Eighty percent of success is showing up. - Woody Allen
Living in the State capitol I was able to mosey on by a meeting of Legislators and party activists charged with revising the 2006 Texas Democratic Party Platform. Among those present were a former State Speaker of the House and other former Committee Chairmen.
Since my special interest is reform of campaigns and elections I raised my hand to be on a committee of 5 to revise the section of the platform focused on “Protecting Democracy” The text of that section is below.
I invite your comments with the rare assurance that they will be heard by people who can actually do something about it. However what ends up in the final draft will be decided by consensus and a vote of Statewide Delegates.
I will have posts on our progress and a near final draft of recommendations.
Reflecting some more on James Woodard, the man profiled last night on 60 Minutes who was released last week after serving 27 years and four months, the longest of any inmate in the nation to be cleared with the help of DNA…
The last time I quoted Mount Holyoke College criminology professor Richard Moran about malicious prosecution was when I was all fired up about Kennedy Brewer, the Mississippi man freed from Death Row after 15 years. The DNA showed that Brewer didn’t murder his girlfriend but he was still held in jail several additional years as prosecutors decided whether to retry him.
My recently completed study of the 124 exonerations of death row inmates in America from 1973 to 2007 indicated that 80, or about two-thirds, of their so-called wrongful convictions resulted not from good-faith mistakes or errors but from intentional, willful, malicious prosecutions by criminal justice personnel. (There were four cases in which a determination could not be made one way or another.)
Yet too often this behavior is not singled out and identified for what it is. When a prosecutor puts a witness on the stand whom he knows to be lying, or fails to turn over evidence favorable to the defense, or when a police officer manufactures or destroys evidence to further the likelihood of a conviction, then it is deceptive to term these conscious violations of the law — all of which I found in my research — as merely mistakes or errors.
Mistakes are good-faith errors — like taking the wrong exit off the highway, or dialing the wrong telephone number. There is no malice behind them. However, when officers of the court conspire to convict a defendant of first-degree murder and send him to death row, they are doing much more than making an innocent mistake or error. They are breaking the law.
It’s time we do something about it!In Dallas they’re doing something about it!
“We have a responsibility to go back and right the wrongs of the past and free the innocent,” [Dallas County District Attorney Craig] Watkins tells Pelley.
“You know, some people say that you’re wasting time and money that you’re looking back at these old cases when you’re sitting in the middle of the city that has the highest crime rate in the nation,” Pelley remarks.
“You know, I disagree with that,” Watkins says. “The job of the district attorney is to seek justice. And when justice has failed, then we have to fix it.”
James Woodard spent 27 years in prison for a crime that he did not commit. He was released last week as a result of DNA evidence gathered through an unprecedented cooperative effort between Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins, a Democrat and the first black DA in the history of Texas, and the Texas Innocence Project.
Together they re-examined hundreds of cases and have freed 17 Texas inmates so far — their effort still has 250 more cases to review. Last year NPR’s Morning Edition profiled DA Watkins. Last night 60 Minutes did a segment on the DA and the Innocence Project that featured the story of James Woodard. Convicted in the 1981 murder of his girlfriend, Woodard served 27 years and four months, the longest of any inmate in the nation to be cleared with the help of DNA.
Woodard had always maintained his innocence, he says, including every one of the 12 times he came up for parole:
“They always told me, as long as you deny your guilt its saying something about you, you know you are not willing to own up to your deed. And we gonna deny you,” Woodard says.
But Woodard refused to admit guilt. “I wasn’t guilty,” he says.
“You chose truth over freedom,” Pelley remarks.
“I mean, a man has to stand for something,” Woodard says.
Jeralyn at Talk Left called it “one of the most moving segments ‘60 Minutes’ has ever done” and points to a summit on the wrongfully convicted in the Texas Senate on May 8.
A Georgia resident, I am reminded of the case of convicted “cop killer” Troy Anthony Davis who sits on death row here despite the recantations of seven witnesses who testified against him, despite the fact that no murder weapon was ever found and no physical evidence linked him to the crime, and despite the fact that he has maintained his innocence throughout.
RELATED: 60 Minutes was at the top of its game last night. Crooks & Liars and Think Progress both applaud the What Really Happened to Pat Tillman? segment. Said Pat’s mother Mary Tillman, “this isn’t about us. It’s about what they’ve done to the public. This was a public deception.”
Have Democrats - and Europeans - become too comfortable with the inevitability of a Democratic President in 2008? Financial Times Deutschland columnist Thomas Klau writes in part, ‘The dramatic struggle between two exceptional Democratic politicians has drawn attention away from the fact that McCain’s candidacy is also a turning point - a break in the position of Republicans which, as far as party politics is concerned, could mean a historically and culturally deeper break than the Democratic Party’s nomination duel. … The reproach so often repeated by Obama - that McCain offers only a sequel of the failed politics of George W. Bush - misses the point: McCain has contradicted Bush’s policies so often, that no one can embody calls for change the way he does.’
