And Another Palin Scandal Coming - An Affair?

Via the Telegraph, all of the sudden they want to talk about the issues:

“Senator McCain and Governor Palin look forward to discussing the issues that Americans care about, fixing broken government, creating jobs, making our country energy independent and securing the peace for the next generation by bringing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to a victorious end,” Mr Schmidt continued.

After spending the entire "meet some Alaskan lady who ain't what she says she is" evening attacking community organizers, the average American kind of person trying to help others in thousands of little people ways, and as a back handed attack on Barrack Obama's previous works, and instead of concentrating on defining their positions on real issues... Now, all of a sudden they want to talk about the issues?

Via the AP, and I know this may shock some of you - the McCain campaign is so shocked they are threatening to sue the National Enquirer - but it appears that adultery may run in the Palin family:

The National Enquirer wrote in its edition dated Sept. 15 that Palin had an affair with a business associate of her husband, Todd Palin. He discovered the infidelity and dissolved the business, the article said. It attributed the allegation only to "an enemy" of the Alaska governor.

No need to wonder why the sudden change of direction from the misfiring McCain-Palin for Alaskan Independence ticket...

“The National Enquirer's coverage of a vicious war within Sarah Palin's extended family includes several newsworthy revelations, including the resulting incredible charge of an affair plus details of family strife when the Governor's daughter revealed her pregnancy.

“Following our John Edwards exclusives, our political reporting has obviously proven to be more detail-oriented than the McCain campaign's vetting process. Despite the McCain camp's attempts to control press coverage they find unfavorable, The Enquirer will continue to pursue news on both sides of the political spectrum."

Now this is the funny thing here that doesn't make much sense at all - and I credit my wife for noticing this before I did - Why the hell is the McCain campaign threatening legal action? Neither McCain nor his campaign should have any legal standing here. Shouldn't Sarah Palin be the one doing that? Unless she knows she would lose...

I have this feeling the National Enquirer featuring the scandalized Sarah Palin will fly off the shelves in the next little while.

The ENQUIRER has also learned that Palin’s family is embroiled in a vicious war that is now exposing her darkest secrets, threatening to destroy her political career.

Palin’s ongoing war with her ex brother-in-law Mike Wooten, a state trooper, has caused multiple sources to come forward with shocking allegations about the governor.

Details of those allegations, the family feud, and Palin’s attempt to cover up her teen daughter’s pregnancy are in the new issue of The ENQUIRER.

At this point in time I am beginning to wonder if the GOP should forget about just bringing in a new VP candidate to replace Sarah million and one scandals Palin and yank their endorsement of John McCain entirely.

Because John McCain really blew it big time when he picked Palin.

Side Note: After putting so much effort into building up the National Enquirer's credibility during the John Edwards scandal it should be interesting to watch the right wing try and tear them down as a source this time.

[update] Image via Phillybits:



[update deux] Via the Alaska Blog Mudflats... The shit is really gonna hit the fan across the media:

The latest story the National Enquirer is working on is that Palin had an affair with Todd’s ex-business partner in an Anchorage Car Wash venture. This was an interesting twist because it was also rumored that Todd Palin had an “Edwards problem”. Maybe he has an Elizabeth Edwards problem. I generally try to resist getting too caught up in the smarminess, unless it becomes impossible. It just did.

Two days ago, Todd’s ex-business partner filed an emergency motion to have his divorce papers sealed. Yesterday the motion was DENIED.

And the squeaky clean Hockey Mom's purported lover?

A local Palmer politician and...
A hockey coach? (see update below)

You just can't make stuff like this up! lol

[update trois] A welcome to Buzzflash readers: and a reminder of the many great services they provide to the Blogosphere:

Visit the BUZZFLASH Family of Political News Websites:

BuzzFlash.Org | BuzzFlash.Net | Last Chance Democracy Cafe | Wings of Justice.Com
GOP Hypocrites.Com | Media PUTZ.Com | BE-ELECTED.com | Libby Defense Fund.Com
BuzzFlash MarketPlace.Com | Send Comments to BuzzFlash's Mailbag

And a friendly note to Friendly Bear at the TulsaNow Forum: I am an unaffiliated little "i" indie and, YES, I support Obama. Big whoop! Just a liberal with those frickin' pesky liberal facts. Other than being among the millions of Obama supporters there is no connection to any political party, news agency or campaign. But seriously, WTF? Did you think the GOP would be pumping this stuff out like they did with the Enquirers stories on Edwards? You will be waiting forever an a day for them to write on this. And please note the AP and Telegraph sources as well. Unlike the ludicrous GOP talking point brigade, I waited for multiple sourcing before I Blogged on this.

[update quatre] Right now there are all kinds of rumors floating around... While there is the original rumor of a guy named Brad Hanson as the lover, there is also a guy named Richter that shares a property with the Palins and that wanted to get his divorce papers sealed, and another former business partner named Ray Wells...

From what I have read about the Palins so far... I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out they were swingers! lol And it is fun to watch republicans squirm over this.

Obama Picks Up 7 More Delegates in Iowa Saturday

Say what? Say yep... Obama picks up 7 more delegates in Iowa on Saturday:

Iowa Democratic Party officials said that with more than 86 percent of the delegates picked, Obama claimed 52 percent of the delegates elected at county conventions on Saturday, compared to 32 percent for Clinton. About 16 percent of the delegates picked at Saturday's conventions were sticking with Edwards, even though he's dropped from the race since Iowa held its caucuses in January.

Democratic Party projections said the results mean Obama increased by seven the number of delegates he collects from the state, getting a total of 23 compared to 14 for Clinton and seven for Edwards, with one to be decided.

Twelve automatic delegates bring the state's total to 57. Obama has been endorsed by four of those and Clinton three, with the remainder uncommitted.

Note the funky emergence of some funny term that has no definition in political speak: "automatic delegates"? Meaningless unless you are trying to make something "super" seem less sinister when you try and convince them to "automatically" vote for the loser in Colorado:

A while back we noted that top Clinton advisor Harold Ickes had admonished the press not to use the phrase "super delegates" but instead to employ what he claims is the more accurate "automatic delegates." The Clinton campaign has pushed for this change of phrase on the thinking that calling them "super delegates" carries a negative connotation that somehow they're more powerful or privileges than other delegates. And that's important because their path to the nomination will almost certainly have to rely on super delegates going overwhelmingly for Clinton despite Obama's having the majority of pledged delegates.

