The Des Moines Register, the largest newspapers in Iowa, has endorsed Hillary Clinton and John McCain in their respective caucuses.

The endorsement of Hillary also took some shots at Barack Obama, agreeing with the Clinton campaign's criticisms about his experience in office: "When Obama speaks before a crowd, he can be more inspirational than Clinton. Yet, with his relative inexperience, it’s hard to feel as confident he could accomplish the daunting agenda that lies ahead."

In 2004, the paper endorsed John Edwards in the Democratic caucus, even though at the time he was way behind in the polls — and he ultimately finished a strong second. The question is, can these endorsements help McCain, who is virtually invisible in this state's polls, and can it aid Hillary in her dogfight against Obama?

Bill Clinton is definitely taking the gloves off against Barack Obama. In an interview with Charlie Rose, taped last night, Bill said the following:

• That "it's not close" in terms of how much better prepared Hillary is to be president;

• That picking Obama would be a "risk";

• Likened nominating Obama to picking "a gifted television commentator";

• Criticized Obama for beginning his presidential campaign after only one year in the Senate;

• Called Obama a mere "symbol for change," adding that "symbol is not as important as substance";

Bill also sought to downplay expectations for Hillary in Iowa, saying that "It's a miracle she even has a chance."

The bottom line: The next three weeks ought to be really fun.

Late Update: Check out this truly brutal excerpt:

Late Late Update: The whole thing is available here.

Rep. Julia Carson (D-IN) has died, less than a month after announcing that she had been diagnosed with terminal lung cancer, and would not be running again. The diagnosis was made over this past Summer.

Carson was 69, serving her sixth term, and was both the first African-American and the first woman to represent Indianapolis in Congress.

The Associated Press asked all the Presidential campaigns to name their principal's most "prized possession." Fred Thompson's answer:

Trophy wife

A gaffe? Naah. The AP reassures us that Thompson's answer was meant to be "tongue in cheek."

Barack Obama comments on Hillary Central Command's role in the drug flap, says he believes Hillary's promise that it wasn't planned:

“I take the Clinton campaign's word that they didn't know what this guy was doing and I understand all that," Obama said, "but the one thing I will say is I told my staff that if I catch you guys doing any kind of stuff like this you're fired. Period."

"And I think what we need to do -- and I told this to senator Clinton yesterday -- is that we need to send a strong message to all of our surrogates and all of our staffs, that we don't play that," he said. "I know my staff has gotten that message because it's one that I delivered several months ago and I haven't seen that come out of their mouths."

Does the Clinton campaign want to keep the Obama drug flap story alive?

That's what New York Times reporter Kit Seelye asserted in The Times today, based on nothing more than the fact that Hillary pollster Mark Penn used the word "cocaine" on Hardball yesterday. And the question is being debated in political circles today, albeit no one will speak about it on the record.

Today, Hillary gave an interview to an Iowa radio station that sparked a new round of talk about this. Here's the key exchange:

QUESTION: Why are you the most electable?

CLINTON: People are asking -- number one, who would be the best president? Who is ready on day one. We are not going to have time to wait. Economy, wars, terror. There is no way to describe the pressures and stresses of this job.

The second important question is who can win – if you decide who is the best president, clearly we want to be able to win. I offer 35 years of experience and not just talking about change. You can’t demand change, you can’t hope for change, you have to work hard to create change and that is what I have done. If you want to know what I am going to do – look at what I have already done. I have been tested and vetted, there are no surprises.

Over at The Politico, Ben Smith interprets this as an effort on Hillary's part to draw "a contrast with unnamed rivals." The suggestion being that she is making an implicit reference to "surprises" that just might lurk in Obama's past.

It's true that Hillary was asked why she's the most electable, and that her answer to the question -- that there are "no surprises" in her past -- could be interpreted as wanting to keep the implicit comparison in the air. This is similar to the line from her New Hampshire chair that caused all the controversy -- i.e., that GOP rivals could start asking if there's more to Obama's drug past than we know -- which naturally gives rise to the suspicion that the Hillary campaign wants the drug talk to kind of hang out there.

