She admitted defeat and congratulated Barack Obama.
It may be said that the candidacy of an African-American for the White House was carefully prepared by the media. What was unthinkable for years (“I have a dream” said Martin Luther King) became something consciously acceptable by the vast majority of North Americans - “Whites” included - ever since television series began in which the protagonist is a “Black” president. A premonition? Evidently not. The Democratic political machine worked on and prepared the way which has permitted the “politically incorrect” to become the “politically correct.”
This may come as a bucket of cold water for the many who today think Obama will be what he objectively cannot be: there will be no disruption in the United States’ establishment. He will obviously have the consent of the Pentagon and Wall Street, both still bursting with the apparent narcissism of George W. Bush, who led the country into the quagmire of war for which there is no plausible solution and to the edge of an abyss of serious economic crisis. G. W. Bush confined himself to being a useful tool of the oil cartels, who have never been as fat as they are today; and to the military industry, which has also been enriched by lucrative profits. All in the name of “freedom,” “democracy,” and the jingoism of the moment.
READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, along with continuing translated foreign press coverage of Barack Obama’s victory and the U.S. election.
Have three of the Democratic party’s top leaders named Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Howard Dean decided they’ve had enough and want to make sure that with Democratic Senator Barack Obama now the Democrats’ presumptive Presidential nominee the still-looming — and potentially divisive — campaign of Senator Hillary Clinton is definitively short-circuited once and for all?
It certainly looks that way. There were two big bits of news last night:
1. Obama now has the winning numbers to be the Democratic party’s nominee and his win is symbolic in terms of ethnicity and an epic shift in Democratic party control from the Clintons to a newer group of Democrats.
2. Hillary Clinton’s speech last night that was cheered by supporters but criticized by many as graceless was peppered with continued hints that Obama’s win was not quite legitimate. Clinton had her chance to be a unifier — and passed on it. Which means that if Clinton doesn’t get the nomination, her supporters will feel it was stolen from her.
So now the big news the day after is that amid continued and accelerating indications that the Clinton camp is attempting to pressure Obama to offer her the Veepstakes, Pelosi, Reid and Dean are telling superdelegates to make up their minds by Friday on who they support.
With the final primary concluded barely hours before, top Democratic Party leaders in Washington early this morning ratcheted up the pressure to force all remaining uncommitted superdelegates to make their choice of candidate known by Friday — and thus end the now hopeless, one-time frontrunning campaign of New York Sen. Hillary Clinton.
The joint statement was obviously pre-planned and timed for issue shortly after Clinton refused to concede the presidential nomination’s victory to Barack Obama, who’s gained sufficient delegates to clinch the party’s nomination. Read the rest of this entry »
June 3rd, 2008 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
My doctorate is in the study of group behavior, tribal and ethnic, racial and corporate, amongst others. I wrote protocol for following how groups come apart and come back together again. It’s time-tested these many years later. I witnessed it again when I covered the Libertarian National Convention last week.
There, ‘the coming together after heavy battle’ began to meld like six creeks flowing into one river. This occurred after the only one still standing after it was all over was former Congressman Bob Barr.
But right after he was elected to run for POTUS with a barely squeaked-by majority vote, almost half the 1000+ national delegates still were climbing down from their high hopes regarding at least 6 other candidates besides Barr. The blowback appears to be harder and deeper on candidates and supporters when the race is very close and only one prevails.
It took some time for the adjustment, but most were making it; albeit with certain reservations, or wait and see attitudes. Even those who disliked the candidate, unified ‘as a party’ despite personal ‘druthers.