Got that?

Hey AP! Quit the stenography posing as journalism and report on the facts about the SUPER delegates.

What do the Soldiers think about Bush's failed war?

Well? What do they really think?

Yesterday, the Center for Responsive Politics reported that members of the military donated the most not to McCain, but to two anti-war candidates:

Individuals in the Army, Navy and Air Force made those branches of the armed services among the top contributors in the 4th Quarter, ranking No. 13, No. 18 and No. 21, respectively. In 2007, Republican Ron Paul, who opposes U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, was the top recipient of money from donors in the military, collecting at least $212,000 from them. Barack Obama, another war opponent, was second with about $94,000.

These donations reflect the military’s disapproval with the Iraq war and President Bush’s handling of it. A recent Military Times poll found that just 46 percent of U.S. troops now believe that the country should have invaded Iraq, and only 40 percent approve of Bush’s handling of the war.

Money talks and bushit walks... And it is important to note that CGG's ActBlue (I am sure she has taken over the place now! lol jk) is becoming a real force to be reckoned with:

The biggest "contributor" of all after one year of fundraising remains the progressive group ActBlue, which facilitates individual donors pooling their money to finance Democratic candidates. In donations exceeding $200, ActBlue has directed more than $2.2 million to the presidential candidates, but nearly all of it went to dropouts John Edwards and Bill Richardson. ActBlue's fundraising is far greater than campaign finance reports would suggest, however, since donations below $200 are not itemized on candidates' reports and, therefore, cannot be tracked or totaled.

That money may not have pushed those candidates on to the top of the ticket, but it did help push Edwards and Richardson's pro-sanity positions on war, poverty and other issues to the forefront of the presidential debate. Sometimes winning is as simple as effecting the agenda of a primary or election. Never mind the large amounts ActBlue sends other candidates into what would normally be underfunded primary and election races.

ActBlue has raised over
$36,000,000.00
for their prefered candidates since 2004...

Polling Connecticut on Presidential Candidates

The Hartford Courant has some numbers up from a poll conducted by the Center For Survey Research and Analysis at the University of Connecticut:

McCain's rise is a dramatic turn in a state where former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani was the favorite last fall before fading in the early decision states of Iowa, New Hampshire and Michigan.

After being widely written off last year, McCain now is preferred by 39 percent of Republicans, compared with 16 percent for Giuliani and 11 percent for former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, according to the poll by the Center for Survey Research and Analysis at the University of Connecticut.

In the Democratic race, Clinton is favored by 41 percent of Democrats, compared with 27 percent for Barack Obama and 9 percent for John Edwards. One in five Democrats is undecided, an audience Obama is trying to reach with television ads that began Saturday.

You can head over there to get a breakdown of the poll, from the Hartford Courant's Mark Pazniokas.

Obama Takes Nevada in Soap Opera Twist

Hillary Clinton wins the vote count:

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton won the Nevada caucuses on Saturday, capturing strong support from women voters and adding a fresh boost of momentum to her campaign as the Democratic presidential race heads to South Carolina, where she is engaged in a fierce battle with her rival, Senator Barack Obama.

snip

The New York senator had 51 percent of the vote to Mr. Obama’s 45 percent, with just over 90 percent of the state’s caucuses reporting. John Edwards, the former senator from North Carolina, faded to a distant third place with 4 percent of the vote.

But Barack Obama wins the delegate count:

Barack Obama released an official statement celebrating a delegate victory. "We came from over twenty-five points behind to win more national convention delegates than Hillary Clinton because we performed well all across the state, including rural areas where Democrats have traditionally struggled," he said.

A current estimate of the national convention delegate count is below, though not all precincts have fully reported.

District 1 Clinton 3, Obama 3

District 2 (Washoe) Clinton 1, Obama 2

District 2 (Rural) Clinton 0, Obama 1

District 2 (Clark) Clinton 1, Obama 1

District 3 (Clark) Clinton 2, Obama 2

At-Large Clinton 2, Obama 1

PLEO Clinton 3, Obama 3

Hillary wins the vote.
Barack wins the delegates.
Or did he really?

Obama partisans don't heart Hillary too much because of tactics, Hillary partisans don't heart Obama trying to get some Edwards love, and Edwards wins a fund raising Bomb but bombs in the Nevada vote. And I am guessing you haven't even thought about adding Super Delegates in the mix yet?

Confused? You won't be after this episode of Soap...



[update] HuffPo is reporting that AP releases that had originally given Hillary Clinton the edge in delegates have flipped the count in Barack Obama's favor in their story:

As Plouffe cast doubt on the accuracy of the caucus results, he also claimed electoral victory. Senator Obama, he argued, actually wound up winning more delegates (13) than Clinton (12).

"On one very important measure, we had a slight lead," said Plouffe. "Just as important as the number is why that is: we showed real strength statewide."

The Associated Press was reporting the numbers flipped, but an AP official on the conference call suggested that Obama's campaign could be right. [Update: The AP has changed its count to reflect a delegate win for Obama, 13-12.]

NH Recount - 5th Ward Way Off After Hand Count

As the hand recount begins at Dennis Kucinich's request, The Brad Blog was going through recount results as they were coming in:

As mentioned earlier today, NH SoS Bill Gardner told WMUR in NH that "We did nine of the 12 wards in Manchester, and a lot of the votes were exactly the same...Some went up by a vote or two." He didn't, of course, note that a lot of the vote counts (most of them) were off by 5 or more.

And now, the rest of the numbers from the rest of the Manchester wards are coming on. And get a load of Ward 5:

	Diebold Result	Hand Count
CLINTON	683	619
EDWARDS	255	217
OBAMA	404	365

All of the other candidates seem to have lost votes as well. No clue who received them instead...

From another of his posts, and after media reports that "a lot of the votes were exactly the same":

But many more vote counts were not at all the same, ranging anywhere from 5 to 8 votes off in regular cases, across almost all candidates.

And before you say that's no big deal, we'll remind you that in 2004, had just 6 votes per precinct been registered in Ohio for John Kerry instead of George W. Bush, we'd have a different person sitting in the White House right now.

