Friday’s campaign round-up

March 28, 2008

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:

* Barack Obama picked up a very helpful endorsement today, earning the support of Sen. Bob Casey (D) of Pennsylvania, “a move that could help the presidential candidate make inroads with white working-class voters dubbed “Casey Democrats” in the Keystone State…. Casey is scheduled to join Obama in Pittsburgh Friday and campaign with him as Obama travels by across Pennsylvania by bus.” Most of the Democratic establishment in the state, including Gov. Ed Rendell and Rep. John Murtha, are backing Hillary Clinton.

* Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt.), an Obama supporter, was rather blunt on Vermont Public Radio this morning: “There is no way that Senator Clinton is going to win enough delegates to get the nomination. She ought to withdraw and she ought to be backing Senator Obama. Now, obviously that’s a decision that only she can make frankly I feel that she would have a tremendous career in the Senate.”

*During a taping yesterday of the ABC talk show, “The View,” Obama conceded that he would have left his church if Jeremiah Wright had stuck around. “Had the reverend not retired, and had he not acknowledged that what he had said had deeply offended people and were inappropriate and mischaracterized what I believe is the greatness of this country, for all its flaws, then I wouldn’t have felt comfortable staying at the church,” he said.

* Bill Clinton believes his wife would be doing great if it weren’t for all of those caucus states. “Right now, among all the primary states, believe it or not, Hillary’s only 16 votes behind in pledged delegates,” the former president told ABC News, “and she’s gonna wind up with the lead in the popular vote in the primary states. She’s gonna wind up with the lead in the delegates [from primary states]. It’s the caucuses that have been killing us.”

* DNC Chairman Howard Dean is getting impatient. ”You do not want to demoralize the base of the Democratic Party by having the Democrats attack each other,” he told the AP. ”Let the media and the Republicans and the talking heads on cable television attack and carry on, fulminate at the mouth. The supporters should keep their mouths shut about this stuff on both sides because that is harmful to the potential victory of a Democrat.”

* On a related note, Dean doesn’t want superdelegates waiting to decide which candidate to support until August. ”There is no point in waiting,” he said. This morning, he added that he is eyeing a July 1 deadline.

* Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) is getting impatient, too: “I think it’s very difficult to imagine how anyone can believe that Barack Obama can’t be the nominee of the party. I think that’s a foregone conclusion, in my view, at this juncture given where things are. But certainly over the next couple of weeks, as we get into April, it seems to me then that the national leadership of this party has to stand up and reach a conclusion. And in the absence of doing that — and that’s not easy and I realize it’s painful — but the alternative, allowing this sort of to fester over the months of June and July and August, I think are irresponsible. I think you have to make a decision, and hopefully the candidates will respect it and people will rally behind a nominee that, I think, emerges from these contests over the next month.”

* Sounds good to me: “Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton said in an interview on Wednesday that if elected president she would push for a universal health care plan that would limit what Americans pay for health insurance to no more than 10 percent of their income, a significant reduction for some families. In an extensive interview on health policy, Mrs. Clinton said she would like to cap health insurance premiums at 5 percent to 10 percent of income.”

* InsiderAdvantage, a Republican pollster, shows Obama leading Clinton in North Carolina, 49% to 34%.

* The Clinton campaign has said, on a few occasions, that Obama may have taught constitutional law, but he’s lying when he says he was a “professor.” The University of Chicago Law School has finally weighed in, explaining that Obama really was considered a “professor,” though “not full-time or tenure-track.” (What’s more, the law school invited Obama “to join the faculty in a full-time tenure-track position, but he declined.”)

Billary: “It’s the caucuses that have been killing us.”

And tomorrow we finish the job in Texas.

Buh Bye!

  • Nice job Bill. Keep speaking and wasting your capital. Hard to remember a time when, despite his dalliances, still commanded my respect. Now he just looks like another opportunist, willing to take whatever money, power, and sex is offered to him from anyway.

    Way to point out that even without those pesky unimportant caucus states that your wife is still losing.

    ‘If you didn’t count some of those times when she lost, she’d be loosing by less.’

    Time to muzzle the big dog again, Hills.

    What a shame.

  • July 1 sounds like a good enough deadline.