By Thomas Klau
Translated by Julian Jacob
March 6, 2008
Germany - Financial Times Deutschland - Original Article (German)
The saga goes on - the epochal battle for the Democratic Presidential nomination. Once again, the voters have resisted the pressure of the media, which was so quick to choose a favorite candidate.
In the U.S., people love quick results and clear statistics and a fast declaration of winners and losers. But Americans also appreciate the courage of those who don’t give up. Hillary Clinton has fought on after being written off and has gone on the attack when many were urging her to clear the field for Barack Obama. On Tuesday [Mar. 4] , the voters didn’t abandon her.
The senator’s tenacity and her steadfastness in times of great stress could be her best argument, if in Denver in July it comes down to drawing party delegates to her side. Clinton will need arguments because despite her victory yesterday, the numbers continue to speak against her. In terms of the number of delegates, Obama is out in front and will be almost impossible to catch - the arithmetic and dynamics of the approaching primary dates work in his advantage.
Now the battle for the Democratic nomination will become harder and perhaps dirtier. Clinton’s revitalized election team will make every effort to keep the Illinois senator on the defensive. Obama’s squeaky-clean image will suffer if for the first time, the press keeps its klieg lights on the senator’s more problematic contacts. It is here that he is vulnerable to attack. He’s member of a Black church congregation in Chicago, the leader of which has maintained contacts with Black racists. And the corruption trial against a former Obama supporter, building contractor Tony Rezko, is imminent.
DEEP-SEATED PARTY CRISES
With the withdrawal of Mike Huckabee, the Republican primary battle has ended with the formal selection of John McCain. The dramatic struggle between two exceptional Democratic politicians has drawn attention away from the fact that McCain’s candidacy is also a turning point - a break in the position of Republicans which, as far as party politics is concerned, could mean a historically and culturally deeper break than the Democratic Party’s nomination duel.
Politically, Clinton and Obama are conventional Democrats, located in the middle-left of their own party. But McCain is the first Republican presidential candidate in many years who has ascended in spite of the resistance of the culture warriors - that aggressive nationalistic wing of the Party. Unlike the leading figures of the present U.S. government, his TV is not tuned to Fox News - the propaganda channel of the right - but MSNBC - and anyone who knows the United States understand how much that says.
READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, along with continuing translated foreign press coverage of the U.S. elections
March 10th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton’s efforts to reunite the Democratic Party — and get the votes of some independent voters — could become tougher than ever with news that former President Bill Clinton appeared on conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh’s show…on the day of the Texas primary.
If the story catches on, it will likely strike a decidedly sour note with many Democrats — and adds to the increasing instances in this campaign that anything will be done to get votes.
Why? Because Limbaugh is considered the quintessential demonizer of Democrats by Democrats and this means the former President was trying to help the conservative talk show host’s efforts to get Republicans to cross over in the Texas primary to vote for Hillary Clinton.
There is an irony here since Bill Clinton helped Limbaugh become quite a wealthy man over the years. But here it seems to be “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
The “crime” is made worse by the fact that the avowed purpose of Limbaugh and those talkers who joined him in this effort to get GOP crossovers was to a) throw a monkey wrench into Obama’s string of victories and break his momentum b) help force the Democratic battle for the nomination to go on longer and become more bitter in order to weaken the Democrats and help Republican chances c) get Senator Clinton as candidate because some Republicans perceived her as the weaker candidate.
Even worse: the Clinton’s have not been easily accessible to some PROGRESSIVE talk show hosts such as Ed Schultz.
But it turns out as if there apparently was a mutual overlap of interests here — the desire of Limbaugh, his fill-in host that day and other conservatives to influence the race and the former President to do whatever it took to get every single vote for Hillary Clinton, even if it meant crossover votes from Republicans who wanted to weaken the Democrats. Crossover, schmossover, weaken Obama, schmeaken Obama — as long as it’s a vote for Hillary…
It’s an almost mind-boggling development — and one that could undercut the Clinton’s credibility among many Democrats. Some blog reaction:
You may have missed it - almost everyone missed it - but Bill Clinton was on Rush Limbaugh’s show the day of the Texas primary. You can hear the radio here. Limbaugh himself was sick that day, apparently, but he had already urged Republicans to cross over to keep Hillary Clinton in the race. Bill saw an opening - and went there.
Now just wrap your mind around this: the Clintons were happy to support a cynical, partisan Republican campaign to wound the Democratic front-runner, and they were brazen enough to go on the Limbaugh show to do so.