Anyone who wants to believe this will also see nefarious doings behind the fact that Penn referred to Obama's "cocaine" use last night on Hardball. It's easy to see dark motives at play with Penn, obviously, because he's such an unpleasant figure and because he's become a kind of stand-in for everything that's wrong with the uglier side of Clintonian politics.

But Hillary's claim that she was vetted comes at the very end of a long answer that veered into a discussion of her own electability, and it seems equally likely that this could simply be a reference to just that -- her own electability. The Hillary campaign is getting killed on this story -- the Obama people have skillfully ridden it for all it's worth for days now, raising money off of it and using it to paint her as a dirty campaigner in the eyes of purist Iowa voters.

Indeed, it seems clear to me that the only thing the Hillary people want from this story right now is that it go away. Of course, suggestive answers like the above from Hillary make it easier for the press to hang on to the story. But it's hard to imagine that Camp Hillary wants this talked about any longer.

But I'd like to hear what you all have to say about this, and wanted to throw this one open to readers. Have at it.

Late Update: Steve Benen has a good post on the broader context here, and Michael Crowley has some color from the press conference that followed. They both seem to conclude, as did I, that Hillary's comments are worded in such a way that guarantees that this story keep going, but both also tilt more strongly in the direction of suggesting that the campaign's "no surprises" line is partly designed to keep the drug talk hanging in the air.

Late Late Update: Here's some video of the subsequent press conference:

Still Later Update: Obama weighs in.

The Edwards campaign has been notified that the Federal Election Commission has decided to deny matching funds for contributions collected for him by ActBlue, upholding its earlier draft opinion and rebuffing the Edwards camp's request that the funds be matched.

Edwards campaign spokesman Eric Schultz sends over the following statement:

"Although today's decision by the FEC is a setback to the progressive grassroots movement, our campaign has all of the resources it needs to aggressively make our case to voters. Even without the ActBlue contributions included, we will meet our projected $10 million in matching funds."

Though the Edwards camp didn't budget for the matching funds, the move will deprive them of needed funds going into the early voting. And it is a big disappointment to progressives who had mounted a pressure campaign against the FEC, arguing that grassroots contributions such as those collected through ActBlue should be matchable, just as funds collected by lobbyists and special interests are.

This morning, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced on the Senate floor that the Senate FISA renewal bill containing immunity for the telecoms would go to the floor on Monday. The move, which many expected, dismayed opponents of telecom immunity.

Now the campaign of Senator Chris Dodd, who has promised to put a hold on and filibuster the bill, has just sent out an email to supporters containing a challenge for the other Dem Senators running for President: Will you stick by your promise to publicly support my filibuster of the bill?

Back when Dodd first announced his planned filibuster of the measure in October, the Dem Senators running for President came under heavy pressure to say they'd publicly support it. Senators Clinton, Obama and Biden all said they would.

Now the Dodd campaign is reaffirming that he is going to come back to D.C. and stage his filibuster -- and it's asking people to put a new round of pressure on the other Senators to stand with him. From the Dodd campaign's email from Dodd Internet guru Tim Tagaris:

Remember when this all started playing out? A lot of people rushed to send out strongly worded press releases about how committed they were to "supporting a filibuster."

They'll have a chance to show they are true to their word.

Call or email the Senators that pledged their opposition to this bill to support the Dodd Amendment and a filibuster if necessary. And ask them to be there with Dodd when it counts.

The Dodd campaign is clearly mindful of the fact that when Dodd announced his filibuster in October, it gave his campaign a boost in fundraising and media attention. And it'ss surely aware that the same thing might happen again if and when the bill comes to the floor and Dodd takes a stand against it. As it did last time, the campaign is again looking to use the issue to highlight the fact that he's been out front on this in a way his Dem rivals haven't. The full email after the jump.

Late Update: Senators Leahy and Wyden have now commented on this. Their statements after the jump.

