Long-time New Hampshire state Senator Lou D'Allesandro (D) has endorsed Hillary Clinton. With this endorsement Hillary now has the endorsement of eight out of 14 Democrats in the state Senate — a clear majority.

During the 2004 campaign, D'Allesandro supported John Edwards.

A new poll from Newsweek shows that Hillary Clinton has yet to feel any pain in the national polls from this past week's debate. Hillary leads the Democrats with 43%, followed by Barack Obama at 24% and John Edwards with 12% — statistically unchanged from Newsweek's last poll back in August.

On the Republican side, Rudy Giuliani continues to benefit from a heavily divided field. He has 30% support, followed by Fred Thompson at 15%, John McCain with 14%, Mitt Romney at 12%, and Mike Huckabee at 7%.

Hillary leads Rudy by a 49%-45% margin. In a three-way race with Mike Bloomberg, it comes out at Clinton 44%, Giuliani 38%, and Bloomberg 11%.

So it looks as if Barack Obama is going to continue to push the "gender card" criticism of Hillary. A female Obama adviser, Samantha Power, just went on Tucker to go after Clinton. Take a look:

Here's a transcript:

TUCKER: I'm just wondering very quickly what you think of Senator Clinton's position that Barack Obama is being mean to her partly because she's a woman, and that's wrong, that's out of bounds, that he should stop it. You think that's a legitimate response to his attacks on her?

OBAMA ADVISER SAMANTHA POWER: I'm hoping it was just a colossal slip of the tongue. I can't conceive that Hillary Clinton who, you know, is such a professional, that she would think that somehow points of policy difference come about because of gender difference -- that makes no sense to me whatsoever. To think that women in this country will respond to that I think would be, if that what's she's implying, and again, I can't believe that it is, but that would be quite insulting to women voters who are trying to actually make decisions on the merits.

Maybe I'm missing something here. Whatever you think of Obama and Hillary, did any of the stuff alleged above ever happen? Did Hillary ever say (as Tucker claims) that Obama is being "mean" to her because she's a woman? Did Hillary ever say (as Samantha Power claims) that policy differences come about because of gender differences?

As we noted earlier at some length, Camp Hillary is definitely trying to highlight the gender dimension to all this for political gain. There's no question about that. But still, none of the stuff alleged above by Tucker and Power ever happened.

Late Update: A number of commenters below are saying that Power was actually sticking up for Hillary here. I think that's plainly not the case. First off, note her first line: "I'm hoping it was just a colossal slip of the tongue." This is a ratification of Tucker's characterization of what Hillary said. Power then goes on and says she can't believe that Hillary could have possibly meant this. But this isn't a defense of her at all. It's saying, in effect, "I can't believe Hillary could possibly mean this, but she did say these things, and they're insulting to women." It's hard to see this as not being disingenuous. This is clearly a condemnation.

And again, as I noted below, the Hillary camp has in some ways emphasized the gender dimension of the contest for political reasons. So in some ways the spirit of what the Obama camp has been saying is right. But Hillary just didn't say the stuff alleged, or suggested, above. That's my problem with this exchange.

Late Late Update: Go take a look at what Taylor Marsh has to say about this Tucker/Power exchange.

For some time now we've been trying to push the idea that Rudy G. has, well, issues when it comes to telling the truth. And along comes another perfect example of this:

We're not sure what to make about this, really. It seems pretty clear cut. In the first interview, Rudy was asked explicitly about Joe Biden and foreign policy experience and he suggested very directly that Biden didn't have any, summarizing Biden's record thusly:

"It's one thing to speak about what you want or even pass laws about it. It's another thing to actually do it. Foreign policy experience to me means being an ambassador, being in the state department."

Unless I'm missing something, Rudy explicitly used the words "foreign policy experience." But then Rudy was later confronted about his contention that Biden Senate Foreign Relations Committee chair Biden lacks said experience. And he responded that he hadn't attacked Biden this way at all. "I didn't mention foreign policy." Rudy said. Of course, Rudy did in fact "mention foreign policy."

Wolf Blitzer did fact-check Rudy here, but he also kind of laughed off Rudy's mendacity -- yet another reminder that many in the media elite still see Rudy as someone who hit the political jackpot on 9/11 but who is fundamentally unthreatening and is a kind of harmless buffoon.