There also seems little doubt that Republican mischief played a real role in affecting the results. And they call Obama’s call for them to release their tax returns a tactic worthy of Ken Starr. I repeat: the chutzpah and the cynicism just leave you speechless. And as you find it impossible to do much but splutter, the Clintons plow on with new self-serving lies.
–TPM Cafe has a MUST READ HERE with Limbaugh’s campaign to get Republicans to cross over and vote for Hillary Clinton. Read it all. TPM notes:
Rush was saying the day before that he felt a “flu” coming on, and then Tuesday he was “sick” and had the substitute host, and then Wednesday he was back to crow about his achievement in getting Hillary elected.
Folks, this is an ex-President! That is absolutely nuts! But he apparently wanted to get all those ditto heads to come vote for Hillary so she could stay in the race….
And to think she made an issue of Obama’s mention of Ronald Reagan, as if he were some Republican in Democrat’s clothing. The “do and say anything” crew strikes again.
Oh that is so unfair the Clintons are just dedicated Americans trying to get back the White House at any cost to save us from ourselves to show how much George Bush has taught them to get around the “no third term” rule to help small children and little old people out while keeping our defenses strong and changing our economy back into a bubble.
–Comments from Left Field recounts the infamous “mistake” Limbaugh made on his now defunct TV show when he showed a photo of then first-daughter Chelsea Clinton when mentioning a dog. He writes:
Interestingly, the Clinton campaign has engaged in the most unusual tactic of embracing the right in order to wrestle from Obama a nomination that would seem to be his based upon math alone. One thing that seems to have escaped scrutiny up until now is that years after Rush Limbaugh called Bill Clinton’s daughter a dog, the former president was actually a guest on Limbaugh’s show.
Rush wasn’t there, he was conveniently sick so that the two wouldn’t have to share a studio together. This still doesn’t change the fact that Rush had been calling for Republicans to vote for Hillary. Clinton’s appearance with a guest host only seemed to endorse this call.
…It may seem hypocritical to point to Republican support for Clinton as a bad thing when Obama partisans point to Republican support for Obama a good thing, but here’s the simple truth of the matter. Obamacans, as they are called, are planning on voting for Obama in the General Election. Clintonicans (I made that up, and I can see one of the reasons why no one really uses it) seem to be looking instead at merely sabotaging the Democratic nomination process.
But, in general this is simply the onset of what seems to be a disturbing pattern on the Clintons relying upon the right to take out Obama.
This became even more apparent when Clinton decided to become the president of the John McCain fan club. I know, I believe, what she was trying to do here, but I also believe it failed fantastically due to a miscalculation regarding how we view the world around us.
There IS a pattern now emerging from the Clinton campaign. Not a nice one. And not one that will appeal to many independent voters.
Was Limbaugh sick? As Marshall implies, this seems set up in a way to provide some “plausible deniability” so that Clinton was not tarnished with actually appearing with Limbaugh — but would be on with a substitute host. If the story gains “legs,” look for that argument from the Clinton camp and its defenders.
P.S. Did John McCain ever appear on Schultz’s or Randi Rhodes’ show on the day of a primary where Democrats could cross over and vote for him instead of other Republican nominees? Can you IMAGINE how McCain would have been skewered by Republicans if he did?
It has become quite common in some parts of the world to wonder whether American democracy continues to be head-and-shoulders above Russia’s. But according to Patrik Etschmayer of Switzerland’s Nachrichten newspaper, Russia’s recent presidential ‘election’ and America’s ongoing presidential race should put any such chattering to rest. Etschmayer writes in part, ‘American democracy undoubtedly suffers many shortcomings, like voting machines that can be manipulated, smear campaigns, and the fact that apart from the two parties, there is virtually no chance for a candidate to establish him or herself. But American democracy is not yet completely ruined. Last weekend however, Russia’s took another step toward self-imposed dismantling and its rebuilding into a Potemkin democracy - only a facade.’
By Patrik Etschmayer
Translated By Ulf Behncke
March 3, 2008
Switzerland - Nachrichten - Original Article (German)
The world media and election observers are all in agreement: Russia’s presidential elections were a farce. The Russians held an election without a choice, and the President was chosen by his predecessor Putin, who as prime minister will keep his new “boss” Dimitrij Medvedev under his thumb.
