Barack Obama at the Wisconsin Democratic Party gala Saturday
night in Milwaukee.
** PAKISTAN CRISIS: OPPOSITION PARTIES WINNING PARLIAMENT MAJORITY, PRO-MUSHARRAF AND FUNDAMENTALIST PARTIES TRAILING BADLY. The two principal parties in opposition to President Pervez Musharraf appear to be winning a strong majority in the new Pakistani national parliament in today’s elections. Led by the Pakistan People’s Party of assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, the opposition parties may get two-thirds of the parliament. If they do, they can overturn various measures widely viewed as undemocratic which were imposed during Musharraf’s martial law rule a few months ago.
But the vote appears to be coming in slowly. And Musharraf retains the constitutional power to dissolve the parliament. Were he to do so, however, he would risk being unseated himself by the army under its new chief of staff, General Afshaq Kayani.
Likely Texas Democratic primary voters view Clinton and Obama on roughly equal terms. Seventy-nine percent say they would be satisfied if Clinton were the nominee; an equal number feel the same way about Obama. Seventy-nine percent say it’s likely Clinton can win the nomination; 82 percent say the same about Obama.
The two candidates are essentially tied on immigration, Iraq and the economy, but Clinton has an advantage on health care and abortion.
** TOMORROW — GAME DAY: WISCONSIN AND HAWAII. On Tuesday, after Presidents Day, it will be “Game Day: Wisconsin And Hawaii.” I’ll be anchoring PJ Media network’s coverage throughout the day on Tuesday, weaving together reports and information from correspondents and contacts inside and outside those states. The anchor coverage will be linked to and, to an extent, mirrored here on NWN. This will be a continuation of the “Game Day: Iowa,” “Game Day: New Hampshire,” “Game Day: Michigan And Vegas,” “Game Day: Nevada And South Carolina Republicans,” “Game Day: South Carolina Democrats,” “Game Day: Florida Republicans,” “Super-Duper Tuesday Special Edition,” “Game Day: Semi-Super Saturday,” and “Game Day: Chesapeake Tuesday” packages.
** HART ON HIS ETHNICITY. Former Senator Gary Hart wrote in about this morning’s column, with regard to my reference to his winning the Wisconsin primary, which noted that he was a white candidate in a 92% white state.
I used to be white.
“The Irish are the blacks of Europe, and the Dubliners are the blacks of Ireland, and the north-side Dubliners are the blacks of Dublin. So say it once and say it loud: ‘I’m black and I’m proud.’”
–The Commitments
The Commitments, which Hart, whose written more books than I can shake a stick at, gave proper attribution to, is a favorite movie of his about an Irish, er, soul band. I think. The band, however, as you may notice, do not properly attribute the partial phrase, “I’m black and I’m proud.” Lifted from the full phrase by the late James Brown, “Say it loud, I’m black and I’m proud.” Which, for all I know on this fine holiday morning, he stole from H. Rap Brown.
** BEZ BULDYRABYZ! OBAMA BORROWS CAMPAIGN SLOGAN FROM FORMER SOVIET OFFICIAL. Tatarstan President Mintimer Shaimiyev’s political slogan — seen in the title, I’m not typing it twice — according to Moscow Times used the “Yes We Can!” slogan of Barack Obama years before the freshman Illinois senator made it a catch phrase of his campaign. It has also been the title of Vladimir Putin’s United Russia Party newspaper in Tatarstan. Media in the former Soviet republic noticed the similarity after viewing the wildly popular viral music video you may have seen of various celebrities singing along to Obama speeches. “Obama’s borrowing of our slogan proves once again that we are fully in step with the times, and on some issues we are even ahead of the Americans,” said a Tatar web site. “Our PR tactics are up-to-date, competitive and are even ‘rented’ by leading politicians.”
In reality, the slogan first appeared nearly 40 years ago when California labor and civil rights leader Cesar Chavez popularized the slogan of the United Farm Workers: “Si se puede.” Which actually translates as “Yes, it can be done.” Whether Chavez himself came up the phrase, I don’t know. I’ve been told that he did, but he wasn’t surrounded by smart people for nothing. It subsequently became a slogan of some other Latino-oriented labor unions, notably the hotel and restaurant employees. And, for all I know, in its English form, various singers.
** CLINTON OFFICIAL ACCUSES OBAMA OF “PLAGIARISM.” Hillary Clinton campaign communications director Howard Wolfson this morning accused Barack Obama of plagiarism, a charge designed to upset Obama’s aura of authenticity on the eve of the Wisconsin primary and Hawaii caucuses. Obama’s supposed sin? Using some lines also used by and suggested to him by a longtime close friend and advisor, Deval Patrick, the first black governor of Massachusetts.
The lines in question, used Saturday night in the Wisconsin speech seen in the video below, in reply to Clinton’s charge that “words are cheap”: “Don’t tell me words don’t matter! ‘I have a dream.’ Just words. ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’ Just words! ‘We have nothing to fear but fear itself.’ Just words — just speeches!”
Patrick immediately put out a statement: “Sen. Obama and I are longtime friends and allies. We often share ideas about politics, policy and language. The argument in question, on the value of words in the public square, is one about which he and I have spoken frequently before. Given the recent attacks from Sen. Clinton, I applaud him for responding in just the way he did.”
The flow of a speech is going to get awfully choppy if the speaker properly attributes everything suggested by advisors and aides. As a frequent ghost, and having seen much from my columns turn up elsewhere, not infrequently in a speech, I can tell you the obvious; it doesn’t happen. And since Clinton herself is not a writer, that’s not a good road to go down.
THE MORNING COLUMN
On this Presidents Day, the beginning of another big week in presidential politics. Today John McCain receives the endorsement of the former President George Bush. Tomorrow Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton continue their close-fought battle in Wisconsin and Hawaii before turning Thursday to a debate at the LBJ Library in Austin, Texas.
First to the Republicans before turning back to the fascinating Democratic race, in which the once overweeningly confident Clinton machine is exhibiting some fascinating behavior.
John McCain’s endorsement by George Bush I won’t do much for him with the right-wing talk show, pundit, and blogger crowd that seeks — just like the netroots on the Democratic left — to impose a doctrinaire political correctness on “their” party. But it will help further consolidate McCain’s hold on the operatives and functionaries of the national Republican Party, not to mention its fundraisers.
The Republicans’ talk show wing inveighed for months against McCain, mostly pushing Mitt Romney. Who, ironically, not all that long ago had a political background not unlike that of Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, a moderate Democrat who narrowly decided against seeking his party’s presidential nomination. But the drumbeat of invective against McCain was to little avail, as McCain whipped former Massachusetts Governor Romney in next door New Hampshire before effectively winning the nomination in California, a primary closed to independent voters set up for a conservative by state party officials over the objections of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose endorsement helped push McCain over the finish line.
Now back to the Democrats.
At the end of December, I heard Hillary Clinton tell Meet The Press host Tim Russert that she was “in the campaign for the long haul.” Something she and her campaign are saying now. The difference was this. She said “the long haul” would end on “February 5th.”
Well, not really.
After Obama’s smashing victories on Chesapeake Tuesday, especially his amazing blowout win in Virginia, that erstwhile Cradle of the Confederacy recent red state where he drew more votes than all the Republicans combined, the Clintons are on the ropes.
Hillary Clinton’s latest anti-Obama TV ad in Wisconsin.
In tomorrow’s contests, Obama has a slender edge in Wisconsin, a state which should go to Clinton, and Hawaii, where he was born. Until recently, Clinton led in Wisconsin, which is 92% white, with only a 6% black population, and a huge white blue collar vote. There’s also a sizable college grad vote, which is why candidates like Gary Hart have been able to win there. Hart, of course, is white.
Obama has campaigned steadily in Wisconsin, where Governor Jim Doyle announced his support, and Hillary had mostly left the state to Bill Clinton and other surrogates — though she’s running attack ads — until late last week. But a big storm has disrupted the plans of both candidates, causing them to cancel their planned rallies yesterday around the state.
Which freed Obama to pay a not-so-secret visit yesterday to John Edwards in North Carolina. Hillary visited him earlier, also seeking his endorsement, and actually succeeded in keeping the trip secret for a few days.
That’s because Hillary and her campaign have a distant and not infrequently poisonous relationship with the press. Which is odd, considering how fawning almost all the coverage was of her “inevitable” campaign last year. I kept saying and writing that Obama had a real shot at winning, but that was a distinctly small minority point of view.
Now that Hillary is in serious danger of losing to the upstart Illinois senator with the big ears and the funny name, her campaign is in full spin mode, even more so than before. And it was always an operation that insisted on winning each micro-news cycle. Which, since journalists develop an allergic reaction to too much spin, they are having increasing trouble accomplishing.
Hillary, who trails Obama among delegates won in the state primary and caucus contests to date, insists that she can and should win the nomination with the votes of unelected “superdelegates” and the votes of delegates from Michigan and Florida, whose primaries were disqualified by the Democratic National Committee for violating party rules. And in which all the candidates, including Hillary, agreed they would not compete. Which is why the press did not count those primaries as actual contests, and scoffed at Hillary’s faux victory party in Florida.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a San Franciscan I’ve been acquainted with for quite awhile, will chair the Democratic national convention in Denver. After she made it known at the end of the week that she believes that the nomination should not be decided either by the superdelegates or votes from Michigan and Florida, the Clintons rolled out a longtime consigliere of theirs, New Yorker Harold Ickes, in a weekend conference call. Which, as it happens, was an odd thing to do, given Ickes’ own actions and his role for Hillary. I wasn’t on that holiday weekend event, but the AP did a good job of capturing what I expected him to say.
He said millions of voters in Michigan and Florida would be otherwise disenfranchised — before acknowledging moments later that he had favored the sanctions. Ickes explained that his different position essentially is due to the different hats he wears as both a DNC member and a Clinton adviser in charge of delegate counting. Clinton won the primary vote in Michigan and Florida, and now she wants those votes to count.
“There’s been no change,” Ickes said. “I was not acting as an agent of Mrs. Clinton. We had promulgated rules and those rules said the timing provision … provides for certain sanctions, automatic sanctions as a matter of fact, if a state such as Michigan or Florida violates those timing provisions.”
Well, for one thing, Hillary herself agreed that the primaries in those states were not real contests. Which of course they were not. Now she is trying to rewrite history.
And Ickes, contrary to his comments over the weekend, was in fact Hillary’s agent on the Democratic National Committee, especially with regard to party rules around the primaries and caucuses.
As I reported in September 2007 on New West Notes, when Ickes was acting as her agent on the DNC, the Clinton campaign clearly agreed that the contests would not count. Indeed, Hillary campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle, who was replaced in a shakeup last week put out this statement: “We believe Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina play a unique and special role in the nominating process. And we believe the DNC’s rules and its calendar provide the necessary structure to respect and honor that role. Thus, we will be signing the pledge to adhere to the DNC approved nominating calendar.”
And as I reported in July 2006 on NWN, Ickes, acting as Hillary’s agent on the DNC, supported moving Nevada into the early group of contest states, but was unhappy about the addition of South Carolina. And he was right to be unhappy, for Obama’s huge victory in South Carolina there proved to be a major turning point in the race.
While the spin machine is running full tilt for the Clintons, the former president himself, in this desperate time, is returning to the sort of attacks on Obama that proved effective in New Hampshire and Nevada but ultimately backfired. Most Americans, even many Republican critics, had come to like the global statesman version of Bill Clinton. But the red-faced finger-wagger is decidedly more problematic. Nevertheless, he remains quite popular among many Democrats, and this is all-hands-on-deck time for the hoped-for Clinton Restoration.
In the process sounding, quite disappointingly, like a resentful older guy.
“If you fought you made somebody mad, and you got cut up,” he declared, in what he says is Obama’s “explicit argument” against the former first lady. “We just have to turn over a new leaf. And it is actually an advantage not to have any experience because then you never made anybody mad.”
In Clinton’s view, this supposed strategy of Obama’s is very unfair and yet “has been very effective in this campaign.”
“It has already taken four candidates out, four good candidates out,” he said, referring to candidates who lost and dropped out, as candidates do in every presidential campaign. “And it would have taken Hillary out if she didn’t have so much grassroots support and so much guts in the face of a lot of what has happened here. ”
Clinton added that Hillary believes in “solutions, not speeches.” Which he says could be “a generational thing.” But he also touted his own speechifying, noting that even bigger crowds than Obama draws had listened to his speeches as president. He mentioned that he once drew a million people to a speech he gave as president in Africa. And over 100,000 to the Brandenberg Gate following the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Which is a bit on the sad side.
Who knew that the most powerful political couple in America — who have spent decades honing what seemed to be the most powerful national political machine in the history of the Democratic Party — could be so easily made victims by this do-nothing talker the former president once again resentfully rails against? Disappointing.
BARACK OBAMA campaigns in Niles, Ohio, Youngstown, Ohio, and Beloit, Wisconsin.
HILLARY CLINTON campaigns across Wisconsin in De Pere, Wausau, and Madison.
BILL CLINTON is raising money at several private fundraisers in Northern California.
JOHN MCCAIN is in Houston, Texas and Appleton, Wisconsin.
MIKE HUCKABEE campaigns in Hudson, Eau Claire, Appleton, Wisconsin.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** CALIFORNIA BUDGET CRISIS: HOT AND COLD. As part of his special session on the chronic California budget crisis, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed emergency budget legislation yesterday in Los Angeles to avert an impending state cash crunch and begin dealing with the overall.
After a lot of tussling with, and within, the Legislature, he came up with $2.2 billion in savings for the current and coming fiscal year. This includes a half-billion dollars from education and over $400 million from MediCal.
The cuts go beyond fat and into muscle. They’re going to affect the sinews of society.
It’s also true that there is some major deferring going on. This includes $3.3 billion worth of previously voter-approved bonds and delaying a planned early debt payment of $1.5 billion. Which even so will leave at least half the problem remaining for the coming fiscal year.
Our friends at the LA Times, whose coverage has seemed steadier of late, absent past hysteria-mongering about non-existent racist slurs, seemed to be bouncing between two poles. In January, they excoriated Schwarzenegger for his budget proposal, saying it “threatens to unravel his investment in schools, healthcare and criminal justice programs.”
Now these interim moves — which will definitely hurt on the education and health care fronts — are dismissed. “With the state in its worst financial shape in years, the emergency actions amount to little more than nibbling around the margins,” the paper opined yesterday.
Obviously, the long-term budget crisis is not being solved in the middle of February. Budgets don’t actually get passed until summer time. With the growing dysfunctionality of the Legislature, again beset by hyperpartisanship, it’s significant that the short-term crisis has been handled. At no little future pain to some of California’s most vulnerable citizens, mind you.
