"Her minister will not appear in McCain commercials."

Her lies will. In my view, there's a microtrend, nay macrotrend, toward voters valuing honesty.

While the great and grand GOP godess's minister may not appear in a McCain-Clinton '08 ad . . . BUT Billy-boy shaking Reverend Wright's hand might.

Should we really be listening to Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who's ready to throw the Red to Blues under the bus to save her friendship with some Florida Republicans?

Wright? What's that? I'm pretty sure he survived that whole smear thing and is now even tied with Hillary in PA. What damage?

And this won't show up in a McCain ad, because McCain has his own church issues, and McCain, unlike Hillary, actually defended Obama on this.

Also, Hillary can't win the "big states" any better than Obama can, look at the polls, it doesn't matter if she does slightly better in the primary, with the help of lies about NAFTA and Limbaugh Democrats, Obama will always do better against McCain in the general, that is common sense, and the polls have always backed this up.

You wonder were some of these "super delegates" come from. These comments are so wrong! Just two of the many reasons are:

1) In Iowa, about as white as you can get and historically Republican the county conventions were after the Pastor Wright controversy broke in the news. The Republicans did not have to insert the clips in to commercials because the "news" outlets were playing the clips at least hourly. Senator Obama picked up delegates and increased his % lead over Senator Clinton.

2) Senator McCain has his own "pastor problem" with pastors he actively recruited for endorsements.

Of Course, if the Democrats keep making it an issue it will be an issue.

...and of course Hillary herself will appear in McCain commercials, saying all those nice things about McCain's experience and Commander-in-Chief credentials.

Thanks Eric for faithfully reporting on the Clinton Talking Points word by word. I love your impartiality in this primary. I was so pissed off by the Obamanicacs here and I am happy that you provide the much needed balance.

Debbie Wasserman talking about electability of a democrat in FL, indeed !!!

You have to be understanding of poor Debbie Wasserman-Schulz's dilemma:
The $'s she needs for her political career
in South Florida come to a large degree from the extremist, hardline but wealthy and influential
first wave Cuban immigrants, who secretely pine for the good ol' days under Battista (two GOP members of congress, Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart are sons of the dictator's former interior minister).
This honorable group has one main objective: stave off any normalization in relations between the US and Cuba. To that effect since decades they hedge their bets by also bribing, er financing, key Florida Democrats. The Fanjul brothers, who control the Florida sugar industry and are prominent Cuban exiles, contributed to Bill Clinton's campaigns. Hillary most likely is now a happy recipient of their largesse, and reciprocates with a duly hardline stance on Cuba.
Now for the first time Cuban exile hardliners are
facing a real threat in the shape of Obama, who is likely to weaken the counterproductive embargo against the island.
Which explains the ferocious efforts to eliminate him from the game and leave only two reliable allies (i.e. McCain + HRC) as contenders in November.

Either candidate will have a tough race against McCain, but the truthfulness/trust issue is a big detriment for HRC, and it is about her penchant for making stuff up whole cloth, not just about the mistakes of people around her. Obama was seen to tell the truth, and do so immediately, about the Wright matter, and he will continue to do this as it re-emerges. Nothing can ever completely neutralize the Wright video with the lowest information voters, but this approach does as much as possible, especially with independents in the middle. And the polls show he has a strong reputation for trustability.

The Republicans would have an easy time running ads directly critical of HRC's lack of truthfulness, and that issue is already dragging her down. The Bosnia fantasy was the clincher, but there is a steady drip of other instances (NAFTA, hospital, stance on war, etc.).

I just do not think the superdels will take long to decide after the next few races. There will be a steadier flow to Obama than there already has been, assuming he wins or keeps it relatively close in PA, IN, and NC.

I think it is a mistake for Clinton and her surrogates to go after the UCC. It's a large liberal denomination that is already upset over what has happened so far and they vote.

Hillary's minister could appear in Obama's commercials, repeating his earlier comments that the story is a bunch of hooey.

Her minister won't appear in McCain commercials, but her many, many documented positions on Iraq will.

Are people even aware of Clinton's many, many statements on Iraq? Are they aware that virtually none of them are consistent?