Some still hope that the Putin saga will play out again with Medvedev. Because even the strongman from Moscow was initially regarded as a predictable, weak president - merely a stooge in office. But today the arrangement is quite different. At the time, Putin took over from the sick, alcoholic Boris Yeltsin, Read the rest of this entry »
One of the late breaking issues that hurt Democratic Senator Barack Obama in recent Texas and Ohio primaries involved allegations that his campaign gave winking private assurances to Canada not to worry about his anti-Nafta campaign rhetoric — a controversy the Clinton camp used to it’s advantage. But now it turns out that the allegation focused more on Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
Yet, the pre-Ohio primary stories only focused on the Obama campaign, not the Clinton campaign — which used it against Obama in Ohio. The Globe and Mail reports: Read the rest of this entry »
March 6th, 2008 by SWARAAJ CHAUHAN, International Columnist
I was driving in the hills when my wife placed a vintage Harry Belafonte audio cassette into the car stereo player… Belafonte’s magical voice never fails to refresh me during strenuous drives. Nearly 40 years ago this wonderful musician had swept American women off their feet with his broad smile and throbbing Caribbean songs…Somewhat like Obama, the politician, who has woven his own magic (with his presence and words) over women, as well as men, in the present day US of A.
Of course, it is not an appropriate comparison. How can one compare a legendary musician with a politician? Let me explain. While listening to Belafonte’s old number “Women smarter than men in every way” (click here to listen), I thought how topical/relevant the song had become with Hillary Clinton registering dramatic wins in Ohio and Texas…leaving the legions of her detractors in the media/blogosphere virtually speechless.
The British newspaper, The Independent, somewhat agrees that the woman (Clinton) is smarter and tougher than the man (Obama). “Super Tuesday belonged to Barack Obama, but its sequel – the US state primaries held this week – belonged to Hillary Clinton. Her victories in Ohio and Texas have given her presidential election campaign a new lease of life. If she eventually wins the Democratic Party nomination, 4 March will go down as the date her fortunes turned. Americans like to say that when the going gets tough, the tough get going.
“Not for the first time in her varied career, Mrs Clinton showed herself to be among the toughest. She responded to the setbacks of Super Tuesday by revamping her campaign staff, going on to the attack and applying herself with renewed energy to the task in hand. Before this week, it was possible to argue that maybe Mrs Clinton did not have what it takes to win the nomination, let alone the presidency. It is far more difficult to maintain that position now.”
Two commentators from different parts of the political spectrum have raised the issue of whether the race card has been played against Senator Barack Obama via the use of more subtle code words.
With Hillary’s big Ohio win and smaller Texas one, look for the whackos to become unhinged in their racist attacks on Obama now that they perceive some vulnerability in the candidate. And they’ll do it in a way that makes it seem like Obama acts like he has something to hide.
For a case study on how to insidiously inject race into the race, take a look at Amir Taheri’s column today in the New York Post: “Obama’s Real Mideast Problem - It’s His Policies, Not His Heritage.”
While Taheri’s headline focuses on Obama’s mideast policies, those don’t come up till more than halfway through his piece. The first half reveals Taheri’s true agenda: getting voters scared about a black American running for president who happens to have a father who’s Kenyan. First is a detailed exposition of the name “Hussein”: “one of the most popular names for Muslims, especially Shiites.” How special. Next up, details on where the names “Barack” and “Obama” come from: the former, Arabic for ‘blessing,’ and the latter referring to Obama’s “father’s tribe who converted to Islam.” Taheri ultimately bottom lines it: “In other words, ‘Barack Hussein Obama’ is a perfectly common identifier for someone with an ethnic East African Muslim background (emphasis mine).”
Has anyone informed Taheri that Obama’s parents separated when he was two years old and that he was raised — mostly in Honolulu — by his white mother and her parents? Or that, throughout his early years, Obama was commonly known at home and school as “Barry”? Or that Obama’s East African Muslim father — so integral to Obama’s “exotic” “family story” — attended Harvard University to pursue Ph.D. studies?
The column fairly oozes racial innuendo.
He has a lot more so read it all (we’re sure it will spur debate between the increasingly bitter supporters of Clinton and Obama).
And then there’s conservative Robert Novak writes about Senator Hillary Clinton’s political comeback in three key primary wins in a newsletter column titled: Hillary’s Wins Raise Prospect of the Unthinkable — A Contested Convention. He writes:
# Think about the unthinkable: a contested Democratic convention in Denver, with the identity of the Democratic presidential nominee unknown until just before Labor Day. That’s the impact of Sen. Hillary Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) remarkable performance Tuesday that broke her long losing streak against Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.): a big win in Ohio where she was supposed to win narrowly, if at all, and unexpected wins in Texas and Rhode Island.
# A group of prominent Democrats was being formed secretly to go to Clinton to ask her to bow out for the sake of party solidarity. Now, neither candidate, counting their current super-delegates and potential unpledged delegates, can win a majority of delegates even after the Pennsylvania primary April 22. It is hard to imagine either bowing out. That raises the possibility of carnage in Denver with the super-delegates and the disputed Michigan and Florida delegations in play.