So far, this is not looking very pretty. Not in retrospect, nor in looking forward...

Peak Inside Howard Dean's Email Inbox

Mary McElveen is trying to get you to send notice to the Democratic party concerning disgust with the media's censorship of candidates views:

By Mary MacElveen
January 16, 2008

To Chairman Howard Dean,

When you were running for president back in 2004, you stated that the people “had the power to take back their country” Well in light of former Senator Mike Gravel being omitted from past debates and now with Congressman Dennis Kucinich being barred from an upcoming debate: Where is the power of the people to decide who they get to hear from? I do not see it, Chairman Dean. This is surely not democracy, but censoring the words coming from both candidates.

Read the rest and sign on if you believe the media has no right to decide which candidates are supposedly viable.

If you aren't up to speed on what this is all about, here is the most recent episode in which the media is trying to dictate which candidates the people are allowed to hear about and from:

Just announced, the Nevada Supreme court is kicking the public right to hear all of the candidates' views in the teeth:

MSNBC reports that the Nevada Supreme Court has ruled that NBC can block Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) from tonight’s presidential debate in Las Vegas, overturning an earlier ruling by a Clark County District Judge. NBC had uninvited Kucinich after changing its participation criteria.

Previously brewed here:

Kucinich Wins Nevada Debate

At least, in court, he wins the debate on whether he will get an invitation to the debate, OR ELSE:

“A judge in Nevada has just ordered MSNBC to include Rep. Dennis Kucinich in Tuesday’s Democratic Party presidential debate in Las Vegas or he will cancel the forum. Senior Clark County District Court Judge Charles Thompson vowed to issue an injunction halting the nationally televised debate if MSNBC failed to comply. Kucinich had filed a lawsuit seeking to be included just this morning.”

Good for Dennis Kucinich, and great for Democracy! And a hearty "Thank you!" to Judge Thompson...

When will the media leave it up to the voters, and only the voters, which candidates are viable? Since when did the media become the rule makers for a political party's primary?

The media needs to learn its place is to report and fact check. Not to cheer lead and blackout.

Connecticut Bob has a few choice words (and pics) to describe this recent news...

Both Mike Gravel and Dennis Kucinich have been completely shafted by the media. And John Edwards seems to suffer from a similar problem. Even though they do allow Edwards to participate in the debates, he gets little press beyond that. And when they do cover Edwards, it is usually addressing how angry he is supposed to be, or concerning his haircuts.

Honestly? I don't give a damn how much Edwards' haircuts cost, and when I have seen him talk he has seemed upbeat most of the time, and at other times grave, solemn or concerned, but never really angry. If you want angry, look at the corrupt and enraged (deranged too?) Dick "Go FV@K Yourself!" Cheney, or the average citizen that has had to suffer the complete failure of the media on about every front in the last couple of decades.

And make no mistakes about this: The media in America is failing BIG TIME. And they are dragging the rest of the country down with them.

And the Draft Bloomberg race is off to a slow walk!

You were all anticipating this news... Waiting on this announcement and knowing it would generate all of the excitement of turtle marathon!

The Draft Bloomberg site is up, with a surging

527 signatures!

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzz...

On the bright side for the left? His candidacy will likely only hurt them if Hillary is the candidate. There are too many on the left that would refuse to vote for her if she is the nominee for the Dems, IMHO.

But regardless of the candidate for the GOP, given their especially weak crop of candidates this election cycle, a "Mike Bloomberg for President" third party run will siphon off a lot of their usual voters.

[update] Since I posted this yesterday the signatures have climbed to a mind boggling 865 signatures... The media ought to have Bloomberg out ahead of Edwards in the horse race soon with this kind of support.



[update deux] I just wanted to put Bloomberg's support in perspective compared to a snapshot of the reality of how America really feels. Representative Wexler was seeking 50,000 signatures for his Impeachment efforts last month. In a matter of hours he had surpassed that number.

As of 10:43 AM today (Sunday, December 15th) Wexler has amassed more than the 50,000 signatures he was looking for:

55024
signed up and counting...

After about 24 hours Wexler had reached 67000 signatures. As of today (January 16th - a month later) here are the numbers for Wexler's Impeachment petition:

191803
signed up and counting...

We are now at about 30 hours into the "Draft Bloomberg" campaign and he has 890 signatures... All of the excitement of a turtle marathon.

Candidate Matchup Test

How do the candidates line up with your views?

I was clicking around the net slightly aimlessly and came across this "Candidate Matchup" diary leading to a test that matches up candidates with your issues... So, being a lazy Saturday I took the test:

95% Dennis Kucinich
93% Mike Gravel
87% John Edwards
84% Chris Dodd
84% Barack Obama
80% Hillary Clinton
77% Joe Biden
77% Bill Richardson
35% Rudy Giuliani
25% John McCain
21% Ron Paul
20% Mike Huckabee
18% Tom Tancredo
17% Mitt Romney
10% Fred Thompson

2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz

I don't put too much faith in tests like this, in as far as their accuracy goes, because they usually don't cover every possible issue that people may be interested in. In this test's case there is a total disregard of religious issues like the separation of church and state, which is an issue that can provide a huge defining line between party and candidate support. And it does not address the issue of "Single Payer" universal healthcare head on, only universal healthcare ("We need a national health insurance system that makes sure everyone is covered."), but the candidates have never had a chance to vote on that issue so it would be hard to match up a person with a candidate. Nor does this test completely address some of the very real racial and gender issues, which would mark some serious differences beyond just GLBT issues and immigration issues that are highlighted in the media and by candidates, IMHO.

But these tests do give you an idea of candidates that are close to your ideology, as imperfect as they are.

Previously, I had posted on the Political Compass:

How Does Your Candidate Measure up?

Many of us are familiar with the Political Compass. Some at MLN even had their compass score in their signatures for a while, and even took the time to chart some of their own personal scores in March. But do you know where the 2008 Presidential Candidates sit on this political chart?

You should:

My kingdom for a real progressive candidate!

Perhaps you've heard of the Political Compass website, where you can take a test that places you on a grid based on the degree to which you are "left" or "right" on the economic scale as well as how socially libertarian or authoritarian you are.