    Even South Dakota & Montana superdelegates can divvy up based on actual results…

  • The Clinton campaign has said, on a few occasions, that Obama may have taught constitutional law, but he’s lying when he says he was a “professor.”

    Oh boy! Another exciting installment of ‘Semantics with the Clintons!’ Today, we learn what ‘professor’ and ‘sniper fire’ mean.

  • At the risk of offending Dean, whom I admire on many grounds, I just have to say it: the Clintons really are disgusting. The road to that conclusion, from my early enthsiastic support of them prior to his first term, has been long and hard … and one way, I’m afraid.

  • Oh boy! Another exciting installment of ‘Semantics with the Clintons!’ Today, we learn what ‘professor’ and ’sniper fire’ mean.

    Shucks, I’m still in the remedial class trying to figure out “is.”

  • Astute politicians have a knack for knowing when a situation has turned against them and being able to use that politically to their advantage. I don’t see this prescience with either Hillary nor Bill. The longer they postpone the inevitable the more damage they do to their political power and prestige. It’s time to make lemonade out of lemons and Pat Leahy has the right take on the situation: being a powerhouse in the Senate and a perpetually influential voice in the party isn’t such a bad career. She can be like Bush and spend her political capital now, or she can make a capital investment and continue to reap political rewards for some time to come. Hillary is at the zenith of her career and she can either stay at this height or endure a precipitous fall. It is preferable to go out on your own terms than to be told unequivocally to get the hell out. I’m beginning to think she isn’t such a savvy politician after all.

  • I live in WA state, and in the caucus, which was held in a tiny room, at a certain time, on a certain day, Obama won by a huge percentage. In the primary votes, which don’t count for delegats in any way, Obama won by less than 3%.

    Tell me how caucuses are a true reflection of voters again?

  • Obama conceded that he would have left his church if Jeremiah Wright had stuck around. “Had the reverend not retired, and had he not acknowledged that what he had said had deeply offended people…

    I’m sorry, but stating that he would have left the church had these things not come to pass after they had already happened is about as disengenuous as saying that he would not have voted for the Iraq war had he been in the US Senate.

    Anybody can say what they would have done, but what is more important is what he did or did not do when he had the information that he had.

    “Right now, among all the primary states, believe it or not, Hillary’s only 16 votes behind in pledged delegates” – Bill Clinton

    This is certainly true, I’ve been saying this now for weeks. It’s also important to note that the Caucus delegates in most states have yet to be actually awarded, what you see on the MSM outlets are estimates.

    “I think it’s very difficult to imagine how anyone can believe that Barack Obama can’t be the nominee of the party. I think that’s a foregone conclusion, in my view, at this juncture given where things are. – Chris Dodd

    Dodd, just because you couldn’t compete very well in this race doesn’t give you a right to tell Clinton when to get out, you are part of the problem and not part of the solution, so shut up already.. besides, the latest polls show that only 20% of people want HRC to drop out, and 50% wanting her to stay in.

    InsiderAdvantage, a Republican pollster, shows Obama leading Clinton in North Carolina, 49% to 34%.

    This will change as the primary gets closer, polls generally do.. but I actually can’t find this poll on their website (not the one that CB linked, but the actual website for InsiderAdvantage). If somebody could please post a link that would be helpful.

  • At the risk of offending Dean, whom I admire on many grounds, I just have to say it: the Clintons really are disgusting. The road to that conclusion, from my early enthsiastic support of them prior to his first term, has been long and hard … and one way, I’m afraid.

    Between Dean and Leahy, I have to say I’m feeling really proud of my state today. And not for the first time! Pretty sure the Clintons are way at the top of Dean’s personal shit list, so I’m sure he’d love nothing more than to just shoot her campaign down. But political necessity being what it is …

    And on a lighter note, how long until the Clinton campaign pounces on Obama’s turning down a tenure track job at the University of Chicago as further proof of the ambition that’s consumed him since kindergarten?

  • 5-10% of income ain’t so great if the coverage stinks or the insurer denies coverage (a distinct possibility with her (and Obama’s) subsidized private provider plan)

    And 5-10? can we narrow it down some?

    Lastly, is she prepared to decline coverage for some costly procedures because it would exceed the 10% ceiling she has put in place?

