Illinois Super Saturday: The First Domino to Fall?

We got a hint of the avalanche headed toward the Republicans in November in Illinois where Democrat Bill Foster beat Republican Jim Oberweis to succeed former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.

The district has been reliably Republican. Hastert has won by large margins for more than 20 years but perhaps more importantly, George W. Bush won the 14th Congressional District with 55 percent of the vote in 2004 and 54 percent in 2000.

Illinois is considered to be a fairly reliable state to vote for the democratic candidate in the general election, but this race is widely seen as an indication of the huge level of frustration with the current administration and the overall status quo on a wide variety of issues.

Barack Obama campaigned for Foster. Now Obama picks up another super delegate.

Hurry Up & Wait

It may seem like years, but it’s been 63 days since the Iowa caucuses on January 3

Think about all that’s happened in the race since then and then consider this: the next significant development in the democratic race isn’t until the Pennsylvania primary on April 22. That’s 47 days from now. That’s a long time for two candidates who agree on a vast majority of the issues to try to find ways to convince people to vote for them for more likely to vote against the other one.

So what can we expect between now and then?

-More negative campaigning. The “kitchen sink” strategy employed by the Hillary Clinton campaign of throwing every available charge at Obama was apparently successful. It was a legitimate question to raise, given Obama’s thin resume. Don’t be surprised if Obama is the Democratic nominee that you might well see McCain play the exact same ad. Even if you like Obama, that image of a huge problem with no time to consult advisors is cause for concern. If you are able to casually dismiss this, for Obama or Clinton or McCain, watch the scene in Fahrenheit 911 where President Bush continues to read along with “My Pet Goat” in a children's classroom for seven agonizing minutes after he's been told about the attacks on the World Trade Center.


-Hillary as the victim. “Golden Boy” Obama is getting a pass from the media. It looked a little pathetic to me when she invoked Saturday Night Live in the last debate, but it worked. There were a series of more invasive stories on Obama after that, which was a big plus for Clinton to co-opt the media as her partner. Maybe she’ll cry again. Whining doesn’t seem very presidential, but if it’s effective, don’t be surprised if it continues.


-Paralyzed super delegates. Georgia Congressman John Lewis switched his allegiance before the last round of voting under heavy pressure from African Americans since his district voted for Obama (not hat he thought Obama was coasting to victory). Now that it’s still a race, the supes are likely to sit on the sidelines waiting to see how this plays out, hoping their choice will be clear, which seems unlikely at this point.

-Rezko, Rezko, Rezko. Businessman Tony Reckon is going on trial. He’s a friend and contributor to Barack Obama. Obama has not been implicated in the case. In case you missed that, Obama has NOT been implicated in the case. Obama has distanced himself from Rezko, but a trial at this time between now and the Pennsylvania primary is the gift the keeps giving for Clinton. Accused of using his influence with politicians to generate illegal profit, Hillary just has to drop the name and it ramps up doubts about the politics of hope.


For political junkies it may seem to defy belief that some people actually haven’t made up their minds about who to vote for yet, but there’s still a lot of campaigning left.

Great theatre for those of us who enjoy it, but most likely a big benefit for John McCain, who can sit back and watch Hillary and Barack damage each other while he sends W out to raise money from the 30 percent of America that does not have a firm grasp of the obvious and realize what a mess the current president has made of the country.

McCain’s luck defies belief this year. Written off last summer, he’s now the nominee. If this continues, he may confound conventional wisdom and be the next president. If he’s campaigning near you, be sure to ask him for his favorite lotto numbers.

Democrats' Strategy: Make McCain W’s Siamese Twin

After some Republican activists started making an issue of using Barack Obama’s middle name Hussein, Democrats came up with signature middle initial for John McCain.

Could it be…. W?

Expect the democrats to beat this to death: the Bush/McCain War, the Bush/McCain recession, Bush/McCain airline flight delays, Bush/McCain traffic jam, Bush/McCain burned your dinner and so on. Every time you hear McCain, they’ll remind you he was also W’s yes-man.

After capturing the needed delegates for the Republican nomination by making a clean sweep of Texas, Ohio, Rhode Island and Vermont, John McCain launched his general election campaign with a lofty promise.

“Our campaign must be and will be more than another tired debate of false promises, empty sound bites or useless arguments from the past that address not a single of America’s concerns for their family’s security”

Let’s hold him to that. Hopefully it will mean no more fanning the flames on fringe wedge issues. Sorry, I know it gins up righteous rage among some of my fellow Americans, but I think establishing universal health care, ending the colossal strategic blunder of the Iraq war and balancing the federal budget trumps whether a couple of guys burn a flag at their wedding.

McCain should be applauded for staking claim to an elevated level of debate. We’ll see if that extends to resorting to George W. Bush’s lexicon to defend the war. Next time you see him teeing off on the democrats on Iraq, ask yourself what defines “victory” and how many times President Bush has moved the goal posts on what our objectives are in this war that seems to have no end.

