I'm starting a blog over at www.JohnMcBush2008.com with a pretty self-evident mission: to let people know that a John McCain presidency would be just like a third term of George W. Bush.

I'll be getting it up and running over the next few weeks, so if you check it out please pardon the dust. Hopefully you'll enjoy the content that's already up!

Andrew Sullivan blogs:

In Tennessee 01 Feb 2008 01:11 pm

The Edwards vote appears to be shifting to Obama.

Apparently he didn't read the actual poll which was taken BEFORE Edwards dropped out. It did conclude that Edwards' support was dropping -- and going to Hillary.

Among the Democrats, Senator John Edwards’ support largely dissolved (and this survey was taken before Edwards’ decision to withdraw). Most of his supporters – nearly all of whom were white – shifted to the Hillary Clinton camp. At the same time, a significant portion of Clinton’s support among African-Americans has moved to Barack Obama’s camp.

I wish I could get paid to be as sloppy as Sullivan!

In Obama's new Harry and Louise mailer, he cites the Daily Iowan as the source for his attack. That's the student newspaper of the University of Iowa.

Lame.

Paul Krugman:

Obama does Harry and Louise, again

The Obama campaign sends out an ugly mailer. Sorry, but this is just destructive — like the Obama plan, the Clinton plan offers subsidies to lower-income families. And BO himself has conceded that he might have to penalize people who don’t buy insurance until they need care. So this is just poisoning the well for health care reform. The politics of hope, indeed.

Update: Ezra Klein adds a screenshot of the original Harry and Louise ad — they’ve obviously deliberately copied it. Just to remind everyone, Harry and Louise were the center of the vile smear campaign the insurance lobby waged against health care reform in 1993 — and this time a Democratic candidate is doing the smearing for them.

According to the new FEC filings, Democratic and Republican candidates for federal office have raised just over $1 billion so far during this election, with a majority of the money going to Democrats.

It's nice to know that that Democrats are finally outraising Republicans, but our campaign finance system is still horribly broken.

Of the $1 billion, less than $75 million went to challengers -- and of that total, $18 million came from the candidates themselves.

Political fundraising is a booming industry. The Democratic presidential field has raised $317 million this year, up from $140 million at this point in the 2004 election and $57 million in the 2000 election.

Republicans have raised $265 million, twice as much as President Bush raised through this point in 2004.

It's important to remember what this boom means, however.

Over the $582 million raised by presidential candidates, just $127 million was raised from donations smaller than $200.

In other words, roughly 80% of all money donated to presidential campaigns came from a very small group of politically influential people.

Along with the media, people who donate large sums of money to political candidates own the political process.

It's still one person, one vote, but these are the people who decide for whom we can vote.

Jan. 25, 2001:

Mr. Penn branded Mr. Gore's campaign one of "lost opportunity," saying Mr. Gore reverted to an old-style populism that alienated independent suburban white men. He did well among upper-income women, Mr. Penn said, largely because he supported abortion rights. But, he said, Mr. Gore "abandoned the fight for smaller government," losing "new economy" men who favored "smaller government, fiscal discipline and personal responsibility."

Here's some more recommended reading...Mark Penn's 2002 presentation to the DLC on Democratic political strategy.

He's not even in the debate, but they sure are pandering to him! Great.

1. Wolf Blitzer? Oh boy, worst moderator ever?

2. Mike Allen says to judge the debate on which one shows more confidence.

3. CNN is promoting a show later tonight called "Broken Government." Might I suggest "Broken Media"?
   

Get me a parachute!

By the end of next week, Hillary Clinton will have withdrawn from the Presidential race.

I think Barack Obama will win a majority of delegates on Tuesday, and if that happens, I think Hillary will see that she has no path to the nomination

I think she'd want to quit this race on her own terms.

Moreover, at the end of the day, the fighting over the legacy of the Clinton Administration does us no good as a party.