Read more »

Mike Huckabee may now be able to claim frontrunner status in yet another early primary: Florida. The new Rasmussen poll gives him 27% support, followed by Mitt Romney at 23%, Rudy Giuliani at 19%, and nobody else in the double digits.

Numbers like this have to really hurt Rudy Giuliani's strategy, as Florida has been one of the few January contests where he was polling well recently. In addition, it says a lot about Huckabee's fellow Southern candidate, Fred Thompson — he used to lead or come in a close second here, but is now down to 9%.

The new Research 2000 poll of Iowa gives Barack Obama a healthy lead in the caucus, at 33% support, with Hillary Clinton and John Edwards tied at 24% each. On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee leads with 31%, followed by Mitt Romney at 22%, with nobody else breaking into the double digits.

A separate poll from Hotline/Diageo puts Obama and Hillary at 27% each, with Edwards at 22%. On the Republican side, Huckabee has 36% to Romney's 23%.

This has gotten a bit of attention already, but it's worth a quick note: The chairman of the Wyoming Democratic Party, an Obama backer, has taken a shot at Bill Clinton, saying that the Lewinsky mess should lead us to question Hillary's electability and ensures that her candidacy would damage the electoral hopes of the state's Democrats.

In a letter to the Denver Post, the Wyoming chair, John Millin, writes:

For reasons I don't agree with and don't completely understand, most voters in Wyoming seem to hate Hillary Clinton. This is in part due to the perception of her as being someone who supports big government, most notably through a federal government takeover of the health care system. She is also paying a heavy price for the sins of her husband.

If Barack Obama is the democratic presidential nominee, we will be the party of new ideas that understands that a united America will be much better able to address the serious problems facing our country than a divided America. If Hillary Clinton is our party's nominee, every democratic candidate in Wyoming will be painted with that same liberal, big government brush. We will also be the target of the locker room jokes that rightfully belong to Bill Clinton.

The letter's author has no official role with the Obama campaign. The letter carries a message about Hillary's vulnerability that the Obama campaign would probably want to push, but there's no way they can push the letter or associate themselves with it because of the attacks on Bill. Full letter here.

Late Update: The Denver Post also notes that Millin is a superdelegate.

Hillary Clinton just bagged a great endorsement in Iowa, picking up the support of six-term Congressman Leonard Boswell, who cited Hillary's electability and experience.

Within the Iowa Democratic delegation, John Edwards has been endorsed by freshman Rep. Bruce Braley, while freshman Dave Loebsack has yet to publicly endorse. Senator Tom Harkin has not endorsed, but his wife is publicly supporting Hillary.

The new Research 2000 poll has some bad news for Hillary Clinton and good news for Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. On the Democratic side, Obama now has a one-point lead, with 32% to Hillary's 31%, followed by John Edwards at 18%. It's not a statistically significant lead, but it's definitely big news when you consider that Hillary used to have an enormous edge here.

They key point here: Among registered Democrats, Hillary actually leads with 36%, with 27% for Obama and 21% for Edwards. But among independents who are likely to vote in the Democratic primary, Obama has 40%, Hillary 23% and Edwards 13%. So this primary could well hinge on how much of the electorate is made of core Democrats versus independent voters.

On the Republican side, Romney can still count on the state as a firewall against a loss in Iowa — he leads with 31%, with Rudy Giuliani at 18% and John McCain with 17%. Mike Huckabee hasn't caught on here, either, with only 9% support.

Yesterday the Rudy campaign released a new ad highlighting how tough on immigration he is -- but as we reported below, the spot is directly contradicted by multiple past pro-immigration statements Rudy made as Mayor of New York.

Now the Romney campaign is seeking to drive this point home by releasing this new Web video highlighting Rudy's past tolerance, and even embrace, of illegal immigration:

It's a pretty slam dunk case. Rudy not only tolerated illegal immigration as Mayor; he embraced it and thought it was a good thing. But tolerance doesn't sell in a GOP primary -- so now all that is out the window. Lovely guy.

The new CNN poll in South Carolina shows Mike Huckabee leading in the Republican primary with 24% supporter, followed by Fred Thompson at 17%, Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney at 16% each, and John McCain with 13%.