Bottom line factors for many supporters of defeated candidates so they can and will unify with others:
–Weigh the strength of their root desire to enable some serious change via their party’s platform
–against their wanting to, at the same time, prevent something else from happening that they deem seriously deleterious
The weight of those two, often allows supporters of defeated candidates to now stand behind the one candidate-elect who may have been, a priori, their second choice, or tenth… or not even considered earlier, or only with antipathy
The process of coming together goes something like this
Explosion Out of the Gate Phase
1. Ambition (by supporters to be a part of something significant, momentous, something that will make life better, different, more meaningful to them, to the people at large…)
2. Competition (supporters find the candidate who matches their admiration quotient and/or their common sense quotient, their hopes and dreams or ideas. Once found, they throw themselves behind that candidate; showing up, planning, proselytizing, banking, beginning the push against all other candidates; each supporter in their own way)
3. Opposition (supporters withstand prevailing and opposing winds that deliver blows to their candidate; supporting that the candidate dodge or feint or punch to stay in the race… Thus, in such protective/ nurturing roles, supporters often feel deepening loyalty to the candidate, regardless of any wins/ losses/ setbacks/ progress. This loyalty is not altruistic only; for some it is deeply personal. Supporters often feel a sense of psychic and spiritual duty, as though they are ‘family of soldiers’ composed of their candidate and other supporters. This is deepened when their candidate has been battered about; supporters feel they have ‘been through a lot together…’ and the toiling and turmoil bonds the group)
Neck and Neck Phase
4. Detritions, (supporters note the weakening of many candidates’ running strength, often caused by friction from those candidates’ ideas not being resonant enough with a majority of voters. If it’s their candidate who is weakened, many supporters will try to re-strengthen their efforts, revive their candidate. If it is some other candidate, many supporters will think too bad, or good deal, and go on working for their candidate regardless)
The Associated Press has added up the numbers and has announced that Democratic Senator Barack Obama has now effectively won the 2008 Democratic party Presidential nomination:
Barack Obama has effectively clinched the Democratic presidential nomination, based on an Associated Press tally of convention delegates.
The tally put Obama over the top Tuesday, ahead of the results from the day’s final primaries in Montana and South Dakota. The Illinois senator becomes the first black candidate ever to lead his party into a fall campaign for the White House. Obama outlasted former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton in a historic contest and now faces Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona for the presidency.
Some other news organizations aren’t quite going as far as the AP yet. For instance, here’s what CBS is saying:
On the eve of the final two primaries of a five-month marathon, Sen. Barack Obama stood poised to wrap up the Democratic presidential nomination, while Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton weighed whether to stay in the race in hopes of delaying what appears to be an inevitable outcome.
Obama is optimistic that he will be able to claim victory Tuesday evening at a gathering in St. Paul, Minn., with superdelegates preparing to rally to his candidacy on the eve of the day’s contests in South Dakota and Montana and push him past the threshold of 2,118 delegates needed to clinch the nomination.
Clinton sent mixed signals about her plans throughout the day Monday. As her campaign recalled field staffers to New York, one adviser indicated that she would suspend, but not end, her campaign within days. But the candidate herself said she will continue to argue to the group of party insiders who will hold sway over the final outcome that her strong showing in recent contests demonstrates that she would be the more electable candidate in November.
Some published reports suggest that while superdelegates may start flowing to Obama tonight, some may hold off until tomorrow in deference to Clinton. Look for other news organizations to effectively declare Obama the winner within the next two days if this happens.
For weblog reaction to this story GO HERE.
The long-predicted parade of Democratic party superdelegates to front-runner Senator Barack Obama has now begun — but it’s happening during a period when Obama’s campaign is ending its campaign with a relatively weak finish.
According to MSNBC’s First read, the line of superdelegates who are expected to either push Obama over the top by the end of the weak or very close to it began in earnest today:
Might this be the start of a potential flood. Water is under the door. The towels are down.
Obama’s picked up six in the superdelegate count so far today. He got 3.5 of those between 11:15 a.m. and noon — CA John A. Perez, MA John Olver, and three from Michigan — Congresswoman Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, Debbie Dingell, and Rick Wiener. (Keep in mind, those Michigan delegates count for half.) Dingell’s husband, Rep. John Dingell, is a Clinton endorser.