Novak gives plenty of informed analysis on the Democratic and Republican primaries, analyzing various factors that contributed to Clinton’s good night and Obama’s bad night. One section:
Exit polls also suggest that Bill Clinton successfully played his racial angle. Concentrating on Obama’s blackness, stressing that it’s fine for African-Americans to support a black candidate, Clinton drove home the idea that Obama is a “black candidate.” According to exit polls, Obama carried 86 percent of the black vote in Ohio and only 33 percent of the white vote. Clinton won big among those polled who indicated the candidate’s race was important.
There will be those who will argue this is all a bunch of hooey, that none of this was ever meant this way and that Ruiz and Novak are reading it wrong — that it’s all a matter of perception. Yet, politics is indeed perception and political professionals know it.
Obama’s critics argue the Illinois Senator’s own campaign has played the race card. Obama’s followers will counter he started out being considered by most Americans as a guy who was running who happened to be black and that the way his critics have battled him is by working on the message that he is a black — or black American with some-eyebrow-raising background — who is running.
My inbox this morning was full to the brim with notes from people sharing election results. The typical email started off with, “I’m so sorry, but it looks like Hillary won Texas…”
I’m sorry, too.
But sadness about the Texas primary results isn’t the overriding emotion this morning. What I feel, rather, is a tremendous and uplifting sense of community.
I talked to hundreds of people in my precinct yesterday — so many that my voice is gone this morning. There were old people and young, of every imaginable ethnicity. I saw friends I hadn’t bumped into for years, others that I see daily, and still more that I’d never met before… and most of them were coming out for the senator from Illinois.
No, not everyone with whom I spoke was voting in the Democratic primary, nor was everyone supporting Obama. Of those who were, though, only two told me they were there to vote against Hillary… and those two didn’t come back to caucus. Negative energy and Obama support were mutually exclusive here.
Although our precinct spent over an hour in line outside waiting to get in to caucus (as evidently happened elsewhere, too), there was no evident hostility between the two campaigns’ supporters. Since I didn’t meet anyone who’d ever caucused before, I had the feeling that the sheer novelty of the experience superseded candidate choice.
In short, my experiences yesterday taught me that my neighbors and I have rather a lot in common — far more than I’d suspected, and far less than with other parts of Texas — and that’s very comforting.
Hillary Clinton didn’t win in Fort Bend County. In my area, Democrats outvoted Republicans 2 to 1, and Barack Obama won the popular vote by an enormous margin: 63% to Hillary’s 37%. Not only that, but if my precinct is at all typical, those numbers are going to carry into the caucus results, too.
We had 140 people for Obama vs. 83 for Clinton last night… and while there were certainly precincts that had larger turnouts, it was astounding for ours (where I’m told the typical turnout is about 4).
So to those of you who sent emails — yes, I’m disappointed… but when all is said and done, there’s a lot to be said for discovering that my neighbors and I share more than a zipcode.
Earlier this morning, TMV’s Shaun Mullen summarized his bottomline view on yesterday’s Democratic contests — offering a conclusion very similar to the one reached by Slate’s chief political correspondent, John Dickerson:
The larger point the Clinton aides will make to superdelegates and voters in the next big primary state of Pennsylvania is that the Texas and Ohio results reflect what happens when the two candidates are compared side by side. Obama can give speeches and draw crowds, but when it comes to matching him against a competitor, as the general election will demand, Obama can’t stand up to the comparison. Will any of the Clinton arguments work? We’ll see in the coming days if hundreds of superdelegates allow the primary process to continue without continuing to move toward Obama. Clinton is pleading for time, arguing that voters should be allowed to have their say in future contests. But even in this she comes up against a contradiction posted by Obama’s lead. Because she must rely on the superdelegates to beat back Obama’s likely lead in the popular vote and among pledged delegates, she is essentially asking those superdelegates to listen to the people—but only long enough to be persauded to vote for her. Then she expects them to undo the will of the people by voting against Obama in Denver. Clinton has rescued her campaign from free-fall, but the ride from here to the nomination is still going to be very bumpy.
New York Senator Hillary Clinton clinched the Texas Democratic 2008 Presidential primary — giving her the two big prizes for the night, Ohio and the Lone Star state, plus Rhode Island. The results: a second-lease on life in her battle to win the Democratic Presidential nomination and a new test for rival Senator Barack Obama.
Clinton’s win in Texas means she and her campaign can rightly say that she carved out victories in several big states and has no reason to agree to end her campaign, even though many analysts say the “math” in the delegate count makes it impossible for her to win via pledged delegates. So the battle will likely start now, more than ever, to convince Super-delegates — via increasingly sharp attacks on Obama and more no-holds-barred advertising — that the Illinois Senator would be a bad risk for the party in the general election.
Clinton, her campaign, and her followers will tout her victory today. And Obama, his campaign and his followers will try to downplay it. But the fact that Obama only won Vermont mean the net result is clear, as the New York Times reports:
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton defeated Senator Barack Obama in the Ohio and Texas primaries on Tuesday, ending a string of defeats and allowing her to soldier on in a Democratic presidential nomination race that now seems unlikely to end any time soon.