I'm damn near as moonbatty as it gets: -6.50, -6.67, which puts me in, for lack of a better term, the "deep Southwest" of the grid.

Anyway, thanks to a recent article on London's TimesOnline, we can see how the 2008 U.S. presidential candidates fit on the grid.

This should worry those on the left, and I know that many at MLN scored even further left than I did (I am a Liberal, but I am a moderate Liberal), as they watch the next candidate chosen for the Democratic party who is nothing less than a conservative. That is, if they chose anyone other than Kucinich or Gravel. And right now they aren't even counted in the top 3 contenders.

This is where the Democratic party is failing miserably. They are not really providing any different ideology than the GOP, just a moderate version of it, if they choose any of those conservative candidates on that chart.

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Chris Dodd, Bill Richardson, Joe Biden... They are all conservatives, as moderate as some of them may be, they are conservatives nonetheless.

These tests often elicit surprising responses from people:

MattW: "I find it hard to believe that I'm actually 3 times more liberal and libertarian than Dennis Kucinich."

Well Matt? You probably are... The problem is that moderate conservative candidates, and ones that are somewhat authoritarian to boot, have been labeled as "Liberals" for so long by the corporate owned MSM it has skewered the views of the American people to accept candidates that are far more conservative than many of the American people really are.

IOW: People have been conditioned to reject candidates that would better represent their own views through years of propaganda.

This is a direct result of the MSM's incompetence in addressing real issues and, instead, sticking to their scripts of Horse Races, Manipulation of Polling Popularity Contests, Who Smells the Best, The Prettiest Face, Masculintity, The Money Game, Crying Games and a myriad of other exercises in avoidance and misdirection from the real issues that are truly important and could do a lot to shape your support based on what is actually best for you, the voter.

Information is the best weapon you have to fight this propaganda:

Click on Pic to Enlarge

So it is left up to you to seek out the important information, at least, until the media finally meets our demands that they AND the candidates address the issues honestly.

The short version of this post?

"Media: Do. Your. Job."

Because We The People are getting tired of doing all of the heavy lifting.

[update] edited and rewritten a few times - CM1

An Informal Quinnipiac Poll

In an article on New Milford resident Lorella Praeli's activism in support of Barack Obama in New Hampshire you can find what I would call an informal poll of the Quinnipiac students' support for presidential candidates:

With that kind of passion and determination, the freshman cajoled McLean to let her enroll in his semester-long honors political science seminar for upperclassmen which would study and track the 2008 presidential campaign.

Selecting a candidate to endorse and participating in the New Hampshire primary are key lessons, McLean said.

Of the students in the class, he said, six are campaigning for Obama, two for Democrat John Edwards, two for Republican Mitt Romney, one for Republican Rudy Giuliani and three for Democrat Hillary Clinton.

"And I'm so proud she's in my class," McLean said.

Besides making door-to-door visits and attending campaign rallies and other events, she has proved to be the "queen of phone banking."

In the past week, Praeli and her Quinnipiac peers have caught the political fever now rampant in New Hampshire. They translated that enthusiasm into conversations with voters, trying to persuade them to see the candidates through their eyes.

It's a far more realistic lesson than anything they might glean from a textbook or lecture, McLean said.

Yes, Obama seems to have generated a lot of support from Quinnipiac's youth... But even more interesting, IMHO, is this realistic lesson in how far the republican party has fallen:

Democratic Supporters - 11
Republican Supporters - 3

Yes, it is a very small polling sample but it can't be much further off than any of the recent New Hampshire polls were.

As soon as the results started trickling in the explanations began as to how the polls could have been so wrong. Was it the voters reaction to the media’s coverage of a show of emotion from Hillary? Or could it have been those damn Diebold machines again?! On MSNBC, WaPo’s Eugene Robinson brought up one explanation that’s now being floated around: the Bradley Effect, in which people supposedly lied to pollsters about whether they would vote for a black candidate.

I wouldn't be surprised about Diebold theories or the Bradley Effect and other possibly racist statements, to be honest... This would be, after all, signs of a pretty freakin' fascist country. Then again? So are the sexist undertones in this campaign.

[minor update] for linkage... And a note: Some of the campaign statements appear to be seriously distorted by the media, IMHO, while others coming from both the media and the campaigns appear to carry genuine racist and sexist over and undertones...

How is that Republican economy going into the election cycle?

According to the worst president ever in the history of the USA:

“In a marked shift from his usual upbeat economic assessments,” President Bush “conceded…that the nation faces ‘economic challenges’ due to rising oil prices, the home mortgage crisis and a weakening job market.” Though Bush insisted he “recognize[d] the reality of the situation,” the White House has refused to say that the economy might be heading towards a recession.

And according to the calculator toting kind of people:

In a “controversial” report, Merrill Lynch “said that Friday’s employment report, which sent shares tumbling worldwide, confirmed that the US is in the first month of a recession.”

Bahhh! What would those financial type idiots know about this anyways? Well... They know they have plenty of money to toss at fighting presidential candidates that want to do something to help the little guy:

“Alarmed at the increasingly populist tone of the 2008 political campaign,” U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue said his organization “would spend in excess of the approximately $60 million it spent in the last presidential cycle” to defeat “anti-business” candidates.

Presidential candidates in particular have responded to the public concern. Former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina has been the bluntest populist voice, but other front-running Democrats, including Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, have also called for change on behalf of middle-class voters.

On the Republican side, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee - emerging as an unexpected front-runner after winning the Iowa caucuses - has used populist themes in his effort to woo independent voters, blasting bonus pay for corporate chief executives and the effect of unfettered globalization on workers.

While I would not lump Hillary Clinton into the populist candidate short list in any way shape or form, it is apparent that the Chamber of Commerce is part of a group of idiots that will try and make "Populist" the new "Liberal" smear from the rightards that got us in this mess.

Also, I am glad to see the recession hasn't stopped them from finding the dough to stomp on the poor people in their ongoing class war known as "The Great and Failed Republican Experiment" brought to you by your local and national GOP candidates, aided and abetted by spineless Democrats who had turned their back on the people, over the last 30 or so years...

We have a crippled Economy brought to you by precisely the kind of candidates and policies that the Chamber of Commerce would and do support, but they want to stop candidates that advocate real change?

