By DEVLIN BARRETT

Associated Press Writer

12:20 PM CDT, April 2, 2008

WALLINGFORD, Pa.

Democrat Barack Obama said Wednesday he talks regularly with former vice president Al Gore and would consider putting him in a Cabinet-level position or higher.

A woman at a town hall asked the Illinois senator if elected president would he consider tapping the former vice president for his Cabinet, or an even higher level office, to address global warming.

"I would," Obama said. "Not only will I, but I will make a commitment that Al Gore will be at the table and play a central part in us figuring out how we solve this problem. He's somebody I talk to on a regular basis. I'm already consulting with him in terms of these issues, but climate change is real. It is something we have to deal with now, not 10 years from now, not 20 years from now."

The only position higher than a Cabinet post is vice president. While Obama seemed to dangle that possibility in his answer Wednesday, he has repeatedly said it is far too early to discuss potential vice presidents because the nomination has not been won.

It is also not clear that Gore, who had the job for eight years under Bill Clinton, would even want to be a vice president again.

Since leaving the White House, Gore has gone on to become one of the world's leading voices for combating the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. His work earned him a shared Nobel Prize.

Now very popular among Democrats, Gore is perhaps the single most coveted endorsement up for grabs in the long-running competition between Obama and rival Hillary Rodham Clinton.

The relationship between Gore and the Clintons became strained after Gore limited Bill Clinton's campaigning on his behalf in the 2000 presidential race which elected George W. Bush.

Obama said he would use Gore to help forge a cap-and-trade system for carbon emissions designed to lower pollution.

The Illinois senator cautioned that such a system could mean an increase in electricity bills from power companies that rely on coal-burning, and that some of the money generated from a cap-and-trade system may be used in the beginning to help lower income or fixed income customers with those bills.

He also called on individuals to do their part to lower energy consumption.

"All of us are going to have to change our habits. We are a wasteful culture," he said.

Using compact fluorescent light bulbs, energy efficient appliances, and unplugging power chargers when they're not in use are relatively simple solutions, he said.

"Those kinds of simple steps, if everybody takes them, can drastically reduce our energy consumption."

Wasn't the conference call about Clinton's lies on NAFTA? Are you going to add more about that, Greg?

Posted April 2, 2008 10:39 AM
The Swamp

by Mike Dorning

PHILADELPHIA — Barack Obama mocked rival Hillary Clinton this morning for comparing herself to the movie character Rocky Balboa as he offered Pennsylvania labor leaders a speech laden with red-meat economic populism.

Rocky

Clinton has made the theme song from the 1976 movie "Rocky," which was set in Philadelphia, a part of the soundtrack of her Pennsylvania primary campaign. When she appeared before the same Pennsylvania AFL-CIO state convention a day earlier, she invoked the fictional working-class boxing hero to explain her determination to continue her campaign, declaring that, like Rocky, “I never quit.”

“There’s been some talk about Rocky Balboa over the last couple days. And you know we all love Rocky,” Obama told the labor leaders.

“But we got to remember Rocky was a movie,” Obama continued. “And so is the idea that someone can fight for working people and at the same time, embrace the broken system Washington, where corporate lobbyists use their clout to shape laws to their liking.”

Obama pounded away at corporate excesses and Republican economic policies.

“We’re ready to play offense for organized labor,” Obama said. “It’s time we had a President who didn’t choke saying the word “union.” A President who knows it’s the Department of Labor and not the Department of Management.

“Over the last seven years,” he said, “we’ve had an administration that serves the interests of the wealthy and the well-connected, no matter what the cost to working families, and to our economy.”

As he has elsewhere during his bus tour through Pennsylvania, Obama attacked $19 million in bonuses given to the two top executives of Countrywide Financial, a subprime mortgage lender that issues many loans now in foreclosure. The executives negotiated a sale of the company with losses to investors but the new owner, Banc of America Corp., recently revealed bonuses to the same executives.

“The system is broken – and over the weekend, we got a reminder of just how badly it’s broken,” Obama said, describing the bonuses. “That is an outrage. That’s not the America we believe in. It’s time to take on the special interests and level the playing field so that our economy works for working Americans.”

Obama pitched an economic agenda that includes middle-class tax cuts, a plan for universal access to health care, and stricter labor, environmental and safety provisions in trade agreements.

And he linked presumptive Republican nominee to the economic policies of the Bush Administration.

“John McCain said a few weeks ago that ‘the issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should’ – and that’s clear since all he’s offering is more of the same Bush policies that have put the American Dream out of reach for so many Americans,” Obama said.

Better for the Party's chances in November that all the dirt comes out now, rather than after the nomination. I think everyone knows, or at least fears that the Wright issue hurts Obama, especially with Republicans. If people are mad at Hillary for using it to try to win the nomination, think of how they will feel when the GOP swift boat teams start their attack the day after an Obama nomination. I'm sure they've already put together their first video.

Oh, and by the way, speaking of what the GOP will say, here is Carl Rove:

"There are Democrats, particularly blue-collar Democrats, who defect to McCain because they see McCain as a patriotic figure and they see Obama as an elitist who's looking down his nose at 'em. Which he is. That comment where he said, you know, "After 9/11, I didn't wear a flag lapel pin because true patriotism consists of speaking out on the issues, not wearing a flag lapel pin"? Well, to a lot of ordinary people, putting that flag lapel pin on is true patriotism. It's a statement of their patriotic love of the country. And for him to sit there and dismiss it as he did—

"Obama is coolly detached and very arrogant. I think he's very smart and knows he's smart, but as a result doesn't do his homework."

The fact that the Clintons are taking the low road only proves that Obama is a liar and he is unelectable and you people are all crazy and in November Hillary will wear her tiara of power and then YOU will be the trolls!