For some context: In the last CNN poll here in July, Huckabee was at only 3%, and Rudy Giuliani was at 30%.

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton leads with 42%, with Barack Obama at 34% and John Edwards at 16%.

Hillary hits the airwaves in Iowa and New Hampshire with another ad featuring her mother -- and this one also includes Chelsea, too:

Though the exchange between Hillary and Obama at the debate was most attention grabbing to the media, it was John Edwards who most impressed the voters who were assembled by CNN and Fox News to gauge reaction.

The Edwards campaign sends over this quote from CNN's Mary Snow, announcing that Edwards won the network's session:

Twenty-three registered Democrats came in here undecided. We asked them who they felt performed the best in this debate and they concluded they felt that John Edwards performed the best, with Senator Clinton right behind him.

Meanwhile, ABC News' Rick Klein kept an eye on the Fox News dial sessions with voters and says that Edwards' answers repeatedly drove voter responses high up and off the charts, live-blogging as follows:

Here's Edwards shooting broad once again – ‘join together to take this democracy and take this country back.’ At least the fourth time he's sounded that theme -- if you're an angry Iowan, you've got to love that message. And the Fox dialers certainly do."

...and, later:

Fox News is doing running dial-testing -- and John Edwards is quite literally off the charts with that answer about the tax system being rigged.”

So these voters, at least, call it for Edwards.

Late Update: In fairness, Obama also earned high marks from Fox's focus groups.

Billy Shaheen, the Hillary official who said Obama's past drug use would make him vulnerable to GOP attacks in a general election, steps down from the campaign with a statement:

“I would like to reiterate that I deeply regret my comments yesterday and say again that they were in no way authorized by Senator Clinton or the Clinton campaign. Senator Clinton has been running a positive campaign focused on the issues that matter to America’s families. She is the best qualified to be the next President of the United States because she can lead starting on day one. I made a mistake and in light of what happened, I have made the personal decision that I will step down as the Co-Chair of the Hillary for President campaign. This election is too important and we must all get back to electing the best qualified candidate who has the record of making change happen in this country. That candidate is Hillary Clinton.”

Chris Dodd really got screwed today. First the debate moderator, Des Moines Register editor, Carolyn Washburn, asked Dodd a silly and insulting question about his father:

"Senator Dodd, you write in your book that you still struggle with the memories of when your father, former senator Thomas Dodd, was censured by the Senate in 1967 for alleged misuse of campaign money. How much are you motivated in your run for president by a desire to restore the Dodd family name that was hurt by this censure?"

Really, now. It's hard to know which question is more frivolous, inane and catty, this or the one she asked Biden about race.

And then, to top this off, CNN's Wolf Blitzer interviewed Dodd after the debate and asked him about everything except for...Chris Dodd. Well, not quite, but almost. The first three questions Wolf asked Dodd were about the tone of the debate, as if Dodd's a pundit, the Mitchell Report, and the Hillary-Obama drug flap yesterday. Only in the fourth question did Dodd finally get asked about, you know, himself and his policies.

This might have been the debate's best moment. Toward the end came this exchange:

MODERATOR: Senator Obama, you have Bill Clinton's former National Security Adviser, State Department policy director and Navy Secretary among others, advising you. With relatively little foreign policy experience of your own, how will you rely on so many Clinton advisers, and still deliver the kind of break from the past that you're promising voters?

(Laughter)

Obama: You know I am --

Hillary: (Laughing) I want to hear that.

Obama: Well, Hillary, I'm looking forward to you advising me as well. (Laughter)

I'd say that this exchange very neatly captures many of the Campaign 2008's various underlying tensions and absurdities, wouldn't you?

Late Update: Here's video of this moment:

Okay, this is just pathetic. The moderator of the debate, Des Moines Register editor Carolyn Washburn, just asked this question of Joe Biden:

Senator Biden, you and your campaign have had a number of occasions to correct or clarify things you've said relating to race, including your remarks about Senator Obama being, quote, "clean and articulate," your comment about Indians working at 7-11, and recently to the Washington Post in which you spoke about race while describing disparities between schools in Washington, D.C. and Iowa.