John Edwards clearly fits into the long tradition of economic populism, and this is clearly a major reason why Versailles has done its very best to ignore him, and if it can't do that, to label him as angry, to write him off as "not serious," in some way. Obama, on the other hand, has repeatedly poked at post-1950s styled "progressives", often along the lines that they are somehow uncouth-a typical progressive complaint about populists. Edwards, in true populist style, is emphatic in demanding change, and stressing the urgency involved. Obama prefers to work incrementally. The two candidates are almost archetypal embodiements of populism and progressivism... except that Obama's followers rally around him like a populist tribune of the people. This is not unheard of. Teddy Roosevelt was one of the main progressive leaders of his day, and was clearly a political rock star. But Roosevelt was the exception that proves the rule. Most progressive leaders are restrained and cerebral, reflecting the normative difference between their tradition and that of the populists.

In fact I would argue the following:

(1) People are suffering from extreme wealth polarization, and related political neglect that has a wide range of manifestations. Edwards is a genuine economic populist speaking to this neglect, and because he is doing so, he is despised by the political establishment.

(2) However, this situation has developed over a long period of time, and has a rather complex and confusing overlay surrounding it, including several decades of distracting political debates, in which the Democrats traditional defense of the work class has largely been obscured, and the normal history of American politics, in which one party or the other dominates for long periods of time, has been forgoten. Barack Obama has taken advantage of this situation to substitute his own version of the elite/progressive narrative, which blames the situation on "gridlock," "polarization," and "politics as usual," casts both sides as similarly (if not equally) to blame, and demonizes populist anger, offering in its place a sanitized dionysian frenzy of ecstatic release.

(3) In short: Edwards is the real populist, but in today's world, you almost need to be a progressive scholar to appreciate just how deeply rooted his populism really is. Obama, on the other hand, is a classic progressive, who is playing the part of a populist to perfection, with none of that icky oppositional baggage that progressives always find so distressing. Obama's victory speech in Iowa was the perfect embodiment of cultural populism-it's model was not William Jennings Bryan's "Cross of Gold," but Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich , more recently channeled by the likes of Tony Robbins.

I am not a member of the Democratic party, not in any way shape or form, and I certainly do not suffer from "GOP delusions" about the differences between the candidates on the left. And I will continue to paint a clear and honest picture of where the Democratic candidates really stand, IMHO, in the hopes that the voters will make an informed choice based on facts... Regardless of whom they should choose as their candidate in the election cycle and, hopefully, with them disregarding the far-right wingnuts spin.

Hillary Clinton's 103 Delegate Lead Over Obama

While CNN is reporting a surge in support for Obama in New Hampshire (Connecticut Bob has more on New Hampshire Primaries), it is clear that he has a lot of ground to make up. From the "I shit you not!" files:

Barack Obama’s stirring victory in Iowa was also a good night for our democracy. The turnout broke records and young people - who were mobilized and organized - participated in unprecedented numbers. And now that Iowans have spoken - the first citizens in the nation to do so - here’s the Democratic delegate count for the top three candidates (2,025 delegates are needed to secure the nomination):

Clinton - 169

Obama - 66

Edwards - 47

“Huh?” you say. “vanden Heuvel, you made a MAJOR typo.”

In fact, those numbers are correct: the third-place finishing Sen. Hillary Clinton now has over twice as many delegates as Sen. Obama, and more than three times as many delegates as the second-place candidate, Sen. John Edwards. Why? Because the Democratic Party uses an antiquated and anti-democratic nominating system that includes 842 “super-delegates” - un-pledged party leaders not chosen by the voters, free to support the candidate of their choice, and who comprise more than forty percent of the delegates needed to win the nomination. Many have already announced the candidate they will support.

Oui over at BooMan Tribune offers this up in comments to help explain:

Superdelegates for Clinton (Undecided's No. 1)

(NYT/CBS News) Nov. 8, 2007 - In an early indication of where Democratic Party leaders are leaning, a survey of the party's superdelegates -- elected officials and other leaders who vote at the party's convention but are not selected in primaries -- found they are favoring Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York.

Created by the Democratic Party in 1984, superdelegates include members of Congress, governors, former presidents, Democratic National Committee members and other party leaders. There are 850 of them, which comprises nearly one-fifth of the overall delegate count. They can back any candidate they want and change their mind as often as they want.

... more than a third of the party's 850 superdelegates said they were undecided.

New York Times/CBS News Poll

The superdelegates are in no way bound by their stated preferences and dynamics in the race are likely to change.

Democrats' Superdelegates Unswayed

In the same comment threads idredit offers some food for thought on this issue brought up by Katrina vanden Heuvel:

The Super-delegates Issue:

"In a clear attempt to protect the party establishment, this undemocratic infrastructure was created following George McGovern's landslide defeat in 1972. It was designed to prevent a nominee who was "out of sync with the rest of the party," Northeastern University political scientist William Mayer told MSNBC. Democratic National Committee member Elaine Kamarck called it a "sort of safety valve."

MSNBC article - "What role for Democratic Super-delegates? - had this

Evidence of momentum

Building the appearance of momentum and inevitability is why Clinton and her rivals will gradually be unveiling their endorsements by super-delegates.

Howard Dean's momentum appeared unstoppable in the first weeks of 2004. Super-delegate Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa said emotionally a few days before his state's caucuses, "In my entire adult lifetime, I have never seen anyone broaden our party and bring people in and excite young people... like Governor Howard Dean." It was powerful testimony from a hard-nosed politician.

Dean had amassed the most super-delegates before the Iowa caucuses. But many had buyer's remorse and some abandoned him once he finished a weak third in Iowa.[.]

In the two weeks following the Iowa caucuses, 36 of 132 Dean's super-delegates peeled away from him; while John Kerry's tally jumped from 74 to 102."

So, Clinton beware!

I had never realized that the grassroots primary voter was relegated to only a 60% share of the vote in the Democratic primaries. It is so anti-Democratic in so many ways.

It is pretty clear that things can change, as far as the previous declarations of of intent by these "Super Delegates," but this is a system that needs to be tossed along with the conservative DLC types that would likely covet it as populism is on the rise.