We've got more for you on how the media is still failing to confront Rudy's chronic dishonesty here and here.

Late Update: Biden responds to Rudy:

“Today’s comments come from a guy -- Rudy Giuliani -- who said Dick Cheney, the architect of Bush’s failed policy in Iraq, was a great choice for vice president and who recommended the now discredited Bernie Kerik to be Secretary of Homeland Security. Once again, Rudy has demonstrated his complete lack of knowledge of U.S. foreign policy.”

Michael Mukasey is now guaranteed a majority of votes in the Senate, with Democrats Chuck Schumer (NY) and Dianne Feinstein (CA), who both serve on the Judiciary Committee, announcing they will vote yes.

Here's our continually-updated vote chart:

The methodology is explained here.

Fox News is not impressed by Mitt Romney's defiance of their edict against campaigns using Fox footage in campaign ads and Web sites.

The Huffington Post reports that Chris Silvestri, Fox's Vice President of Legal & Business Affairs, has responded to the Romney campaign's contention that their latest ad and others constitute fair use.

"The Romney campaign using footage as part of the 'Mitt TV' section of their website goes well beyond a 'Fair Use' exception to U.S. Copyright Law and we will respond accordingly," Silvestri wrote in a statement obtained by the HuffPo.

The Politicker asks the key question here: "Will the Romney campaign live to regret alienating Fox? Guess we'll find out."

Did she or didn't she?

The debate is raging away on this question today. Ezra Klein says no. Atrios agrees, and adds that Hillary was right to describe the political world and its domination by Russert and company as a "boy's club." Garance Franke-Ruta agrees, suggesting more female moderators at debates such as the one last Wednesday.

The New York Times and Washington Post political blogs are both all over this, too.

Today Obama strongly suggested, without quite saying outright, that Hillary was claiming that her rivals were attacking her because she's a woman. "I didn't come out and say: `Look, I'm being hit on because I look different from the rest of the folks on the stage,'" Obama said.

But Hillary herself says she isn't playing the "gender card," saying today in New Hampshire: "I don't think they're piling on because I'm a woman. I think they're piling on because I'm winning."

So what really happened here, anyway?

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Rudy Giuliani is standing firm on his position that there are wild differences between prostate cancer survival rates between America and England — despite the fact that the statistics apparently don't exist, and even experts at the American Cancer Society say the comparison is misleading in the first place.

"Even if you want to quibble about the statistics," Rudy told reporters, "you find me the person who leaves the United States and goes to England for prostate cancer treatment, and I'd like to meet that person."

Two key votes on the Senate Judiciary Committee are still undecided on the nomination of Michael Mukasey for Attorney General. Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) is on the fence, and a spokesman for Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI) confirmed to Election Central that the votes of both Wisconsin Senators are still up in the air.

Hillary has just offered her own thoughts on whether she thinks the men are attacking her because she's a woman:

"I don't think they're piling on because I'm a woman. I think they're piling on because I'm winning," Clinton told reporters after filing paperwork to appear on the New Hampshire primary ballot.

"I anticipate it's going to get even hotter, and if you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen. I'm very much at home in the kitchen," she said.

This comes in response to Obama's assertion earlier today that she was complaining that the male candidates were "picking" on her when she yesterday described Presidential politics as a "boys' club."

Stay tuned for a longer post on whether Hillary "played the gender card" or not.

CNN has just reported that Senate Patrick Leahy (D-VT), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, will vote against Michael Mukasey.

"No American should need a classified briefing to determine whether waterboarding is torture," said Leahy, according to the Associated Press. According to a Leahy aide, he's scheduled a presser for 3 P.M. to discuss his opposition.

We have updated our vote chart:

An explanation of the chart's methodology is available here.

Dennis Kucinich just got a little lonelier in his position on UFOs. During the debate this week, Kucinich cited Jimmy Carter's well-known experience as another example of people seeing strange things in the sky.

But now Carter has told CNN that he does not at all believe the object he and about 25 other people saw — a round object that changed colors — was actually any sort of alien spaceship.

"It was unidentified as far as we were concerned, but I think it's impossible in my opinion, some people disagree, to have space people from other planets or other stars to come to us," said Carter. "I don't think that's possible."