    I’m not saying it’s a bad idea, but we need to understand the consequences.
    The current system (get super sick then check in at the E.R.) is no picnic, I agree.

  • Dean is right on all counts, as usual. He does have a way with words doesn’t he?
    “Fulminate” is priceless. Telling supporters to “shut up” won’t win him any brownie points, but he is right.
    Leahy, like many of us in Vermont, is blunt. He, too, is right.
    We need to move on before this goes too far. Those of us who voted for Sen. Clinton (myself included) need to suck it up, put our disappointment behind us and focus on solidarity in order to salvage the election. If I am getting worried, Dr. Dean must be spitting bullets.

  • Dodd, just because you couldn’t compete very well in this race doesn’t give you a right to tell Clinton when to get out, you are part of the problem and not part of the solution, so shut up already. -Greg

    Dodd is definitely not part of the problem. Dodd is fighting for our rights against the Bush administration and the telecoms, something which Hillary couldn’t even be bothered to show up for. He is consistently one of the good guys. So, with all due respect, you shut up already.

    This is certainly true, I’ve been saying this now for weeks. -Greg

    Oh, wow, you’ve been using a dishonest metric for weeks, and now Billy Boy has picked up on it. Oh boy. Show of hands for who cares? No one? Really? You in the back..no? Okay.

    Caucuses count. Get over it.

  • In academia, a person is not considered a professor unless they hold an appointment as a professor, generally tenure track and full time, although there are some “visiting” and “emeritus” professor appointments. Calling himself a professor is very misleading because that term is generally reserved for those with full-time permanent, tenure-track appointments — the members of an academic faculty at a university. Obama would surely know that. It does not matter whether he was offered and declined such a position. Teaching part-time does not make you a professor. Further, the academic ladder starts at Assistant Professor, then Associate Professor, and finally Full Professor (the folks who are called simply Professor), but the general public glosses those distinctions and refers to all ranks as simply Professor.

    Students frequently call their teachers professors, even when they do not have an appropriate degree or are in part-time and temporary positions, but no one expects students to understand the nuances of academic titles. Obama can be expected to know them, so when he calls himself a professor, he IS misrepresenting his position. Because of the difficulty acquiring such a title legitimately, it is a serious breach of academic etiquette to claim such a title without having earned it. Obama is inflating his experience more egregiously than Clinton did when she claimed to have landed under fire in Bosnia (where Obama never landed at all).

    Cue the various academics supporting Obama who will all now state in a chorus that they don’t mind it when people claim academic honors they haven’t earned because “what’s in a title…an Obama by any other name would smell as sweet”.

  • Obama is inflating his experience more egregiously than Clinton did when she claimed to have landed under fire in Bosnia (where Obama never landed at all).

    WHAT? She flat out and repeated lied about getting shot at and he calls himself a professor, at worst a resume embellishment, which the school itself doesn’t find contentious, and you make this claim? There is no line of absurdity you will not cross, is there? That was rhetorical; we all know full well what the answer is.

  • Tonya the Monster, Bill “Big Dog” Gillooly, Howard Wolfson Eckardt, James Carville-Stant, and several of their fellow expedition members are now thigh-deep in quicksand. Some of them are holding machetes, others are holding spears. Some are holding lead pipes, others kitchen sinks.

    But the harder they try to get out of their predicament, the more they sink.

    Perhaps once they’re neck-deep in the muck they’ll stop struggling, give up the fight, and ask for forgiveness and help.

  • Students frequently call their teachers professors, even when they do not have an appropriate degree or are in part-time and temporary positions, but no one expects students to understand the nuances of academic titles.

    Assuming everything you say is true, you’re suggesting that Obama not use the term that everyone in the real world is familiar with, but instead such focus on the official title that no one except people in the academic world would understand? Right. Look, I’ve been to several colleges, including community colleges and the university I eventually graduated from, and I’ve always called every teacher a “professor”. Every single one. Everyone does. Perhaps in academia, you guys make a big distinction. But in the real world, someone who teaches at that level is called a professor. I’m sure his students referred to him as Professor Obama or just Professor.