McCain dared the democrats to spell out how they will end the war without the withdrawal of American troops triggering an escalation of sectarian violence. On that front, he’s probably right. I suspect whoever the next president is, he or she will face limited options when it comes to President Bush’s war. We’ve now seen McCain back away from his statement that he’s fine with American troops staying for 100 years, so perhaps the democrats may have an impact even if they lose the election.

What the Senator Meant to Say was...

John McCain’s Straight Talk Express made a detour on the campaign trail when he made a classic Washington mistake. He told the truth.

In Ohio today, McCain said to win the general election in November, he must convince voters U.S. policy in Iraq is succeeding. If he can't do that he said, "then, I lose. I lose.”

The words were barely out of his mouth before he starting backing up so fast he should have been making a loud beeping noise.

“Let me not put it that stark,” he said. "Let me just put it this way: Americans will judge my candidacy first and foremost on how they believe I can lead the country both from our economy and for national security. Obviously, Iraq will play a role in their judgment of my ability to handle national security.”

Later in the day, he tried again.

“I quickly retracted that. I was not allowed to retract it obviously,” he joked. “I don’t mean that I’ll lose. It’s not often that I retract a comment. I retracted the finality of that statement, I think that the issue of the war in Iraq is important to the American people and it will be a major factor in their determining who they are going to support in the election in November.”

Maybe he was right the first time.

Don’t Smile, You’re on Candid Camera

Watching Mike Huckabee on Face the Nation, and we’re looking at the smiling former Arkansas governor basking in his victories, smiling and nodding as Bob Schieffer introduces him until he gets to Kansas primary results “a very big day for you, you literally crushed [John McCain] in Kansas.” True, but if you’re running for Vice President, you don’t want to gloat, at least not when people, especially the likely nominee, are watching.

You could almost see the wheels turning as he calculated how to react to that. Kind of like trying to convey the right facial expression when your girlfriend asks you if you’re seeing her best friend on the side. Whether you are or not, you better deploy your best poker face.

Methinks Rush Doth Protest Too Much

The siege warfare aimed at John McCain by Rush Limbaugh and the rest of the conservative talk show set may be more a function of economic self interest than political principles.

In the way that writers like me whose bread and butter is mocking other people loved Mitt Romney, a democratic president, especially another Clinton administration, would be the gift that keeps giving for right wing radio. Think of all the Hillary hating rants Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly would miss out on if McCain were president. If my living depended on a steady diet of partisan polemics fueled by righteous outrage, I’d be salivating at the prospect of President Hillary Clinton.

Why do they hate McCain so much? “It’s the economy stupid.”

Conservatives: How Do We Hate McCain? Let Us Count the Ways

The Lazarus campaign of John McCain now sees the attack on its right flank heat up. The best part is that his continued success reveals the relative lack of power wielded by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, as evidence by their failed full court press to gin up support for Mitt Romney.

Interesting to look at how reporters from other countries are covering the race. The Euros know why the hate us and most especially our current president, but they seem to be fascinated by how much we despise each other. Case in point from the Guardian’s James Ridgeway:

“In today's GOP, libertarians who want to keep government out of bedrooms as well as boardrooms are at odds with the fundamentalist Bible-thumpers who are glad to use the power of the central government to criminalise everything they don't like, with abortions and gay sex at the top of this list.”

More and video available here:

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/usa/2008/02/last_man_standing_mccains_batt.html

Conservatives talking about sitting out the general election may be blowing smoke at this point. Nothing will unite them behind their candidate like the thought of Hillary Clinton in the Oval Office.

You Won’t Have Mitt Romney to Kick Around Anymore

"$35 million and all I got was this lousy T-shirt."

Our favorite whipping boy bows out today, finally achieving a firm gasp of the obvious, that he wasn’t going to win and the burn rate on his vast fortune wasn’t worth the visceral satisfaction of continuing to piss off Huckabee and McCain.

I was actually starting to feel sorry for Mittens, especially after McCain went after him with those cheap shots on “timetables” in Iraq in the last debate. He even managed to conjure up a somewhat likeable image in his latest version of his ongoing personality makeovers, call it Mitt 3.5.

Former Connecticut Gubernatorial candidate and Clinton White House counselor Bill Curry still has, for my money, the best quip on Mittens: “I wouldn’t believe Mitt Romney if he was telling me his blood type from an operating table."

The Mitt Hits the Fan

Despite garnering an amazing 100% of the comedian/political cartoonists' vote, Mittens lost in the South, in the West and in the East, but yet I'm torn over the potential loss of Mittens from the race. For the health of the country, I yearn for the body politic to drive a stake through the heart of the Romney campaign, but would suffer an overwhelming sense of loss if deprived of Mittens schadenfreude.