We reported on 2.5 in First Thoughts — Rep. Jim Clyburn, who came out officially for Obama on TODAY, as well as Michigan superdelegate Joyce Lalonde (half vote) and Missouri’s Maria Chapelle-Nadal.
As far as those Edwards pledged delegates, the remaining two in Iowa will likely announce their choice today…..
But Obama has a big problem: in recent weeks Obama has not been a political bulldozer at the polls but shown noted vulnerabilities (as has Clinton). The Boston Globe notes:
But even as Hillary Clinton sends mixed signals about her willingness to leave the race, Obama, unlike his counterparts in recent presidential cycles, is not exactly sprinting across the finish line.
Over the last three months, the Illinois senator has won six of 14 contests, one less than the seven Clinton has won. (They essentially tied in Texas as she won the primary and he won the caucus.) A loss to Clinton in either primary today would underscore Obama’s relatively weak finish and make his narrow victory over the New York senator slimmer.
“Usually there’s this I-want-to-be-with-the-winner mentality, and you’re not seeing that this time,” said David Johnson, a Republican pollster who heads the firm Strategic Vision.
Obama and his supporters contend that victory is victory, and that the nomination contest has always been a race for delegates. But some analysts say his less-than-overwhelming recent showing signals trouble - or at least hurdles - as he begins a general election campaign against presumptive GOP nominee John McCain.
“To me it indicates he’s weaker than people would hope,” said Harwood McClerking, a political scientist at Ohio State University. “I was surprised that he’s been regularly losing over the last month-and-a-half when people had given him the election.”
But the Globe’s piece also notes that both Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan lost victories at the end of their primary seasons and both went on to win election to the White House.
The are several problems staring Obama — and the Democratic party — in the face:
1. He has shown to be vulnerable at the polls. He still has problems with blue collar workers.
2. He has shown a great weakness among Hispanic voters.
3. The Democratic party remains hideously divided with almost mirror-image accusatory fingers pointing at each respective political camp (”sexist..”….”racist…”).
4. There are continuing signs that Hillary Clinton’s campaign won’t just fold up within a few days but remain in the wings waiting for some event that would cause Obama to self-destruct such as a major gaffe, something unsavory coming out about his background or some new “bombshell” (such continued rumors about a video tape showing his wife talking at their ex-church — but if such a tape surfaced before the Democratic convention many Democrats and the news media would attribute it to being from Clinton op research and it could backfire).
5. The Republicans are making repeated appeals to angry Clinton voters. GOP likely nominee John McCain pointedly praised Hillary Clinton yesterday. And Marc Ambinder reports that the GOP is about to send out a memo painting the Democratic party as a party in chaos with Clinton voters ready to vote for McCain. Ambinder adds that the Obama people are confident they party will unify once the nominee is clear.
Even so, if Clinton had been the nominee there would be another set of problems and other vulnerabilities, since both campaigns have their own coalitions.
The brutal fact: although it is now a political cliche to say “the campaign has strengthened the party and its candidates” in fact the campaign has left both Obama and Clinton far weaker than they were in terms of broad party appeal and national imagery than they were when it started. And Republicans are breathing easier than they did months ago.
It’s all the more reason why the parade of superdelegates who want to shore up the party and get ready for what promises to be a tooth-and-nail battle with the GOP is likely to continue.
Is this all overdosed-on-politics tea leaf reading, or are we now seeing accelerating indications that Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton will soon head for the exit door of the 2008 Democratic Presidential race racetrack?
Speaking to a crowd in Milbank, SD former President Bill Clinton admitted that today could be the last time he has such an active role in presidential politics.
“I want to say also that this may be the last day I’m ever involved in a campaign of this kind. I thought I was out of politics, ’til Hillary decided to run. But it has been, one of the greatest honors of my life to go around and campaign for her for president,” said Clinton as he began his speech.
As Political Radar notes, this kind of talk isn’t typical of Bill Clinton anticipating some kind of master move. Or the never-say-die Bill Clinton.