Mrs. Clinton also won Rhode Island, while Mr. Obama won in Vermont. But the results mean that Mrs. Clinton won the two states she most needed to keep her candidacy alive. Her victory in Texas was razor thin and came early Wednesday morning after most Americans had gone to bed. But by winning decisively in Ohio earlier in the night, Mrs. Clinton was able to deliver a televised victory speech in time for the late-night news. And the result there allowed her to cast Tuesday as the beginning of a comeback even though she stood a good chance of gaining no ground against Mr. Obama in the hunt for delegates.
“No candidate in recent history — Democratic or Republican — has won the White House without winning the Ohio primary,” Mrs. Clinton, of New York, said at a rally in Columbus, Ohio. “We all know that if we want a Democratic president, we need a Democratic nominee who can win Democratic states just like Ohio.”
Although Mrs. Clinton won the popular vote in Texas, her hunt for delegates was complicated by the state’s peculiar nominating process, which includes a separate caucus that awards 35 percent of the state’s delegates, irrespective of the primary results. Mr. Obama held a slight lead in that contest with less than half of precincts reporting, but the outcome is likely to stay up in the air until later on Wednesday.
The Associated Press reported that all told, Mr. Obama retains his lead in the delegate count, with 1,477 pledged delegates compared to Mrs. Clinton’s 1,391. The A.P. said that 170 delegates from Tuesday’s contests have yet to be assigned, many from the Texas caucuses.
Expect the Clinton and Obama forces to battle each other every centimeter of the way while a smiling Republican (virtual) nominee Senator John McCain looks (and attacks) on.
One factor already being talked about in Texas is: did talk show host Rush Limbaugh help tilt the scales there with his call on Republicans to cross over the primary and vote for Clinton to sandbag Obama? There is already some buzz suggesting he might have. Conservative blogger and talk show host Hugh Hewitt:
If Hillary ekes out close wins, stays alive, gains the nomination and the White House, will Rush hold the Bible at her Inauguration?
Bill O’Reilly was just on with Brit Hume giving Rush the credit for the Clinton comeback –which is certainly the least expected bit of Campaign 2008 news in this very, very long campaign.
A month ago talk radio was dead. Now it has resurrected Hillary?
What does it mean for Democrats and how to some of those who’ve backed Obama view it? Kos from Daily Kos:
If she’s eaten into Obama’s lead, then we’ve got a serious rationale for the race to continue. If Obama wins the delegate count tonight, which is still pretty possible (remarkably, because this primary process is so stupid), then Clinton will have ended her “good” night without making ground where it actually matters. We’ll see.
But he sees a silver lining for the Democrats in general:
For one, Obama may finally have to go negative. I’ve never seen him do that. He’s never had to do that.
Second of all, as long as the talking heads are talking about the Democratic race, that’s time they’re not talking about their “maverick” friend. And what’s the debate about between Obama and Clinton? Health care. Iraq. Jobs. The sort of thing that can only help us long term.
Finally, Obama has to prove that he can bounce back from such setbacks. He’s had a mostly charmed political life. A little political adversity is important. Hillary Clinton and her team responded well to her painful losing streak. Now let’s see how the Obama team bounces back.
So I’m cool with her continuing on. I certainly won’t be calling for her to quit.
But if he wins the delegate count, her task will be even more difficult than it was today. And at that point, she’ll become little more than batting practice for Obama.
Some thoughts:
(1) Forget the navel gazing about negative campaigning and press criticism by candidates not working. It works. And, due to the way Clinton turned her campaign around with highly-touted negative ads plus what some called “working the refs” (calling the press to further scrutinize and be tough on Obama, which occurred during the past few days), expect the McCain and Obama campaigns to follow suit.
(2) The most interesting aspect of the Texas race was the issue of national security coupled with the idea that if you elect one candidate you’re safer then if you elect another. For several years now Democrats and independents have been critical of the administration’s and Republican Party’s suggestion that if you vote for them you’re more likely to live to a ripe old age and watch your children survive. Democrats decried this tactic. But, in a primary, it apparently worked quite well.
(3) The Republicans will most certainly use a national security argument — and advertising — against the Democrats. It’ll be harder for the Democratic Party itself and whoever the candidate is to argue it’s foul play or unseemly since the argument that if you vote for X you and your family are more likely to survive than if you vote for Y — since the Democrats have already been there/done that in their own primary. Expect the battle over this issue to continue in remaining Democratic primaries on the stump and on advertisements.
(4) The Clinton campaign came under fire for suggesting when it lost that it really didn’t matter losing their states. The Obama campaign is now suggesting the same — apart from its still-ahead position on delegates. In reality losses matter and, just as Clinton’s task and image was impacted by her losses, so are Obama’s despite what his camp may argue today.