I particularly like the speech she gave to the Council on Foreign Relations, after Saddam was captured, where she proclaimed she was "proud" of her Iraq vote.

McCain can contrast that clip with her position pre-Iowa, and her position post-Iowa, and all the many, many shifting positions in between.

It will be devastating. Her credibility will be shot.

This is what it's come to. Clinton's political supporters have abandoned all arguments for her experience and policy agenda, and have resorted to the lowest common denominators of race and fear.

One would expect such tactics from republicans, and perhaps from inside the Clinton campaign. However, it's beyond shameful that Democrats currently in office are willing to go there.

I want to address two of Rev Wright's issues from the sermon.
1. The USA and our CIA did in fact train Osama bin Laudin and his cadre and fought side by side with Osama bin Laudin for a decade. When Osama bin Laudin's men killed the thousands in NYC, those were your tax dollars at work, those were our chickens, come home to roost.

Does anyone doubt that the CIA ran the operation to provide missiles to the Ayatollah, that the CIA ran the Iran portion of IRANGATE? No. Testimony during the trial of Lt Col North was prevented in open court precisely because some CIA key Irangate players were still in Iran. And further, the middle-man Maryland arms dealer who arranged the sale was successfully prosecuted in US court and had to pay a fine too. To add the 2 + 2 for you, the arms dealer who arranged to sell the missiles to the terrorists on behalf of Bush and the CIA, went to prison. He was found guilty. He copped a plea. All that amounts to our US chickens, coming home to roost.
America is has many a foul deed on its bloody hands, and 9-11 is one of them. To cry out two days later about it, is healthy.
To pretend as so many on the right do, that the US is nigh perfect and the only game in town, is delusional.
Now to the HIV business. You can read in Mother Jones about the whites of Union of South Africa intentionally passing HIV to the blacks during the attempted revolution there.
You can read on the internet that the research into immunity lead to the creation of the HIV strains that now pass around the globe. You may say, you cannot prove any of it, and fine.
But there are replete urban legends on the topics of creation and spreading and if one of those urban legends pertains to the US, it is not a far stretch from Alabama where syphillis was spread among blacks by US tax dollars at work.
How many articles are there about the intentional destruction of democracy in the inner cities, by means of Rockefeller's bank in NYC refusing to refinance apartment buildings there, and using savings of black in NYC to grant mortgages in the suburbs, and how many articles are there about the CIA involvement in the drug trade with Noriega? Is anyone actually claiming there is nothing to any of that? Please, dont be naive.
If you want to try to shoot the messenger I think we can first discuss the Rev Wright sermon in its actual contexts, which include the Rev Wright personally accepting guilt for our situation, and asking all his Christian congregation to share in the guilt of the US, for OUR wrong doings. And we can remember the actual context of the speech is a prior interview on FOX by a white US ambassador, who first suggested that 9-11 was "our chickens, coming home to roost". That was a quote of a white American ambassador, not the original phrase of the Rev Wright.
If we are going to pound on this 9-11 issue in context and not only as a complaint about Rev Wright, let's start with Bush sitting reading to the little children when it was told to him that the very first plane struck a building in NYC, and Bush stayed in the school reading, and did nothing to scramble jets from the two air force bases in DC to defend the Pentagon from the other hijacked planes.
Why? Are there not thousands or millions of Americans who believe that Bush is complicit in the 9-11 and that it was done as pretext to eliminate habeus corpus, your rights, our rights?
The Constitution says that your right to be accused of a crime before you may be taken away, may only be temporarily suspended in event of insurrection or invasion.
We are not in an insurrection nor an invasion.
Restore habeus corpus.
And stop blaming Rev Wright for noticing our terrible acts.
That is called shooting the messenger. If you insist on pillorying anyone who is on speaking terms with the messenger, let's look deeply at the messages. Osama bin Laudin is still free, sending video messages (from elsewhere than Iraq). Ambassador Wilson testified to the Senate, which I watched on C-Span, that the CIA had bin Laudin in the sights of a predator on two instances after 9-11, but that they didnt want to arm the predator because they dont want to be associated with killing him, lest CIA agents be persecuted in revenge.
The real reason for invading and staying in Iraq was confessed by Bush in his most recent speech. The value of the dollar vis a vis the Euro, and oil. There were no WMD's.
Iraq is a misdirection play, intentionally moving attention from Osama bin Laudin, our paid murderer. Tell me that is not a US tax dollar "chicken coming home to roost".
All that leaves you is whining whether the expression God Damn America is appropriate to use against a country that paid and trained the Al-Quaida. If not then, when? Are we really so self absorbed to think we dont deserve any karmas for the evil done in our name, in the name of Congress, in the name of the CIA.
We are the CIA, we are the US Army, we are the US Congress.
We are all one nation indivisible, under God, as the Divine is indivisible and we are One with God and One with the terrrorists we trained and paid.