We need to never forget how much better the Clinton years were than the Bush years years and the Reagan years, not just for the country but for the world.

This is an important part of the story we have as a party to explain to the American public why we should be once again entrusted with the White House.

Last night, the Republicans debated at the Reagan Presidential library. They understand the importance of preserving Reagan's legacy.

For all our misgivings about things undone during the Clinton years, we would also be foolish to abandon the legacy of the 1990s: strong economy, more efficient government, and world peace.

It's Bush and the Republicans -- not the Clintons -- who have mismanaged the 2000s.

Barack Obama raised more money in January alone ($32 million) than John Edwards did in the first nine months of 2007.

Sen. Arlen Specter and AG Michael Mukasey discuss whether Bush violated FISA (from yesterday's Judiciary Committee):

SPECTER: [President Bush] acted in violation of statutes, didn’t he?

MUKASEY: I don’t know whether he acted in violation of statutes.

::

What is there to say about this?

Maybe it's progress -- we've gone from an AG who couldn't remember anything to one who doesn't seem to think it's important to figure out whether or not his boss has broken the law.

I know it's unlikely that Bush or Cheney will get impeached, but isn't letting them walk a moral failure?

Aren't we telling the next generation of Americans that the law has no meaning?

::

Full transcript (h/t Think Progress):

SPECTER: Is there a legitimate argument that the President has Article II powers to undertake such conduct?

MUKASEY: There are a number of concepts in your question, including whether he has authority to undertake torture. Torture as you know is now unlawful under American law. I can’t contemplate any situation where this president would assert Article II authority to do something that the law forbids.

SPECTER: Well, he did just that in violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He did just that in disregarding the express mandate of the National Security Act to notify the intelligence committees, didn’t he?

MUKASEY:I think we are now in a situation where [that issue] had been brought within statutes, and that’s the procedure going forward.

SPECTER: That’s not the point. The point is that he acted in violation of statutes, didn’t he?

MUKASEY: I don’t know whether he acted in violation of statutes.

SPECTER: Well, didn’t he act in violation of FISA? Expressly mandates you have to go to a court to get an order for wiretapping. There’s really no dispute about that, is there?

MUKASEY: It required an order with regard to wire communications, when that was a surrogate for foreign communications — for domestic communications. When foreign communications became something that traveled by wire.

SPECTER: I’m not talking about foreign communications. I’m talking about wiretapping U.S. citizens in the United States. Terrorist Surveillance Program undertook to do that. Well, not getting very far there, let me move on to…

From the National Review:

So it is over. Finished. In November, we'll be sending out our most liberal, least trustworthy candidate vs. to take on Hillary Clinton—perhaps not more liberal than Barack Obama, but certainly far less trustworthy.

And the worst part for the Right is that McCain will have won the nomination while ignoring, insulting and, as of this weekend, shamelessly lying about conservatives and conservatism.

Something tells me this fool is wrong about at least one thing.

...but this is pretty amazing:

Montel Williams Loses Job after Defending Troops on Fox News by Brandon Friedman Wed Jan 30, 2008 at 11:39:14 PM PST

For just over three minutes on Saturday morning, TV talk show host Montel Williams owned the hosts of Fox and Friends. A former Marine and Naval officer, Montel lectured the stunned hosts on the stupidity of spending air time on the death of Heath Ledger, rather than covering the war in Iraq. It was a spectacle rarely seen on live cable television, as Montel exposed and condemned both tabloid "news" shows and much of American culture for what they have each become: shallow and greedy.

Three minutes into this awkward segment on Fox, one host cut off Montel in order to go to a commercial. Montel did not return after the break. Four days later, after 17 years as a television host, Montel lost his job. Variety reported on Wednesday that the

Fate of "The Montel Williams Show" was sealed when key Fox-owned stations opted not to renew it for the 2008-09 season.

This isn't how I hoped the campaign would end, but at least the campaign ends with most of the issues Edwards has been fighting for on the agenda of both Obama and Hillary.