Rasmussen Reports has just released a new poll taken after the debate, claiming that the numbers show that the pounding Hillary took from her rivals in the Dem debate may not have had any real impact on her.

Rasmussen says that in polling taken on the two nights after the debate free-for-all, "Clinton held a 45% to 18% lead over Barack Obama. For Clinton, that’s an improvement from Monday and Tuesday nights when her lead over Obama had been 40% to 24%."

Of course, there's been, and will continue to be, plenty of battling among Dems about the points raised that night, so who knows whether this will hold.

Barack Obama has received the endorsement of former South Carolina Chief Justice Ernest Finney, who served as the state's first black Supreme Court justice in modern times.

The endorsement has the potential to help Obama consolidate support among the state's African-American voters, who make up half of the Democratic primary electorate.

Campaigning today in South Carolina, John McCain attacked his fellow Republican candidates by name for their refusal to condemn waterboarding as torture, and challenged their qualifications to say otherwise.

"There's a clear division between those who have a military background and experience in these issues and people like Giuliani, Romney and Thompson who don't — who chose to do other things when this nation was fighting its wars," McCain told reporters.

And as for Rudy's claim that his own superior experience over the other candidates in handling a crisis — namely 9/11 — gives him some perspective on the importance of interrogation, McCain didn't give an inch.

"Mayor Giuliani just contradicted himself because anybody who has experience in warfare knows that waterboarding is by any definition torture and cannot be condoned," he said. "I do not know which crisis the mayor may have been talking about. My experience goes back to the Cuban missile crisis and every conflict we've been in since."

Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK), who is both a strong pro-lifer and a vociferous deficit hawk, said yesterday that the budget is in fact the more pressing issue — and he has a rather novel rationale.

"The greatest moral issue of our time isn't abortion, it's robbing our next generation of opportunity," Coburn said at the National Press Club. "You're going to save a child from being aborted so they can be born into a debtor's prison?"

The Romney campaign has sent a letter to Fox News saying that they will defy the network's request that all the GOP campaigns "cease and desist" from using Fox debate footage in ads or on their web sites, I've just learned.

Today the Romney camp went up with a new ad bashing Hillary. As Eric Kleefeld noted below, the ad contains a smattering of that debate footage -- despite the fact that Fox's lawyers sent a letter to the GOP campaigns last week demanding that they refrain from using it.

So we checked in with the Romney campaign to see what was up. And Romney spokesman Kevin Madden confirmed that the campaign has informed Fox that they were defying the request.

It's an interesting move by the Romney camp, because by defying Fox they're taking on a network that wields great power in GOP primary politics. Meanwhile, the move is likely to win Romney plaudits from liberals and conservatives alike, because as we noted here yesterday, right-wing bloggers have allied with MoveOn to wage a public fight against Fox's ban on the use of debate footage.

Madden said the campaign was on "very strong legal ground" and gave Election Central portions of the letter the Romney campaign's lawyer sent to Fox in which he argued that Romney's use of the footage is "the very essence of political speech protected by the First Amendment."

More from the letter after the jump.

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The environmentalist group Defends of Wildlife has a new ad running against Congressman Don Young (R-AK). Interestingly, the ad focuses more on Young's many ethics scandals, with only a short mention of global warming:

The news yesterday, that Congressman Tom Udall (D-NM) is reconsidering his previous decision not to run for Senate, now appears to be getting even more serious.

New Mexico political columnist Heath Haussamen reports that multiple sources have confirmed that Udall is now actively putting together a campaign structure for a potential Senate run.

If he runs, Udall would be considered the favorite for the seat of retiring GOP Senator Pete Domenici.

One new thing we're seeing in Campaign 2008 is the advent of the Official Campaign Attack YouTube. Here, for instance, is a vid just sent out by the Edwards campaign going after Hillary. It's called the "politics of parsing":

You've probably already noticed this, but the Dem primary really is in full swing right about now.

Check out these quotes from Barack Obama's interview with NBC's Today Show in which he accuses Hillary of playing the victim with her post-debate "the men beat up on me" line:

Obama said:

"I am assuming and I hope that Sen. Clinton wants to be treated like everybody else. And I think that that's why she's running for President.

