Barack Obama Has Resigned From The Senate
Barack Obama officially resigned his Senate seat today, as he devotes his full time to his White House transition. "But I will never forget, and will forever be grateful, to the men and women of this great state who made my life in public service possible," Obama said in an open letter to the people of Illinois.

No Obama or Biden Public Events Today
Barack Obama and Joe Biden do not have public events scheduled for today.

Obama Announces More Key Staff Appointments
The Obama transition office announced some more top staff appointments: Pete Rouse, who was Obama's Senate chief of staff and was also chief of staff for Tom Daschle before that, will be a White House senior adviser. Mona Stuphen, a top corporate consultant, and Jim Messina, who served as national chief of staff for Obama's presidential campaign and was a long-time Congressional aide, will both be White House deputy chiefs of staff.

Jim Martin Gets Big Dem Name To Campaign For Him: Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton is headed to Georgia on Wednesday, where he'll campaign for Democratic Senate candidate Jim Martin in the runoff election against incumbent GOP Sen. Saxby Chambliss. The Dems are definitely getting serious about this race, which for both sides will be all about turnout and mobilizing the party bases.

Report: Greg Craig Picked To Be White House Counsel
Barack Obama will reportedly appoint Greg Craig, an experienced Washington lawyer who served on Bill Clinton's impeachment defense team and also portrayed John McCain during Obama's debate prep, as the new White House counsel.

NYT: Obama May Have To Give Up E-Mail
The New York Times reports that Barack Obama may have to give up the use of e-mail, an ironic twist for the president elected thanks in part to the Netroots: "In addition to concerns about e-mail security, he faces the Presidential Records Act, which puts his correspondence in the official record and ultimately up for public review, and the threat of subpoenas. A decision has not been made on whether he could become the first e-mailing president, but aides said that seemed doubtful."

Robert Gates Working For Smooth Transition
The Washington Post reports that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is working closely with the incoming Obama Administration on the transition process, setting up office space for them right near his own office at the Pentagon and canvassing political appointees to find out which ones would like to leave and which would like to stay on. Gates himself, of course, may very well be one of those employees who wishes to stay on for a while, a matter that still remains to be sorted out.

Rudy Considering Bid For New York Governor, Won't Rule Out Another Presidential Run
Rudy Giuliani told reporters in Dubai that he is considering a run for governor of New York in 2010, and wouldn't rule out another presidential campaign. "No one knows whether you'll do something again until you come to the point of: 'Is it possible to do it again? Would you have a chance of winning?'" said Rudy.

It was perhaps predictable that the task of recording the worst of McCain's robo-slime -- the worst so far, at least -- would fall to Rudy Giuliani.

Giuliani has recorded a new McCain robocall in which he suggests, in effect, that Barack Obama doesn't think sex offenders, drug dealers and murders should have to go to jail, according to Jennifer Henderson, a stay-at-home mom in Maine who tells us she received the call.

Readers in Wisconsin, North Carolina, Ohio, and Colorado also report receiving the same call. Here's audio:

Click To Play

Script:

Hi, this is Rudy Giuliani, and I'm calling for John McCain and the Republican National Committee because you need to know that Barack Obama opposes mandatory prison sentences for sex offenders, drug dealers, and murderers.

It's true, I read Obama's words myself. And recently, Congressional liberals introduced a bill to eliminate mandatory prison sentences for violent criminals -- trying to give liberal judges the power to decide whether criminals are sent to jail or set free. With priorities like these, we just can't trust the inexperience and judgment of Barack Obama and his liberal allies. This call was paid for by the Republican National Committee and McCain-Palin 2008 at 866 558 5591.

Note that Rudy claims Obama "opposes mandatory prison sentences" for rapists and murders, Rudy is actually referring to Obama's opposition to specific mandatory minimum sentences. By dropping the word "minimum," he's insinuating that Obama opposes mandatory prison sentences in general.

This just might be the sleaziest exercise in robo-slime yet. Congrats, Rudy!

Late Update: Ben Smith has a very interesting example of a new genre in McCain slime. Every day a new innovation!

Late Late Update: The Obama campaign sends over a response from Tom Nee, president of the National Association of Police Organizations. Read it after the jump.