Cagle cartoon by Paul Zanetti, Australia
UPDATE: The AP’s veteran political reporter Ron Fournier reports that pressures, tensions and ugliness in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign are going to soon increase:
“Despite Obama’s impressive victories in February, Clinton’s comeback is based on sowing political seeds of doubt,” said Donna Brazile, a Democratic strategist and one of nearly 800 party leaders known as superdelegates for their ability to determine the nomination. “In order to clinch the nomination, he must anticipate the worst attacks ever.”
Consider that a shot across the bow to the Clinton campaign because Brazile — like many other superdelegates — worries that Clinton’s only hope for victory is tearing down Obama and dividing the party. Party chairman Howard Dean recently told House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid that he was concerned about the possible impact of a nominating campaign that stretched through the end of the primaries in early June.
Some superdelegates are bracing themselves to intervene on Obama’s behalf if necessary.
“If these attacks are contrasts based on policy differences, there is no need to stop the race or halt the debate,” Brazile said. “But, if this is more division, more diversion from the issues and more of the same politics of personal destruction, chairman Dean and other should be on standby.”
A senior Obama adviser, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Obama’s team will respond to Tuesday’s results by going negative on Clinton — raising questions about her tax records and the source of donations to the Clinton presidential library, among skeletons in the Clintons’ past.
The winner of that fight would be John McCain, who sealed the GOP nomination Tuesday night and would love nothing more than fratricide among the Democrats. He could use the time to raise money, energize conservative voters and sharpen his general election message.
March 4th, 2008 by MICHAEL STICKINGS, Assistant Editor
It’s way too long to post here at TMV, but, if you just can’t get enough, check out the live-blogging of tonight’s election returns, along with commentary on and analysis of the presidential race generally, over at my place.
For Arizona Senator John McCain, it’s now all over but his official coronation as the Republican Party’s 2008 Presidential nominee in light of his four-state primary wins — on a night when it seems certain that the Democrats will battle each other for months in a bitter nomination battle that could impact Democratic Party unity.
Who would have thunk it?
There may have been a male Comeback Kid. It seems increasingly possible that tomorrow there could be a female Comeback Kid. But as McCain gets ready to get a head start on his presidential campaign, he has become the REAL political comeback story of 2007-2008. Love him or hate him, he’s the guy who truly rose from the ashes to the top of his party’s political heap.
And who would have thunk this:
For months the narrative was of a bitterly-split Republican Party, with conservatives sitting on their hands and not supporting McCain, speculation about a possible third party, and talk of the Republican coalition falling apart. But as the epic political battle between Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama plays out, it’s the Democrats who now seem on positioned on the edge of a bitter era of intense hard-feelings so that, no matter who wins, a certain number of their followers could stay home on election night — or even vote for McCain.
Some insist the winning-the-nomination-math reportedly isn’t there for Hillary Clinton, no matter how well she does tonight. But at this writing, there’s a genuine prospect that she will win three out of four states tonight. So the Democratic race will most assuredly go on — while McCain mends party fences and attacks the Democrats. NBC reports:
“I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat.” -Will Rogers
That disorganization was certainly evident tonight in my precinct Democratic Party caucus. The photo above shows the most organized part of the evening, when people filed into the combination cafeteria/gym. There were questions about party rules regarding whether voters had to remain after signing in for their preferred candidate, and the Obama volunteers were loudly insisting their supporters remain so they could dominate the debate because the Clinton volunteers were supposedly going to challenge the vote count for delegates to the county convention.
It has been reported that the Clinton campaign was behind the curve in organizing for the caucuses in Texas, and that was evident in the lower numbers of Clinton volunteers than Obama volunteers, well out of proportion to the ratio of supporters of each candidate at the caucus. Unfortunately, the Obama volunteers were rather obnoxious, and the ill manners were not limited to the young cohort.
Eventually, after much commotion in setting up tables so that the disabled and those who had small children could have a shorter line to wait in before signing in their preference, a quasi-organization arose out of the confusion, and the registration of the caucus proceeded with reasonable smoothness. Although I have been hard on the Democratic Party organizers of the caucus, some acknowledgment must be made that at least ten times as many voters came to the caucus this year as compared to four years ago. Still, some better planning would have reduced the confusion.
Overall, it was an interesting experience, reminding me of how much I hate the inside maneuvering that is inherent in party politics.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) has won the Rhode Island primary, a win that breaks Sen. Barack Obama’s (Ill.) 12-contest win streak and leaves Ohio and Texas as tiebreakers in the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination.
With 13 percent of precincts in Rhode Island counted, Clinton led, 53 percent to 46 percent, but the Associated Press had already called the contest in her favor.