"When we had a debate back in Iowa awhile back, we spent I think the first 15 minutes of the debate hitting me on various foreign policy issues. And I didn't come out and say: `Look, I'm being hit on because I look different from the rest of the folks on the stage. I assumed it was because there were real policy differences there...

"I don't think that people doubt that Senator Clinton is tough. She's used to playing in national politics. And in fact that is one of the things that she has suggested is why she should be elected -- because she's been playing in this rough-and-tumble stage.

"So it doesn't make sense for her, after having run that way for eight months, the first time that people start challenging her point of view, that suddenly she backs off and says: 'Don't pick on me. That is not obviously how we would expect her to operate if she were President."

It's obviously debatable whether Hillary is saying, "Don't pick on me"; what Hillary said yesterday is that her all-girls education left her "prepared" for the "all boy's club" of politics. And Clinton spokesperson Phil Singer is adamantly denying that this was a play for the female vote.

Nonetheless, this is some sharp and potentially potent stuff from Obama. As Ben Smith observes, he's basically coming right out and saying, "Hey, I'm black -- who are you to use your gender status to play the victim?" It seems clear that this signals the opening of a new front in their battle, and that Obama is going to keep this up. It'll be interesting to see where it goes.

Mitt Romney's latest TV ad breaks the edict from Fox News — it's using video from their debate two weeks ago, in which he quite pointedly likened Hillary Clinton's experience to that of an intern:

Romney, like all the candidates, got a cease-and-desist letter from Fox News in the wake of John McCain's ad, ordering the candidates to not use any Fox video content in their ads or Web sites.

A new poll in South Carolina by Winthrop University shows a three-way statistical tie in the Republican primary, while Hillary Clinton has a significant lead for the Democrats — and John Edwards is in a distant third.

On the Republican side, Fred Thompson led with 17.9% of respondents, followed by Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani at 16.5% each. John McCain had 9.2%, and Mike Huckabee 5.4%.

Among Democrats, Hillary Clinton has a solid 33% of respondents, with Barack Obama at 22.7%. The state's native son John Edwards is way behind, with only 9.6%

Barack Obama has a new ad set to run in New Hampshire, promoting the issues of economic fairness:

"My plan says, let's restore some balance to our tax code," Obama says. "Close these corporate loopholes the lobbyists put in. And let's make sure that tax breaks are given to people who really need it."

Duncan Hunter has an idea for how to deal with diplomats who don't want to go to Iraq. In a new press release entitled, "Hunter: Go to Walter Reed and Bethesda for New State Dept Personnel," Hunter argues that the diplomats should be fired and then replaced by wounded veterans.

"Especially for those whose mobility has been impaired by wounds, State Department positions, not only in Baghdad but around the world, will provide excellent jobs as well as availing our nation of their enormous talent," Hunter wrote.

Full statement after the jump.

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The liberal Web site Democrats.com has thought up an interesting way to sway Chuck Schumer's vote on the Mukasey nomination. The Washington Post reports that they've begun an e-mail campaign to withhold donations to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which Schumer heads up, if he votes for the nomination.

Barack Obama introduced in the Senate last night a resolution to officially declare that the White House does not have the authority to attack Iran.

In a clear shot at Hillary Clinton's vote for the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment, Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton told the Associated Press the resolution was made in order to "nullify the vote the Senate took to give the president the benefit of the doubt on Iran."

The Clinton campaign, meanwhile, is hitting right back. Spokesman Phil Singer told the AP that if Obama were so concerned about the issue, he should have a) co-signed Jim Webb's letter on the subject, and b) have shown up to vote against Kyl-Lieberman.

As promised, here's some video of Joe Lieberman on the Senate floor today saying that it would be "unjust" to oppose Michael Mukasey's confirmation as AG over a peripheral detail such as his refusal to say whether waterboarding constitutes torture:

Thirty Senators, led by Jim Webb, have just released a letter they sent to the President. The message: Stop trash-talking about Iran. Key quote:

We are writing to express serious concerns with the provocative statements and actions stemming from your administration with respect to possible U.S. military action in Iran. These comments are counterproductive and undermine efforts to resolve tensions with Iran through diplomacy.

We wish to emphasize that no congressional authority exists for unilateral military action against Iran.