Thankfully, if she's up against McCain, the Republican attack machine will have nothing, and I mean nothing, to go on. Think Mother Theresa, or the Virgin Mary.

The pressure from the Clinton campaign must be having some effect. Let's hope Obama nullifies the argument by winning Pennsylvania or at least holding his own there.

I hate the Clintons more than Bush.

there are always some representatives that like to be able to complain when their calls to the White House go unanswered. And they only need to wait for 20 January 09

Evan Bayh would like to introduce the Byzantine Delegate and the Intermediary Delegate!

"The pledged delegates are simply an intermediary for the will of the people themselves," Bayh says. "So in a race this close, why not go to the real thing, and see who won the aggregate popular vote? It seems to me that's a better indicator of the will of the people than these delegates that, as you know, are awarded in all sorts of Byzantine ways from state to state."

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89424926

The democrats have allowed Obama to spin this Wright issue into more of a race issue rather than as anti-American and a lack of judgment on the part of Obama. The GOP certainly will define this to their advantage.
Remember, Obama listened to and embraced this pastor with his wife and kids for 20 years and did nothing. He's the last person on earth to be telling us what's it about and how to address it. Why only now is he sayng something about it? It's hypocritical, intellectual dishonesty and divert attention to the real issue at hand.
This issue truly helps define Obama as a person. While speeches and promises may change over time, what a person is won't.
Whether the GOP defines this issue properly, there's a need to remove our blinders and see this for what it is. And more so because the man involved is a candidate for the presidency of the US.

"If he tries to play the sympathy angle, he becomes just another Jesse Jackson style guilt-slinging victim of racism, rather than a leader who can take America past its racial history. If he calls on America to rise above such politics, his detractors will ask why he sat in the pews for twenty years while his pastor engaged in the racist politics of liberation theology."

Spoken like the good little Brown Shirter you really are, Otto.

"Her minister will not appear in McCain commercials."

Obviously, since he will be running against Obama.

Floridians know Wasserman-Schultz as a sort of Leiberman who supports her Republican colleagues (such as Ros_Lehtinen and the Diaz-Balart twins) over their Dem challengers.

Are Otto and Yotin -- Clinton supporters or wingnuts temporarily on leave from their padded cells?

Thanks for both your solipsistic insights, but really, generating a pile of pataphors won’t prevent anyone from noting your brownshirt outlook.

And then too there is always the danger that Obama's response to the GOP swift boat Rev. Wright attacks will come across as arrogance. Carl Rove has already started the attack against Obama's perceived arrogance. Whether Obama is truly arrogant or not, he does sometimes come across that way as any Hillary supporter can readily attest. If Obama decides to rise above the swift boat attacks and becomes dismissive of them, he will risk appearing arrogant.

Racism is a powerful issue in America. For decades much white resentment has been swept under the rug. The politics of guilt have been employed extensively to force concessions from whites. As Obama himself mentioned in his speech, many whites have been made to feel guilty for things they themselves have not participated in. Not one slave owner is alive. Not one former slave is alive. Most Americans have no ancestors who owned slaves. Many Americans have no ancestors who lived in the South. Many Americans have ancestors who fought in the Civil War on the side of the North. Many Americans have no ancestors who lived in America before slavery was abolished. Many Americans are neither guilty of racism nor discrimination. Yet the issue of slavery haunts America a century-and-a-half after its abolition, and black religious and political leaders have put enormous effort into expanding and exploiting white guilt.