Read more »

Prominent McCain surrogate Rudy Giuliani today urged the media to look into Barack Obama's past drug use -- even though he explicitly said last November that it shouldn't be an issue and even said he respected Obama's candor for having written about it.

On Fox News today, Rudy echoed the McCain campaign's new line, asking why the press, in light of the Times's recent profile of Cindy McCain, hadn't investigated Obama's youthful indiscretions (which the Times already has done).

"God forbid somebody would do some reporting on Barack Obama's use of drugs," Rudy said this afternoon, artfully dropping the fact that it was past drug use.

But last fall, when Rudy was a GOP primary candidate and Obama's past drug use came up in a different context, Rudy explicitly said it shouldn't be an issue, as a way of arguing that his own manifold indiscretions should be overlooked.

"I respect his honesty in doing that," Rudy said then, referring to Obama's writings about his past use of drugs. "I think that one of the things we need from our people who are running for office is not this pretense of perfection. And the reality is all of us that run for public office, whether its governor, legislator, mayor, president, we are all human beings. If we haven't made mistakes don't vote for us."

Later in today's Fox interview, Rudy did say that he didn't think the press should probe Obama's past drug use or Cindy McCain's. But let's get real: Rudy was deliberately amplifying the McCain campaign's new message that Obama's should now be on the table -- even though he explicitly said such foibles, and Obama's in particular, were irrelevant, back when his own were at issue.

Here it is: The bio video of Sarah Palin that was supposed to air at the Republican convention last night before her speech.

You should watch it. The video, which was leaked (surprisingly) to Fox News, gives us a glimpse into how the Republicans were planning to sell a soft-focus version of Palin's life as a soft-peddled intro into the harsh, partisan, and undeniably successful speech that followed:

So why didn't America get to see this last night? We speculated here yesterday that Rudy, who spoke just before Palin's speech, ran long, forcing the convention planners to nix the video (and another intervening speaker) to get Palin onto the stage in time.

We went back and checked the GOP convention schedule. Rudy was supposed to start speaking at 10 P.M., followed by another speaker, followed by the video, and followed Palin's speech. All that was supposed to be wrapped up by 11 P.M.

Rudy actually started speaking at 10:01, right on time. He kept talking all the way until 10:28. Palin came out a few minutes later, and ran past 11 P.M.

Bottom line: If Rudy had clammed up and gotten off the stage, they could have run the video.

To be clear, no Republicans I spoke to are upset about the vid not running; they're thrilled with how things went. But it seems clear to us that last night would have been more successful with the video: The bio intro would have taken the edge off the speech.

Rudy!

Late Update: We were right! Jonathan Martin confirms with a top convention planner that Rudy ran much longer than expected, forcing the nixing of the vid.

Here's a little tidbit from the GOP convention we forgot to blog last night. From Rudy Giuliani's speech:

"Tough times require strong leadership, and this is no time for on the job training."

...and here's top McCain adviser Charlie Black on Sarah Palin last week:

"She's going to learn national security at the foot of the master for the next four years, and most doctors think that he'll be around at least that long."

To be clear, this is more than just a fun little gotcha. It's another sign of how absurd and untenable McCain's argument that our commander in chief requires national security preparedness now looks in light of his choice of Palin as back-up president.

Either the president needs decades of experience to be effective or he doesn't. Choosing Palin as Veep candidate is effectively an admission by McCain that the latter is the case -- or, worse, it means McCain put someone within reach of the presidency that he believes isn't up to the job. There's just no other way to look at it.

This was a nightmarish image we'd anticipated, and it happened: The GOP convention crowd, which is made up of people who have spent much of their adult lives in the grip of profound Hillary hatred, suddenly were able to reach deep inside themselves and find the magnanimity to cheer for her.

The moment came, as expected, with the evocation of Hillary's criticism of Obama during the primary. Rudy Giuliani, the speaker, said:

Tough times require strong leadership, and this is no time for on the job training.

It's about who can answer that crisis call at 3:00 in the morning -- yes, Hillary!

The crowd roared for what seemed like a solid half-minute.