Now we just need to keep their feet to the fire.

Tomorrow's debate will be the first big test to see if they can handle it.

Update: My thoughts on Edwards decision over here at Daily Kos.

Update II: Obama is surging. I wonder whether he'll now pick up Edwards supporters thanks to Teddy Kennedy's endorsement. If Obama beats Hillary on Tuesday, I can't imagine she'll stay in the campaign.

Despite the media blackout of John Edwards, voters are moving towards his campaign.

Of the 10% of all voters who decided today:

Hillary - 34%
Obama - 30%
Edwards - 29%

Here's a breakdown of the Edwards surge:

Edwards support among voters who decided...

...more than one month ago (33% of voters): 9% supported Edwards
...last month, but less than one week (16% of voters): 12% supported Edwards
...within last week (24% of voters): 24% supported Edwards

And again, of the 10% of voters who decided today, Edwards won 29%.

(source: CNN exit poll)

A lot of people were understandably excited by David Brooks' seemingly gushing column heaping praise upon Ted Kennedy and Barack Obama.

Without taking anything away from the magnitude of Ted Kennedy's endorsement and the meaning it will have -- not just for Barack Obama but also for the nation -- allow me to offer you a reminder.

You trust David Brooks at your peril. Assuming that Obama gets the nomination -- which I think is more likely than not -- Brooks will screw you so hard you won't know what hit you. When he does, Paul Krugman will be there for you. Bob Herbert will be there for you. They'll both have your back.

Brooks, on the other hand, will be sticking a knife in it. Consider the caveat Brooks threw up at the end of his column:

It’s not clear how far this altered public mood will carry Obama in this election.

Translation?

At the right time, David Brooks will declare his dalliance with Obama over. I'll explain what I think he'll say down below.

::

If you've read any of my posts here or elsewhere, you know that I'm a John Edwards supporters, and that I continue to have concerns about Barack Obama.

This is not the time to highlight those concerns; as I have also stated, I think Barack Obama is qualified to be President from day one. I think he is a brilliant man. He's a great speaker but he's much more than a great speaker.

The Clintons have sought to reduce Barack Obama to nothing more than a shell of a human being, marked only by his race. They've tried to boil his essence down to the color of his skin.

The Clintons' strategy is to argue that the only reason Obama is a candidate is because he's black, and that there is nothing else about him that qualifies him to be President.

That's why President Clinton called Obama's Iraq story a "fairy tale"; it was part of the concerted campaign to demolish the substantive rationales for Obama's candidacy.

Doubt me? Listen to Clinton on the Charlie Rose show in December:

::

Now, I want you to keep that in mind while you read David Brooks' explanation for why Barack Obama's candidacy is generating renewed interest:

Something fundamental has shifted in the Democratic Party.

Last week there was the widespread revulsion at the Clintons’ toxic attempts to ghettoize Barack Obama.

At best, Brooks is offering a different type of reductionism. Instead of explaining the rise of Obama as a consequence of his skin color, Brooks explains the rise of Obama as a consequence of revulsion at the Clintons.

Of course, he uses explicitly racial language to explain that revulsion.

Like all good propaganda artists, Brooks never really specifies exactly who the Clintons' "toxic attempts" revolted, but it's pretty clear he's talking about white liberals.

The hidden subtext? White liberals are supporting Barack Obama because they are rejecting racism -- not because they support Barack Obama.

Ironically, David Brooks is making the same argument about Barack Obama that are the Clintons.

He's just wrapping it up in faint praise.

::

I started off this post saying that David Brooks will at some point turn on Barack Obama. I promised to venture a guess as to what he'll say.

Here goes:

I think that if (perhaps when), Obama gets the nomination, David Brooks will explain the victory as a rejection of Clintonism.

Over the course the campaign, he'll lament that Democrats nominated someone purely on the basis of opposition to Clintonism.