One reason the Rev. Wright controversy is so very powerful is because it mutes the racism charge that might otherwise be aimed at whites who speak up against black racism. Wright's words were racist. Wright's views are racist. Therefore the issue has given whites a rare opportunity to criticize blacks without facing a charge of racism themselves. Obama attempted to explain the controversy in historical terms, but that doesn't go deep enough. Heretofore whites could say nothing publicly about black crime, or rampant disregard for basic education among black youth, or welfare, or irresponsible parents, etc., without being viewed as racists. The blame for the above was explicitly or implicitly aimed at whites, and they could not speak up publicly about the state of perpetual black victimhood and lack of personal responsibility. But the Wright controversy has forced Obama to open up a dialog on race in the presidential campaign that is very unprecedented and unpredictable. In my opinion, many people of all political persuasions are waiting for the Fall campaign and the GOP swift boat ads to open the floodgates and let the pent up torrent lose. And I predict Obama will be swept away in it.

Were he a man who was above these issues, then he would be the ideal person to bring America past its racial divisions and into a post-racial era. But Obama has always been very conflicted about race as his books and his adherence to the Rev. Wright demonstrate -- never above it.

Every candidate in the race has their problems, and that includes Obama, AND Hillary, AND McCain. And if anyone thinks McCain wouldn't DESTROY Hillary over her phony claim of "experience," they're simply on drugs. The reason Obama never got into the experience fight with Hillary is because he was looking ahead to the general election. Hillary has already doomed her chances (if they weren't already doomed before she entered the race). Her positives are way down, and her negatives are way up. So if Obama isn't the Democrats' best chance, then we HAVE no chance.

Hillary is a destructive force within the Democratic Party.

And of course, Otto F always rises above. Yeah.

He loves being down the in the dirt with his candidate.

Greg says: Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) had this warning on the subject of why Hillary Clinton is more electable: "Her minister will not appear in McCain commercials."

McCain himself will never have any Wright ads. He's too vulnerable with endorsements he sought from hateful evangelical ministers. Plus that would ruin his reputation with independents.

Republican 507/527s will. That's why it's important to fund Democratic 507/527s that can go extremely negative on McCain, for example, calling into question his flying recklessness and inability (four wrecks in a day's worth of flying), his Keating Five days, and his "senile"-appearing moments. Imagine a loop of scenes like Lieberman whispering in his ear.

That's why it's also important for Obama not to accept public funding, so he can spend extra money defending himself forcefully, without going nastily negative.

BTW, I don't like the thought of dual swiftboating, hope it never happens. But I also doubt that anyone can make a silk purse out of Wright. He's too firmly established in the political landscape.

I guess if you can't get enough people to vote for Hillary on her merits, the strategy is to scare people into voting for her.

So who's playing a better fear card, the Bush administration, or the ex-Clinton administration?

Republican 507/527s will. That's why it's important to fund Democratic 507/527s that can go extremely negative on McCain, for example, calling into question his flying recklessness and inability (four wrecks in a day's worth of flying), his Keating Five days, and his "senile"-appearing moments. Imagine a loop of scenes like Lieberman whispering in his ear.

What makes you think this isn't already in the offing? We have 527s and if we didn't learn anything from '04, then something's really wrong. Do you think that every bit of that about McCain isn't going to come up over and over during the campaign? I am pretty damn sure it will - Obama isn't alone here. The entire party should be behind him. He should know we're out here behind him.

He's not John Kerry. Thank god. He is not detached. When he hits a town incredible things happen.

McCain is his own walking advertisement for why he shouldn't be president.

And since everyone insists on speculating about who is more electable, then look at Barack - he's a head taller than either one of them. Tallest candidate always has a statistical advantage.

Look it up.

I do know how to make a subject and verb match. Honest.

I have no idea how "there has been 10 years" came out of the fingers, cause the brain wasn't thinking that.