The fundamental political problems remain. It’s the problem of the ultra-government faction vs. the anti-government faction. Hyperpartisan Democrats don’t want to cut programmatic spending, or even seek long-term efficiencies in government. They’ve never seen a challenge which does not require a government solution. Hyperpartisan Republicans are against taxes, period. Even fees for fire protection services in fire-prone areas of the states, recently ravaged by the Southern California fire storm. Even the repeal of the notorious yacht tax break, which conservative Republicans cling to as some sort of incongruous life preserver. Which, of course, in any competitive election, it is anything but.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
BARACK OBAMA has a rally in Kaukauna, Wisconsin.
HILLARY CLINTON campaigns across Wisconsin, with rallies in De Pere, Wausau, and Madison.
BILL CLINTON campaigns across Ohio, with rallies in Toledo, Canton, Steubenville, and Marietta.
JOHN MCCAIN is off the trail.
MIKE HUCKABEE has a speaking gig in the Cayman Islands.
** ALOHA! The Wisconsin primary, a key event, is on Tuesday, of course. As is the Hawaii caucus. In part because of the flight time out to the middle of the Pacific Ocean for the contest in Barack Obama’s state of birth (he was born in Honolulu), the candidates themselves have not been there of late, instead sticking to the big upcoming contests on the mainland.
Yesterday, Chelsea campaigned in several locales, including one near Diamond Head. Today she has a rally on Maui. Remind me why I’m not covering this contest firsthand. Nonetheless, NWN will have correspondents on the ground in Hawaii as part of Tuesday’s Game Day coverage package.
** PAKISTAN IN CRISIS AGAIN ON ELECTION EVE. Pakistan’s ongoing crisis is heating up once again as the troubled unreal nation — America’s frontline ally in the Terror War and only Islamic nuclear power — prepares to vote on Monday. The parliamentary elections, originally set for January 8th but postponed after President Perve Musharraf imposed and then, to a large extent, removed martial law, have been conducted in a non-free media environment. Criticism of the government can be construed as advocacy for terrorism, which has an obvious chilling effect on political coverage and analysis.
In which case the army, now headed by General Afshaq Kayani, once head of the dread ISI intelligence service and former military attache to Bhutto prior to her exile, may move to impose another solution. The army, founded by the British, is historically the only stable major institution in Pakistan. While clearly infiltrated by Islamic jihadists, it is a professional organization which values stability and at least a reasonable semblance of legitimacy.
And you thought things were heated between the Clintons and Barack Obama.
** KOSOVO DECLARES INDEPENDENCE. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia today. This may set up some sort of confrontation betweeen Russia, which backs Serbia, and NATO.
SATURDAY REPORTS
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
BARACK OBAMA is campaigning across Wisconsin. He has events in Wausau and Eau Claire, then attends the Democratic Party of Wisconsin’s Founders Day Gala in Milwaukee.
HILLARY CLINTON is campaigning across Wisconsin. Tonight she attends the Democratic Party of Wisconsin’s Founders Day Gala in Milwaukee.
BILL CLINTON holds rallies in Amarillo, Texas and Lubbock, Texas.
** GORE, PELOSI ET AL STAYING ON SIDELINES WITH EYE TO FUTURE SETTLEMENT. A number of high-level Democrats, including former Vice President Al Gore and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, are staying on the sidelines of the Democratic presidential race with an eye to mediating and settling things if need be. This New York Times article concretizes the obvious, which is that Gore and Pelosi see value in not endorsing either candidate now but in remaining above the fray so as to help guide the party toward a solution that does not place the fate of the nomination in the hands of superdelegates, who are a permanent class of delegate not won in primaries or caucuses. Hillary Clinton has the edge in superdelegates, while Barack Obama has won the most pledged delegates in the actual contests to date.
Pelosi yesterday, on Al Hunt’s Bloomberg TV show, shot down two cherished notions of the embattled Clinton campaign. Namely, that the superdelegates should decide and that delegates from the Michigan and Florida primaries — contests in which all candidates not to campaign and declared out of bounds by national party rules — should be seated to vote for Clinton. The San Franciscan Pelosi, who I’ve known for a couple of decades, will chair the Democratic national convention in Denver. Some close to Pelosi — such as San Francisco Bay Area Congressman George Miller, chairman of the House Democratic Policy Committee and the House Education and Labor Committee — are big Obama backers.
Incidentally, a great many Democratic superdelegates from around the country read NWN.
** THE JOHN LEWIS MYSTERY. Questions about the role of Georgia Congressman John Lewis in the Democratic presidential race deepened today with this report in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Lewis has clammed up about who he supports in the race, following a Friday New York Times article that was something of a bombshell in which he seemed to shift his superdelegate backing from Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama.
That was significant because the support of Lewis, a ’60s icon as a civil rights movement leader, has been a key back backstop of the Clintons as Obama has surged to the fore. He has not always been happy about this role, however. NWN reported that Lewis and other top African American supporters of Hillary went ballistic in December when campaign co-chairman Billy Shaheen raised Obama’s teenage drug use — revealed in Obama’s own best-selling autobiography — as an issue in the campaign. And when Hillary chief strategist Mark Penn continued to do so on a cable chat show.
Now Lewis isn’t saying who he’s for.
In this new ad for Texas, Hillary Clinton says she will fight for
the soldiers who serve in Iraq.
FRIDAY REPORTS
** SCHWARZENEGGER TO SIGN CALIFORNIA BUDGET REVISION TOMORROW MORNING IN L.A. At 10 AM tomorrow morning in LA, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will sign the emergency state budget revision cutting a billion dollars from the current fiscal year passed today by both houses of the Legislature in a live webcast event. Which does not contain the much bruted about rescinding of the notorious yacht tax break — nothwithstanding Democratic claims, and thanks to a few Democratic desertions — and only cuts education by a half billion rather than $1.4 billion. Which is why the Education Coalition is not flooding my e-mail box with protests this afternoon. This will keep state government rolling forward as leaders continue to grasp at longer term solutions.
** ON TUESDAY — GAME DAY: WISCONSIN AND HAWAII.On Tuesday, after Presidents Day, it will be “Game Day: Wisconsin And Hawaii.” I’ll be anchoring PJ Media network’s coverage throughout the day on Tuesday, weaving together reports and information from correspondents and contacts inside and outside those states. The anchor coverage will be linked to and, to an extent, mirrored here on NWN. This will be a continuation of the “Game Day: Iowa,” “Game Day: New Hampshire,” “Game Day: Michigan And Vegas,” “Game Day: Nevada And South Carolina Republicans,” “Game Day: South Carolina Democrats,” “Game Day: Florida Republicans,” “Super-Duper Tuesday Special Edition,” “Game Day: Semi-Super Saturday,” and “Game Day: Chesapeake Tuesday” packages.
** SEIU FINALLY ENDORSES OBAMA. The massive Service Employees International Union (SEIU) finally endorsed Barack Obama, as I reported it would week before last. The board vote was nearly unanimous. In a conference call, SEIU chief Andy Stern said Obama, a former community organizer, has been a friend to labor throughout his career. “It’s about the right person at the right time,” Stern said. “We think this is a moment that’s an opportunity for fundamental change in this country.”
SEIU has 1.9 million members. Stern says SEIU has 150,000 members in key upcoming contest states, and is particularly strong in Wisconsin, Ohio, Texas, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, and Oregon.
SEIU official Anna Burger, head of the Change To Win labor alliance SEIU is part of, says the union will be “on the ground, on the air, in the streets” working for Obama.
I am hearing that SEIU is preparing a major “independent expenditure” campaign to counter any effort for Clinton. The American Federation of Teachers has long been running “independent” advertising for Hillary. And San Francisco-based fashion designer Susie Tompkins Buell, founder of Esprit, has long been rumored to be on the verge of launching an anti-Obama 527 committee with other super-rich Clinton backers as the Hillary campaign was on the verge of shattering.
** HILLARY LEADS IN TEXAS PRIMARY. Hillary Clinton is making her last stand in two states that are among the most impervious in the Democratic Party to the new ideas/change argument: Texas and Ohio. In 1984, I helped run Gary Hart’s campaign in the Texas primary. We couldn’t crack it. I got West Texas. Which does not include the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex, which I actually enjoy. Thanks so very much. (My revenge: I got Senator Hart to wear a great big sombrero at a Latino event in El Paso. He hates hats.) Though I did discover a fabulous source of cowboy boots to this day, actually founded in San Antonio. With an oddly Italian name, Lucchese. (Which, as readers may recall, I recommended to Fred Thompson after he wore Gucci loafers to the Iowa state fair.) As much as I enjoy Texas, where I’ve worked on several projects, it remains difficult turf for a future-oriented candidate to this day.
But Hart did win Ohio against former Vice President Walter Mondale. For whom the state outwardly seemed perfectly set up, as Mondale had the endorsement of every union other than the United Farm Workers, whose president, Cesar Chavez, personally assured me they would be neutral. More on that in the very near future. Obama, in contrast, has just won the endorsements of the massive Service Employees International Union and the United Food and Commercial Workers, as well as the Midwest council of the United Auto Workers.
Meanwhile, the latest Texas primary tracking poll, from the Rasmussen robopolling outfit, gives Hillary Clinton a big lead. Nothwithstanding Barack Obama’s new edge in national polls. As of last night, Hillary still led Obama in Texas, 54% to 38%.
Which, however, is not nearly the margin she needs to be highly competitive once again with Obama in the delegate race. And experience shows that the longer Obama has to spend in a state, the better he does. After Wisconsin and Hawaii next week, he will have two weeks to devote to the next few primaries on March 4th.
By the way, here is some relevant political history for you. In 1972, Gary Hart gave Bill and Hillary Clinton their first significant political posts. As co-coordinators of a state in the McGovern for President campaign. Which state? Texas.
** THE CALIFORNIA VOTE COUNT. By the way, a week-and-a-half after the California primary, there are still 1.25 million ballots yet to be counted. Including many independent votes in LA County not counted because voters did not fill in a bubble indicating they wanted to vote in a particular partisan primary, even as they voted for an actual presidential candidate. This is, let’s say, a singularly unimpressive performance by local and state elections officials. In America’s ultimate high tech state.
Barack Obama dismisses Hillary Clinton’s latest attacks on him
as “the same old politics.”
** SLENDER OBAMA LEAD IN WISCONSIN. In this new Rasmussen poll of the Wisconsin Democratic presidential primary, Barack Obama has a slender lead over Hillary Clinton.
It’s Obama 45%, Hillary 41%.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
JOHN MCCAIN has a town hall in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, a town hall in La Crosse, Wisconsin, and addresses the Milwaukee Reagan Day Dinner. He holds press avails after all events.
MIKE HUCKABEE has a rally in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, then departs for the Caribbean. (See item below.)
BARACK OBAMA has rallies in Milwaukee, Oshkosh, and Green Bay, Wisconsin.
MICHELLE OBAMA holds rallies at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio and at the Cincinnati Music Hall in Cincinnati, Ohio.
HILLARY CLINTON has a rally in Lyndhurst, Ohio with Governor Ted Strickland and Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Johnson.
BILL CLINTON has rallies across Texas today, in Texarkana, Longview, Tyler, Nacogdoches, and Lufkin.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger backs John McCain as a
future-oriented candidate for president.
And yet, ultimately correct, as last week’s primary results make clear, loathe as the individual is to admit it.
California Republican Assembly chief Mike Spence, writing on the far right Republican web site Flash Report, says it is “a myth” that the far right wing controls the California Republican Party apparatus.
That’s funny, because NWN has featured a number of items in which he claims that the far right controls California Republican politics. Going so far as to threaten to defeat moderate Republican state Senator Abel Maldonado. A threat repeated earlier this week by Flash Report proprietor — and longtime flack for disgraced former Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona — Jon Fleischman.
Spence’s latest take? That the California Republican presidential primary winner, John McCain, and his operations will control the Republican Party in the Golden State.
Well, that means Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and his close Republican aides and advisors Steve Schmidt, Adam Mendelsohn, and Matt David.
Which is hardly what Spence, Fleischman, and the rest of the Young Americans for Freedom alumni association were saying, ah, a week or so ago.
Through their narrow majority on the California Republican Party executive board — at the motion of Fleischman, the Southern California party vice chairman — the party leadership voted to block any move to open the California Republican presidential primary to independent voters. This was a move to help Mitt Romney, the heavy favorite of the Orange County conservative money crowd who provide the financial underpinnings of the Flash Report, and to block more moderate Republicans such as McCain and Rudy Giuliani.
But the move, ultimately, was a failure, as McCain swept virtually all of California’s delegates despite the exclusion of independent voters. (Many of whom found another form of disenfranchisement in the Democratic primary, where many independent votes have still not been counted.)
Which leaves Schwarznegger — the constant target of attacks from the Fleischman/Spence/Mike Schroeder faction of far right Republicans — and McCain and their joint operatives in the catbird’s seat. Once again. Not surprisingly, since NWN readers know that even core Republican voters agree more with the Arnold view of politics than with the YAF view of politics.
You will recall Fleischman and Spence’s memorable declarations in the NWN Forum section that the very existence of the minimum wage equates to socialism. And that Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez is a Communist fellow traveler. And other such fringe sentiments.
** NOTE: HOLIDAY WEEKEND EDITION BEGINS NOW, MONDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK AS USUAL. After nine Game Day packages in the past six weeks, along with the usual near 24/7 coverage and analysis, NWN is going into holiday weekend mode.
Neverthless, the usual Monday Morning Quarterback column on the week ahead in presidential politics will publish on Presidents Day. And yet another Game Day package will emerge the following day, when Wisconsin and Hawaii vote.
Because the fun never sets on the Permanent Campaign.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Will.i.am’s “Yes we can” music video for Barack Obama has
nothing on this mash-up for Johnny Mac.
** UFCW TO BACK OBAMA. The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) will endorse Barack Obama for president, according to Obama campaign sources and confirmed by a knowledgeable labor source. The UFCW is strong in the Midwest — hello, Ohio — and the Southwest (hello, Texas). The Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which I’ve already reported will endorse Obama, is about to do so officially.
The UFCW, like SEIU, is part of the Change To Win labor alliance that split from the AFL-CIO. It has 1.4 million workers in agriculture, health care, meatpacking, poultry and food processing, manufacturing, textile and chemical trades, and retail food. One of its earlier incarnations was known as the Retail Clerks Union.
** CALIFORNIA’S RECURRING BUDGET CRISIS. Obviously, I can’t pay an enormous amount of attention right now to the endless maneuverings around California’s chronic state budget crisis, much of which have little meaning. There are reporters who are supposed to do that, and we get what we get. That said, the state Senate and Assembly budget committees have been working on the shortfall in the current budget — the next budget is a very different matter — and the Legislature may vote tomorrow on immediate adjustments. New revenues are not in the short-term picture. Well, except for the demise of the yacht tax break.
From an Assembly budget document: While the Governor took an “across the board” approach, the plan now before the Assembly Budget Committee takes a more fine-tuned approach. Still, the solutions hit every area of the budget, but in many cases avoid the most negative impacts proposed by the Governor. Some key elements of the proposal are as follows … The plan reduces Medi-Cal rates by 10 percent … delays the SSI COLA by four months … delays the CalWORKs COLA, saves over $500 million in the current year (on education) by reverting and capturing unspent prior and current year funds … recognizes an additional $113.7 million in Tidelands Oil Revenues and makes various reductions (but not parks) … and so on in somewhat more abstruse fashion.
