Politics News

Ernie Fitzpatrick asked:


We’ve had a sub-prime meltdown in the market that’s led to a financial markets meltdown, but the Feds are giving away money to prevent a Wall Street meltdown. So, here’s the question of the day. Is there anything that can be done to prevent a complete Clinton meltdown. Or is it too late for a modern day resurrection?

On the West coast it was Bill Clinton doing his red-faced, finger-pointing, and neck vein exploding act! Bubba was on the West coast trying to woo some super delegates. But guess what happened?

According to those at the meeting, Clinton, who flew in from Chicago with bags under his eyes, was classic old Bill at first, charming and making small talk with the 15 or so delegates who gathered in a room behind the convention stage. But as the group moved together for the perfunctory photo, Rachel Binah, a former Bill Richardson delegate who now supports Hillary Clinton, told Bill how “sorry” she was to have heard former Clinton campaign manager James Carville call Richardson a “Judas” for backing Obama.

It was as if someone pulled the pin from a grenade! That’s Bubba again.

“Five times to my face (Richardson) said that he would never do that,” a red-faced, finger-pointing Clinton erupted. The former president then went on a tirade that ran from the media’s unfair treatment of Hillary to questions about the fairness of the votes in state caucuses that voted for Obama. It ended with him asking delegates to imagine what the reaction would be if Obama was trailing by just 1 percent and people were telling him to drop out.

“It was very, very intense,” said one attendee. “Not at all like the Bill of earlier campaigns.” Bill just isn’t himself these days of is it that the Democrats never saw the real bill, the kill Bill personality that Dick Morris has mentioned that he had experienced: even having been tackled by Bubba!

Back on the East side of the country, it seems as though Hillary was having a poll meltdown in Pennsylvania. On Tuesday it was reported that her one-time 26 point lead which had dropped to 15 points a month ago was now just 5 points according to a Rasmussen poll.

But on Wednesday the latest Public Policy Polling survey had Obama up 45-43%! That’s a major meltdown for Hillary and major Obama momentum!

But of course we have almost three more weeks in which anything can happen! While the numbers are nbot out, nor official, it appears that Obama kept his advertising budget lead with what’s rumored to be $30 million to $20 million advantage for March donations. We’ll know officially in a few more days.

Meltdown does seem like a proper description of the overall Clinton campaign.

Ernie Fitzpatrick asked:


There’s a big debate in tinsle-town tonight and the TWO BIG GUNS get to square off at each other and I am sure they will. Hillary needs to regain some MO as in momentum. The uncontested win in Florida where no delegate seats were up for grabs didn’t get Hillary anything but a few minutes of TV exposure. The South Carolina landslide is still sliding for Barack Obama- even past the Ted Kennedy kudos!

If you wondered whether if the Barack-Star could compete for the Super Tuesday sweepstakes. Think no longer! $32,000,000.00 says he can!

Barack Obama raised $32 million in the single month of January, matching his best three-month period last year, aides said Thursday. The money positions Obama for the sweeping Feb. 5 primary contests, when 22 states will be in play for the Democratic nomination. Aides also announced that with their money they can now advertise in states beyond the Super Tuesday.

Obama is advertising in all but two of the Feb. 5 states and plans to begin advertising in states with upcoming contests, including Louisiana, Washington, Nebraska, Maine, Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C.

Campaign manager David Plouffe said the campaign attracted 170,000 new donors for a total of 650,000 donors overall.

“We think that the strength of our financial position and the number of donors does speak to financial sustainability if it ends up going through March and April,” Plouffe said of the race. “We think we will have the financial resources to conduct vigorous campaigns in the states to come.”

And one of those contributors came from Hillary’s home state of New York.

The late New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan threw his considerable political weight behind Hillary Clinton, helping her win her Senate seat from a state where she had never lived, but that hasn’t deterred his widow from backing Hillary’s rival Barack Obama for 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.

In a statement e-mailed to David Axelrod, a senior adviser to Obama, Elizabeth B. Moynihan attributed her support for Obama to Caroline Kennedy Schlosberg’s Times Op-Ed article where JFK’s daughter endorsed Barack Obama, as well as her own displeasure with Bill and Hillary Clinton’s recent hostility toward Obama’s candidacy. You just never know what one person’s endorsement might bring.

Mrs. Moynihan wrote that her husband, who died in 2003, “would have become excited, as I have, to see Barack Obama rekindle hope in our young as he encourages them to participate in the political process, and I know Pat would approve, applaud and encourage me to join Caroline Kennedy in supporting Barack Obama’s candidacy for the Democratic nomination for president. It is a rare gift to be able to inspire people to share a vision that requires commitment and dedication.

Barack should be all smiles before the debate tonight. We’ll have to wait until the debate is over to see if he’s still smiling. With John Edwards out for the Democrats (and Rudy for the Republicans) the stage is really small now for tonights Democratic debate.