    So this is considered fraud for him to use that term to describe what he did? I’m sorry, but the purpose of our language is to communicate, and that means that people should use the words that best convey the message being given. And if Barack had a job that almost everyone in America would call “professor” then there’s nothing wrong with him using that word. And no, this is not the equivalent of Hillary repeatedly claiming to have gone into Bosnia as part of some dangerous mission when she was really doing public relations. You can insist otherwise, but no one really listens to you anyway.

    But in any case, I’d rather have someone use the technically incorrect word that best conveys the message than the technically correct word that confuses people. That’s the reason words change meaning over time. They’re designed to convey ideas; not make academics feel better about themselves. I don’t know whether or not Barack deserved to use the term “professor” in an academic setting, but in the real world, that was definitely the proper word.

  • Time to muzzle the big dog again, Hills.

    I foresee a divorce within the next few years. She stayed with him so she could use his star power to win the presidency; his participation has proved a spectacular failure.

    I’m of two minds on this: Perhaps deep down he really doesn’t want her to win. He’s not a stupid man; he’s got to know the things he says are doing more harm than good. If this is the case, his motives are unclear at this point.

    Or it could be that he’s the reason she refuses to drop out. He’s pushing her to keep fighting because he desperately wants to move back into the White House and act as the de facto vice president (because you’ve got to know that the de jure veep will be marginalized to an extent not seen since LBJ, Humphrey and Agnew.)

    This course of action will hurt her in the long run by alienation. If she’s seen as the torpedo that sunk Obama’s chances in the general, she’ll be persona non grata within the Dem establishment. She could say good bye to any significant Senate leadership role.

    The second scenario is more likely, but in any event a divorce is looming. Mark my words.

    (Hey, three Latin phrases in one comment. That’s got to be today’s record so far.)

  • As a college educated white male, I look forward to an Obama Presidency for reasons of both Heart and Mind. And while I am tired of living in the United States of Halliburton, I will not and cannot vote for Clinton. If by some chance Senator Obama does not get the nomination, I will again vote for Ralph Nader. I know many of you will complain. But, it is a matter of principle. I truly don’t see a difference between Billary and the Republicans, except on a superficial level. There are way too many bodies buried in the Clinton’s path to power. Voting for yet another compromised politician is not going to help this country. The Obama campaign slogan that will win to the White House should be: “It’s about integrity, stupid!”

    Let’s revisit one of Hillary’s earlier remarks where she talked about another Clinton cleaning up after another Bush. 2008 is Clinton’s big chance; but Obama is standing in her way. She will not give up very easily. Many people have theorized recently about a providential Democratic loss to McCain in 2008 setting the stage for a Clinton Presidency in 2012, if she can’t scuttle Obama’s momentum this year.

    But, haven’t Billary’s hubristic presidential aspirations been evident since the moment Bill left office. The machinating, carpetbagging, and massive expense of Hillary’s first Senate election race in 2000 with all its controversy and pending legality:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Senate_election_in_New_York%2C_2000#Post-election_charges
    has burned a number of previously loyal Democratic power brokers.

    But, more importantly and at the risk of sounding conspiratorial, Democrats may blame the Republicans or even Ralph Nader for Al Gore’s 2000 loss to Bush. But, ask yourself would the Clintons have wanted an Al Gore Presidency? What would that have done to their dream of returning to the White House? No, I think their greatest stratagem has always been that we need a Clinton in order to clean up after another failed Bush or Republican Presidency. But, after all this careful maneuvering, along comes Obama threatening to spoil the Clinton’s return to power. Will Billary easily let go of this dream? No, they will simply sink the Democratic ship, and come back even stronger in 2012 with the argument that we still need a Clinton to clean up after McCain. I wonder how much support Al Gore really got behind the scenes in 2000?

  • In academia, a person is not considered a professor unless they hold an appointment as a professor, generally tenure track and full time,

    See, Mary did too go to a good college, and not some “teacher’s training school.” She got an “A+” when she took “Bullshit Semantics” with Professor Bill.

    Mary, you are such a mendacious moron – but thanks for every post you make, which turns another 10 readers against you and The Bimbo Empress. You give a whole new and original definition to the term “airhead.”

  • This may be the first time I agree with a comment of Mary’s. A professor leads a research group, a lecturer (like Obama) mainly holds lectures. Obama was not a professor, and at least in other countries pretending to hold the title would be punishable with imprisonment.

    • Comments are closed.