Bipartisan votes are supposedly on tap. Meanwhile, the larger problem for the near term remains.
** SUPER-DUPER TUESDAY LAGGARD NEW MEXICO FINALLY FALLS TO HILLARY. The last state to report from the 22 Democratic contests a week ago, New Mexico, finally falls to Hillary Clinton by the narrow margin of 49% to 48%. The counting, done by party officials, was initially marred by the disappearance of two county Democratic chairs for day last week after the voting. Along with a bunch of ballots. When they came back on the radar screen, there was another problem. Nearly 20,000 provisional ballots, some hard to read. Clinton now gets 14 delegates there to Obama’s 12, not affecting the freshman Illinois senator’s lead in the delegate race for the Democratic presidential nomination.
** TIMING OF ASSASSINATION OF HEZBOLLAH OPERATIONS CHIEF PROBLEMATIC FOR U.S. IN IRAQ. The assassination of Hezbollah operations chief Imad Moughniyah in Damascus two days ago in a car bombing brings mixed tidings. Israel, which suffered a serious setback in its 2006 war with Hezbollah, denies that the Mossad is responsible. On the one hand, the terrorist leader was responsible for manyattacks against Israelis and Americans. On the other hand, the killing has caused Iran to postpone a negotiation with the US on settling the security situation in Iraq that was just about to happen. Meanwhile, it’s just been announced that Iran’s president will visit Baghdad on March 2nd, meeting with Iraq’s president and prime minister. This is Iran’s first state visit to Iraq since 1979.
The US military surge in Iraq has created a political space for settlement of the security situation. But the surge is time limited, even with a fudge factor.
** NEW CLINTON APPROACH. Today Hillary Clinton declared that the campaign between she and Barack Obama is one of solutions vs. speeches. “Words are cheap,” she said today in Ohio. Bill Clinton’s new line? “Record vs. rhetoric.”
There are ready counters that come to mind here.
** OBAMA RUNNING WELL IN SWING STATES AGAINST MCCAIN. New polls in swing states New Hampshire, Colorado, and Nevada by the Rasmussen organization all show Barack Obama with healthy leads against John McCain. Hillary Clinton runs even with or trails McCain in those states.
Obama leads McCain in New Hampshire, 49% to 36%, while Hillary is in a dead heat with the Vietnam War hero.
Obama leads McCain in Colorado, 46 to 39%, while Hillary trails McCain there, 49% to 35%.
Obama leads McCain in Nevada, 50% to 38%, while Hillary trails McCain there, 49% to 40%.
** ROMNEY BACKS MCCAIN.Mitt Romney is now backing John McCain. Just a week after dropping out following his defeat in the California primary, Mitt Romney is throwing his backing to John McCain, who’s altering his campaign schedule in Rhode Island to come to Boston for the endorsement. Romney is urging his delegates to support McCain.
Another rational decision by Romney. McCain is struggling to pull together a national campaign organization for the general election. He’s done well in the primaries, but is running on a relative shoestring compared to the well-funded machinery of Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. And if Hillary is not the Democratic nominee, it will be all the harder to pull together a fairly dispirited Republican Party. To the extent Romney was seen as an impediment to that, it would not have been good for whatever future hopes he may yet have.
** OBAMA SURGES TO BIG LEAD IN NEW NATIONAL POLL.The brand new Rasmussen robo tracking poll shows Barack Obama surging to a big national lead over Hillary Clinton, 49% to 37%.
Obama now leads by five points among all women, while Hillary continues to lead among white women, although only by three points. Obama leads among white voters, 47% to 44%.
In general election match-ups, Obama leads John McCain 46% to 42% while McCain leads Clinton 48% to 41%.
In terms of favorability, it’s Obama 55-43 favorable over unfavorable, McCain 50-47, and Hillary 44-53. The Clinton favorability ratings are the most firm of the three.
** IT AIN’T OVER TILL … BIG HILLARY LEADS IN OHIO AND PENNSYLVANIA. New Quinnipiac polls show Hillary Clinton with huge leads in Ohio and Pennsylvania over Barack Obama. In Ohio, as favorable an electorate for Hillary as there is, with low numbers of college educated, high numbers of blue collars, and a relatively small black population, it’s Hillary 55%, Obama 34%. In Pennsylvania, it’s Hillary 52%, Obama 36%.
The polls were conducted February 6-12. Which means they could be out of date.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
JOHN MCCAIN has a rally in South Burlington, Vermont and holds a press avail there, then has a rally in Warwick, Rhode Island and holds a press avail there.
MIKE HUCKABEE holds rallies across Wisconsin today, in Madison, La Crosse, Rothschild, and Green Bay. He holds press avails after each rally.
BARACK OBAMA is off the campaign trail. He is in Chicago, spending Valentine’s Day time with his wife Michelle and their family.
HILLARY CLINTON holds a roundtable in Youngstown, Ohio and a rally in Columbus with her backers, Governor Ted Strickland and former Senator John Glenn. No press avails scheduled.
John McCain’s campaign likes to remind their fellow Republicans
that he is their presidential nominee.
** HUCK CAN’T SURGE IN WISCONSIN IF HE’S NOT THERE. Well, you may recall the Game Day package day before yesterday in which I speculated that Mike Huckabee might surge on John McCain in Wisconsin next Tuesday as he did in Virginia this past Tuesday, where he caused the presumptive Republican nominee some tense moments and embarrassment. But he can’t do it if he’s not around. Fox News reports that Huckabee, who has been campaigning in the Badger State, is on Friday going to the Cayman Islands! And won’t be back until Sunday night.
What’s he doing in the Caribbean at this odd moment? Giving what apparently is a lucrative lecture. Which apparently involves his hanging around the conference. He’s not on the public payroll and is not a really rich guy. But if he had a real shot in Wisconsin, would he be doing this? Probably not. This indicates that he will be playing ball again with McCain, with whom he is on friendly terms.
** GARY HART ON SUPERDELEGATES’ HISTORY. Only once have Democratic superdelegates decided the presidential nomination. That was in 1984, in the contest between former Vice President Walter Mondale and then Colorado Senator Gary Hart. Like Barack Obama, Hart exploded out of the chute, then the establishment frontrunner Mondale battled back. Unlike Obama, Hart was not a champion fundraiser and there was no Internet to boost his underfunded effort. Here Hart, who supports Obama, talks in an ABC interview about his experience and his view of the process.
After a sweeping California victory for Hart, Mondale had to resort to superdelegates to put him over the top. And to making sure many delegates elected with financing from illegal “independent” committees — for even the establishment candidate Mondale found funding hard to come by as the months went on — were actually seated at the Democratic national convention in San Francisco.
Unlike Obama, whose campaign has had some problems but on the whole is extraordinarily well organized, Hart had the experience of running up impressive vote totals but coming up short on delegates. For example, to cite an upcoming example, Hart won Wisconsin but came away with virtually no delegates. That was because his underfunded campaign had been unable to develop a national infrastructure prior to its breakthrough in Iowa and New Hampshire. Unlike Obama’s campaign, which has organization seemingly everywhere.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** CONSERVATIVE COLUMNIST BOB NOVAK’S POST-CHESAPEAKE TUESDAY TAKE.… The fact that the Democratic turnout in yesterday’s Virginia primary was double the Republican reflects the larger, more boisterous Democratic rallies from Iowa to the Potomac primaries. The pessimism and gloom in the business community is particularly pronounced.
Adding to the dark mood among Republicans is the increasing prospect that they will not be able to bolster their morale by running against the detested Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.). Her unification of Republicans has been one of the few GOP assets going into the campaign. It will take time and effort to work up a passion against the likable Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) no matter how leftist he really is. …
While the Democratic delegate race looks like a dead heat, all the momentum is with Obama. He showed increasing ability to win white votes yesterday. The Clinton campaign is in disarray with the sacking of the campaign manager and the resignation of the deputy campaign manager, plus the migration of campaign contributors to Obama. Clinton’s reliance on the March 4 Ohio and Texas primaries, where her nominal lead is based on out-of-date polls, is risky in the extreme. …
Obama’s monstrous sweep of the Potomac primaries — particularly his big win in Virginia — is perhaps his most important triumph so far. … His Virginia win, on the other hand, was momentous. While the commonwealth does have wealthy liberal pockets (Fairfax County and Alexandria), and black sections (Richmond and Norfolk), this was not one of the states where circumstances favored Obama. This breaks the mold of the states he has been winning, and suggests that he could win in almost any state.
** MCCAIN’S MEDIA CONSULTANT SAYS HE WON’T GO AGAINST OBAMA.John McCain’s media consultant, Mark McKinnon, who was also a top media consultant for George W. Bush, says that if Barack Obama is the Democratic presidential nominee, he will step away from the McCain campaign.
“I’ll be a McCain supporter from the sidelines,” he says. Why not stay with the McCain campaign against Obama? Because the campaign would inevitably get negative.
** CALIFORNIA STORY. A quiet period in California state politics. Thank God, since I more than have my hands full. I ducked quickly into Fabian Nunez’s final speech as Assembly speaker to the Sacramento Press Club. There’s something wrong with his voice, which will require laser surgery. He predicted that the Assembly could solve the immediate state budget problem on a majority vote basis, somehow, but today there was a delay in budget hearings in that body.
He and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger are entertaining Mexican President Felipe Calderon today. The president addressed the state Assembly this morning, promising a program of economic development which would help assuage the illegal immigration situation in the US.
Of course, I’ve heard Mexican presidents say this before. Quite a few times, actually, to little effect. Calderon and Schwarzenegger signed an accord between Mexico and California to pursue solutions on climate change and air quality. At my cursory glance earlier today, however, it looks rather vague.
A few other things occur, which I’ll get to when I’m not exhausted from a long string of Game Day packages.
** CONGRESSIONAL CONSERVATIVES UNITING BEHIND MCCAIN.House Republican leaders lined up behind John McCain this morning, as the maverick Western senator goes about his task of consolidating his hold on the party and mopping up remaining opposition.
Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio, Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri and Conference Chairman Adam Putnam of Florida each called on Republicans to unite behind McCain. The three had eschewed McCain’s candidacy prior to McCain’s victory last week in California, with Boehner and Blunt neutral and Putnam for Fred Thompson.
** HILLARY LEADS IN RHODE ISLAND POLL. Hillary Cllnton leads Barack Obama in the latest poll of the March 4th Democratic presidential primary. It’s Clinton 36%, Obama 28%, Uncommitted slate 27%. The poll, however, by Brown University, was taken February 9-10. And it’s hard to see a big vote for uncommitted in a hotly contested primary between two real candidates.
** OBAMA TAKES LEAD IN ANOTHER NATIONAL POLL. The Rasmussen national tracking robopoll, for the first time, gives Barack Obama the lead in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination over Hillary Clinton. It’s Obama 46%, Clinton 41%. Obama has a huge lead among black voters, trails narrowly among white voters. He leads among white men, trails among white women. Clinton leads by 10 points among other non-white Democratic voters, mostly Latino.
Obama leads John McCain by six points, while McCain leads Clinton by four points.
* OBAMA ENDORSEMENTS. Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign manager David Wilhelm, later Democratic national chairman, is endorsing Barack Obama. In a sense, not a surprise, as he is a superdelegate from Chicago. He’ll make the announcement in Ohio.
Also, Governor Anibal Acevedo-Vila of Puerto Rico, which some Clinton advisors have seen as a firewall at the end of the primary schedule, is coming out for Obama.
** HILLARY: DON’T COUNT ME OUT. Hillary Clinton just e-mailed her supporters: Every time they start to count us out, we prove them wrong. And we’re going to keep proving them wrong as many times as we need to until we win the White House. You and I know that only the people, not the pundits, get to decide where this race for the Democratic nomination will end up. And, before very long, the people who depend on us the most — working families who have been hard-hit by the failed policies of the Bush administration — will have their say in states like Wisconsin, Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Pennsylvania and others.
Let’s show them what we’re made of. Contribute now.
Don’t forget who we’re fighting for: families who need universal health care, people struggling to survive the Bush economy, folks desperately trying to hold onto their homes, students grasping for the American dream. They’re the reason we need to work hard, and we need to win. And winning means having the passion, energy and resources to aggressively compete in crucial upcoming primaries.
Make a contribution to win.
When we embarked on this journey, you and I promised each other we’d stick together through every point and every moment of opportunity. That’s what we’ve got to do — right here, right now. Are you with me?
Let’s get it done.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.
BARACK OBAMA tours the nation’s largest General Motors plant in Janesville, Wisconsin and delivers his new economic policy speech, has a town hall in Waukesha, Wisconin, and a town hall in Racine, Wisconsin.
HILLARY CLINTON has an event in McAllen, Texas, and rallies in Robstown, Texas and San Antonio, Texas.
BILL CLINTON attends the Yitzhak Rabin Center’s awards dinner in Washington, D.C.
JOHN MCCAIN has a press avail with the House Republican leadership at the Capitol Hill Club in Washington, D.C.
** THE COMMON GOOD PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES FORUM LIVE WEBCAST THIS MORNING. The Common Good, founded by my old friend, longtime Democratic operative/impresario Patricia Duff, holds a forum today on the state of the Presidential primaries at the Friars Club in Manhattan. The event will be webcast live at 9:15 AM Pacific time, noon time in New York.
ABC-TV anchor Cynthia McFadden will moderate the panel of Newsweek senior editor and columnist Jonathan Alter, Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway, Democratic strategist and former John Kerry campaign manager Jim Jordan, and nationally syndicated talk show host Monica Crowley.
Hillary Clinton warns Ohio voters of an economic “trap door.”
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
A cascade of information coming out of today’s three Chesapeake primaries. It’s hard to see how it could have gone much better for Barack Obama, or worse for Hillary Clinton. Meanwhile, John McCain averted — after a major exit poll scare — another embarrassment to the presidential nomination he effectively won a week ago in California.
Obama has now won eight contests in a row since battling Clinton to a standstill a week ago on Super-Duper Tuesday. For the first time since Iowa, he is closing better than his showing in late tracking polls. He was expected to win in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia — though he trailed in the first two states not long ago — but the magnitude of his victories is tremendous. Obama won 64% of the vote in Virginia, 61% in Maryland, 75% in DC. And the turnouts were huge. In Virginia, which has long been viewed as a Republican state, Obama polled over 150,000 more votes than all the Republicans combined.
Best of all for Obama as the contest with longtime frontrunner Hillary moves on down the line, he is now cutting into her base. He’s close to a draw with white voters, winning with white men, and winning with women. Tomorrow, with an event at the largest General Motors plant in America, he’ll begin a drive to win over white working class men, extending his appeal beyond his clearly demonstrated appeal to college grads.