Intrestingly, as The Huffington Post reported today, one Senator who didn't sign the letter is Barack Obama, apparently because he disagrees with the letter's assertion that Kyl-Lieberman "should in no way" be seen as a predicate for war with Iran.

"It will take more than a letter to prevent this administration from using the language contained within the Kyl-Lieberman resolution to justify military action in Iran," Obama spokesman Bill Burton told us. "This requires a legislative answer and Senator Obama intends to propose one."

The full letter, and a full list of signers, after the jump.

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Joe Lieberman, on the Senate floor just moments ago:

"To reject the nomination of Judge Michael Mukasey because he refuses to say what some members want him to say on this question, and he refuses as a matter of sincerely held legal belief...would be grossly unfair, an unjust act to this judge. May I suggest an alternative course...confirm him!"

Of course, lots of folks would argue that "this question" -- i.e., whether waterboarding is torture -- is kind of an important one. Video in a bit.

Meanwhile, we've updated our chart:

The other day, Rudy released a now-notorious ad claiming that the survival rate from prostate cancer is much higher in America than in Britain, showing what a failure socialized medicine has been. That claim was thoroughly debunked, however.

So will Rudy stop making the false claim? Far from it. Not only has he continued to mouth the same falsehood in the days after the claim was knocked down, but he's also expanded the dissembling about health care to another front: Breast cancer.

Check out this Rudy appearance on Fox News, which took place well after the initial claims had been widely proven false:

As you can see, Rudy repeated the same claims about prostate cancer, but he also added this:

"The same thing is true of women with breast cancer — the chance of surviving in the United States for a woman, much greater than in France, or in England or in Canada, or in Cuba where Michael Moore would like us all to go for health care."

The only problem with this is that it's outright false.

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"So the Senator who didn't think Halliburton's war profiteering was worth investigating is endorsing the candidate who wanted to put Bernie Kerik in charge of Homeland Security. Makes sense to us!"

— Andy Barr, campaign manager for Al Franken, responding in the Huffington Post to Senator Norm Coleman's endorsement of Rudy Giuliani.

Sen. Ted Kennedy has announced that he will not support Michael Mukasey for attorney general. Meanwhile, John McCain has been publicly defending Mukasey.

We have now updated our vote-count chart:

Stephen Colbert's effort to get on the South Carolina Democratic primary ballot has been blocked. The Politico reports that the state party's executive council has voted to reject his petition.

Besides the obvious cause — they were probably not amused by the joke — state party director Joe Werner implied there were acts of forgery in the ballot petitions. For example, the name of former Governor Jim Hodges was on the list.

Late Update: It turns out that despite Werner's suspicions, Colbert actually did meet with Hodges, the state's most recent Dem governor. It's not known yet, however, whether or not Hodges really did sign the petition.

Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN), who faces a tough re-election fight next year, has endorsed Rudy Giuliani for president.

"We have similar records — making cities safer, creating jobs, lowering taxes," Coleman told the Associated Press.

Minnesota's Republican governor, Tim Pawlenty, is a national co-chairman for John McCain's campaign

John Kerry has issued a statement opposing the nomination of Michael Mukasey to be attorney general, bringing the number of Senators opposed to the nomination up to nine.

The full statement from Kerry is available after the jump.

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Congressman Tom Udall (D-NM) might just end up running for the Senate, after all. The Albuquerque Journal reports that Udall, who previously took himself out of the running for the seat of retiring GOP Senator Pete Domenici, has informed party leaders that he's giving the race another look.

No firm decision has been made that he will enter, but he would easily become the favorite to win the seat in the general election, according to current polling. The current Democratic frontrunner, Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chávez, has had a much more lackluster performance against the possible Republican nominees.

Fun fact: Udall's family has a strong political presence out West. His cousin Mark is a Democratic Congressman from Colorado who is running for an open Senate seat, and their Republican cousin Gordon Smith is seeking re-election as a Senator from Oregon. It's thus possible that three cousins could end up winning three simultaneous Senate races, in three different states and from both parties.

This is interesting: A coalition of right-wing bloggers and MoveOn that helped force several networks to allow public use of their political debate footage last spring has just launched a similar campaign against Fox News.