James William Smith asked:


Barack Obama’s candidacy for the Democratic Presidential nomination has struggled throughout 2007 in the public opinion polls because his campaign has not developed a clear, focused message that provides Democratic voters with a reason to vote for him.

Obama has raised over thirty million dollars for his campaign during the first six months of the year and has considerable popular, grass root support, so the resources are available to deliver the message. But what is the message? Should Democrats vote for Obama and cross their fingers and hope?

Consider this from Barack Obama in February of 2007 at a Democratic National Committee Meeting: “There are those who don’t believe in talking about hope,” Obama told the crowd. “They say, Well, we want specifics, we want details, and we want white papers, and we want plans. We’ve had a lot of plans, Democrats. What we’ve had is a shortage of hope. And over the next year, over the next two years, that will be my call to you.”

In July, as the polls began to show Obama falling further behind Hillary Clinton, Davis Plouffe ( Barack Obama’s campaign manager) had this to say in a letter to reassure campaign contributors. “One of our opponents is also the quasi-incumbent in the race, who in our belief will and should lead just about every national poll from now until the Iowa caucuses. Expect nothing different and attach no significance to it. It is clear you did not in this past quarter and we would encourage everyone to keep our sights focused on doing well in the early primaries and caucuses, and then using our organizational advantage nationally to clinch the nomination in February.”

The fact is that the “quasi-incumbent” that Plouffe referred to was Hillary Clinton, who in some public opinion polls had a nearly forty percent unfavorable rating with Democratic voters. It also should also be pointed out that there is no discussion by Plouffe of the Obama message or the strategy to get that message out.

In a column in July 2007, by David Paul Kuhn, Obama campaign advisors outline the strategy of their campaign as being modeled after insurgency campaigns like that of Ronald Reagan. As Obama pollster Cornell Belcher said of Reagan “Now, it is blasphemy for Democrats, but that hope and optimism that was Ronald Reagan allowed him to “transcend” ideological divisions within his own party and the general electorate.”

It is true that Reagan projected hope and optimism. However, Reagan got elected with a clear message of smaller government, lower taxes, and less government bureaucracy. At the time that message was called the “Reagan Revolution.”. It should be pointed out that once again beside “hope” there is no discussion by Belcher of the Obama message or the strategy to get that message out.

In August, with John Edwards attacking Hillary Clinton for taking campaign contributions from Rupert Murdoch, (We later found out that John Edwards made $800,000 on his last book deal from a Murdoch publisher. ) the Obama campaign decided that their candidate was an outsider who was going to clean up Washington. Here is how that turned out (from the Associated Press): Democrat Barack Obama, who says he swims in “the same muddy water” of lobbyists and fundraising that corrupts Washington, is pledging to reform the system if elected President. “I have a bunch of friends who were state lobbyists. The fact of the matter is … I played poker with them, so I don’t think that lobbyists are evil,” said the first-term Illinois senator. “I just think they’ve got an agenda and you got to be clear about that, and not pretend that they don’t. Why else are they getting hired and making all this money unless they’re actually getting something done?”

If you were a Democratic voter and wanted to see real reform in Washington, D.C. would that message from Barack Obama be a catalyst for you to vote for him in 2008?

Also, consider that after attacking Hillary Clinton for months over her vote in the Senate to support the war in Iraq, Obama had this to say about Pakistan: “There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al Qaeda leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.”

It sounds like Obama who has called for an immediate withdrawal from Iraq would be in favor of invading Pakistan. If you were a Democratic voter and wanted to see an immediate end to the hostilities in Iraq, would this message about Pakistan, from Barack Obama be a catalyst for you to vote for him in 2008?

The early 2007 strategy of the campaign was apparently to capitalize on Obama’s star qualities with the American public. The campaign would use Obama’s book , “ The Audacity of Hope” to formulate a positive message of “hope” that would be delivered by Barrack’s gifted oratorical abilities to audiences that were longing for a fresh new face in Washington, D.C. The campaign would raise a lot of money and spend much of it in the early primaries to insure victories that would create a “domino” effect in other primaries and propel Barrack Obama to the Democratic nomination. However, as the year progressed, the fresh new face began to look like a politically inexperienced fresh new face to potential Democratic voters. To counter that impression of political inexperience, we are now seeing his campaign search for a message for voters to consider beside hope. Searching for a message in the middle of the campaign can become a painful experience for a candidate on election night.

The result of this campaign strategy can be seen in the latest polling data. Barrack Obama trails Hillary Clinton by twenty two percent nationwide and has now fallen behind Clinton in the early primary states of Iowa and South Carolina .

Throughout 2007, Barack Obama’s political campaign has been based solely on a message of hope. In an insurgency campaign facing a formidable opponent, the candidate needs a message that has much more audacity than that.