As for the Republican side, the contest there ended last week. Yet Mike Huckabee has fought on, determined to be the clear favorite of very conservative voters, winning two stunners over the weekend in Kansas and Louisiana over McCain. Thinking of this in football terms, McCain and Huckabee and Obama and Clinton are playing in the conference championship games prior to the Super Bowl. Team McCain has won its title, running up an insurmountable lead, only to see the opponent threaten to embarrass them with a series of late scores. So tonight, they squelched that move with three more winner take all victories.
Virginia was a scare, for the exit polls, as I showed below, indicated that Huckabee was running a little over a point ahead of McCain. This, after a late Huckabee surge in the tracking poll I cited yesterday and this morning, with a 32-point McCain lead last week fast evaporating.
The McCain high command kept its cool, insisting their candidate would be fine in Virginia, notwithstanding the exit poll. And he was, for the exit poll was wrong. McCain actually won Virginia by a comfortable nine points, while winning in Maryland and DC by huge margins.
While they find Huck’s insistence on keeping his campaign going distracting at times, it also suits several purposes of theirs, not the least of which is allowing conservative steam to blow off while a relatively friendly face becomes its electoral champion.
Meanwhile, McCain turned to the general election in his remarks tonight. Earlier today, he sought out Obama on the Senate floor in a show of good fellowship. He wasn’t quite as friendly tonight, addressing a few hundred supporters at a victory celebration in an Alexandria, Virginia hotel.
“To encourage a country with only rhetoric rather than sound and proven ideas that trust in the strength and courage of free people,” declared McCain, “is not a promise of hope. It is a platitude.”
“I will fight every moment of every day for what I believe is right for this country, and I will not yield,” he said. “And, my friends, I promise you,” he said with a sly grin, as he appropriated one of Obama’s best known lines, “I am fired up and ready to go.”
For his part, Obama, who spoke earlier to a roaring throng of 17,000 in Madison, Wisconsin, had his supporters cheer McCain as an “American hero.” Then the caveat. “But his priorities don’t address the real problems of the American people,” he declared, “because they are bound to the failed policies of the past.”
With McCain running against Obama and Obama against McCain, Hillary Clinton looked rather forlorn in El Paso, Texas. There she made no acknowledgement of Obama’s victories, as was the case with her five defeats over the weekend, including one contest, in Maine, that she was favored to win. After a seemingly unending introduction by the unfortunate Congressman Silvestre Reyes, the remarkably unknowledgeable chairman of the House Intelligence Committee — he spectacularly flunked a journalist’s quiz on Al Qaeda — Hillary launched into a standard stump speech.
Obama is now in the lead in the Democratic race, both in terms of delegates won in the primaries and caucuses, and in terms of overall delegates claimed, which includes the so-called superdelegates. Just a week ago on a conference call, Hilary’s communications director Howard Wolfson insisted that she would continue to lead the race so long as superdelegates, who are actually unbound to any candidate, were counted.
She can still win this thing. But the contrast between her latest blithe non-concession speech, and the victory speech of Obama, was stark. And with Obama making inroads on her base, while maintaining and expanding his own, she has some difficult times ahead.
6:35 PM Pacific — Maryland Exit Polls: Big Wins For Obama and McCain
The media exit polls show Barack Obama crushing Hillary Clinton in the Maryland Democratic primary, 62.1% to 35.4%.
John McCain swamped Mike Huckabee in the Maryland Republican primary exit poll, 55% to 29%.
Obama is projected as a big winner in the District of Columbia. Though there is no exit poll there. McCain is also the projected winner in DC.
62% of the vote in the Maryland Democratic primary was female, but it made no difference. Obama took 59% of the female vote. Obama won overwhelmingly among African Americans, and came close to splitting the white vote.
5:35 PM Pacific — Johnny Mac Dodges A Bullet
Despite the dead heat in the media exit poll, with a slight edge to Mike Huckabee, Fox News has just projected John McCain the winner of the Virginia Republican primary.
That is because with about half the precinct vote in, McCain has built a slender lead. And much of the vote that is still out there, around the Chesapeake Bay and in Fairfax County, should go to McCain.
This is key, because without all of Virginia’s delegates, McCain would be chasing the arithmetic delegate clincher for a long time.
But, while he is going to be the Republican nominee — thanks to his backbreaking win last Tuesday over Mitt Romney in California — he is not out of the woods.
Because Huckabee is going to Wisconsin.
And it is not unlikely that much the same thing can happen there as happened in Virginia.
That is to say, independents flocking to the Obama banner — nearly a quarter of the vote in the Virginia Democratic primary were independents — along with many moderate Republicans.
That made the Virginia Republican primary disproportionately hard right conservative and half evangelical.
If that happens in Wisconsin next Tuesday, McCain could have some more tense moments.
4:35 PM Pacific — Virginia: The Correct Exit Poll Horse Race Numbers And What Drives Them
Incidentally, due to bad weather, voting in parts of Maryland has been extended an hour and a half, to 6:30 PM Pacific time.
Now, back to Virginia.
In the media exit polls, Barack Obama leads Hillary Clinton by a landslide, 62% to 38%.
And, contrary to what I reported earlier, John McCain does not have a slight lead over Mike Huckabee. Huck has the slight lead, 45.8% to 44.6%.
So the Huck surge continued through the beach, though well within the margin of error.
What’s going on?
Barack Obama drew huge numbers of independents and even Republicans into the Virginia Democratic primary.
Independents were 20% of the Virginia Democratic primary. Obama won two-thirds of them.
Republicans, yes, Republicans were 8% of the Virginia Democratic primary. Obama won nearly 80% of them.
With independents and moderate Republicans flocking to the Obama banner, rather than voting on the Republican side, tthe Virginia Republican primary, where turnout was not big, was dominated by even more conservative voters than usual. Nearly half were evangelicals, the core of Huckabee’s support.
4:10 PM Pacific — OBAMA LANDSLIDE IN VIRGINIA; MAC AND HUCK TOO CLOSE TO CALL
John McCain has a slight edge in Virginia Republican primary exit polls over Mike Huckabee, indicating that the late tracking poll I reported on late yesterday and this morning showing a Huck surge was accurate.
On the Democratic side, it’s an Obama runaway in Virginia, Hillary Clinton’s best contest in today’s Chesapeake primaries.
Not quite a third of the Virginia Democratic primary vote was African American. Obama beat Hillary, 90% to 10%.
Among white voters, Hillary barely shaded Obama, 51% to 48%. Obama won white men with 55% of the vote.
35% of the voters today were first-time Virginia primary participants.
Incidentally, Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, a major Hillary supporter, said today that white men won’t vote for Obama in Democratic primaries.
3:15 PM Pacific — Obama Makes A Move For Blue Collar White Men
Barack Obama is about to make a significant adjustment to his campaign message.
Obama is in Wisconsin tonight, where he will greet the returns from Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia at an election night rally in Madison, home of the massive University of Wisconsin.
Obama is very strong with the college-educated, and of late has been winning the votes of white men in his tough race with Hillary and Bill Clinton.
But his area of vulnerability in that segment has been with blue collar men. He and his campaign have emphasized the Harvard Law Review president side of his persona more than that of the gritty Chicago community organizer who worked with people affected by plant closings.
That starts changing tomorrow morning, when Obama tours the biggest General Motors plant in America and then delivers a new economic policy speech.
In the words of the campaign spin doctors, “he will lay out his comprehensive agenda to restore economic balance and fairness, reclaim the American dream, and create millions of new jobs.”
Hillary very narrowly came from behind to win New Hampshire after the Clintons tossed up a kitchen sink of tactical and thematic moves in the final 36 hours of the campaign there. One key element of that was turning blue collar voters in Manchester and Nashua away from Obama and back to Clinton, something the former president was instrumental in pulling off Obama had no counter to that.
But looking ahead not only to Wisconsin, which has a substantial blue collar vote, but also Ohio and Texas on March 4th, where Hillary will make what is beginning to look like a last stand, the blue collar appeal is key.
Obama also needs to find a way at another core element of the Clinton coalition, the so-called “50/50s.” Those are women 50 and over who make under $50,000 a year. That’s another move.
2 PM Pacific — A Possible Turnout Wrinkle
Says correspondent Brad Rourke: “A thin film of rain falling and freezing has snarled the DC area’s rush hour. This may make evening voting tough. Official offices are closing (no poll closure reports) and people are trying to get out early. One traffic reporter said that he believed no ramps on the infamous Mixing Bowl (a key Beltway interchange) were moving. Having just driven from downtown Washington to Rockville, Maryland, I can attest to the traffic. Up to this point, turnout at Maryland polling places has been on the high side, according to sources.”
1:20 PM Pacific — Clinton Counter-Moves
Trying to shift attention away from today’s Chesapeake primaries — and next week’s contests in Wisconsin and Hawaii — Hilllary Clinton’s campaign rolled out two fairly big endorsements today for the Ohio and Texas primaries, which are still three weeks away, and made some California fundraising moves. This as she goes to Texas today to campaign in El Paso.
In Texas, Hillary is endorsed by former Congressman Charlie Stenholm. Elected in 1978 representing Abilene, Stenholm was one of the most conservative Democrats in Washington, as a leader of the Boll Weevils faction. A longtime supporter of a constitutional amendment for a balanced budget, Stenholm was one of only three Democrats in the House to vote against the Americans with Disabilities Act. He voted for three of the four articles of impeachment against former President Bill Clinton.
But it as all for nought, as he became a target of Republican Tom DeLay’s mid-decade redistricting scheme in Texas in 2003 after voting against the Bush tax cut, losing his seat in the process. Now he’s a lobbyist, working to keep foreign-owned horse-slaughter plants open.
Obviously, the Hillaristas are going for the conservative Southern white male vote with this endorsement, since his views are anathema to her New York constituents.
In Ohio, Hillary was endorsed by former Senator John Glenn, the first American to orbit the earth, in 1962. Glenn, who became the oldest man in space when he flew on the space shuttle Discovery in 1998, at the age of 77. Glenn ran his own presidential race in 1984, which did not go all that well. Seen as the main challenger to former Vice President Walter Mondale, Glenn was quickly supplanted by Gary Hart when the actual voting started in Iowa and New Hampshire. He did stay in the race long enough — thanks to an unsecured $3 million in loans from Ohio banks that he didn’t pay off for years — to siphon enough anti-Mondale votes away from Hart to allow Mondale room to get back in the race.
With the campaign’s finances somewhat unsteady, Bill Clinton is coming to California for three high-dollar fundraisers next Monday, on Presidents Day. That will help keep the Clinton advertising on the air. Obama is relying almost entirely on Internet fundraising at this point.
11:45 AM Pacific — Virginia Turnout Running Up
My shy Virginian cousin outside Charlottesville reports that her sources in state government say that turnout in the Virginia primary is running about 25% higher than four years ago.
Barack Obama, she says, will win Virginia pretty handily.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton, having lost five contests over the weekend, today is off to Texas, saying that the real contests don’t come until March 4th. In Texas and Ohio, where she currently leads.
She will contest Wisconsin next week, however, where she has long led. But the new poll I reported earlier this morning, taken last night, shows Obama with the lead there. As well as the backing of Wisconsin’s governor.
11:20 AM Pacific — Conservative Mischief Making In Virginia?
Will there be some conservative mischief making in Virginia today?
Correspondent Rick Steroni reports that many conservatives he knows are disaffected from both remaining Republican candidates, presumptive nominee John McCain and hard-charging populist preacher runner-up Mike Huckabee. Many he suggests, may vote for Fred Thompson or some other name left on the ballot but out of the race.
Then there is a rumored “Block Hillary” bloc. “Speaking with my staunchly conservative dad, I found out he voted for Obama today.Why? Because he can’t stand the thought of Hillary winning Virginia. Seems he’s not alone.” ht
Of course, there is something else going on in Virginia, as I first reported yesterday on New West Notes, and again this morning here. Mike Huckabee has closed most of the big gap between him and John McCain. But McCain still had an 11-point lead, and Virginia is winner take all for delegates.
10:40 AM Pacific — Maryland Turnout Revving Up
Correspondent Brad Rourke reports that a friend texted him from her polling place saying: “Long lines, people comparing it to flu shot lines. ‘I’ve never stood so far back [in line] is the buzz.’”
At another polling place this morning, he reports a young woman voting for the first time coming out with “a big grin on her face, skipping and chanting ‘Barack, Barack, Barack’ under her breath. When she got in her car, she whooped and screamed, ‘I just voted!”
10:15 AM Pacific — Obama Takes Wisconsin Primary Poll Lead
Next week’s Wisconsin Democratic primary has looked like an opportunity for Hillary Clinton to end Barack Obama’s post-Super Tuesday winning streak. However, a new tracking poll last night by Public Policy Polling shows Obama now leading Clinton there, 50% to 39%.
John McCain leads Mike Huckabee in this Wisconsin Republican primary, 53% to 32%.
The firm polled 642 likely voters in the Democratic primary and 700 in the Republican primary.
Wisconsin has a large youth vote and big state university, but it also has many blue collar voters and is 92% white.
Obama leads by only a few points among self-described Democrats. But among independents, who can vote in either primary, he leads by a whopping 63% to 25%. Obama leads among women and men, and among whites and blacks.
9:15 AM Pacific — Obama Takes First National Gallup Poll Lead
On the Republican side, John McCain leads Mike Huckabee, 53% to 27%.
In general election match-ups, Obama leads McCain, 50% to 46%.
McCain does markedly better against Hillary, 49% to 48%.
Intriguingly, McCain is given a big edge over both Democrats on the question of who would best handle Iraq, prevailing 54% to 40% over both Obama and Hillary. He has an even bigger edge on terrorism. The Democrats’ edge over McCain on the economy is in the single digits.
8:30 AM Pacific — Crowds
My cousin, one of those shy Virginians, who lives near the University of Virginia outside Charlottesville in the Old Dominion’s horse country and knows a little bit about politics, notes that Barack Obama is drawing much bigger and more enthusiastic crowds than either Hillary Clinton or former President Bill Clinton.
Last night, for example, Obama drew 18,000, filling the basketball arena at the University of Maryland in College Park. And 15,000 in Baltimore.
But he also drew 18,000 at a rally the night before in Virginia Beach, the state’s biggest city. Which, she points out, is not a hippie college town, as it’s home to several military bases.
While Obama was rallying his fans in College Park, Maryland, Bill Clinton drew one-twelfth as many at Virginia’s George Mason University in Fairfax County. Correspondent Brad Rourke notes that Clinton also appeared in Silver Spring, Maryland, at Leisure World.
7:40 AM Pacific — Weather And Turnout Expectations
State elections officials in Virginia and Maryland are predicting big turnouts. Virginians have taken a record number of absentee ballots. Maryland may see a new record for primary turnout, breaking the record set in 1976 when Jerry Brown beat Jimmy Carter there.
Obama received a rock star reception in College Park, Maryland, yesterday, with 18,000 screaming his name. Clinton has held smaller and more low key events as she and husband Bill, the former president, campaigned in the region.