Ohio and Texas remained too close to call based on exit polling. Earlier in the night Obama won the Vermont Democratic presidential primary.
AND:
The Vermont race was called by television networks and the independent organization conducting exit polling immediately upon the close of polls in the state at 7 p.m.
Obama was widely expected to claim Vermont and the majority of its 17 delegates. For Clinton, the more critical tests were in Ohio and Texas, where she is seeking to snap Obama’s now 12-contest winning streak and keep alive her chances at the Democratic presidential nomination.
I am bemused by the suggestions of bloggers such as Matt Yglesias and various and sundry media pundits that Hillary should just admit that Obama is the better candidate and lie right down in the coffin the media, the right wing, and Obama’s supporters have recently—and gleefully— been knocking together for her. Obama’s supporters in particular need to look beyond their own corner of the party at the still substantial number of Democrats who prefer Hillary. If you believe in polls, here’s one that says that even many Dems who support Obama aren’t ready to see her out of the race. Yglesias thinks it’s because we’re ill-informed. I think otherwise.
I am resigned to having Obama as my candidate, but I hope Hillary will fight on. Hillary is the only one of the three remaining candidates I am absolutely sure is equal to the nasty task of cleaning up Bush’s mess. As anyone who looks at the results across the country can see, despite the groundswell of support for Obama’s magic, a substantial number of Dems just won’t believe in magic or think that all you need is love—at least not for this election cycle.
I can assure my fellow Dems and interested others that I’ve met plenty of Democrats who are as excited about Hillary as some of Obama’s supporters are about him. Her supporters believe in her superior capability. We recognize the fears of some Dems that she might not be ‘electable,’ and our response to this is, “If so, so it must be.”
We have never bought into the right wing’s atavistic Clinton-fear. We’re hurt by, and increasingly resentful, of the way that some of Obama’s supporters have used the Clinton-bashing rhetoric of the far right to undermine a fellow Democrat and powerful Democratic Senator whom Obama, if elected, will certainly need.
Seventy-five years ago today, Franklin D. Roosevelt took office to end a Depression and face an oncoming war. Now, voters are choosing a President to resolve a war and stave off a Depression.
In these hard times, Americans will take their chances on the first woman or African-American or the oldest president ever. Back then, they were relying on the first Chief Executive who could stand only with braces on his legs and spent most of his time in a wheel chair.
“We have nothing to fear but fear itself,” FDR said in his inaugural address on March 4, 1933, but that night, two million Americans were homeless and banks in 32 states closed and could not reopen the next morning.
Compared to then, the choice now is less daunting, but it nonetheless marks another turning point in how the country is to be governed and who will lead the way and set the tone.
Roosevelt, despite his infirmity, brought energy and hope to the White House and changed the direction of American politics for half a century. Nothing that momentous may happen in this election, but after eight years of disastrous leadership, something important is at stake again.
Tonight, we will get a clearer idea of who will be entrusted with the job of leading us through the first hard times of this century.
March 4th, 2008 by MICHAEL STICKINGS, Assistant Editor
It seems increasingly likely that, at best, Clinton will win narrowly today, perhaps by a few points in Ohio and by a point or two in Texas. (She’ll lose Vermont, but she’ll win Rhode Island.) In terms of delegates, not much will change.
Still, victories in Ohio and Texas would be huge. Obama has won 11 contests in a row — and everything since Super Tuesday — but the media, which are already turning on Obama, are looking for a new story, a new chapter, a new narrative. The one about Obama’s rise and seeming invincibility has grown stale. They want sensationalism, and Clinton victories would have the smell of sensation about them. (Clinton the Comeback Kid, and all that nonsense.) But they would only smell like sensations because of ever-changing expectations — and media-driven expectations are very much what these races are all about.
Put today’s contests in context: Clinton was, not so long ago, the decisive frontrunner. The race was hers to lose. Doubting Obama, like many others, I thought her eventual victory was pretty much a sure thing. Obama might win Iowa and perhaps even South Carolina, but Clinton would win New Hampshire and pull ahead for good on Super Tuesday. And that would be that.
But, well, a funny thing happened on the way to the nomination. Obama rose to the occasion and proved to be one of the one of the most impressive political figures of our time. All in a span of a few weeks. The potential was always there, but he seemed to find his voice, and his mission, and, well, he just caught fire. I endorsed him just before Super Tuesday, but even then it wasn’t clear just how impressive his run would be. He became not just the frontrunner after Super Tuesday but the head of a movement that has engaged Americans in a way that I didn’t think possible. Clinton has repeatedly belittled him and his campaign — as well as, by implication, his supporters — but he is a man of outstanding style and substance. His supporters know it. I know it. And I am excited about what I have come to call his capacity for greatness in the White House. Millions of Americans are behind him, and believe in him, as do millions of us non-Americans around the world. Read the rest of this entry »