Do these gaffes, or misunderstandings, or however you characterize them indicate you're uncomfortable talking about race, or are people just being too sensitive?

Look, this is just absurd. Biden has been forced multiple times to defend this comment about Obama being "clean and articulate." Here's what he said of Obama at the time:

"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy."

Some have pointed out convincingly that if you add a missing comma, Biden very clearly could have meant Obama is "mainstream" and in addition is "articulate and clean." At any rate, asking Biden to answer for this yet again is just a big waste of time.

Thankfully, Obama stepped forth to defend Biden, saying:

"I have absolutely no doubt about what is in his heart and the commitment he's made to racial equality in this country."

Good.

Hillary's just delivered her opening statement at the debate. Key line:

"Well, everybody on this stage has an idea about how to get change. Some believe you get change by demanding it, Some believe you get it by hoping for it. I believe you get it by working hard for change. That's what I've done my entire life. That's what I will do as president."

The "demanding change" formulation clearly looks like a reference to John Edwards, and the "hoping for change" formulation is obviously a reference to Barack Obama and his "politics of hope." Hillary's reference to "working" for it is in keeping with the campaign's message -- it's meant to charicature Obama as a pretty talker and use that as a foil to her longer career.

The Hillary campaign has been trying for months now to undercut Obama's argument that he's the race's real change agent by saying that she has the experience to realize actual change. Here she's pushing this message in a newish way -- will it work?

Here's the first sentence of Obama's opening statement at today's Dem debate:

You know, 40 years ago, Dr. King challenged America to act on what he called the "fierce urgency of now," and I feel that urgency today.

The phrase has become a frequent one for Obama since his Jefferson Jackson Dinner speech, but here he leads with it. The quote seems designed to call attention to the historic nature of his candidacy -- but also to give historical sheen to his "urgency" to become President right now, at his relatively young age.

The Dem debate sponsored by the Des Moines Register is now underway, and it's hard to overstate how much is at stake for the candidates here, given that the Iowa caucuses are right around the corner and that this debate will focus relentlessly on issues important to Iowans.

First interesting moment: Asked if balancing the Federal budget every year would be a "priority" under her administration, Hillary went out of her way to evoke her husband's fiscal record:

"Fiscal responsibility is a very high priority for me. We don't have to go back very far in our history, in fact just to the 1990s, to see what happens when we do have a fiscally responsible budget that does use rules of discipline to make sure that we're not cutting taxes or spending more than we can afford I will institute those very same approaches. You can't do it in a year, it'll take time, but the economy will grow again when we start acting fiscally responsible."

And, suggesting that she's making a concerted effort to remind Iowans of the prosperity of the 1990s, she just made another reference to the Bill years, saying:

"During the nineties, the typical Iowan's income rose several thousand dollars."

We'll be blogging the debate right here.

Rudy tries to arrest his plummeting support among conservatives by going up on the air in New Hampshire with a new get-tough-on-immigration ad:

In the ad, Rudy promises to "end" illegal immigration -- but back when he was Mayor of New York in 1996, Rudy said:

"We're never, ever going to be able to totally control immigration to a country that is as large as ours, that has borders that are as diverse as the borders of the United States, and as a society that wants to be a country that values freedom -- that values freedom of movement, freedom to do business...So we just have to accept that if we want to be the kind of country that we are."

In the ad, Rudy says that in order to become a citizen, "you have to be able to read English, write English, speak English." But back when he was Mayor of New York in 1996, he said the following about an English-only law:

"There's no reason to pass a bill like this except, maybe, to exclude people, insult people or offend people."

In the ad, Rudy says that in order to end illegal immigration, "what we need here is leadership." But back when he was Mayor of New York in 1994, Rudy's idea of leadership was to say the following about illegal immigrants:

"If you come here and you work hard and you happen to be in an undocumented status, you’re one of the people who we want in this city."