Says correspondent Brad Rourke in Maryland: “In my high-turnout neighborhood, the length of the wait to get into the school board multipurpose room where we cast our ballots is often a good indication of turnout. This morning it took me twenty two minutes, start to finish, which is about half the time it usually takes. The line to go in was shorter; there were fewer cars in the lot than usual.
“This may be because the election officials are finally getting used to the state’s new Diebold machines. Last two elections (if you count local), there have been snafus that had people waiting as if they were stranded at Dulles in a snowstorm.
“Speaking of weather, it is crisp and cold, overcast, but with a winter weather advisory issued for later — sleet and freezing rain.
“Local households have been contacted multiple times by Obama volunteers (calls and leaflets) — zip from the Clinton campaign, save one yard sign at a neighbor’s house.”
7 AM Pacific — Where They Are Today
BARACK OBAMA is attending to Senate duties in Washington, D.C. and holding a rally tonight in Madison, Wisconsin. The Wisconsin primary is a week from today, as are the Hawaii caucuses.
HILLARY CLINTON is attending to Senate duties in Washington, D.C. and then doing events in El Paso, Texas. The Texas primary is on March 4th, and has become a must-win contest for Clinton.
JOHN MCCAIN is attending to Senate duties in Washington, D.C. and will have election night event tonight in Alexandria, Virginia.
MIKE HUCKABEE is having an election night party in Little Rock, Arkansas tonight.
THE MORNING COLUMN
Voters are going to the polls today in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. It’s Chesapeake Tuesday, as two states and a pseudo-state, each given historic life by the massive Chesapeake Bay, make what could be consequential picks in the very tight Democratic presidential race between longtime frontrunner Hillary Clinton and new co-frontrunner Barack Obama.
There are Republican primaries as well, and they have a certain importance, though John McCain, after his backbreaking win over Mitt Romney last week in California, is the mathematically all but assured nominee. McCain leads in all three contests over the persistent populist preacher Mike Huckabee.But a late tracking poll in Virginia showed a surge toward Huckabee, who took two out of three over the weekend from McCain with an overwhelming win in the Kansas caucuses and a narrow win in the Louisiana primary (which yielded him no delegates, as he was well under a majority), apparently losing only in Washington state. McCain needs wins in all three contests today to help consolidate his hold over a fractious bunch of Republicans; Jeb Bush’s endorsement late yesterday will help in quelling the uproar from the talk show wing of the party. McCain especially needs to hold off Huckabee in Virginia, where his backing from Senator and former Navy Secretary John Warner will help the Vietnam War hero.
Of course, the real contest is on the Democratic side. Obama has substantial leads in Virginia and Maryland. There isn’t much polling in the District of Columbia, but with a very large African American vote and the backing of the mayor, his victory there is expected.
In Virginia, the biggest contest of the day, Obama has the backing of Governor Tim Kaine and former Governor-turned-Richmond Mayor Doug Wilder, the South’s first African American governor since Reconstruction.. Senator and former Navy Secretary Jim Webb is neutral. Obama wowed the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner Saturday night in Richmond, following Hillary to stage, with Governor Kaine introducing Obama by saying, “Now for the main event.” In Maryland, young Governor Martin O’Malley endorsed Clinton last year, but his political mentor, former Senator Gary Hart, recently came out for Obama.
It’s “Game Day: Chesapeake Tuesday.” Focusing on the contests in the two states and a pseudo-state given given historic life by the mighty Chesapeake Bay — my ancestral Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia. I’ll be anchoring PJ Media network’s coverage throughout the day on Tuesday, weaving together reports and information from correspondents and contacts inside and outside those states. The anchor coverage will be linked to and, to an extent, mirrored here on NWN. This will be a continuation of the “Game Day: Iowa,” “Game Day: New Hampshire,” “Game Day: Michigan And Vegas,” “Game Day: Nevada And South Carolina Republicans,” “Game Day: South Carolina Democrats,” “Game Day: Florida Republicans,” “Super-Duper Tuesday Special Edition,” and “Game Day: Semi-Super Saturday” packages.
Hillary Clinton’s latest TV ad on universal health care.
Here is how the voting will unfold today.
Virginia Democratic Primary
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 4 PM Pacific.
83 delegates, proportional representation.
Virginia Republican Primary
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 4 PM Pacific.
63 delegates, winner take all.
Maryland Democratic Primary
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 5 PM Pacific.
70 delegates, proportional representation.
Maryland Republican Primary
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 5 PM Pacific.
37 delegates, winner take all.
District of Columbia Democratic Primary
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 5 PM Pacific.
15 delegates, proportional representation.
District of Columbia Republican Primary
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 5 PM Pacific.
16 delegates, winner take all.
Finally, a word about why this is “Chesapeake” Tuesday. It was the Chesapeake Bay, one of the greatest bays in the world — into which many rivers, including the Potomac, flow, opening on the Atlantic Ocean — which enabled the colonies, later states, of Virginia and Maryland to flourish and Washington to become something more than a fetid swamp.
It was also on the Chesapeake Bay, on which I’ve enjoyed sailing, that the American Revolutionary War was won. It was actually a naval battle, the Battle of the Chesapeake, that led to America’s victory over Britain in the Revolutionary War. The Royal Navy was attempting to resupply Cornwallis at Yorktown. But was defeated in a great battle on the Chesapeake. By … the French Navy.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Barack Obama addresses the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in
Richmond, Virginia Saturday night after sweeping the Semi-Super
Saturday contests.
** GALLUP NATIONAL POLL: DEAD HEAT DEMOCRATS.The latest Gallup Poll, taken February 8-10, thus missing most of Barack Obama’s weekend victories, shows a dead heat nationally between Obama and Hillary Clinton. Here are the numbers.
Hillary 46%, Obama 44%. On the Republican side, John McCain has a huge lead over Mike Huckabee, 56% to 25%.
** A LATE HUCK SURGE IN VIRGINIA?The Survey USA robo tracking poll, taken Saturday and Sunday, appears to show a late surge for Mike Huckabee in the Virginia Republican primary following his strong showing in Saturday’s contests against John McCain. Here are the numbers: McCain 48%, Huckabee 37%.
Still a very sizable lead for McCain. But the previous poll had McCain much further ahead of Huckabee, 57% to 25%.
** GAME DAY: CHESAPEAKE TUESDAY.Tomorrow is “Game Day: Chesapeake Tuesday.” Focusing on the contests in the two states and a pseudo-state given given historic life by the mighty Chesapeake Bay — my ancestral Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia. I’ll be anchoring PJ Media network’s coverage throughout the day on Tuesday, weaving together reports and information from correspondents and contacts inside and outside those states. The anchor coverage will be linked to and, to an extent, mirrored here on NWN. This will be a continuation of the “Game Day: Iowa,” “Game Day: New Hampshire,” “Game Day: Michigan And Vegas,” “Game Day: Nevada And South Carolina Republicans,” “Game Day: South Carolina Democrats,” “Game Day: Florida Republicans,” “Super-Duper Tuesday Special Edition,” and “Game Day: Semi-Super Saturday” packages.
** FIRST ON THE AIR IN OHIO: OBAMA. Hillary Clinton says her latest firewall to turn back Barack Obama is the March 4th primaries in Ohio and Texas. And her campaign says it will focus its resources on those contests. But the first campaign to go up with a TV ad in Ohio is Obama’s. He has just begun running a spot focusing on his mother, who died at age 53 from cancer, saying that there will be no solutions to the health care crisis without a new approach in Washington. As I reported first, Obama was endorsed by the Cleveland Plain Dealer over the weekend. Nothwithstanding the conventional wisdom, Obama has a shot at taking Ohio away from the Clintons, just as Gary Hart won the state in 1984.
** INTERESTING GENERAL ELECTION NUMBERS. The new AP-Ipsos poll has some interesting match-up numbers. Hillary Clinton is in a dead heat with John McCain, 46% to 45%. Barack Obama has a lead on McCain, 47% to 41%. This is consistent with other recent polls, as Obama has a strong pull on independent voters.
** OBAMA AND MCCAIN HAVE LARGE LEADS IN VIRGINIA AND MARYLAND POLLS.In new Mason-Dixon polls, Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain have large leads in their respective party presidential primaries in Virginia and Maryland.
In Maryland, Obama leads Hillary Clinton, 53% to 35%. McCain leads Mike Huckabee 54% to 23%.
In Virginia, Obama leads Clinton, 53% to 37%. McCain leads Huckabee 55% to 27%.
** LANTOS PASSES AWAY. The only Holocaust survivor ever to serve in the US Congress, Tom Lantos, passed away today. The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee died of cancer at the age of 79. An immigrant from Hungary, Lantos was a champion of human rights issues and had long represented the San Francisco Bay Area in the House of Representatives, since his first election in 1980. Lantos, facing a challenge from popular former state Senator Jackie Speier based on his support of the Iraq War, announced in early January that he would not run for reelection because of cancer of the esophagus.
A native of Budapest, Lantos was part of the anti-Nazi resistance movement in his country prior to his capture by the German Army in World War II. He represented much of San Mateo County, to the south of San Francisco, and a sliver of the city itself, in the Congress.
THE MORNING COLUMN
So, after two dozen odd contests in the past week, the presidential race slows down markedly this week. Especially since John McCain essentially won the Republican nomination with his near sweep of the delegates available in the California primary, in spite of far right efforts to rig the primary for Mitt Romney by excluding independents.
This week, we have only Chesapeake Tuesday, three primaries in states and a pseudo-state given historic vitality by their direct access to the lifeblood provided by the Chesapeake Bay — Virginia, Maryland (whose capital Annapolis is also the site of the U.S. Naval Academy), and the District of Columbia.
In those contests, in the wake of major gains by the candidates on Super-Duper Tuesday, polling indicates that Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain have decided edges.
Before looking forward to tomorrow’s contests, let’s look back for a moment at the momentous week just past. First to the Republicans.
Given the frequent winner take all rules in Republican primaries, John McCain essentially wrapped up the Republican presidential nomination last Tuesday night with big wins in New York, New Jersey, and Illinois. But the truth is that he did it in California, which was not winner take all on a statewide basis, but merely winner take all by congressional district.
But when you win 50 out of 53 congressional districts, as McCain did over Romney — who spent millions of dollars in TV advertising in the Golden State, where right-wing operatives in the state GOP organization did their best to lock up a win for him by excluding independents from the primary — it may as well be winner take all on a statewide basis.
McCain’s shattering win in California was a huge win for moderate Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and his allies, a win which leaves the very vocal ultra-right/anti-government faction of the Golden State on the outside looking in. After being essentially shut out in California, Romney, a numbers guy at the famous Bain & Company management consulting firm, realized he had no chance for the nomination and, notwithstanding the wailing from his far right backers, that was that.
The blooper reel from the Chuck & Huck conversation series. Mike Huckabee
(the guy in there with Chuck Norris) won two out of three states over the weekend.
Mike Huckabee, who appears to be having the time of his life as one of those rare candidates who truly enjoys campaigning, is carrying on, of course. After doing extremely well in the South on Super-Duper Tuesday, he won two out of three contests on Semi-Super Saturday.
Yet, although he says he “majored in miracles instead of mathematics,” he knows full well that he has no chance of defeating McCain for the Republican presidential nomination.But that’s not why he’s running. If he were a real serious candidate for president, he wouldn’t be putting out blooper out-takes of his amusing “Conversations With Chuck” (Norris).
The truth is that Huck’s continued candidacy benefits both him and McCain. Huck gets more famous and influential as the Republican presidential runner-up. And Mac gets to deal with a guy he likes as the representative of the right wing. (As distinguished from the right-wing talkers and bloggers a la “Rushbo” who lost big time in this presidential casino.) This is what we call a “win win.”
Now the Democrats.
After surging close to or perhaps into a lead in California, Barack Obama forced Bill and Hillary Clinton to spend far more personal time campaigning to defend their California primary redoubt.Meanwhile, as he left the Golden State to surrogates, Obama himself spent his time elsewhere, racking up wins and delegates that few would have forecast a few weeks ago, when he trailed by nearly 20 points in some national polls.
As a result, Obama emerged with a tiny edge on Super-Duper Tuesday, a set of contests that the Clintons’ longtime financial consigliere Terry McAuliffe, the very personable former Democratic national chairman, had set up as the coast-to-coast decider for the Clinton Restoration.
Over the weekend, as you’ve read here — with my real-time coverage — and elsewhere, Obama extended his slight edge in delegates won in primaries and caucuses.
Meanwhile, Hillary fired her longtime campaign manager, the first Latina to manage a major presidential campaign, Patty Solis Doyle, replacing her with her White House chief of staff, Maggie Williams.
Which is a problem for the Clintons in the long run, assuming that there is a long run. For Maggie Wiliams, for all her many positive attributes, harkens back to the not so good old days of the ’90s.
Williams is an intriguing figure, in some ways a liberal idealist who worked on children’s issues when she entered politics, and in her post-White House career headed up the big liberal PR outfit Fenton Communications.
However, in her White House days, new Clinton for President campaign manager Williams found herself caught up in the major fundraising controversies that dogged Bill and Hillary Clinton. She was a key gatekeeper who gave convicted influence peddler Johnny Chung regular access to the White House.
It was through Williams that Chung was able to eat for free whenever he wanted in the White House Mess. It was Williams who arranged for Chung and his associates to attend the president’s radio addresses. One of those Chung friends was the CEO of China’s national oil company. It later emerged that some of the nearly $400,000 Chung contributed to the Democratic National Committee came from China’s intelligence service.
The ability to revisit these sorts of issues — not to mention dredge into Bill Clinton’s post-presidential business dealings and massive fundraising for the Clinton Library — is a major reason why John McCain and the Republicans are hoping that Maggie Williams can right the Good Ship Hillary and beat back the surging Barack Obama.
Obama, as I reported in real time over the weekend, swept the big and not so big contests on tap. He won every contest on offer — Washington, Nebraska, Louisiana, the Virgin Islands, and Maine — in landslide fashion and more. In Maine, Hillary was the favorite.
In Washingon state, the last tracking poll showed Hillary in close striking distance. It didn’t matter. For the first time in this campaign since Iowa, Obama closed better than the last tracking polls suggested that he would.
Now we head into Chesapeake Tuesday, so called for the two states and a pseudo-state — Maryland, the District of Columbia, and my ancestral (as in a couple of centuries ago) Virginia — given life by the massive and wondrous Chesapeake Bay. Which, among other things, is one of the great bays for sailing in the world.
Those are all primaries in which John McCain, not surprisingly, given the martial tradition of the region, has big leads. And so does Barack Obama.
The Clintons are working very hard to dislodge Obama and stop his momentum. Which I will be covering over the next two days.
Obama has the lead in delegates won in primaries and caucuses. He will work hard to extend that lead over Hillary this week and in next week’s contests in Hawaii (he was born in Honolulu) and Wisconsin.