Sincerely,
gotalife

Any update on taxes?

They were promised. Please ask them!

One of John Kerry's greatest strengths going into the 2004 election was the fact that he was a decorated Viet Nam war hero running against an unpopular President who served only in the "champaign unit" of the National Guard where he had a questionable record of attendance. So suddenly we had the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth", and Kerry's military record advantage was neutralized.

One of Barack Obama's greatest strengths and appeals is that he was perceived as someone who can transcend America's racial divide, offering America a chance to put its dismal history of racism behind and move on. Then comes Obama's playing of the race card in South Carolina when Hillary was accused of belittling MLK when she said it took LBJ to push through civil rights legislation. Then came Michelle's "proud of America for the first time" remarks. Then came the words of Obama's pastor, "important mentor," and Obama campaign's religious adviser Jeremiah Wright. Then we learn about "Liberation Theology" which is a cornerstone of Wright's church where Obama sat for 20+ years. Then Obama says during his years in Wright's congregation he never heard some of Wright's most inflammatory racist rhetoric, though it is well known and has long been available on CD right there at the church. Then Obama compares his grandmother's words to Wright's diatribes, and refuses to disavow Wright. Then when accused of selling out his devoted grandmother, he slips and calls her "a typical white person".

No need to wonder what the swift boat ads are going to look like this time. Clearly Obama will not make Kerry's mistake of failing to respond immediately. But unlike Kerry, Obama himself has provided his critics with all the ammunition they need. He'll surely be giving more speeches on race. And just as surely, he'll be on the defensive. And if he or his supporters resort to calling his attackers racists, it will only highlight that fact that Obama is not the candidate who can transcend America's racial divide and help America move on.

Sen. Barack Obama "raised more than $30 million in the month of March, a campaign official told Time on Tuesday. Though the official would not provide an exact number, he did say, 'The number starts with a three and we are still counting. It's in the 30s.'"

"One Clinton campaign adviser hinted that the New York senator's total for the month will come close to $20 million. That estimate could not be independently confirmed." However, there are "continued reports that the Clinton campaign is struggling with a persistent debt that at times has reached nearly $9 million."

On the issue of race the GOP has Obama over a barrel. Not only will they neutralize any perceived advantage he has as a "uniter", they will use the issue to portray him as a divider. It will be almost impossible for Obama's supporters to avoid calling his opponents racists, which will just prove their point that he is a divider, not a uniter. If Obama himself tries to somehow remain above it all, his own words from his books and on the campaign trail will be used to show that he is not above it all. The GOP can totally derail his campaign.

Regarding Josh's post on the front-page....

I think it baffles many pundits that the Rev. Wright thing hasn't scared Red-state democrats into supporting Hillary Clinton, but Josh is really missing the larger point--that those of us not in New York or D.C. are painfully aware of the contempt most of the country feels towards Sen. Clinton. It may shock them, since the hatred isn't deserved, but it's the reality on the ground those of us out in the big red-yonder have witnessed for years.

This is why we never supported Clinton, in fact looked for the candidate that could take her down in the primary. We're much more worried about the seething antipathy towards Hillary than we are some minor flap about Sen. Obama's former pastor.

If America is going to vote this November based on racial fears, and not on the Economy and the War in Iraq...then we are a bunch of morons, and I'm moving to Barbados.

I'll just move full time to Taos - it's not like living in the US at all.

Josh Marshall asks this question on the front page:

"So why is it the Democrats from the reddest states and many from purple states seem to go for Obama over Hillary Clinton? If nothing else it seems to me that these people are voting with their feet on Ickes argument and they're not convinced."

The answer is so obvious that I can't beleive Josh missed it. The politicians in red states know for a fact that Hillary at the top of the ticket will galvanize the GOP voters to the polls and that bodes ill for all the Democrats down ticket.

Red state Democrats have far better chances of offsetting GOP votes with Obama at the top of the ticket as someone who will get the DEM's out to vote.

Ickes argument is persusasive to areas like PA, IN and OH where there is much more blue collar racism. In other words, the states with large populations of Reagan Democrats are the ones who will listen to Ickes. Reagan Democrates bought the southern strategy and voted against their own economic interests in the Appalachian region just so they could keep blacks off welfare, derail busing and oppose affirmative action.

Red state Democrats have far better chances of offsetting GOP votes with Obama at the top of the ticket as someone who will get the DEM's out to vote.

O god, thank you so much for that.

This is one thing I keep trying to get across.

Texas is in play and I know no one believes that, but it is. If they put Hillary on the ballot - we will have a hard time electing the Democrats we need to elect, I predict, even though I don't believe in this idea of electability. I'm talking about turnout.

If the country feels "contempt" for Mrs. Clinton, as deadalus, it has a funny way of showing it. I always contempt was reserved for folks like Joe McCarthy. I usually don't ascribe it to people who are the choice of roughly half their political party to be president.

No, if there is contempt, it belongs with the media types who thought they could run her out of the race by declaring for Obama. They are shocked she wouldn't take their suggestions -- just as guys like Limbaugh and Hannity were that their political picks weren't honored.

Look, the hardcores support their candidate no matter what happens. There is nothing Obama could say or do that will discourage Josh, Keith Olbermann and the other media surrogates from supporting his cause and doing whatever is considered necessary to make Clinton look bad.

Frankly, I admire her for standing up to them and sticking to her guns.

She hasn't needed much help lately to make herself look bad.

SuperDelegate Count Since 2/5 (NBC) Obama 53 Tuzla Terrorist -5 (net)

The Clintons' Camp talks the talk while Obama walks away with the Superdelegates

Can anyone tell me why TPM displays the two most discredited polls in the business in Gallup and Rassmussen? I think theyve both proved they have a margin of error of about 15.