Trifecta!

Who needs Oprah when you've got a mom to campaign for you? Hillary -- or, more accurately, her mother Dorothy -- goes up on the air in this new Iowa ad:

The Obama campaign clearly thinks its got a winner in the dust-up yesterday over Hillary New Hampshire co-chair Billy Shaheen's claim that Obama's past drug use could make him vulnerable to GOP attacks in a general election.

So much so, in fact, that Camp Obama has just sent out an email to supporters trying to raise money off the fight.

"The only way to stop these kinds of tired, desperate attacks is to
demonstrate very clearly that they have a real cost to Senator Clinton's
campaign," reads the email, from Obama campaign manager David Plouffe.

"If 5,000 people donate in the next 24 hours, we can show their campaign
that we reject this kind of divisive politics. Make your donation of $25
now."

The Hillary campaign -- and Shaheen himself -- have emphatically declared that the comments were not authorized by the Hillary camp in any way. Plouffe's full email after the jump.

Read more »

GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell, whose support for the Iraq War has made him vulnerable to a challenge in 2008, officially has a challenger: Andrew Horne, a retired Marines lieutenant colonel who served in Iraq and who's also a senior adviser to the antiwar group VoteVets. Here's his announcement video:

Presumably Horne will be making an issue of McConnell's recent comments belittling the deaths of professional soldiers.

His official Web site, complete with bio and other stuff, is here.

Okay, this is interesting. Take a look at this new and absolutely brutal Web video that slams Mike Huckabee over his role (first reported by The Huffington Post) in pushing for serial rapist Wayne Dumond:

Who's behind this video?

The only clue to who made this vid is that it includes the web address of something called HuckabeeFacts.com. That site is right here. It's apparent that this was just set up, probably to post this video -- indeed, this video is the only thing posted on it, and it was posted at 1 A.M. today. What's more, the site offers no clue as to who is behind it -- the only contact info given is an email address: huckabeefacts@gmail.com.

But here's the thing: The mother of Dumond's victim clearly participated in the shooting of this ad. So who shot it?

Late Update Mystery solved by Max Brantley on the Arkansas Times blog. The culprit is an Arkansas political operative named Keith Emis.

A new Quinnipiac poll gives a bit of weight to Rudy's argument that he's the Republican who can put blue states in play, finding that he's in a virtual dead heat with Hillary in New Jersey, 45%-44%.

It's true that Jersey is notorious for having the polls show close races between Dems and Repubs, only to tilt blue on a reliable basis, but these numbers are noteworthy.

In one surprising finding, the survey also finds that though Rudy enjoys a wide lead over his rivals in the state's GOP primary, he has slipped 10 points since October -- and much of that went over to Mike Huckabee.

Still another report of tensions inside Camp Hillary, this one centered on the performance of Hillary pollster Mark Penn:

With Clinton barely holding her own against Barack Obama and John Edwards in Iowa, dissatisfaction is growing with Penn, who some say has mistakenly run Clinton as a de facto incumbent...

For months, tension has been building between the "Hillary" and "Bill" parts of the team, say several people familiar with the situation. Bill Clinton -- along with former White House hands -- have counseled her to adopt a far more aggressive approach with Obama.

Penn, sources say, has counseled moderation, believing an attack would elevate her already-high negatives and drive her too far to the left to win a general election.

Again, it's impossible to know whether this reflects real internal struggles or garden variety internal disagreements and discussion over strategy. Reporters are generally under tremendous pressure to get the "campaign infighting" stories -- particularly now, with so many stories appearing about alleged tensions within Camp Hillary -- so often routine disagreements are elevated into reports of real discord.

The new poll of Iowa from GOP firm Strategic Vision shows Barack Obama leading the caucus with 33% support, followed by Hillary Clinton at 25% and John Edwards with 24%. This result is not significantly changed from their last poll five days ago.

On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee leads with 30%, followed by Mitt Romney at 25%, Fred Thompson 13%, Rudy Giuliani 10%, and John McCain at 5%. Again, these numbers have not changed significantly since the last poll.