** SCHWARZENEGGER LIVE WEBCAST THIS MORNING ON NEW TECH. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger tours Invitrogen Corporation in Carlsbad (north of San Diego) and discusses California’s biotech future in a 10 AM live webcast.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** ANOTHER BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK. Call it another bad day at black rock for the “inevitable” Hillary Clinton and her once dominant Democratic presidential campaign.
First, she fired her longtime campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle, the first Latina to manage a major presidential campaign. Replacing her is Hillary’s White House chief of staff, Maggie Williams.
Then, Hillary lost the Maine Democratic caucuses to Obama in a landslide. Which was quite interesting, in that many thought she would win. She had the backing of the governor and his political organization, as well as labor. The demographics of the state — 98% white and heavily blue collar — are quite different from that which has usually gone for Obama. Hillary campaigned heavily there, as did former President Bill Clinton and daughter Chelsea, matching Obama in TV advertising.
But Obama, with the help of Senators Ted Kennedy and John Kerry and a huge turnout of first-time caucus participants, swamped her, 59% to 41%.
As Clinton was in the process of losing her fifth contest of the weekend — following blowout losses in Washington, Louisiana, Nebraska, and the Virgin Islands yesterday — she fired her campaign manager.
And replaced her with a veteran of the Clinton White House, who served as Hillary’s chief of staff. Who, amidst many admirable things in her career, was also a major gatekeeper granting access to figures in the Clintons’ late 1990s fundraising controversies.
** NOW THAT … IS A LINE. We’ve been hearing a lot of lines from the politicians and the spinners and the journos.
But for a real load of lines, check out the video above. Of David Caruso. And the sunglasses of justice. From CSI: Miami.
I’ll probably update later today with the results of the Maine Democratic caucuses.
Or … Maybe not.
After publishing nearly 5000 words yesterday in the Game Day: Semi-Super Saturday package, with the Monday Morning Quarterback column coming up tomorrow and the Game Day: Chesapeake Primaries package coming up on Tuesday, I’m concerned that I may be writing too much.
A little.
** MCCAIN WINS WASHINGTON STATE. OR DOES HE? After I finished writing last night, reporting that John McCain had a very slight lead in the Washington state Republican caucuses — ever so slowly counted by the state party — with 83% of the vote in, the state party chairman announced that McCain had won.
These are very small numbers, incidentally, as the Republican caucus turnout was tiny. McCain’s lead over Huckabee, 2% in one perspective, is actually only 240 votes.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.Mike Huckabee appears on Meet The Press and Face The Nation.
Barack Obama has a town hall in Alexandria, Virginia and a rally in Virginia Beach. He appears on 60 Minutes.
Hillary Clinton campaigns in Manassas, Virginia and Roanoke, Virginia.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND U.S. ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Crude oil prices shot up some four dollars a barrel Friday, closing at $91.77 per barrel. Why? Well, I don’t know. Energy markets are closed on the weekend.
A very big day for Barack Obama, and a surprisingly good day for Mike Huckabee. The one is far more consequential than the other, of course.
Obama swept the Louisiana primary, as well as the Washington state and Nebraska caucuses, and the Virgin Island caucuses. He beat Hillary Clinton 57% to 36% in Louisiana, actually a substantially higher margin of victory than his exit poll lead, which was itself a sizable 8 points. (Yet the exit poll did not trigger a quick projection of victory by the nets, as the race was quite racially polarized and there was concern that some of those polled lied. Recall that, as I’ve reported, Obama led Clinton in the New Hampshire exit poll by 5 points.) He beat Hillary in Nebraska, 68% to 31%, and in Washington, 68% to 32%, in the latter race surging to a much bigger than expected victory than the Friday night tracking polls I reported on this morning indicated. He beat Clinton in the Virgin Islands territory, 90% to 7%.
Obama, who eked out a tiny delegate lead in the Super Tuesday contests after coming back from a double digit deficits around the country, had a slight lead in pledged delegates going into today’s contests, according to media and private estimates. (Pledged delegates are those awarded as the result of success in primaries and caucuses.) Today’s results appear to give him another 35 to 40 delegate gain on Clinton. She retains a slight lead, however, when superdelegates are added in. Superdelegates are various politicians who are automatically delegates to the Democratic national convention. But they are not pledged to anyone, and can turn on a dime. Or a change in fortune.
The Clinton campaign put out an interpretation of the results within minutes of the polls’ closure in Louisiana, discounting Hillary’s defeats as “expected,” and chalking them up to Obama having more organization and money for advertising.
Intriguingly, and somewhat contradictorily, if one thinks about it, the Clinton campaign also announced late today that it has raised a whopping $10 million since Super Tuesday. Which is nearly as much as it raised in all of January, not counting the emergency $5 million from the Clintons’ joint account infused into the campaign to keep Hillary competitive on Super Tuesday. The Clinton campaign has never before shown anything approaching this sort of online fundraising prowess.
Now this gets interesting, because on Thursday morning, the estimate was about $3 million since Super Tuesday. Which quickly became $4 million. And by day’s end, was $6.4 million. And now is $10 million.
Meanwhile, Clinton was outspent in Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington, and tomorrow’s Maine caucuses. (Which Clinton has a decent chance to win.) And is outspent even now in the upcoming Chesapeake primaries — Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. — on Tuesday.
Incredible.
Meanwhile, Mike Huckabee won big in the Kansas Republican caucuses over presumptive presidential nominee John McCain, 60% to 24%. With 99% of the vote counted in Louisiana, Huckabee has a thin but real 43% to 42% over McCain. The maverick Western senator may end up winning only in the Washington state caucuses, where with 83% of the vote counted in an extraordinarily slow count, he leads Huckabee 24% to 22%, with 21% going to Ron Paul.
Huckabee’s apparent win in the Louisana primary — in a sense foreshadowed by Pat Buchanan’s win in the 1996 Lousiana caucuses — will not do him any good in his essentially hopeless quest to overtake McCain in the delegate sweepstakes. Under party rules in the winner take all Louisiana Republican primary, no candidate who gets under 50% gets delegates, so the Bayou State will send an officially uncommitted delegation to the Republican national convention in St. Paul, Minnesota. Which makes Louisiana essentially a draw, though Huck will apparently get the bragging rights of having narrowly won the popular vote.
A loss, a practical draw, and a potentially narrow win is not a good day for McCain. But if he’s going to lose to anyone, in contests dominated by evangelicals, it may as well be to Huckabee, with whom he’s on good terms. Especially with likely McCain wins in the Virginia and Maryland primaries coming up on Tuesday.
8:50 PM Pacific — Waiting On Too Close To Call GOP Contests, Obama Leaps In Delegate Race
Incidentally, I’m waiting on the Louisiana and Washington results before doing the wrap-up for both parties. With 78% of the vote in Washington, John McCain has a very slim lead. With 90% of the vote in Louisiana, Mike Huckabee has a very slim lead.
Meanwhile, with his bigger than expected win in Washington, along with victories in Louisiana, Nebraska, and the Virgin Islands, Barack Obama picked up about 40 delegates, as a net gain competitively, in his national delegate race with Hillary Clinton. He already had a very slim lead in pledged delegates. Clinton’s lead is now based on superdelegates.
7:35 PM Pacific — Obama Romps In Virgin Islands
He wishes.
As Barack Obama speaks to the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Richmond, Virginia, comes word that he carried the Virgin Islands with 90% of the vote.
7:10 PM — Louisiana Finally Called For Obama
Okay, CNN finally called Barack Obama the winner in Louisiana. I explained the delay below. As you see, it’s not that close.
7 PM Pacific — Louisiana Exit Polls
According to the media exit polls, I will tell you that Barack Obama leads Hillary Clinton in the Louisiana Democratic primary, 52.6% to 44.8%.
Why are they not calling the state yet for Obama?
Because they are afraid that some people lied to them.
Turnout was relatively light, perhaps 15%, and that hurts Obama, who did not campaign heavily there. Hillary was there recently, and former President Bill Clinton, who carried the state as president, spent Friday stumping across the Bayou State, as I reported early this morning.
The vote looks very racially polarized, more so than most other states.
Clinton led Obama among white voters, 70% to 26%.
Obama led Clinton among black voters, 82% to 18%.
6:15 PM Pacific — Hillary Spins Three States Tonight.
The Hillary Clinton campaign is now, in a new press release, spinning away her losses in Washington, Nebraska, and Louisiana as “expected.”
Intriguingly, although Obama leads in Louisiana, no one has yet called it for Obama.
The other rationalization from the Clinton camp is that Obama outspent and out-organized them in those three states.
I’m not quite sure that is what I would want to say about today.
5:30 PM Pacific — Obama Wins Big In Washington State
Barack Obama has broken what was a 5-point lead in the latest Washington tracking poll, as reported this morning, into a very big win in the Washington state caucuses.
Based on Obama’s 2 to 1 lead in returns from around the state, with almost 40% of the vote in, Fox News has projected an Obama victory in Washington.
As reported here throughout the day, the turnout overwhelmed the state Democratic Party’s system, both online to direct voters to their proper caucus sites, and at the sites themselves, where ballots not infrequently ran out.
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama had dueling rallies at nearly the same time late yesterday, as reported this morning, and Obama bested Hillary in turnout 20,000 to 6000.
Obama’s big victory was built in major metropolitan areas, such as Seattle, where the mayor has long backed him. But also in rural Washington, as you see in the earlier report today from a caucus outside Olympia.
The late endorsement of Washington Governor Christine Gregoire, and subsequent employment of her political organization, helped push Obama to a huge win, much bigger than expected.
5:25 PM Pacific — Obama Wins Big In Nebraska
To no one’s surprise who’s been following along here today, CNN has projected Barack Obama as the big winner in Nebraska.
You don’t draw 10,000 people to a rally in Omaha, Nebraska, with overflow turnouts around the state — and a banner Friday headline in the Omaha World-Herald dubbing the city “Obamaha” — without a big win.
It’s Barack Obama 69%, Hillary Clinton 31%.
4:50 PM Pacific — Super Huck Day?
Incidentally, folks, it should not come as a complete surprise if Mike Huckabee wins today in not only the Kansas caucuses, but also the Washington caucuses and the Louisiana primary.
With an overwhelming delegate lead, John McCain’s campaign has turned its attentions to getting the campaign, and the Republican Party, ready for the general election against either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton.
This means that there is not a major caucus effort underway.
And Louisiana, as I reported in the kick-off column early this morning, is a place where very socially conservative candidates such as Pat Buchanan have done quite well.
4:30 PM Pacific — Looking To March, And Virgin Islands Ignorance
Looking forward to a key March 4th battleground state, Ohio, the Cleveland Plain Dealer will tomorrow endorse Barack Obama.
Incidentally, I confess to total ignorance as to what is going on in the Virgin Islands Democratic caucuses today. No one campaigned there, sadly, and there are three delegates at stakes.
From tomorrow’s Cleveland Plain Dealer endorsement: “Obama’s frequent talk of hope strikes some people as naive. It leads others to question his toughness. But Obama understands something his critics do not: Change requires vision and optimism, shared sacrifice and mutual trust. Hope can sustain those elements; a presidency defined by political tactics cannot.
“Hillary Clinton is an exceptionally bright and accomplished woman. Only a fool could dispute that. It would be nice if Obama’s policy proposals were as meaty as those she has put forward. It’s no wonder she wants Democrats to see this race as a choice between resumes.
“But in a campaign where history matters, she carries an inordinate amount of baggage. Who wants to relive the soap operas of the 1990s?”
3:15 PM Pacific — Report From A More Rural Washington Caucus
The Washington Democratic presidential caucuses have been overwhelmed by a turnout the state party was unprepared for. Here’s a report from one of the more rural parts of the state, away from the mania in cosmopolitan Seattle.
Says correspondent Larry Maxcy: “My precinct caucus was held in a school gymnasium, with four other precincts. It was scheduled to start at 1 PM, finally got going at 1:45, because there were far more people there than expected, chairs had to be brought from the cafeteria, parking was an ordeal, and because we’re Democrats.
“In 2004 nine precinct caucuses were held in the nearby Grange hall. This year more people were expected, so five were sent to the school. We drove past the Grange on our way home, and people were standing outside trying to hear. In 2004 the precinct had 33 people show up for the caucus. This time, more than double that. Another precinct had to move up to the bleachers since they ran out of chairs.
“Our precinct selected 7 delegates to attend the county convention April 19. The 74 people split out 4 for Obama, 2 for Clinton, and 1 uncommitted.
“The crowd is older than I would have expected–an average age in the late 50s, I guess. Mostly white, but that’s a function of a semi-rural neighborhood. Very pale, but some of these people have rarely seen the sun. The Hillary people were mostly female, and mostly grandmotherly. The Obama supporters were more mixed. We did elect one first-time voter to go to the cconvention as an Obama delegate.
“Brown bags were passed for donations. One dollar was suggested. The cost of the caucuses for the county is $6,000. The day was over by 2:40 or so.
“Overall the mood was upbeat. If I wrote in cliches I’d say there was some electricity there. Some Obama shirts and buttons, but nothing visible for Hillary. This year there has been a complete absence of lawn signs so far.
“The Washington state convention, when delegates for Denver will be picked, is in June. On to Denver.”
2:35 PM Pacific — Some Chaos In Washington State
Lots of problems with the Washington Democratic caucuses, which are seeing record turnouts.
They’re still going, and will clearly go longer than planned. Results, which might have been available mid-afternoon, now may come early evening.
Problem 1. The online Democratic caucus-finder — needed for folks not directed, or not remembering the direction — by one of the campaigns to get to the appropriate caucus location, ran very slow, and at times stalled out.
Problem 2. Some locations are running out of ballots.
The Republican caucuses, drawing substantially fewer people, don’t seem to be having these problems.
1:35 PM Pacific — Looking Ahead While They Vote
They’re caucusing in the state of Washington now, till at least 2 PM. The Nebraska caucuses take place at different times in different locales throughout Saturday. And the primary in Louisiana, after the fashion of all primaries, has polling places open till tonight.
So let’s look ahead for a moment.
The reason why Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are both holding rallies in Maine today before appearing at the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Richmond, Virginia tonight is because the Maine Democratic caucuses are tomorrow.
Maine’s governor is backing Clinton, as is local labor, and some expect Hillary to do best in the state. On the other hand, this is a state won by such candidates as Gary Hart and Jerry Brown, powered by college grads and environmentalists.
Former President Bill Clinton has barnstormed Maine for his wife, while Senator Ted Kennedy toured the state for Obama.
But the big prizes coming up are on Tuesday, with primaries in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C.
It’s Chesapeake Tuesday, referring to locales surrounding the Chesapeake Bay.
I reported yesterday on a few polls of Virginia and Maryland, all showing Barack Obama and John McCain with comfortable leads in the Democratic and Republican primaries, respectively.
There are new Rasmussen polls out today on Virginia and Maryland. McCain has big leads over Mike Huckabee in both states.