Republican Convention Reconvening Today, Minus Rudy
The Republican National Convention will be meeting again today, with prime-time programming set to go ahead after yesterday's cancellation from Hurricane Gustav. But there have been some major changes: Rudy Giuliani has been bumped from the schedule completely, and will be replaced tonight by Fred Thompson and Joe Lieberman.

Both Presidential Candidates Off The Trail
Neither Barack Obama nor John McCain have any public events scheduled for today.

Biden In Florida Today
Joe Biden is campaigning today in Florida, with stops in Deerfield Beach and West Palm Beach. Biden's relative age and experience could go a long way in convincing voters here that Barack Obama is a safe choice for president.

McCain Adviser Touts Palin's Virtues In Wall St. Journal
McCain Adviser Nancy Pfotenhauer has penned an entertaining column in The Wall St. Journal today, arguing that Sarah Palin has the real experience necessary to be on the national ticket and that women have a chance to break the glass ceiling. For one thing, Pfotenhauer says Palin is "chief executive of the nation's largest state," which is only true by geographic size -- Alaska is one of the smallest states by population, and Palin has been chief executive of it for a very short period.

Intrade Taking Bets On Palin Pulling An Eagleton
Intrade.com is now offering a contract on the proposition that Sarah Palin will have to withdraw her vice-presidential candidacy before this election is over. As of this writing, the price is 18.0 and climbing.

Palin's Town Secured Massive Earmarks
The Washington Post profiles Sarah Palin's history of earmarks, finding that her town of Wasilla secured about $27 million worth of earmarks during her years as mayor -- quite impressive for a town of less than 8,000 people. It's a reality that goes heavily against her professed opposition to big spending from her big speech on Friday.

Poll: GOP Way Ahead In Open House Seat
A new SurveyUSA poll shows the GOP heavily favored to hold on to their open House seat in Alabama, which Dems have been making a major play for. The numbers: Republican state Rep. Jay Love 56%, versus Dem Montgomery Bobby Bright's 39%.

Oh, it's just so great to have Rudy back!

On a conference call with reporters just now set up to attack Obama over his foreign policy adviser's trip to Syria, the pro-choice Rudy basically said that as a "matter of conscience" McCain should choose his Veep not based on his views of abortion but on his national security readiness.

Even more interestingly, Rudy seemed to suggest that he was speaking for McCain on the Veep question.

Rudy said: "I know from talking to John McCain about this" that "our main criteria would be a person that would allow us to sleep at night knowing he could immediately be president."

Asked about the relevance of his pro-choice views to the Veep selection process, Rudy added that a presidential candidate is bound to pick someone as Veep who would "be able to handle" whatever "could happen in the age we live in."

Rudy also seemed to suggest that the Republican Party wouldn't really mind that much if McCain picked someone who is pro-choice.

"It would see to me that the Republican Party is not, as far as I can tell, a one-issue party," Rudy opined, adding that whatever happened, "I believe that the party will support Senator McCain's choice."

No doubt the folks in McCain campaign headquarters really appreciate Rudy's willingness to share McCain's views on these pressing questions.

Late Update: Also, Ben Smith points out that a reporter asking tough questions on the call seemed to have been cut off mid-sentence by the call's organizers.

It looks like the designated attacker on the issue of Obama's foreign policy adviser going to Syria will be none other than Rudy Giuliani.

As we reported below, the McCain campaign has been planning to make an issue out of a new report in the New York Sun saying that the adviser, Daniel Kurtzer, provided advice to the Syrian government last month. Now comes this release from the McCain campaign:

Senator John McCain's presidential campaign will hold a press conference call with former New York City Mayor, Rudy Giuliani and Randy Scheunemann, McCain 2008 Senior Foreign Policy Adviser to discuss reports that an Obama campaign Middle East adviser was recently in Damascus for meetings with Syrian officials.

As always, we strive to bring you tomorrow's McCain smears today.

Rudy seemed to have disappeared into one of his many bunkers/love nests for months after abandoning his multi-million-dollar campaign. But now he's back in full 9/11 spewing force.

Indeed, it was also announced today that Rudy will keynote the Republican National Convention. Hey, at least it won't be tough to write the speech.

...noun...verb...9/11...noun...verb...9/11...

