Newshoggers.com

President "Hamas' Worst Nightmare"

by Stacie

Comments like this make me seriously reevaluate McCain's foreign policy credentials. From a policy perspective, what does it mean when the Republican nominee announces that he will be the "worst nightmare" of a foreign political party? Hamas, like it or not (and I'm not thrilled about it) is a legitimate player in the mid east. Since under President McCain, we're going to have a substantial military presence in the region for the duration, how does this approach help anything?

I'm not saying they're going to be our buddies. Far from it, but antagonism of elected governments in the region doesn't exactly send a message of "we're from America and we're here to help." We are there to help, right?

His Holiness

by Stacie

I remember hearing George Bush refer to the Dalai Lama as "His Holiness," and I remember wondering if that was just one more offense that Bush's conservative Christian followers were supposed to shut up about. Answer: Yes, indeed.

Nominate me! Nominate me!

by Stacie

As I read Lanny Davis' Top 10 Reasons Why The Process The Democrats Use Is Insufficient Because Hillary Can't Win It (h/t Cole, see below), I thought exactly what I always think when a candidate, campaign, or party goes entirely off the deep end with the burning, burning stupid. I thought: Nominate Me!

So here's my Top 10 List of Undisputed Facts Showing Barack Obama's Weakness Against Me In The Primary Race.

10. He's beaten me in exactly zero head-to-head matchups so far this year.
9. My delegates are prettier.
8. White people don't like him. Haven't you heard? He's black.
7. I have truly amazing hair. Barack, though not balding as far as I can tell, has very little of the stuff. Not sure about body hair, though I'm proud to say that what little I have is also awesome.
6. No one's ever accused me of giving "whoop-de-doo speeches." That would hurt my feelings.
5. No Rezco scandal here. Like I could get a guy like that return my phone calls.
4. Barack Obama said that some small town Americans are bitter, and to prove this is false, the Clinton campaign now insists that those same people will never forgive such a use of language and wouldn't vote for the speaker. Dude, I think small-town Americans are frigging rock stars who never do anything out of bitterness or wrong-headedness. I'm just in a city because I like to make money, but I certainly don't think rural folks with their limited opportunities are bitter. That's just silly.
3. Just because he's like 1600 delegates ahead of me doesn't mean I can't pull it out.
2. I met a superdelegate once. I believe I have an inside track there.
1. Obama outspent me by exactly every penny he spent in the state of Pennsylvania, and I didn't die. I'm not dead. I'm still alive enough to write this list. Clearly he's a weak candidate.

Why can't Hillary beat him?

by Stacie

I'm pretty sure that John Cole is all the way done with Hillary Clinton.

Well, thanks for nothing Pennsylvania

by Stacie

I think Josh Marshall has it right when he calls today's situation "Status Quo Ante." Fester notes that, despite Clinton's win, her chances of securing the nomination diminished slightly last night. Her campaign appears to have settled on a strategy of raising doubts about Obama, and I think Obama now needs to make the case boldly that the math for Clinton doesn't work, that she's run a terrific campaign but can't win it, and that voters now need to shut the door on the primary and begin the general election.

Clinton can raise all the questions she wants about Obama, but what voters really need to hear is a couple of facts: she can't win, and she's only helping McCain now.

Obama won't say any of this, but the campaign needs dispatch its surrogates far and wide to every camera and every reporter with a pen and paper they can find and say it over and over again: The math doesn't work, she can't win, she's only helping McCain.

Clinton wins

by Stacie

And on it goes...

If only...

by Stacie

Is it just me, or is the entire Clinton campaign at this point predicated on the notion that if only... something were different, she'd already be president? Bill Clinton:

"If we were under the Republican system, which is more like the Electoral College, she'd have a 300-delegate lead here. I mean, Senator McCain is already the nominee because they chose a system to produce that result, and we don't have a nominee here, because the Democrats chose a system that prevents that result," he said.

Why John McCain sometimes supports campaign finance reform

by Stacie

This piece in the Times gives a very good view of the type of people who latch into the current money system of politics, and why. McCain bundler, friend, and longtime supporter Donald Diamond is very clear that when he makes contributions, he wants a return on his investment, and clearly, the land developer has gotten just that.