[update] Welcome to Crooks and Liars, skippy the bush kangaroo, NYC Educator, American Street, NewstThief, House of the Rising Sons and Jabberwonk readers and please feel free to enjoy some fresh brews on me!

danvera notes in comments here that a movement of "Super Delegates" may already be happening:

"Clinton Machine Shaken by Setback"

The scope of Barack Obama's victory in Iowa has shaken the Clinton machine down to its bolts. Donors are panicking. The campaign has been making a round of calls to reassure notoriously fickle "superdelegates" — elected officials and party regulars who are awarded convention spots by virtue of their titles and positions — who might be reconsidering their decisions to back the candidate who formerly looked like a sure winner. And internally, a round of recriminations is being aimed at her chief strategist, Mark Penn, as the representative of everything about her pseudo-incumbent campaign that has been too cautious, too arrogant, too conventional and too clueless as to how much the political landscape has shifted since the last Clinton reign. One adviser summed up the biggest challenge that faces the campaign in two words: "Fresh thinking."

It should also be noted that with a third of the super delegates undecided when the NY Times took its poll (image ^^up there^^), there is a lot of wiggle room for movement on their support.

As well, Mike's Blog Roundup suggests reading one of my favorite Blogs' - The Strange Death of Liberal America - post titled "Can Barack Obama Pull Off a Woodrow Wilson?" as a companion piece to this one:

"In the aftermath of the Iowa Caucuses, Barack Obama’s stunning win has the pundits seeking parallels. The problem is they are all looking in the wrong places. They need to go back 100 years. In keeping with this blog’s reputation for original analysis, I offer a historical analogy that you will read here and nowhere else."

Sorry Liberal American... But you can read a snippet of it here too!

[update deux] The eggman runneth over at the Drudge Report with a screeching headline full of what must be right-wingnutty wishful thinking:

"TALK OF HILLARY EXIT ENGULFS CAMPAIGNS"

As I said... Screeching, BUT not a siren or flashing light in sight so I don't think that anyone could mistake that GOP wet-dream as anything more than non-news. (h/t Memeorandum) Even the right wing Captain's Quarters points out the obvious:

It didn't work with Fred Thompson, and it won't work with Hillary Clinton. Matt Drudge says that Hillary's considering withdrawing from the race if she loses big to Barack Obama in tomorrow's New Hampshire primaries -- a notion that makes even less sense for Hillary than Fred (...snip...) A flashing siren on Drudge won't be enough.

Maybe that is why Drudge didn't even bother with the siren... He has got to know that nobody will buy that story.

[update trois] Ken Layne at Wonkette seems to have captured the image of what was a fading siren by the time I read the story:

Have you ever seen a sadder Drudge Report Siren? Hillary can’t leave Matt, not after he’s been telling the world how she’s so smart and tough and the whole President Clinton Jr. thing is inevitable! Hang in there, Matt! Hillary might still be your Queen.

Too funny!


[update quatre] ABC gave a different breakdown of the decided Super Delegates:

Because super delegates are unpledged, they are under no obligation to state their preferences publicly before the convention. Counting super delegates is an inexact science, but this is the best estimate of the current state of play according to the super delegate responses we've received.

DELEGATES

Clinton 158

Obama 89

Edwards 26

Richardson 20

Dodd 15

Biden 8

Kucinich 1

Gravel 0

[update cinque] An explanation of how the Delegates are allocated, because it confused the heck out of Aristocrats, posted in 2003:

Delegate counts, super delegates

"The allocation of each state's delegates to each candidate is a bit murky, but in general it's apportioned by a complex series of formulas that kick in once a candidate crosses the 15% threshhold.

For example, this is how North Dakota allocates its delegates:

Here's how we compute the delegate count:

1. A candidate must receive 15% or more of the total popular vote to qualify for delegates. Discard those votes cast for candidates who do not qualify.
2. Allocate Congressional District delegates from the qualified vote in each district. Allocate Pledged PLEO and At-Large delegates using the statewide qualified vote.
3. In each jurisdiction:
1. Total qualified vote = total votes cast for the qualifying candidates in the jurisdiction.
2. Allocation = (delegates for the jurisdiction) x (candidate's popular vote) ÷ (total qualified vote).
3. Assign each candidate the WHOLE NUMBER of delegates.
4. If delegates remain, allocate each of the remaining delegates to those candidates with the LARGEST REMAINDERS.

If you can figure out what that formula means then you're a smarter person than me.

Super Delegates can vote for whomever they want, but they generally vote with the winner of the popular vote. It would be highly undemocratic and a breach of faith to subvert the will of the voters and push an alternate candidate itself. Now if we were to face a brokered convention, then all bets would obviously be off. But the chances of that happening, as exciting as it would be for political junkies like us, is practically nill."

When this was posted in 2003 Iowa had 45 delegates and 9 super delegates. Those numbers have likely changed since then.

[update six] AP had a different breakdown for before the Iowa Caucus:

Most superdelegates contacted by the AP before the Iowa caucuses were undecided. However, among those who have endorsed a candidate, Clinton leads with 160, compared to 59 for Obama and 32 for former Sen. John Edwards.

Even The Left Blogosphere Falls Into Media Traps

I very rarely have anything to disagree with over at TPM since they do such great work on many issues but in this case Josh Marshall critiques the Dem debate like a wolf with one leg caught in the right wing media trap:

John Edwards also had, I thought, a very strong debate, particularly in the latter half of the debate. He talks a lot about feeling this fight in his blood and being a fighter. And it's important when you say things like that that it really resonates in what you say, how you act, who you seem to be. And I think it did on every count. Unfortunately for Hillary, most of the eloquence and fire was directed at her tonight.

The exchange I noted earlier from around 9:30 PM was the emotional, dramatic crux of the evening. After that a lot of the energy seemed to be released from the discussion. Not in a bad way necessarily. I thought each of them had very good moments in the second half. But that was the crux of the debate, where the key points were enunciated, and each candidate defined.

In general, I think Obama's the winner tonight. I think Hillary made her case well. I think Edwards had the best debate. But the debate can only be understood in the context of the moment. Right now, Obama's on fire. The first post-Iowa polls show him picking up a big post-caucus bump. He needed to come off well. Not make any mistakes. And not let Hillary open up any strong line of attack against him.