First, Hillary Clinton announced this morning that she’ll spend Tuesday evening in New York, the city that never sleeps and that she represents in the U.S. Senate. Not in Montana or South Dakota, where people are voting, but New York City.
Second, Bill Clinton told folks in South Dakota this morning that “this may be the last day I’m ever involved in a campaign of this kind. I thought I was out of politics, till Hillary decided to run. But it has been one of the greatest honors of my life to go around and campaign for her for president.”
Third, the folks at Politico report that Mo Elleithee, a Clinton spokesman, tells them that “we just haven’t figured out our schedule past Tuesday,” so many members of the advance team are being sent home.
(UPDATE: A fourth factoid, Tom Edsall reports over on Huffington Post that Clinton has taken the “unusual move” of summoning “top donors and backers to attend her speech.”)
If you take all this together, it certainly sounds as if she is either going to get out totally or stay in the race in a pro forma way.
One observation. A lot of the speculation from angry Obama supporters has been that the Clintons were going to stay in this race to sandbag Obama so he lost and she could pick up the pieces in 2012.
If she gets out soon and truly works for the ticket she’d be in a good position in 2012 if he loses.
And if Obama wins? The once-again-flawed conventional wisdom seems to be that if Obama serves two terms she could be too old. Balderdash…
As Ronald Reagan, John McCain — and HOST of world leaders — have shown, being “too old” when someone is past 60 is usually in the eye of the beholder…and more likely than not that beholder is someone who opposes said person and is looking for an argument to halt a candidacy.
Is Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton now winding down her campaign with the shedding of staff as a key indicator? Or is is this merely a sign that the primary season is over and now she moves it to a new phase — kind of a political guerrilla warfare phase to pick off superdelegates or get ready in case some new rumored bombshell about front runner Senator Barack Obama surfaces?
There are conflicting reports right now: reports that suggest the campaign may be winding down and in its last viable moments and reports suggesting that Clinton is considering battling on no matter what anyone — including some wavering supporters — may wish.
Members of Hillary Clinton’s advance staff received calls and emails this evening from headquarters summoning them to New York City Tuesday night, and telling them their roles on the campaign are ending, two Clinton staffers tell my colleague Amie Parnes.
The advance staffers — most of them now in Puerto Rico, South Dakota, and Montana — are being given the options of going to New York for a final day Tuesday, or going home, the aides said. The move is a sign that the campaign is beginning to shed — at least — some of its staff. The advance staff is responsible for arranging the candidate’s events around the country.
And how did the Clinton campaign respond? This way:
Clinton’s senior aides didn’t respond to requests for comment on her Tuesday night plans.
That usually means a source is trying to find the best way to respond to a report so they can put unhelpful news in a better light, or find a response that would help sandbag the story….or that they hope the reporter will simply go away so the story won’t grow anymore.. If something is false, they usually very respond quickly.
But Clinton isn’t out (yet). She made it clear to reporters on her campaign plan that she intends to go after Obama superdelegates, noting that they could change their minds.
One tidbit of this assertion is the context — it comes amid a pro-Clinton website’s repeated assertions that there is a new video damaging to Obama involving his wife talking at their ex church. And since it was on a website that got lots of hits, the alleged tape became a discussion point on a cable network.
But, even if it proved correct — and reporters will rightfully want to trace the sourcing of this (who got the tape, who leaked it, who was pushing it, what political camps wanted it out there and why…and the timing of the release and why) — 1) it would have to be something hugely earth-shattering to derail Obama’s bandwagon and (2) if the tape could be interpreted in several ways, it may not have the impact Obama foes assumed it would (3) there are some voters who would be so revolted by yet more search-and-destroy 20th century style politics that those touting it would lose their votes come November.
Clinton’s dilemma is that although she won the Puerto Rico primary by a whopping margin yesterday, the impact of that win is minimal in terms of the news media — which is already minimizing the win’s impact on a campaign most feel is all but over.
The DNC rules committee settled some things. Or did it? There’s still an awful lot of heat out there. Here’s our linkfest offering you links to sites of differing viewpoints.
THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY’S PRIMARY PROCESS FLAWED? Thoughts from Glenn Reynolds.
SPEAKING OF FLAWED, CONTROVERSY STILL RAGES AMONG DEMOCRATS REGARDING YESTERDAY’S DECISION OF THE DNC TO GIVE HALF VOTES TO THE FLORIDA AND MICHIGAN DELEGATION: Pro-Clinton blogger Tom Watson thinks the decision on Michigan is a disaster and will hurt Obama.
AND CLINTON’S FRIENDS WHO ADVOCATE A DIVISIVE, POSSIBLY GENERAL ELECTION LOSING CONVENTION FIGHT? Should they be prevented from working in the party again? John Aravosis’ view HERE.
JUST WHY DOES IT NOW APPEAR THAT OBAMA WILL DEFEAT CLINTON?According to one view, it was a matter of long-range planning (Obama) and short-range planning with little long range planning (Clinton).
WHAT DID THE CLINTON CAMPAIGN LOSE YESTERDAY? IS SHE AHEAD IN THE POPULAR VOTE RIGHT NOW? One view..
AND WHY IS CLINTON STAYING IN THE RACE: ABC’s George Stephanopoulos (who has good ties to the Clintons since as Hillary Clinton reminded him on camera, he used to work for them) has an answer…
So are we now close to the endgame in the seemingly-endless Democratic primaries? Or will it go all the way to the Denver convention in August, with supporters on each side of the nearly evenly divided Democratic Party continuing to be increasingly irritated and frustrated with the other side as Republicans watch the spectacle with bigger and bigger smiles?
Yesterday’s decision at the DNC, which gave the Clinton campaign some of what it wanted in terms of Michigan and Florida delegates but not its actual demands, ended up being the decision that many on the DNC reportedly actually wanted.
And now the predictions and questions have started. Will Clinton start to ease her campaign to a close or suspend it this week? Will she withdraw? Will she fight on in Denver? Will Obama make a big victory speech this week if, as expected, he’s within a hair of the nomination or over the top by the end of the week in pledged delegates and more superdelegates come out for him? Or will he make a more modest pitch?
The Telegraph reports that there’s an Obama effort behind the scenes to offer Clinton a “graceful” exit — one that notably avoids asking her to run as Obama’s Veep:
Hillary Clinton will be offered a dignified exit from the presidential race and the prospect of a place in Barack Obama’s cabinet under plans for a “negotiated surrender” of her White House ambitions being drawn up by Senator Obama’s aides.
The former First Lady would get the chance to pilot Mr Obama’s reforms of the American healthcare system if she agrees to clear the path to his nomination as Democratic presidential candidate.
Senior figures in the Obama camp have told Democrat colleagues that the offer to Mrs Clinton of a cabinet post as health secretary or to steer new legislation through the Senate will be a central element of their peace overtures to the New York senator.
Not inviting her to be his running mate is not an oversight:
Make no mistake about it. The decision rendered today by the Democratic National Committee’s rules panel showed that Barack Obama has displaced Hillary Rodham Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, as boss of the party.
…..Losing what they needed today proves that for the first time in 16 years the Clintons are no longer in charge of the Democratic Party. There is a new boss in town.
The Drudge Report has just put up a link to a You Tube of an audio of a fundraiser last month where ex-President Bill Clinton said in private on April 29, 2008 at the Westglow Spa in Blowing Rock, NC that solution is to seat half a delegate for each delegate in the disputed primary states. VIDEO IS BELOW.
Also listen to what Clinton said about Democratic party rules. Apparently the participants had a tape recorder and this was not supposed to be an official public pronouncement.
FOOTNOTE: Nothing official has been announced yet, but The Huffington Post political reporter Sam Stein reports that two sources have told him that a compromise has been reached over Florida that will entail the awarding of half-delegates to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama — but Michigan remains possibly unsolvable and could go all the way to the convention.