Mr. Diamond is close to most of Arizona’s Congressional delegation and is candid about his expectations as a fund-raiser. “I want my money back, for Christ’s sake. Do you know how many cocktail parties I have to go to?”

On the one hand, I agree that McCain was engaging in constituent services, although it sounds like in at least one instance, his aides went above and beyond to ensure good terms for a Diamond investment. On the other, when I contact my senators, I'm lucky if I receive a form letter loosely related to the topic weeks later that's more spin than substance. But one difference between Donald Diamond and myself is a lot of zeroes in a bank balance, and I would be stupid to think that I would warrant the same consideration.

I think it's a bit dim to think that McCain actually plays the game that differently from the rest of the members of the senate, and articles like this rightly chip away at his "maverick" persona, but I continue to believe that McCain is fundamentally less corrupt than some in that body and does actually care about appearances, which is refreshing. But the political world is filled with men like Donald Diamond who use money to build relationships that ultimately favor them heavily. McCain uses them just like everyone else does. And is used in return.

The politics junkie thinks of primary day

by Stacie

I will give you conventional wisdom in three bullet points:

• Clinton must win PA
• If Clinton wins PA by +10 points, she remains -- somehow -- credible
• Nearly all polls put her not quite that much ahead

If you still believe in Santa Claus, you are welcome to hold out hope that Obama can sneak a victory in, but don't hold your breath. Unfortunately, this thing isn't likely to end today.

Clinton has done a truly remarkable job of convincing reporters and voters that she still somehow has a shot at the nomination. Neither would have given a lesser candidate such consideration, so the simple fact that she remains is a testament to her argument that she is a fighter. She is indeed.

Perhaps Obama can be criticized for not being able to put this away, all the way, today. I'm unsure whether traipsing through Pennsylvania with a math-based argument would have played with voters, but Clinton's brilliant line of attack, charging that Obama "doesn't want people to vote," short-circuited any try he may have made with that. I'm sure that John Edwards is even now cursing the evil leaders of the race who didn't want people to vote. And Dennis Kucinich. And Bill Richardson. And on and on. (Remember when there were 400 Democrats running for president?)

So what from here? Clinton will get a good drubbing in Indiana and North Carolina on May 6, but the press will (somehow) accept the argument that neither state is important, and she will continue playing the traditional role of veep for John McCain -- the vicious attack dog throwing everything and the kitchen sink at his opponent, hoping beyond hope that superdelegates decide at the end of it that she's the last one standing. It's an ugly, ugly strategy, and I hope beyond hope that it doesn't work.

Pondering PA

by Stacie

A thousand apologies if you're bored with primary race handicapping. I'm a little bored with it myself, and it doesn't appear that the voters of Pennsylvania will bless the rest of America with a conclusion to the primary tomorrow.

Josh has loads of polls up -- here, for instance, but really, TPM is polling central today and rightly so. All but one suggest a solid but not huge Clinton lead, meaning that my hopes for Wednesday's concession speech are almost certainly not going to happen.

Dan Balz tells WaPo readers that, "Her campaign has the aura of a march toward inevitable disappointment," which is my take on it as well, but that doesn't appear to have persuaded Pennsylvanians to force her to throw in the towel. Slate gives us a blow-by-blow of Obama's closing argument, which is worth a read, but here's mine:

Dear Pennsylvania,

The math doesn't work. Hillary Clinton will almost certainly not be the nominee for the Democratic Party in 2008. She is too far behind in delegate totals, and her strategy at this point is to entice elites to overrule the voting public and to finagle a last minute rule change regarding Michigan and/or Florida, rules which she pledged to support earlier in the cycle. It reeks of horrible. Make it stop.

Kthxbye.

Stacie

Obama's actual close is a little better, but at the end of it all, I think my argument is the correct one (I would think that...). If Clinton almost certainly can't gain the nomination, she is serving only to assist McCain by being one tine in a pincer move against the Democratic nominee. Pennsylvania Democrats: we have to win in November. You can end this bloodletting. You should.