Obama Arrives In Afghanistan
Barack Obama has arrived in Afghanistan, meeting with American General Jeffrey Schloesser, commander of NATO forces. "I want to, obviously, talk to the commanders and get a sense both in Afghanistan and in Baghdad of, you know, what the most, their biggest concerns are," Obama told reporters before he first departed for the trip in secret on Thursday, "and I want to thank our troops for the heroic work that they've been doing."

John McCain Raising Money Today
John McCain does not have any public events scheduled for today, but will instead be holding a series of fundraising events.

Maliki Backs Obama's 16-Month Timetable
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has endorsed Barack Obama's call for a timetable to leave Iraq, a development with serious ramifications for the American debate over foreign policy. "US presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months," Maliki told German news magazine Der Spiegel. "That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes."

McCain To Focus On Economy This Week
John McCain is set to use this week to focus on economic issues, while his rival Barack Obama is overseas focusing on foreign policy. McCain will then hold campaign events this week in Maine, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Colorado and Ohio, where he will try to shore up his image on kitchen-table issues where he's tended to lag behind his Dem rival.

LAT: Romney Getting On McCain's Good Side
The Los Angeles Times reports that Mitt Romney has more and more maneuvered his way into John McCain's favor, with active fundraising efforts to help the man who defeated him in the primaries: "Even if McCain goes on to pick someone else as his running mate, Romney's dutiful, well-noted slogging for the party's winner after his own defeat will help bolster his standing within a GOP party that traditionally awards its presidential nominations to the next in line."

New Right-Wing Ad: Obama "Worse Than A Flip-Flopper!"
A new right-wing group called Let Freedom Ring is launching an attack ad against Barack Obama, which it says will run with an ad buy of several hundred thousand dollars. The ad accuses Obama of being worse than a flip-flopper, holding two contrary positions at the same time:

Rudy Starts New Leadership PAC For New York Republicans
In a sign that Rudy Giuliani might not be done just yet with electoral politics, the former mayor has started a new leadership PAC called Solutions America -- which despite its national name, will reportedly aid New York Republican. Take it as a sign that Rudy might be looking at a run for governor in 2010.

Oh man. We now have another Republican voicing the silly myth that China is drilling for oil off of American shores -- and not just any Republican, but Rudy Giuliani himself!

As noted by Think Progress, Rudy appeared last night on Glenn Beck's TV show and made the claim.

"You look at Cuba," Rudy said. "Cuba is going to allow China to drill for oil within 80 miles of Florida. And Florida had a 300-mile limit. So in essence, we have China drilling for American oil."

Um, no. China's agreements with Cuba extend only to shoreline areas. Some exploration contracts for deep sea areas have been sold to firms from other countries, but no active drilling is happening as of yet.

Maybe Rudy hasn't heard that the GOP's heavy-hitters have already retired this line -- Dick Cheney himself retracted it three weeks ago, though a few GOP stragglers here and there continue to repeat it.

The McCain campaign has enlisted Rudy Giuliani as the leading communicator of the message that Barack Obama can't be trusted to defend us against terrorism.

But even one of McCain's own foreign policy advisers said that Rudy scandalously screwed up the task of preparing his own city for disasters and terror attacks.

Former Navy secretary John Lehman is a leading McCain adviser and surrogate, but here's what Lehman had to say to the 9/11 Commission about Rudy's performance in defending New York as Mayor:

It was Lehman who, during a Sept. 11 Commission hearing in NY City, took the Giuliani administration to task for the failure to have effective radio communications in place on Sept. 11, leading to chaos.

''I think the command and control and communications of this city's public service is a scandal,'' Lehman said at the time. In his most memorable quip, he said the city's disaster-response plans were ''not worthy of the Boy Scouts, let alone this great city.''

If even the McCain campaign's national security expert says that Rudy failed to defend his constituents adequately, why is the McCain campaign enlisting Rudy as a voice of authority on the question of who is best qualified to defend America?

Last fall, Joe Biden famously dismissed Rudy Giuliani's campaign rhetoric as little more than "a noun, a verb, and 9/11."

So I thought it would be a good idea to check in with Biden again, now that Rudy's emerged as John McCain's lead attack dog against Obama's alleged weakness on terror.