Forgive me for noticing the fact that Edwards took the second spot in Iowa, and even you said he had the best debate showing, so I don't buy the media spin about the Obama/Hillary fight and neither should TPM. It seems to me that Obama had to worry more about not opening up any line of attacks from Edwards. But that line doesn't follow the media's pre-written script about pre-ordained candidates, which is nothing more than a trap that I will not fall into.

We expect more, and certainly better, from you than this at TPM.

A Little Tweety Hypocrisy on Obama and Edwards

Go back to the entire show and look at who comes on as the Obama representative right after this exchange...

Then he asks Elizabeth to differentiate between John and Barack Obama, and when she tries to play up John’s populist appeal, Tweety’s response is to denigrate trial lawyers as an undesirable interest group to be supporting Edwards’ campaign, even going so far as to blame trial lawyers for the lack of bartenders in Pennsylvania. Huh? Is he forgetting that Elizabeth Edwards was a trial lawyer herself? Watch how Elizabeth constantly tries to get Matthews to focus on John Edwards’ campaign and Tweety’s little mind flits elsewhere.

If you didn't notice, the next guest after this exchange was a trial lawyer supporting Obama. Yet... Not a word about that fact from Tweety.

Why not?

Why is it a horror story if a trial lawyer supports Edwards, but not even notable if the next guest introduced is a trial lawyer supporting Obama?

Note: I can't find the video of it OR the transcripts... But I am certain it is the case as I noticed it as soon as he introduced the Obama supporter right after the Elizabeth Edwards shtick... If you have the video of it somewhere, or the transcripts, please send it my way!

Will Clinton Be Third Wheel in Iowa?

Hillary Clinton's campaign may be bracing for this possibility:

As the presidential candidates engage in furious pre-caucus spin, one of Sen. Hillary Clinton's most prominent Iowa supporters said Wednesday that she's already accomplished what she needs to in Iowa and can declare success even if she finishes in third place.

Former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack told ABC News that Clinton has shown that she can appeal to a wide swath of Democrats, which is what she came to Iowa to do.

Sure... We are certain she was planning on this all along.

With Dennis Kucinich recently giving a codified endorsement to Barak Obama and Ralph Nader giving an endorsement to John Edwards - and depending on whether or not you give those endorsements any credibility - there is a possibility of Obama and Edwards getting a little more traction from the left.

I view this more as the reality that while the media had pre-ordained Queen Con as the Democratic party front runner from the get go, the people that actually vote in this - the democratic party members - have never bought the media propaganda and think of Hillary Clinton as something between a moderate conservative and a full blown Joe Neocon Lieberman wingnut Republican. Her biggest problem? She did very little to dispel that perception of herself both before and during the primary campaign. In fact, she seemed to try and re-enforce that perception with some of the idiotic votes, positions and statements.

Even with all of the campaign money in the world...
You cannot buy credibility.

Who Do You Endorse?

And why?

Blue Gal over at C&L gives a shortlist on Democratic endorsements:

• Blue Hampshire endorses Chris Dodd.
  
  
• The Nation endorses Dennis Kucinich.
  
  
• The SEIU Union is funding advertising for John Edwards.

There is absolutely nothing worth looking at over on the Republican side, as it is a foregone conclusion that they are picking a candidate to try and lose gracefully with. If they really wanted to win, and if they really wanted to bring the change that is demanded by the people, all of their candidates would be slamming George W. Bush for being the worst president ever in the history of the USA, and they would be running from his legacy, not trying to sweep it under the carpet by ignoring the last seven years as if bush didn't exist and they didn't support him. If they really wanted to win, Republicans would all sound like Ron Paul on the key issues of our time.

As it is, Republicans seem to be content to hand the reigns over to the Democratic party. And they seem more interested in trying to influence the Democratic party's choice of candidates through their media spin cycles.

All I know is that the happier the media is with a candidate, the more I know that candidate is a piece of junk. The media would be happy if they could turn the trick of getting the people to vote for another conservative Democratic candidate that would continue the Corporate successes, and people's failures, of the last few decades.

None of these candidates would give the media and their right wing corporate masters the full satisfaction they crave:

• Blue Hampshire endorses Chris Dodd.
  
  
• The Nation endorses Dennis Kucinich.
  
  
• The SEIU Union is funding advertising for John Edwards.

And so they will continue to be maligned by the media and the right wing lunatics on the fringe side of the internet. And make no mistake about this, the left Blogosphere is the truest representative of mainstream and populist ideals in America today.

We are are all about protecting your rights under the Constitution, and the GOP and conservatives in general are all against you and your rights. The GOP has led this country into the abyss of Corporatism:

In the recently released annual survey of worldwide privacy rights by Privacy International and EPIC, the United States has been downgraded from “Extensive Surveillance Society” to “Endemic Surveillance Society.” As Glenn Greenwald notes, this is “the worst possible category there is for privacy protections, the category also occupied by countries such as China, Russia, Singapore and Malaysia.” In general, “the 2007 rankings indicate an overall worsening of privacy protection across the world, reflecting an increase in surveillance and a declining performance of privacy safeguards.”

And the media, what used to be the Fourth Estate in the balance of power, has silently sat by and watched this happen.

The USA is now a Corporatist country with no more freedoms than some of the worst Communist offenders.

This is another of the very real end results of the "Great Republican Experiment" and you can thank the GOP and their partners in crime, the media and their punditocracy echo chamber of non news right wing ignorance, for the current downfall of the USA.

This is an unusually large excerpt from C&L's Barbara O'Brien from about a year ago:

A (Pretty) Short History of Wingnutism:
"By now you probably see where we’re going. “American Way” conservatism was the dominant political philosophy in the 1920s, and the nation was governed by its principles through the Harding and Coolidge administrations, from 1921 to 1929. Some historians call this decade “the Republican Era.” The vigorous progressivism of 1900-1916 was vanquished, and the labor union movement lost ground. In fact, the longer one looks at America in the 1920s, the more familiar it gets — corporate profits rising faster than worker earnings; a crackdown on immigration; culture wars led by an aggressive Christian fundamentalist movement; and tax cuts galore. If they’d had iPods back then, you’d hardly know the difference.