• The transcript for this afternoon's Republican debate in Iowa is available here. Beware: This transcript was clearly done with voice recognition software, and has its fair share of errors.

• The debate — the last GOP event before the Iowa caucus — was in many ways a total bust. It was dull, the candidates were not really put on the spot in tough ways, and moderator Carolyn Washburn, editor of the Des Moines Register, openly said they would avoid high-profile national issues like Iraq and immigration. It's hard to pick out a winner, but there was one surefire loser: Carolyn Washburn.

• The best moment was when Fred Thompson led a candidates' revolt against hand-raising questions, regarding climate change. Thompson refused to do a show of hands, then asked for 30 seconds to give a more detailed answer. When Washburn said no, he stood firm and declared, "Well, then I'm not going to answer it." He then got his 30 seconds.

• John McCain gave the best answer on climate change: "Suppose that climate change is not real and all we do is adopt green technologies which our economy and technology is perfectly capable of, then all we've done is given our kids a cleaner world. But suppose they're [the skeptics] wrong, suppose they're wrong and climate change is real and we've done nothing? What kind of a planet are we going to pass on to the next generation of Americans?"

• Rudy Giuliani defended himself on the Shag Fund story, insisting that none of this information was ever a secret: "All that information was available, and known to people, known six years ago, and I would make sure that government was transparent," he said, then alluding humorously to the scandals surrounding his 2000-2001 divorce. "My government in New York City was so transparent that they knew every single thing I did almost every time I did it."

• Not surprisingly, given his online following, Ron Paul praised the Internet: "The Internet is delightful for finding the information, and if there's a question that I need, ask, you can find it. So I spend a lot of time getting information that was at one time in my life was very difficult to find." On a side note, it's also made it easier for him to get money that was once difficult to find.

Read more »

The Hillary campaign is condemning remarks made by New Hampshire co-chair Billy Shaheen, who said earlier today in an interview that Barack Obama's past drug use could be used against him by the GOP, thus calling his electability into question.

The Obama campaign directly blamed Hillary for the remarks this afternoon, saying that it was born of a "desperate effort to slow her slide in the polls."

Now Clinton spokesman Phil Singer has sent us this statement:

Senator Clinton is out every day talking about the issues that matter to the American people. These comments were not authorized or condoned by the campaign in any way.

Late Update: Shaheen himself adds in a statement: “I deeply regret the comments I made today and they were not authorized by the campaign in any way."

The Obama campaign has just slammed Hillary for an interview her New Hampshire co-chair Billy Shaheen gave earlier today, in which he brought up Obama's past drug use and used it to question Obama's electability by suggesting the GOP would attack him for it. Here's the statement just out from Obama campaign manager David Plouffe:

“Hillary Clinton said attacking other Democrats is the ‘fun part’ of this campaign, and now she’s moved from Barack Obama’s kindergarten years to his teenage years in an increasingly desperate effort to slow her slide in the polls. Senator Clinton’s campaign is recycling old news that Barack Obama has been candid about in a book he wrote years ago, and he’s talked about the lessons he’s learned from these mistakes with young people all across the country. He plans on winning this campaign by focusing on the issues that actually matter to the American people."

Still no word form Camp Hillary on this.

Late Update: The Hillary campaign says it does not condone the remarks in any way.

Late Late Update: Shaheen himself adds the following in a statement: “I deeply regret the comments I made today and they were not authorized by the campaign in any way."

Woah -- the Dem primary's getting pretty vicious now. Billy Shaheen, the co-chair of Hillary's New Hampshire campaign, has just raised the specter of Obama's past drug use in an interview, arguing that it will give Republicans an opening to attack him, raising questions about his electability in a general election:

"The Republicans are not going to give up without a fight ... and one of the things they're certainly going to jump on is his drug use," said Shaheen, the husband of former N.H. governor Jeanne Shaheen, who is planning to run for the Senate next year.