On the Democratic side, Obama leads Hillary in Virginia, 55% to 37%, and in Maryland, 57% to 31%.
In both states, Obama wins big among African American voters and runs even with Hillary among white voters.
Intriguingly, the gender split may be more telling than the racial split, as Hillary wins with white women, but Obama wins with white men.
There are no public polls in Washington, D.C., where the electorate is overwhelmingly African American and Obama is expected to romp to another victory.
1 PM Pacific — Nebraska Update
Correspondent Nancy Dolan reports near-chaos at her Lincoln, Nebraska caucus location.
“They expected 500 people,” she says, “and there have been maybe 1000. Bigger lines for Obama than Clinton. So big I saw some Obama supporters give up and leave.
“The party wasn’t ready enough for this. They asked people to wait in a parking lot. It’s not warm out there.”
It seems that traditional caucusing has been abandoned, not only at this site, but also at other sites around Nebraska. Rather than gather in groups, as in a normal caucus, participants are herded into lines to drop “ballot” slips into bowls.
12:55 PM — A Pre-Caucus Washington Report
Sources in both the Clinton and Obama camps express some uncertainty about Washington state.
The Clinton campaign thinks it has a shot here, but worries about Obama-mania spilling over amongst young voters and new voters. The state’s two female U.S. senators, Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray, have been pushing Hillary with their organizations.
The Obama campaign, on the other hand, says a high-ranking source, was pleasantly surprised by the endorsement of Washington’s female governor, Christine Gregoire, who has set her organization to work on Obama’s behalf.
Says correspondent Larry Maxcy: “We have had several robo calls the past few days from Hillary people. Nothing from Obama. Yet he drew a huge and unruly crowd in Seattle yesterday, 17,000 at Key Arena downtown, with thousands more trying to get in, after the fire marshall closed the doors. Hillary had 5,000 at a more sedate gathering in Tacoma.
“Caucuses begin at 1 PM. The day is a five on a murk scale of 1-10, so the weather in western Washington is seasonable.”
And reasonable.
12:30 PM — Where They Are Today
As the contests take place in Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington, Kansas, and, ah, the Virgin Islands, the candidates are elsewhere, mostly looking forward, as they must, to big contests on Chesapeake Tuesday.
Today on the trail, Mike Huckabee spoke to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, D.C. Then held a press availability in Washington and a small rally in College Park, Maryland. This afternoon he visits patients at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.
John McCain is off the trail today.
Barack Obama has a rally in Bangor, Maine. Tonight he speaks at the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Richmond, Virginia.
Hillary Clinton had a town hall discussion on the economy in Orono, Maine and another in Lewiston, Maine. Tonight, she, like Obama, speaks to the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Richmond, Virginia.
Former President Bill Clinton rallied this morning in Chesapeake, Virginia. This afternoon, he has a rally in Abindon, Virginia, and tonight, while his wife is at the JJ dinner in Richmond, Virginia, has his own rally for her in Blacksburg, Virginia.
Incidentally, a Jefferson-Jackson Dinner is a staple of Democratic politics in most states outside of the Californias and New Yorks, i.e., more heartland type states. They are big party banquets, usually once a year. They are held in honor of the two principal founders of the Democratic Party, Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson.
Why don’t the Democrats in California and New York hold Jefferson-Jackson Dinners?
Because Andrew Jackson is a politically incorrect figure.
12:10 PM Pacific — Kansas: It’s Huck!
Fox News has just projected Mike Huckabee as the winner of the Kansas Republican caucuses, winning at least two-thirds of the 36 delegates on offer.
Huckabee barnstormed across Kansas yesterday and got the backing of state right-to-life activists.
McCain barely campaigned there, but did have the backing of Kansas Senator Sam Brownback, a former presidential candidate.
11:30 AM Pacific — Louisiana Update
Louisiana, which holds the only primary of the day, looks like an impending victory for Barack Obama.
Correspondent Harold Jones in New Orleans says the weather is good — it’s in the 70s in New Orleans — but he doesn’t expect much of a turnout. Nevertheless, Obama seems more popular than Hillary Clinton in the Bayou State. The candidates haven’t had much time to campaign in Louisiana — aside from early pilgrimages decrying the troubled federal effort around Hurricane Katrina — what with all the emphasis on the early states and then Super Tuesday.
Obama held a big rally with over 4000 people on Thursday at Tulane University, where he pledged to rebuild New Orleans and praised it as a special place where, as Jones paraphrased it, “all kinds of people and cultures come together and produce something new. The Creole, the cuisine, the jazz.”
Former President Bill Clinton barnstormed through Louisiana yesterday, seeking to transfer his popularity to his wife’s candidacy. He hit, Jones says, New Orleans, La Place, Lake Charles, Lafayette, Monroe, and Baton Rouge.
But Clinton did not draw big crowds. In New Orleans, he spoke to about 200 people in a small chapel with plenty of empty seats, reports Jones.
He, too, pledged the rebuilding of New Orleans, and promised universal health insurance and cheaper college educations.
This is the first time in years that Louisiana has been consequential in a presidential nominating contest.
In 1996, the Republicans held early caucuses there, in a move engineered by backers of then Texas Senator Phil Gramm. But conservative commentator Pat Buchanan foiled Gramm’s plans by winning, which helped send the heavily funded Gramm to a quick exit in the race won ultimately by then Kansas Senator Bob Dole.
The last real race on the Democratic side was in 1984, when then Colorado Senator Gary Hart and former Vice President Walter Mondale were battling for the nomination. In the event, Rev. Jesse Jackson won, with 40% of the vote, as Hart finished second and Mondale third.
11 AM Pacific — Nebraska Update
Hillary Clinton has campaigned in Nebraska, but probably isn’t expecting a victory today in the Democratic caucuses. Her campaign has a TV ad running there featuring Bob Kerrey, the popular former governor and U.S. senator who won the Medal of Honor as a Navy Seal in Vietnam.
However, Nebraskans have memories.
Says correspondent Nancy Dolan: “I remember Bob Kerrey saying Bill Clinton is ‘an unusually good liar.’ Seems that he’s changed his mind since he’s moved to New York.”
Kerrey made that observation when he ran for president against Clinton in 1992. Since then, he’s retired from the Senate and become chancellor of the New School in Manhattan, recently demurring at a suggestion from national Democratic leaders that he move back to Nebraska to go after his old Senate seat.
While Clinton is backed by former Senator Kerrey, Obama is backed by popular current Senator Ben Nelson.
Dolan, who lives in Lincoln, Nebraska — home of the famed University of Nebraska Cornhuskers — says she made the 60-mile drive over to Omaha on Thursday for the Obama rally there.
“We’ve never seen anything like it,” she says. “The Omaha paper had ‘Obamaha’ as the headline yesterday.”
10,000 Nebraskans turned out for the Obama rally in Omaha.
It’s snowing in only a few parts of Nebraska today, though it’s cold, of course, on the plains. It was, however, colder in Iowa when Obama won his break-through victory there.
The polls close on the Nebraska caucuses at 5 PM Pacific time.
10:15 AM Pacific — Washington Update
The Washington Democratic caucuses haven’t been polled much, because it isn’t easy to say who will turn out. Hillary Clinton has had the backing of her husband’s old supporters, as well as the state’s two U.S. senators, Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell.
But Barack Obama, the former community organizer, has set up an extensive organization in the state. And, as evidenced by his drawing 20,000 people to his Washingtonrally yesterday while 6000 attended Hillary’s rally, it may be paying off. Washington’s Governor, Christine Gregoire, threw her support to Obama yesterday.
A Survey USA poll has Obama and Clinton running essentially even among all registered Democrats in the state. But among those who say they will attend the caucuses, Obama has a slight edge. But this is a robopoll, so it isn’t easy to know how perceptive the machines are at what may be shifty answers.
Weather is always a major factor this time of year in the Pacific Northwest, and Washington is one of the American states closest to Canada.
Eastern Washington has been having a very cold and snowy winter, with a key pass linking the interior of the state with the coast closed on and off.
Correspondent Larry Maxcy says: “I’m in Olympia, where there’s no snow, but lots of rain. We were honored by the presence of Mrs. Huckabee this morning, appearing at the IHOP. Reservations recommended, a phrase that never before has been used in connection with IHOP. No word about Mary Hartman.”
The polls close on the Washington caucuses — in both parties, though the contest that matters is on the Democratic side — at 2 PM Pacific time.
THE MORNING COLUMN
Several significant contests today in the deadlocked Democratic presidential race between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. While on the Republican side, presumptive nominee John McCain does some mopping up while Mike Huckabee, coming off a strong Super Tuesday showing in the South, moves to roll up more delegates and finish as the clear Republican runner-up.
As this Semi-Super Saturday begins, there is a new national poll by Newsweek magazine. It shows that Obama, following a Super Tuesday showing in which he eked out a tiny edge in overall delegates won that day, has eliminated Hillary’s national lead. It’s Obama 42%, Clinton 41%.
On the Republican side, McCain dominates with 51% to Huckabee’s 32% and Ron Paul’s 6%. Of course, the Republican nomination is decided, with John McCain’s near sweep of the delegates in the California primary over Mitt Romney, who spent millions making a major stand in the Golden State and then dropped out Thursday, proving to be the decisive event.
The Democratic contests today are in Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington state, and the Virgin Islands, with Louisiana a primary and the latter three all caucuses. The Republican contests today are in Kansas, Washington state, and Louisiana, the latter a primary and the first two being caucuses.
It’s “Game Day: Semi-Super Saturday.” I’ll be anchoring PJ Media network’s coverage throughout the day on Saturday, weaving together reports and information from correspondents and contacts inside and outside those states. The anchor coverage will be linked to and, to an extent, mirrored here on NWN. This will be a continuation of the “Super Tuesday Special Edition,” “Game Day: Florida,” “Game Day: Iowa,” “Game Day: New Hampshire,” “Game Day: Michigan And Vegas,” “Game Day: Nevada And South Carolina,” and “Game Day: South Carolina” packages.
Coming up next Tuesday … “Game Day: Chesapeake Primaries.” Covering the primaries in my ancestral Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C.
Hillary Clinton says she is only candidate to provide health care to
all in this TV ad running in Washington and elsewhere.
The public polling operations seem more than a bit exhausted after the crush of early contests, and perhaps a bit abashed after some noteworthy miscues.
I do know that Obama leads in private polling of the Lousiana primary. Caucuses are notoriously difficult to poll, especially in states other than Iowa — along with New Hampshire the most polled state in America, for obvious reasons — but I do know that Obama and Clinton held rallies late yesterday in Washington state.
Obama, joined by his newest endorser, Washington Governor Christine Gregoire, drew a crowd of 20,000, who stood throughout his 50-minute speech. Hillary, joined by Washington Senator Maria Cantwell, drew a crowd of 6,000. And was heard earlier in the day complaining to a group of nurses that their colleagues would likely be more able to participate in a primary than a caucus.
Obama and both Hillary and Bill Clinton have campaigned across Louisiana (where the former president campaigned yesterday), Nebraska, and Washington. But, sadly, none of them have campaigned in the Virgin Islands.
Here is how the day will unfold.
Washington Republican Caucuses
Polls open at 1 PM Pacific and close at 2 PM Pacific.
18 delegates, proportional representation.
Washington Democratic Caucuses
Polls open at 1:30 PM Pacific and close at 2 PM Pacific.
78 delegates, proportional representation.
Kansas Republican Caucuses
Polls open at 8 AM Pacific and close at Noon Pacific.
36 delegates, winner take all by congressional district.
Virgin Islands Democratic Caucuses
Polls open at 5 AM Pacific and close at 3 PM Pacific.
3 delegates, proportional representation.
Nebraska Democratic Caucuses
Polls open at 8 AM Pacific and close at 5 PM Pacific.
24 delegates, proportional representation.
Louisiana Republican Primary (no independents allowed)
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 6 PM Pacific.
20 delegates, winner take all.
Louisiana Democratic Primary (no independents allowed)
Polls open at 4 AM Pacific and close at 6 PM Pacific.
56 delegates, proportional representation.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND U.S. ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH.Crude oil prices shot up some four dollars a barrel Friday, closing at $91.77 per barrel. Why? Well, I don’t know. Energy markets are closed on the weekend.
On the Democratic side, Obama leads Hillary, 52% to 33%. He splits the white vote with her and lead 4 to 1 among African Americans. She leads among senior citizens but trails among all other age groups.
On the Republican side, McCain leads Mike Huckbee, 56% to 17%. Maryland votes as part of Chesapeake Tuesday.
McCain, of course, has essentially secured the Republican presidential nomination. Huckabee is continuing to make sure he has the second largest bloc of delegates to the Republican national convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Obama also has a big lead in Virginia. I haven’t seen a poll for the Washington, D.C. primary, but I would take it to the tables in Vegas that Obama wins there on Tuesday as well.
Obama leads in private polling in tomorrow’s Louisiana primary, though Bill Clinton jetted in there today in a late move. I don’t know of polls for the weekend caucuses in Washington state, Nebraska, and Maine.
** CALIFORNIA ASSEMBLY REPUBLICANS SET UP BUDGET WEB SITE. As the maneuvering continues to deal with the latest eruption of California’s chronic budget woes, Assembly Republican Leader Mike Villines has had a web site set up to illustrate his caucus’s points. It will no doubt play up Democratic efforts to raise taxes. Hopefully, it will also provide realistic suggestions for governmental efficiencies and acceptable program cuts.
** SURVEY USA VIRGINIA: BIG LEADS FOR OBAMA AND MCCAIN. Last night’s tracking poll shows Barack Obama leading Hillary Clinton, 59% to 39%. And John McCain leading Mike Huckabee 57% to 25%. Obama ties Hillary among white voters and leads 2 to 1 among voters under 35. This is not our forefathers’ Old Dominion State. Democratic Governor Tim Kaine backs Obama in the biggest contest of Chesapeake Tuesday. Democratic Senator and former Navy Secretary Jim Webb is neutral. Republican Senator and former Navy Secretary John Warner backs McCain.
Well, no. On Super Tuesday night, incidentally, Rove said that Clinton would clearly win the night, with 1000 delegates to Obama’s 650 delegates. Actually, as you know, Obama eked out a tiny edge in delegates won on Super Tuesday.
** CALIFORNIA: DENHAM RECALL QUALIFIES. Senate leader Don Perata was quite perturbed with one-time moderate Republican state Senator Jeff Denham when he joined the budget holdout faction last summer. So he and Democrats have been working to recall Denham, who had been a swing vote in the Senate prior to deciding to run in the Republican primary for lieutenant governor in 2010. The forces out to recall the Central Valley lawmaker turned in 50,000 signatures this morning, which should be enough of a cushion to meet the legal threshold of 31,000 signatures needed to trigger a recall election.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.HILLARY CLINTON campaigns today in Tacoma, Washington and Spokane, Washington.
BILL CLINTON is campaigning today in Maine.
BARACK OBAMA campaigns in Seattle, Washington before returning to Chicago.
TED KENNEDY is campaigning today in Maine.