Fox recently sent letters to all the GOP Presidential candidates "cease and desist" from using Fox footage in any way. In response, the right-wing bloggers and MoveOn are demanding that Fox rescind these cease and desist orders and allow public use of its debate footage.

In a press release just blasted out by MoveOn, RedState.com founder Eric Erickson, a prominent right-wing blogger, is quoted saying: "Already FOX is viewed as a partisan network by the Democrats, who will not use that forum for debates...Every other news organization has liberated their debate footage and FOX should either be no different or no longer have the privilege of airing debates."

The primary concern of the right-wing bloggers seems to be that if they can't use Fox debate footage on their sites, it hampers their ability to comment on the GOP primary and on politics in general. MoveOn, for its part, opposes Fox because its refusal to allow use of debate footage could "stifle debate."

One reason this campaign is interesting is that similar version of this alliance has had success before. After it launched a similar campaign last spring and gained considerable attention, CNN, ABC and NBC all agreed to allow use of its debate footage.

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The Edwards campaign isn't letting Hillary Clinton off easy about Tuesday night's debate. In a conference call just now with reporters, Edwards advisor Joe Trippi was asked about the Hillary camp's characterization that the other candidates and Tim Russert had ganged up on her.

Trippi then turned the question around and went after the Hillary campaign for trying to turn the debate aftermath into a new plea for money.

"Well I think the more telling one is that yesterday they had a conference call, their money people, saying they needed more money because of the debate performance, which goes back exactly to what we've been talking about," Trippi said. "You don't need money to tell the truth, or to not double-talk."

A new SurveyUSA poll shows Hillary Clinton ahead of all the Republican candidates in Florida, though some of the results are within the margin of error:

Clinton (D) 49%, Giuliani (R) 45%
Clinton (D) 53%, Thompson (R) 43%
Clinton (D) 55%, Romney (R) 40%
Clinton (D) 55%, Huckabee (R) 39%
Clinton (D) 49%, McCain (R) 46%
Clinton (D) 54%, Paul (R) 36%
Giuliani (R) 48%, Gore (D) 47%

Here's something that could put another dent in Rudy's 9/11 halo: Giuliani is now facing a New York City government investigation into his handling of the radios used by firefighters on 9/11.

The Huffington Post reports that the probe's goal is to get to the bottom of an enduring charge against Giuliani -- that because of his negligence the radios used by the FDNY on 9/11 were the same ones that malfunctioned during the 1993 World Trade Center attack. HuffPo says that more than 20,000 people have signed a petition demanding the investigation.

At the very least, such a probe could reveal more unflattering facts about his allegedly heroic 9/11 performance. Stay tuned -- we'll definitely be following this one.

Chris Dodd hits the airwaves in Iowa today with this new ad:

The ad is designed to capitalize on the sudden acrimony that's erupted in the Dem primary by saying that while the other Dems proclaim their willingness to fight for results, Dodd himself has gotten them in the Senate. Intriguingly, however, there's no mention of the thing that got him tons of attention in the past couple of weeks: His taking the lead in the battle against telecom immunity by threatening to block the Senate FISA bill, something that prompted similar opposition to telecom immunity from Hillary and Barack Obama.

Governor Ernie Fletcher (R-KY), who is headed towards a landslide defeat this Tuesday according to all the opinion polls, has a new ad about in which he is pitched as the champion of school prayer, the Ten Commandments, and Kentucky's traditional values:

"Choose life. Choose values," the announcer says. "Choose Ernie Fletcher — it's how we preserve our Kentucky home."

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) — whose personal fortune helped launch the 2003 recall of Governor Gray Davis — is now bankrolling the initiative to split California's electoral votes in a manner that would net the Republicans roughly 20 new electors.

"I have made a small contribution," Issa told The Hill. Issa has an interesting definition of "small" — though he did not disclose the full amount, he said it was in the tens of thousands of dollars.

"This is about making people’s votes count," he said. "It’s about proportional representation."

John Edwards is rolling out his first major TV ad in Iowa, a populist spot entitled "Heroes":

"It is time for our party, the Democratic Party, to show a little backbone, to have a little guts," Edwards says to an applauding crowd. "Stand up for working men and women. If we are not their voice, they will never have a voice."