Billy Shaheen contrasted Obama's openness about his past drug use -- which Obama mentioned again at a recent campaign appearance in New Hampshire -- with the approach taken by George W. Bush in 1999 and 2000, when he ruled out questions about his behavior when he was "young and irresponsible."

Shaheen said Obama's candor on the subject would "open the door" to further questions. "It'll be, 'When was the last time? Did you ever give drugs to anyone? Did you sell them to anyone?'" Shaheen said. "There are so many openings for Republican dirty tricks. It's hard to overcome."

A top Hillary campaign official attacked Obama for candor and contrasted that unfavorably with Bush's handling of such questions? Seems like an unorthodox approach in a Dem primary.

No word yet from the Obama campaign -- or Camp Hillary headquarters -- on this.

Late Update: The Obama campaign hits back.

Late Late Update: The Hillary campaign says it does not condone the remarks in any way.

Still Later Update: Shaheen himself disavows the remarks and confirms they weren't authorized by the Clinton campaign, saying in a statement: “I deeply regret the comments I made today and they were not authorized by the campaign in any way."

In case you weren't aware of this: The Federal Election Commission is set to make a decision Friday on whether to match contributions collected for Edwards through ActBlue.

The FEC's answer will have far reaching implications both for the John Edwards campaign, which stands to lose a substantial amount of campaign cash heading into the early voting, and for grass-roots fundraising in general.

The FEC recently indicated that they might not match the contributions -- prompting the Edwards campaign, with the help of bloggers and other activists, to launch a campaign to press the FEC to match the contributions.

The Edwards camp and others rallying in favor of the match are arguing that since contributions collected by lobbyists and special interests get matched, not matching the ActBlue contribs would unfairly disenfranchise grassroots fundraising efforts such as this one. It "would be a body blow to the whole concept of public funding," Edwards online suprema Tracy Joan Russo wrote recently.

Anyway, the FEC is set to rule Friday. Stay tuned.

It's been simmering at low heat for weeks, but now it's flaring up into a major issue: The campaigns of Hillary and Obama are exchanging heavy blows over the question of whether Iowa students who live outside the state should have the right to vote in the state's caucuses on Jan. 3.

Yesterday, Bill Clinton himself entered the fray, drawing a fresh round of attention to the issue.

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With the Dem primary coming down to the wire in the early states, a key thing to check out will be the battle for the endorsements of the local papers.

Today, for instance, Hillary picked up the endorsement of the New Hampshire Salmon Press papers, a string of nearly a dozen weeklies across the state, with a combined readership of 74,000. It'll be running in all the Salmon Press papers today and tomorrow.

You can't access the papers without a log-in, but you can read the endorsement right here.

More mail from Edwards in New Hampshire:

The rest of it after the jump.

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Two new Rasmussen polls give close results for the Democratic contests in Iowa and New Hampshire. In Iowa, Hillary Clinton leads with 29%, followed by Barack Obama at 26% and John Edwards with 22%. In New Hampshire, Obama is the one who is ahead with 31%, followed by Hillary at 28% and John Edwards with 17%. Both results are within the margins of error — but this may just be the first poll ever with Obama ahead in New Hampshire.

Obama can find some more good news in the internals, with his favorables higher than Hillary's among Democratic voters in both states. In Iowa, Hillary has 72% favorable to 27% unfavorable, compared to Obama's 84% favorable and 14% unfavorable. In New Hampshire, Hillary has 74% favorable and 26% unfavorable, with Obama at 79% favorable and 20% unfavorable.

Today's New York Times sketches in a bit of detail about alleged tensions within Camp Hillary:

At a time of growing tension in Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, her aides described former President Bill Clinton as increasingly frustrated that his wife’s campaign has not fought back even more forcefully against efforts by Mr. Obama and former Senator John Edwards to raise questions about Mrs. Clinton’s character. They said that Mr. Clinton had warned for weeks that they were taking a toll on his wife’s candidacy.

Mr. Clinton, they said, is still confident that his wife can regain momentum if her campaign presents her message — and particularly criticism of Mr. Obama — more sharply. He took matters into his