James William Smith asked:


Political pundits are beginning to sense an end to the Presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton. Last week Peggy Noonan wrote a column questioning how gracious Hillary Clinton would be in defeat. This week Dick Morris predicted an eventual nomination victory for Barack Obama and the end of the pursuit of the White House by the former First Lady.

So are these pundits correct? Is the race for the Democratic party nomination over? Will it in fact be Barack Obama and John McCain in a race for the White House in the fall? Since at this point in the campaign it is all about the delegate count, let’s look at the possibilities.

The delegate count after last night’s Potomac Primaries is still very close with Obama leading Clinton by just 67 delegates (1242 to 1175) according to CBS News. The magic number for the Democratic Party Presidential nomination is 2025. Nevertheless the campaign of Hillary Clinton certainly appears to be in big trouble.

Hillary Clinton has lost every primary and caucus since Super Tuesday and her prospects for victory are slim for the rest of the month of February. She has loaned her campaign five million dollars according to various news reports. Her senior staff has been working without pay and her campaign is currently raising half of the amount of new campaign funds on a daily basis in comparison to the campaign of her opponent. She has just replaced her campaign manager.

The Clinton current campaign strategy is to conserve money and concede the remaining state primaries in February to Obama. The campaign is concentrating on winning the remaining primaries in March, April, and May. This would give Barack Obama substantial victories in all the remaining primaries in February (Hawaii, Wisconsin, and Washington). It should give him about 1300 total delegates on March 1, 2008.

This February election result would insure that Clinton would trail Obama by around 90 - 100 delegates entering the March 4, 2008 primary contests of Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, and Vermont. She will have not beaten Obama in a primary or caucus for a month. To remain in the race, Clinton would need victories approaching 60% of the vote in every remaining state except Mississippi in the month of March. If she somehow pulled this result off she would have about 1436 delegates on April 1, 2007. Obama would win about 165 delegates and his total would be 1465. The dubious news for Hillary Clinton is that Obama would still remain ahead at the end of March in delegates even if Clinton ran the table in March and won each contest (except Mississippi) by a 60-40% margin.

In April, 151 delegates will be at stake in the state of Pennsylvania. Let’s assume that Hillary Clinton wins that state with 60% of the vote and captures the same proportion of delegates. Her delegate total would be 1556 to Obama’s 1522, giving her a slight lead in delegate count. There would be 214 remaining delegates for the candidates to battle for during the primaries in the month of May.

Therefore, for Hillary Clinton to regain the lead on pledged delegates from Obama, she needs to win all the primaries (except Mississippi) with at least 60% of the vote in March and April. She needs to win the primaries in Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont, Wyoming, and Pennsylvania. She needs to achieve these primary victories with 60% or more of the vote. She will be outspent by the Obama campaign since he is raising more money. She also needs to produce these victories after a month of non-stop primary losses. Clinton also must realize that this is the same dubious strategy that did not turn out well for Republican Rudy Giuliani at the beginning of the 2008 election season. Based on all these factors, her chance to secure the Democratic Party nomination at this point look like a long shot indeed.

It is true that there are still about 500 remaining Democratic Party super delegates that remain uncommitted to any candidate. These delegates are Democratic party members and insiders. The problem for Hillary Clinton is that these delegates will quickly jump aboard the campaign that looks like a winner during March. After the primaries on March 4, 2008, if Obama is still ahead by at least 100 delegates and has won most of the state primaries and caucuses ( he has won 23 of the 35 to date), the super delegates will begin to endorse him in significant numbers and the Democratic race will be all but over.

The fact is that Obama has been endorsed by too many Democratic party regulars to be a victim of a back room deal that would have most of the remaining super delegates endorse Hillary Clinton. Also, the Democratic party will be careful not to allow insiders to appear to overturn the actual voting results of the primary states. However, in a last desperate attempt to stave off defeat, Hillary Clinton will probably try to use the disqualified delegates in the Michigan and Florida primaries to her advantage. These delegates were disqualified because each state moved its primary forward in the 2008 election calendar. As a result of breaking party rules the states delegates are not currently included in the delegate totals of either candidate.

In general, Hillary Clinton has to hope she can stop Obama’s political momentum very soon. Indeed, it now looks like she will be behind by nearly 100 delegates after all the February primaries are finished. One hundred delegates is a dangerous number to be trailing in this election year with the Democratic Party rule of proportionate allocation of the vote for each states delegates. Her only remaining hope is to run the table with big (twenty percentage point) wins in all the remaining primaries during the months of March, April, and May. However, her campaign’s last stand may well turn out to be on March 4, 2008 in either Ohio or Texas.

It is interesting to see how things can change so quickly in politics. Six months ago, Hillary Clinton was the candidate of inevitability and Barack Obama was the candidate of hope. In February 2008, each candidate’s prospects for the Democratic Presidential nomination are now exactly the reverse.