Of course, it would come to pass that the Republican who won the 1928 presidential election by a landslide, Herbert Hoover, was probably sorry he won. The stock market crashed in October 1929, which marked the beginning of the Great Depression. The Depression was caused by a number of interacting factors, and since it was a worldwide phenomenon you can’t blame the Republicans for all of it. But in the United States many of those factors were created, directly or indirectly, by “American Way” conservative policies. Among these factors were a wildly overheated stock market (security regulation was socialism, after all) and the maldistribution of wealth that resulted from laissez-faire business policies. Since President Herbert Hoover was a tried-and-true “American Way” conservative, he mostly was at a loss to solve the nation’s economic problems, even though he had almost all of his four-year term to do so. In 1932 the nation turned to a liberal Democrat, Franklin Roosevelt, to make things right.

Righties are quick to point out that the New Deal had a limited impact on the Depression, and that the nation’s economy didn’t really pull out of the slump until the industrialization of World War II — over which FDR also presided. (This is just one of many examples of righties taunting lefties for not cleaning up rightie messes they couldn’t clean up themselves; Iraq is another.) But New Deal programs had a longer-term success in fostering economic stability. Federal deposit insurance, unemployment insurance, Social Security, increased government oversight of securities, and other New Deal innovations made Americans’ economic lives more secure and created a buffer against many of the factors that cause economic depressions.

And considering that rightie counter-arguments to the New Deal usually advocate returning to the same governing philosophy that allowed the Depression to happen, you’ll forgive me if I don’t take them seriously.

Anyway, after the FDR landslide in 1932 it was clear the right wing had fallen from grace. Righties spent the rest of the 1930s seething with resentment and planning a comeback. And just when they had a shot at re-taking the White House — bam, World War II happened. And this made the American Right look doubly stupid, because for the most part righties in the 1930s were isolationists who had not only pooh-poohed the threat of the Third Reich but had actually admired Mussolini.

After World War II righties rebounded with a fury. They did this in large part by taking the issue of national security away from the Democrats. It’s important to understand that the Right managed this not because of anything they actually accomplished, but through a “compilation of hysterical charges and bald-faced lies,” to quote Kevin Baker in this Harper’s article, “Stabbed in the Back,” which I vigorously urge you to read.

Much of the Red Scare and McCarthyist hysteria of the late 1940s and 1950s were as much about slapping down liberals and Democrats as it was about national security. See the Kevin Baker article for details. See also Richard Hofstadter’s Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (Vintage/Random House, 1962), in particular pp. 41-42 (emphasis added):

The inquisitors were trying to give satisfaction against liberals, New Dealers, reformers, internationalists, intellectuals, and finally even against a Republican administration that failed to reserve liberal policies. What was involved, above all, was a set of political hostilities in which the New Deal was linked to the welfare state, the welfare state to socialism, and socialism to Communism. In this crusade Communism was not the target but the weapon, and it is for this reason that so many of the most ardent hunters of impotent domestic Communists were altogether indifferent to efforts to meet the power of International Communism where it really mattered — in the area of world politics."

Go read it. See if you can easily pick out the parallels to many of the problems of today, and maybe begin to realize that not only has "The Great Republican Experiment" failed miserably, but that now is not the first time it has failed miserably.

Which candidates truly represent a change in course from the decades of Conservative failure?

• Blue Hampshire endorses Chris Dodd.
  
  
• The Nation endorses Dennis Kucinich.
  
  
• The SEIU Union is funding advertising for John Edwards.

None of them are perfect candidates, but none of them exhibit the grossest of failures that the media presents as the top tier candidates on either side of "the conservative candidates list."

Each of them have voiced support for AND/OR led in the recent battles for the little guys.

And the media and their right wing corporate masters hate them, malign them, marginalize them, trivialize them and belittle them for that.

And there is your clue as to why, IMHO, they are the best candidates to lead this country out of the ashes of The Failed Republican Experiment.

DFA Dem Presidential Candidate Poll

Via Democracy For America:

Total Votes: 135268 as of Mon, 05 Nov 2007 12:37:45 -0500

Candidate	Votes	%
Dennis Kucinich	41941	31.01%
Al Gore (write in)	36590	27.05%
Barack Obama	19586	14.48%
John Edwards	18090	13.37%
Bill Richardson	6010	4.44%
Hillary Clinton	5355	3.96%
Other	2951	2.18%
Christopher Dodd	2370	1.75%
Joe Biden	1307	0.97%
Mike Gravel	1068	0.79%

VOTING IS STILL OPEN!! Polls close at midnight on November 5th, 2007. Cast your vote now at http://www.DemocracyforAmerica.com/PulsePoll

Vote Now - Time Is Almost Up

The final DFA Presidential Pulse Poll ends tonight at midnight Eastern Standard Time. That means you only have a few hours left to vote and make sure your voice is heard.

Today is a big day. With over 130,000 votes cast, the poll is already the largest presidential poll of progressive activists this year. Yet this isn't even close to over. Traditionally, tens of thousands of votes come in on the last day.

That means the winner is still very much up for grabs.

It is pretty obvious that my Blog (Drinking Liberally in New Milford) likes Dennis Kucinich because he is really the only liberal on that list, and a moderate liberal like myself, but you might be surprised that my second choice as a candidate would be Christopher Dodd because of the many strong stances he has taken on pet issues of mine. As a Senator, I have very little to quibble about concerning his votes. As a presidential candidate he has been responsive to the people's (and the Bloggers') serious concerns about the path this country has followed under the disastrous policies of the criminal bush administration.

I am not a Democratic party member, nor a huge supporter of that party overall either (much to the chagrin of some progressive Bloggers... heh), because there is no way in hell that they can afford to keep throwing conservative candidates on to their ballot (the ones that play the triangulation-faux-centrist games) and ever hope to fix what is wrong with this country. But that is only the Democratic party problem side of it.

Fixing it really starts by kicking every single GOP candidate out of office. The corrupt ones. The ones that hate the Constitution. The ones that trample on the Bill of Rights. The ones that have desecrated the principles of this country with torture, illegal invasions, lies and illegally spied on Americans. The ones that have been the embodiment of hatred, racism and done everything they can to divide this country in any way they can.

We, all of We the People, need to unite against these GOP atrocities.

I have said my little piece on this subject... But now it is your tun to go there, vote, and try to make a difference, because even little polls like this make a difference in shaping America's perception (sadly, this is true) of what the heart beat of America is drumming on about.