Here's the best part of what Biden's office sent me, from Biden himself:

"It's no surprise that it takes a man with zero national security and foreign policy experience to defend the policies of John McCain and President Bush," Biden said.

"Sen. McCain insists that Americans must choose between our values and our security. That's exactly wrong. Our values reinforce our security. Our failure to live up to them has been Al Qaeda's biggest recruiting tool."

That first line is a good one that pithily gets at the heart of the matter here. To restate the obvious, the McCain campaign has made Rudy their lead communicator on matters relating to terrorism, but Rudy has no authority whatsoever on this topic.

Rudy has no foreign policy experience. His aura of national security experience comes solely from the fact that he hit the political jackpot by being mayor of New York on 9/11. The notion that he has any kind of counter-terrorism expertise is an illusion that flows from the countless pictures and video clips of him striding through the smoke and dust after the attacks.

Biden's full quote after the jump.

Late Update: Biden's statement was sent to others, too, it turns out. I wasn't the only person who came up with the idea of contacting Biden for comment, apparently.

Read more »

For two days running now, Rudy Giuliani has been bashing Barack Obama because the Illinois Senator suggested in an interview that the convictions and imprisonment of the 1993 World Trade Center attackers showed that we can fight terrorism within the constraints of the Constitution.

Rudy has been pointing to Obama's quotes as proof that he's weak on terrorism, etc., etc., etc.

But when the convictions happened, back in 1994, here's what Rudy himself had to say:

Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani declared that the verdict "demonstrates that New Yorkers won't meet violence with violence, but with a far greater weapon -- the law."

Seemed worth putting out there right about now.

Late Update: Here's Rudy this morning on CNN, lambasting the way in which the 1993 attack was dealt with:

Rudy is now officially John McCain's lead crooner when it comes to singing the GOP's Dems-are-weak-on-terror golden oldie.

On a conference call with reporters just now, Rudy bashed Obama and Dems as weak and "defensive" and unleashed a whole bunch of boilerplate that we've been hearing for many years and will hear for many, many more.

"The reality is there seems to be more concern about the rights of terrorists, or alleged terrorists, than the rights that the American people have to safety and security," Rudy said. "I do not understand why, at a time we're facing this terrorist threat, we want to create new rights that didn't exist before for people alleged to be involved in terrorist activities or alleged to be enemy combatants."

"It is fair to say that Osama Bin Laden would be given new rights that nobody ever had before," Rudy continued.

You don't need to know the rest, because it's just Rudy singing from the same sheet music the Republicans have been using since 2002.

But Rudy's emergence begs a serious question: How much authority will the national press accord Rudy as a voice on terrorism during the general election? Rudy has no foreign policy experience whatsoever. His aura of national security experience comes solely from having been photographed walking through the smoke and dust on 9/11.

When Rudy ran for president it took the press corps many months to realize that Rudy has absolutely no authority to speak on this topic. Now that he's popped up again as McCain's front man it may take the press many more months to awaken to this reality again -- unless perhaps Team Obama makes sure to stress this obvious point as often as possible.

Late Update: Here's the audio from the call:

Click To Play

The new ABC/Washington Post national poll shows a tight race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Here are the numbers, compared to the previous poll from three weeks ago:

Clinton 47% (+5)
Obama 43% (+6)

John Edwards was at 11% in the last poll, an indication that his support may be breaking fairly even between two remaining candidates in the country as a whole — though the breakdowns have also seemed to vary from state to state in other polls.

On the Republican side, it's a different story. John McCain is way ahead, and appears to have picked up virtually all of Rudy Giuliani's past support:

McCain 48% (+20)
Romney 24% (+5)
Huckabee 20% (-4)
Paul 7% (+4)

As expected, Rudy Giuliani just held a press conference with John McCain at the Reagan Library, in which Rudy dropped out of the race and endorsed McCain.

Rudy said that his decision to back McCain wasn't difficult, after he'd said last year that he would have supported McCain if he hadn't been running himself. "If I'd endorsed anyone else, you would say I was flip-flopping," Rudy joked.

We'll have video posted in a little while.