Of course they should consider Wright.Obama's association with Wright not only proves what a calculating two faced politician he really is, it also shows that he doesnt have the judgment,character,conviction or courage to be what he is trying to be. When Obama has the chance over the last 20 years to stand up for America, the truth, decency and against hate mongering and racism, he spit the bit. It's easy to stand up for American and be patriotic when your surrounded by other people doing the same and your trying to get people to vote for you. It's hard to do it when youre alone,when it not only might not be to your benefit but might even be dangerous. Even though Im a Democratic liberal, when McCain was a pow, surrounded by North Vietnamese and being tortured, he stood up for America. He refused to talk,refused to denoucce America and he did it in the most dangerous hostile environment imaginable. Obama not only couldnt bring himself to get up and leave and take his family with him in the face of Wright's American hating rhetoric,( not to mention anti-semetic and that he is a supporter of Hamas)he couldnt even confront Wright with his lies. Chicago reporters who covered him at the time said a lot had to do with his political ambitions since the church was in the district he represented. Gee, whatta guy.

I used to be in the advertising business and in less than a minute I could do a commercial contrasting McCain and Obama and McCain's status as a pow and Obama's, and intercut the two with Wright's rantings and Obama saying " I dont think my church is particularly controversial" and " he ( Wright) is like a member of the family" and if Democrats were ever stupid enough to send Obama and his true lack of character judgement and courage out as the nominee, McCain could run a commerical like that and then go fishing and he would make Reagan-Mondale look close.

By every metric used by political scientists Clinton is by far the stronger candidate.Population in states won which is the strongest indicator of electoral strength is Clinton 163,000,000 Obama 101,000,000. She leads right now 263-202 in states with electoral votes and if Democrats apportioned delegates the way Republican do, winner take all congressional district by congressional district Clinton would have a 300 delegate lead.

Obama is a sham as a candidate but what the Wright controversy shows is he is also a sham as someone with the character and judgment to be President.

this isn't exactly "breaking news". It was reported last week that the Clinton machine would try to slime obama by using the fear of Wright against him.

MDR - If you want to run scared from John McCain and the Repugs, go right ahead.

I ain't scared of nothing and I sure as shizzle ain't scared of John McCain or the Repugs.

The Democrats had the majority for 40 years. The Repugs had it for approximately 12 and fucked it all up so hopelessly that it will be a generation before they get the majority back.

Unless they get to play the Southern Strategy again - like in '04, and in '00. Then we lose.

The way we break through that is we nominate a candidate who is bringing in the most new voters the Democrats have seen in decades. We make a new coalition. We've lost 2 elections running to "Hillary's base" - the old style Democrats.

I'd like to start winning.

Sorry. I posted the following under the wrong thread. I meant to post it here

_______

As a little kid I always thought the candy was called "Black Babies". It wasn't until I learned to read that I realized the real name was "N___er Babies". When I asked my mother about this, she said, "We don't use that word".

My folks were poor, trying to support us on dad's small heating oil delivery business. But my dad was well known for delivering $50.00 worth of free heating oil to any black family who couldn't afford to keep their home warm during the winter. That was a lot of money in those days. But he knew what it was to be poor.

In first grade I was brought up to the front of the class one day so the nun could make an example of me. I was the only child who would play with the black student, and she wanted others to do the same. Until that day I hadn't given it any thought. I just liked her.

Some white people like to say, "some of my best friends are black". Both of my best friends are black.

Not many months ago I believed we had the best field of candidates to choose from. Though I have always liked Hillary, I was also excited about Obama. I found myself fantasizing about what it would mean to America and to black people to have a black President. I thought about what a wonderful example he would set for black youth. I thought about how black politics could finally move beyond the sense of victimization and blame, and enter an era where racism would collapse under its own weight. I felt there would soon be no more reason for white people to feel separate from black people than there now is for Americans to discriminate against the Irish as they did when my ancestors arrived in this country. With everyone standing on their own two feet, racism would not last.

My feelings took a 180 degree turn when Obama played the race card in South Carolina. And so much since has only confirmed my fears about him. Rather than lead the country into a post-racial era as I had hoped, I now believe he will make racial matters worse. He will perpetuate the cycle of guilt and victimization, and elevate it to the level of the presidency. And worse, because of the Wright controversy, I believe he will hand the presidency to McCain.

"Her minister will not appear in McCain commercials."

Nope, I don't think he will.

Her husband's girlfriends might.

Or maybe they'll just scroll a laundry list of Clinton administration scandals or Clinton '08 campaign lies.

Where do they get the idea that Hillary wouldn't be hauling a truckload of baggage into the general election?