In his webchat with readers yesterday, Washington Post Congressional reporter Paul Kane had two juicy political tidbits: (1) undecided superdelegates have actually concluded the race is over and are just waiting for Senator Hillary Clinton to drop out, and (2) supporters of front-runner Senator Barack Obama shouldn’t lose sight of just how narrow a victory (if it occurs) their candidate has over Clinton.
Here are the parts of the chat:
Washington: Looking at the most recent Rasmussen daily polls, I see that Hillary manages a tie today against McCain, but Barack is down by five points to McCain. What piqued my interest was that while Hillary had a “highly unfavorable” rating of 32 percent (i.e., as I see it, people who never will vote for her) Barack was at 35 percent. On Jan. 30, as we entered primary season’s main show, Barack’s “highly unfavorables” were 20 percent and Clinton’s were 35 percent. Is this something superdelegates may be watching?
Paul Kane: I’ve spent the past several months talking to as many super-delegates as any reporter in America, I’d guess, since I cover on a day-to-day basis about 280 of them here on Capitol Hill.
I hate saying this, because all the Clinton people are going to flip out and say, You’re biased, you’re biased, you’re biased. So go ahead and flip out if you want, but the simple basic truth is that the super-delegates stopped paying attention to the Clinton-Obama race about a couple days after the Indiana and North Carolina primaries.
They’ve stopped paying attention to the primary, and instead they’re focused on an Obama-McCain matchup in November. That’s the basic, simple, definitive reality that has happened in this race. The “undecided” super-delegates at this moment are not going to “decide” any time soon, because to them the race is over, they’re just waiting for Clinton to drop out.
AND:
Centreville, Va.: I was surprised and disappointed that The Post did not seem to address the Gallup poll yesterday which seemed to say Hillary Clinton had somewhat of an advantage over Barack Obama in the so-called swing states. The news of that poll was bandied about all day on the political blogs, and I have to say the Obama supporters seemed to be getting the worst of it. (Or is it “worse” with only two candidates in the poll?)
Paul Kane: Again, don’t yell at me because I’m only the messenger here. But the super-delegates have moved on, they’re no longer looking at how Hillary Clinton fares in battleground states against McCain. This is very hard for Clinton supporters to hear, I’m sorry, but the super-delegates are not paying attention to your candidate anymore. These head-to-head matchup polls (Clinton v. McCain, Obama v. McCain) are not having the impact on people’s thinking anymore.
AND then this comment about how Obama supporters should not lose sight of the narrowness of this contest:
Lashing out?: Why? I know that there are many out there who vastly prefer Sen. Clinton to Sen. Obama. I know they think that she’s more qualified and better-equipped to beat John McCain in the general election. I know they think that Clinton has been unfairly treated by the media and that the primary system is all screwed up. I’ve heard all their arguments. And I don’t doubt that they genuinely believe all of these things. My question, though, is this: What realistic outcome are they still holding out for?
Paul Kane: They want their candidate to win. I’m not sure they know how that outcome would occur, but they want Clinton to win, it’s that simple. If Obama was losing this campaign by just as narrow a margin, his supporters would be just as upset. It’s important for Obama supporters to realize just how narrow a victory he appears to have pulled off, rather than running around the country acting like they blew out Clinton. If she had been semi-competitive in the post-Super Tuesday states in February — rather than losing them all 60-40 or worse — it’s highly possible she would be the nominee.
This provides some of the context for today’s big showdown over the Michigan and Florida delegations. If party bigwigs feel they’ve come up with a compromise that is legally sound, they’ll do it. And if superdelegates have all but formally decided the race is over, then maneuvers the Clinton camp does will be fruitless unless there is some huge development or revelation about Obama before the convention.
And, as we’ve noted here before, if some revelation about Obama or someone close to him surfaces on the Drudge Report before the convention, many will correctly or incorrectly attribute the sourcing to the Clinton campaign due to reports about the Clinton campaign’s symbiotic relationship with Drudge.