Late Update: Here's that video:

A new poll from Public Policy Polling (D) shows that Barack Obama might be sneaking up on Hillary Clinton in her home state of New York. Hillary leads with 45% of the vote, followed by Obama at 33% and John Edwards with 10%. In the demographic breakdown, Hillary leads 44%-29% among whites, Obama 44%-32% among African-Americans, and Hillary 64%-31% among Hispanics.

Bear in mind that all Democratic primaries use a form of proportional representation — so Obama could walk away with a decent chunk of delegates if he simply posts a respectable showing for an out-of-state challenger.

On the Republican side, it looks like John McCain will coast to a win in this winner-take-all contest. He leads with 34%, followed by the now-departed Rudy Giuliani at 20%, Mitt Romney with 19%, and Mike Huckabee with 10%.

Rudy's efforts to ride his 9/11 magic carpet all the way into the White House appear to have foundered for good. The Associated Press reports that Rudy will drop out and endorse John McCain tomorrow in California.

In honor of this moment, we thought it would be worthwhile to rerun the Rudy ad that amounted to the single most ridiculous and self-parodic effort on his part to exploit 9/11.

In this ad, Rudy's campaign said that his response to the terror attacks was literally stronger than that of anyone else in the world -- stronger than that of Bush, stronger than that of the rest of America, stronger even that that of the first responders who perished saving the lives of others in the aftermath of the disaster...

John McCain appears to have just barely edged out Mitt Romney in the all-important Florida GOP primary, according to projections from CNN and the Associated Press.

Right now, with just over half reporting, McCain has 36%, Romney has 31% and Rudy is bringing up third with 15%.

The scuttlebutt in GOP circles is that the McCain and Romney camps are both aggressively lobbying Rudy for his endorsement, in the expectation that Rudy will drop out soon, perhaps even tonight.

More soon.

Late Update: Rudy is speaking now. It sounds very much like a drop-out speech. Rudy is telling America what it needs to do in order to not succumb to the terrorists without him at the helm.

Late Update: Tomorrow the GOP is set to debate in California. Will Rudy show? ABC News reports that the Rudy and McCain camps are negotiating over ways to give Rudy a graceful exit.

Late Update: Romney just gave his concession speech. His message, in a nutshell: Unions and Hillary are bad, and we should thank George W. Bush for keeping us safe for the past six years.

Late Update: One thing worth noting: This is the first GOP primary that wasn't open to independents, and McCain won it. If you look at the exit polls, you can see that McCain won the broad middle of GOPers, winning over Romney among somewhat liberal, moderate, and somewhat conservative Repubicans, and only losing to Romney among very conservative voters.

Late Update: It's done -- Rudy will drop out and endorse McCain.

A Democratic source who tracks media buys tells me something interesting that reflects how bad the environment is for Repubs this year: He says that no GOP candidate has a single ad up on the air in any of the Feb. 5th states, even though Super Tuesday is a week away.

He also provides a good explanation for the Mittmentum we've been seeing. According to the source, Mitt spent roughly $1.5 million on TV ads during the week ending January 25, while both John McCain and Rudy spent roughly $800,000 apiece.

This suggests that Romney might be succeeding partly because he's doubled the ad spending of McCain.

Anyway, I've got calls into the campaigns to confirm this. We'll keep you posted.

The final Zogby poll of the Florida primary gives John McCain an apparent lead in the Republican race, though like practically all other polls the race is still too close to call. Here are the numbers, compared to yesterday's release:

McCain 35% (+2)
Romney 31% (+1)
Giuliani 13% (-1)
Huckabee 13% (+2)
Paul 2% (+0)

The final SurveyUSA poll in the Florida primary shows that the Republican race is simply too close to call between John McCain and Mitt Romney. Here are the numbers, compared to the poll released earlier today:

McCain 32% (+1)
Romney 31% (-1)
Giuliani 15% (-1)
Huckabee 13% (+0)
Paul 6% (+1)

Analysis from SurveyUSA: "We can reveal that in the final totals it is McCain 31.6%, Romney 31.2%, but we will caution that those numbers are not materially different than the Romney 31.9%, McCain 31.3% numbers that SurveyUSA reported this morning. The movement is too small to be judged significant, and the best interpretation of the data and the trendlines is that the contest could go either way."