JOHN MCCAIN campaigns in Virginia, Kansas, and Washington state.
MIKE HUCKABEE barnstorms across Kansas.
** WASHINGTON GOVERNOR BACKS OBAMA, COUNTERING SENATORS FOR CLINTON. Washington Governor Christine Gregoire has just endorsed Barack Obama in advance of tomorrow’s Washington Democratic presidential caucuses. Washington’s two U.S. senators, Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, are for Hillary Clinton.
** GAME DAY: SEMI-SUPER SATURDAY. Tomorrow is “Game Day: Saturday.” Focusing on the contests in Louisiana, Nebraska, the state of Washington, and Kansas (the latter Republicans only, Obama swept Kansas on Super Tuesday). I’ll be anchoring PJ Media network’s coverage throughout the day on Saturday, weaving together reports and information from correspondents and contacts inside and outside those states. The anchor coverage will be linked to and, to an extent, mirrored here on NWN. This will be a continuation of the “Super Tuesday Special Edition,” “Game Day: Florida,” “Game Day: Iowa,” “Game Day: New Hampshire,” “Game Day: Michigan And Vegas,” “Game Day: Nevada And South Carolina,” and “Game Day: South Carolina” packages.
Coming up next Tuesday … “Game Day: Chesapeake Primary.” Covering the primaries in my ancestral Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C.
** CALIFORNIA ASSEMBLY LEADERSHIP TEA LEAVES. As reported yesterday, following the defeat of the Prop 93 term limits revision initiative on Tuesday, now termed out Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez will remain in office till the end of the year, but the speakership election will take place on March 11th.
I can’t totally focus on California state politics right now, for obvious reasons, but I’ll tell you what I’ve heard. Anthony Portantino has announced his speakership candidacy. Assembly Majority Leader Karen Bass is looking seriously at it, but also at other races in LA. Chuck Calderon has tried to do a deal with Republican Assembly members, but their leadership is leary of such a seeming coup. Fiona Ma, a San Francisco protege of John Burton, has also looked to gaining Republican support. My observation: You don’t go to Republicans first, you go to Republicans last, as a last resort. Or you make sure that nobody hears about it until the last minute.
Jack Nicholson and Hillary Clinton on the Rick Dees In The
Morning Show. Jack says: “She’s the best man for the job.”
** TIME MAGAZINE POLL: IT’S THE INDEPENDENTS, STUPID.A new national poll for Time Magazine shows Barack Obama the stronger candidate against John McCain than Hillary Clinton. Here are the numbers. Obama 48%, McCain 41%. McCain 46%, Clinton 46%.
The difference, says Mark Schulman, CEO of Abt SRBI, which conducted the poll for TIME, is that “independents tilt toward McCain when he is matched up against Clinton But they tilt toward Obama when he is matched up against the Illinois Senator.” Independents, added Schulman, “are a key battleground.”
62% of likely voters would want Hillary Clinton to name Obama as her running mate. But only 51% would want Obama to name Hillary. A big majority, 55% to 11%, believed that Obama would help rather than hurt Clinton’s chances were he to become her running mate. But if Obama picked Clinton, that margin shifted. Only 38% said she would help, while 31% said she would hurt.
** PEGGY NOONAN ON CLINTON AND OBAMA.Peggy Noonan has an intriguing Wall Street Journal column in which she argues that Hillary Clinton is losing the Democratic race in incremental fashion, and notes that Republicans fear Barack Obama far more than the Clintons. Because they don’t really know how to run against him without looking like asses, whereas they have a good idea how to run against the Clintons, even before factoring in the mostly unexplored to date questions of their post-presidential wealth and massive, secret-yet-not-so-secret contributions to the Clinton Library and associated initiatives.
This tracks with my experience, in which most Republican operatives I know are most concerned about Obama, while most Democratic operatives have been most concerned about John McCain, whom the Republicans are getting around to nominating.
Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn vouches for John McCain at
the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington.
** CLINT EASTWOOD ON THE “MASOCHISTIC” RIGHT.Clint Eastwood discusses the risible Ann Coulter and other examples of what has become known as “McCain Derangement Syndrome” on the far right. Like his fellow classic action superstars, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone, Eastwood, now an Academy Award-winning director, is for McCain. He says Coulter and company have a “masochistic streak.”
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
Mitt Romney, who ended his campaign today, appearing on
Laura Ingraham’s show two days ago.
** QUICK HITS. John McCain, who shattered the Mitt Romney candidacy with his delegate sweep in California, is getting mostly good reviews for his CPAC speech this afternoon. While he was booed by some when he mentioned immigration, an issue on which his position has been a flash point, he was applauded frequently. “It’s my responsibility to unite the party,” he declared. “I cannot prevail over the Democrats without conservatives. “I have defended many positions we share. I am proud to be a conservative. My record is one of a mainstream conservative.” He said that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton want to increase the federal government, but “I intend to reduce it.” With regard to Iran, he said: “I will tell Iran that the United States will not permit a government that makes the destruction of Israel its fondest wish.” … Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign announced this afternoon that it has now raised $6 million since Super Tuesday. And is now saying that, contrary to yesterday’s press reports, top staff is not working without pay, but merely offered to do so. … While the Obama campaign has been advertising in this coming Saturday’s and Tuesday’s primaries and caucuses since last week, the Clinton campaign just began running TV ads in those states today. … They are still counting the ballots from Tuesday’s New Mexico Democratic primary. Amidst many tales of irregularities. Several precincts have been outstanding as the county party chairs responsible for conducting the balloting and safeguarding the vote were unavailable.
** CALIFORNIA’S ASSEMBLY LEADERSHIP TRANSITION. With his leadership cut short by the defeat of the term limits revision initiative, Prop 93, on Tuesday, Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, according to a confirmed source, consulted with the Democratic caucus and came away with a commitment that he will remain as speaker until the end of the year. However, a new speaker is to be elected on March 11th. There are several candidacies to be announced later today. Over a half-dozen have been rumored.
** CALIFORNIA’S STATE SENATE GETS A NEW LEADER LATE THIS YEAR: DARRELL STEINBERG. With his leadership cut short by the defeat of the term limits revision initiative, Prop 93, on Tuesday, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata of Oakland convened a meeting this morning in his Capitol office between the two contenders to replace him, Sacramento’s Darrell Steinberg and LA’s Alex Padilla. After the meeting, Perata issued the following statement: To remove any potential distractions to tackling the state’s budget crisis, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata (D-Oakland) today announced a process for an orderly transition of leadership in which he will remain Pro Tem until the end of his term.
Senator Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) will be the caucus’s only candidate to succeed Perata. A formal vote will be taken on Aug. 21.
“At my urging, the Senate Democratic Caucus decided on a process for an orderly transition of leadership. Our No. 1 priority this year is to tackle a giant budget deficit in a way that protects California’s future. By removing any questions about the transition of leadership, the caucus will be best equipped to decide on the critical issues confronting our state.”
Steinberg, a veteran of the state Assembly and one of the nicer guys in politics, is a backer of Barack Obama for president.
** A SHIFT, OF SORTS, WITHIN TEAM ARNOLD. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had this quip with the news that his gubernatorial communications director, Adam Mendelsohn, is leaving his staff. “He’s not going away,” says the former action superstar, “he’s going across the street. To work with me.”
Specifically, where Mendelsohn, a critical player in Schwarzenegger’s post-2005 turnaround, is going is joining his friend Steve Schmidt at Mercury Public Affairs. There the two will continue working with Schwarzenegger on his current and upcoming projects and play key roles with John McCain’s presidential campaign. Schmidt is back from weeks on the road with McCain since December, weeks which coincided with McCain’s battling through to win the Republican presidential nomination.
That happened, as I pointed out in my “Morning After” column yesterday morning, in California, where the McCain and Schwarzenegger forces turned back Mitt Romney’s late surge in the Golden State and swept the state’s delegates to the Republican national convention in St. Paul virtually across the board.
Mendelsohn, who I’ve known since he was a promising young district aide to former Southern California Congressman Steve Kuykendall nearly 10 years ago, came on board with Schwarzenegger when the governor was still reeling from his defeats in the form of his “Year of Reform” special election initiatives in 2005. Recruited by First Lady Maria Shriver, the Republican Mendelsohn proved to work well with Schwarzenegger’s disparate executive staff, including the controversial yet extremely effective chief of staff Susan Kennedy, and the larger menagerie I call Schwarzworld, as well as with the governor himself.
Very focused and hard-working — and a job like that for someone who is not only a big politician but a huge movie star is not at all conducive to a family or private life, and Mendelsohn is married with a young child and another on the way — he played a major role in righting the course of the good ship Schwarzenegger, which had veered onto the rocks.
The focus on rebuilding California, the very effective thematics of what has come to be known as post-partisanship, the consistently upbeat and, more importantly, future-oriented message from an Arnold who had too often descended into harshness, all flowed from a consistent focus that Mendelsohn helped impart in the Schwarzenegger operation.
As Schwarzenegger says, he hasn’t gone away, as Mendelsohn and Schmidt will work together with the Arnold-backed McCain presidential campaign nationally, as well as in the West and California. And they will be working with California’s Republican politics, which took a decided turn with McCain’s big presidential primary win.
Replacing Mendelsohn, as I’ve reported before, as gubernatorial communications director is Matt David, familiar to longtime NWN readers as head of Schwarzenegger’s rapid response operation in the 2006 re-election campaign. He, too, is a friend of Mendelsohn and Schwarzenegger campaign manager Schmidt, and was a senior aide to McCain. They’ll work quite harmoniously, as best I can tell, surprisingly so, together and with campaign press secretary Julie Soderlund and gubernatorial press secretary Aaron McClear.
** ROMNEY ENDS HIS CAMPAIGN, WOULD-BE MEDIA PARTY BOSSES FAIL. So Mitt Romney has ended his campaign with his CPAC speech in Washington. Though it actually ended the night before last with his near wipeout among the allocation of delegates in the California primary, at the hand of John McCain. Romney, who heavily outspent the rest of the field, though not coming close to matching the financial prowess of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, had several fundamental problems in his campaign.
First, he had an authenticity problem, having been a liberal — certainly in conservative Republican terms — politician in Massachusetts in very recent years. Then there was the emergence of Mike Huckabee, a better campaigner and a real social conservative throughout his life, who shattered Romney’s carefully laid plans in Iowa and swept most of the South, the Republicans’ core, where Romney is a poor social fit, both in terms of class background, social style, and his Mormonism. And there was the re-emergence of John McCain, seen by most voters as an authentic guy, perhaps the most famous war hero in the country.
Romney was introduced by right-wing talk show host Laura Ingraham — I recall him being introduced last year at CPAC by right-wing columnist Ann Coulter — who repeatedly took obviously implicit shots at McCain. The “alternative” media right-wing commentariat of radio and blogs, led by radio talkers Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Michael Reagan, Hugh Hewitt, Lars Larsen et all stepped far outside their roles as news commentators and tried to play the role of party bosses. (I’ve been on some of these shows, which have moved from the doctrinaire to the dogmatic.) They constantly inveighed against McCain and Huckabee and constantly urged their listeners to back Romney.
But the fact is, the effort failed. The two candidates who did best on Super Tuesday were the two who were constantly attacked by talk radio — McCain and Huckabee.
Nowhere was the collapse of this strategy more evident in California, where McCain swept nearly all the state’s delegates. This despite Romney spending much more heavily here than his campaign said, despite the exhortations of right-wing talk radio, and despite the move to set up the primary for him by excluding independents, who sometimes flock to McCain, from voting.
Republican voters in California, with Arnold Schwarzenegger, as did Republican voters in Florida, with Charlie Crist, listened to their governor far more than the would-be party bosses.
Ironically, Hewitt, Romney’s biographer who tellingly threw in the towel yesterday, claimed that Sean Hannity’s endorsement of Romney was far more important than Arnold Schwarzenegger’s, in California as well as nationally. Jon Fleischman, the Southern California Republican party vice chairman who runs the far right Flash Report web site (key for state Republican conservatives though not a mass communicator), gratuitously penned this piece of advice for McCain, that he send Schwarzenegger to the East and avoid him in California. Fleischman, incidentally, backed by California state party chairman Ron Nehring, authored the resolution to block independents from voting in the California Republican primary.
But it was all for nought.
Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn talks up John McCain’s conservatism
on Fox News before his Conservative Political Action Conference speech today.
9:25 AM FLASH UPDATE, ROMNEY OUT: NBC News reports that Mitt Romney will suspend his candidacy today during his speech to CPAC. I had speculated earlier this morning (see below) that he might announce he is not fighting on. NWN yesterday reported that Romney’s official biographer, Hugh Hewitt, a talk show host and pundit-blogger I know who incessantly inveighed against Romney’s opponents, was acceding to the inevitability of McCain. Romney is running behind schedule for his CPAC address today.
** CPAC AND MCCAIN. Today is a big moment for John McCain. His Super Tuesday victories — especially his shattering victory in California — has essentially assured him of the Republican presidential nomination. Last year he skipped the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, choosing to go on Late Night with David Letterman. It might not have been the worst choice, for last year’s CPAC was best known for Ann Coulter calling John Edwards a “faggot.” To the applause of most of the crowd.
Today McCain needs to cool out hard right antipathy toward his candidacy. I expect he will remind attendees, and folks listening to the conference on cable and talk radio, that he actually attended the very first CPAC back in 1974. Accompanying then California Governor Ronald Reagan as a young Vietnam War hero and recently released POW. Beyond that, he should be talking up national security issues and the Terror War, his moves to control federal spending, and his intention not to appoint liberal judges.
An interesting question. Will Mitt Romney fight on today? Or will he throttle it back? His official biographer Hugh Hewitt, as reported yesterday, appears to be acceding to the inevitable McCain.
Chuck and Gena Norris talk up Mike Huckabee, the second
biggest Republican winner on Super Tuesday.
** WHERE THEY ARE TODAY.JOHN MCCAIN addresses the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington at noon Pacific time.
MIKE HUCKABEE campaigns in Kansas and goes to New York for The Tyra Banks Show.
MITT ROMNEY addresses the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington at 9:15 AM Pacific time, and addresses a Lincoln Day Dinner in Baltimore, Maryland.
BARACK OBAMA tours New Orleans and holds a rally in New Orleans. Tonight he has a rally in Omaha, Nebraska.
HILLARY CLINTON has a rally in Arlington, Virginia.
BILL CLINTON has a rally in Portland, Maine.
** THE MONEY RACE. According to sources, since Super Tuesday, Barack Obama has raised $7.2 million. Hillary Clinton has raised about half that. This virtually all from the virtual world, online, through their respective web site operations. The money, however, is not virtual.
Obama is continuing to move forward with full rounds of TV advertising in the upcoming February contests. Clinton is more circumspect, with intimations that she will focus on the Texas and Ohio primaries on March 4th. There are, however, nine state Democratic presidential primaries and caucuses between now and then.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel.
You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti.
While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
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