He'll focus on what he says are the cultural flaws of Obama. He'll claim that Obama is elitist, and can't relate to "working" people. He'll probably even mention arugula and belgian endive.

::

Now, it should be obvious just how wrong I think those arguments would be.

It is ludicrous it is to reduce Barack Obama's essence down to his race, or to a mere expression revulsion at the Clintons.

I'll spend just a few words describing some of the reasons why.

As I've said, Obama's not just inspirational, he's also brilliant. He is an incredible communicator, and I don't mean that he is a good speaker, although he is.

His communication skills come from an understanding the media and his extraordinary ability to synthesize different ideological approaches. He's got a great sense of timing.

He's built a phenomenal campaign team.

He has improved on the campaign trail; he knows how to fight without appearing nasty.

He knows how to deal with Republicans, and in Illinois, he managed to get difficult and important legislation passed.

He has extraordinary poise and I would trust him to lead the country through a crisis.

He's not my first choice; I won't dwell on reasons why in this post. (For a hint, read this article and this oped by his top economic adviser.)

John Edwards is and will remain my first choice.

This much, however, is true: Barack Obama is every bit as qualified to be President as Hillary Clinton or John Edwards.

David Brooks' did not directly acknowledge this fact; the closest he came was to note that Ted Kennedy was vouching for Barack Obama's fitness for office.

::

I'm writing this because I'm disturbed at the visceral distaste so many Obama supporters have developed for Krugman.

I understand that feeling, in the midst of a primary. But please, remember that when the primary is over, if Obama gets the nod, Krugman will be there for him, and David Brooks won't.

The Clinton dynasty will have been defeated; Brooks will return back to the right-wing trenches and launch attack after attack on Obama and the political left.

There's a flip-side to this, of course.

Those of us who don't support Obama should remember that David Brooks' arguments for or against an Obama candidacy are fundamentally attempts to manipulate the political left.

We shouldn't listen to what he says either.

I've certainly fallen into the trap in the past, and I will seek to avoid it in the future.

::

I want to conclude by linking to a few articles written in the past by Brooks and also by his colleagues, Herbert and Krugman.

First, let's look at three columns about Ronald Reagan, Republicans, and race -- written long before Reagan became an issue in this primary.

11/9/07 - Brooks: History and Calumny
11/13/07 - Herbert: Righting Reagan's Wrongs?
11/19/07 - Krugman: Republicans and Race

These three articles should illustrate to you the fundamental divide between the left -- Herbert and Krugman -- and the right -- Brooks.

::

Now look at four recent articles about the Presidential campaign:

Herbert: Questions for the Clintons
In this article, Herbert confronts the Clintons divisiveness head-on. Rather than spinning a grand narrative to support a conservative vision of America (as Brooks did), Herbert takes a fact-based approach.

Krugman: Lessons of 1992
Krugman explores the failures of the Clinton presidency, concluding that while the government was effectively run, it was a second-rate presidency in the sense that it was not transformative, a point which he explicitly concedes to Barack Obama.

Brooks: The Identity Trap
In this article, Brooks presents identity politics as a trap from which Democrats (specifically Hillary Clinton) cannot escape. In other words, Democrats are destined to be divided.

Brooks: Faith vs. the Faithless
In this article, Brooks explores the divisions amongst conservatives on religion. He sees Romney as being a potentially unifying force. In other words, Republicans can all get along. Of course, after Nevada I never once saw Brooks note that one-quarter of GOP caucus goers were Mormon, and 95% voted for Romney. But when a sizeable but smaller share of Democrats affiliated with some group or another vote for a certain candidate, it somehow shows the sky is falling? Puhlease.

::

Short version of this post:

David Brooks is a right-wing hack. He always has been and he always will be.

Even as he praises Obama, he's setting up a narrative to explain Obama's fall from grace.

Even though Paul Krugman is being tough on Obama, when Brooks goes south on us, Krugman will be there to defend Obama -- and, more importantly, us.

I've averaged results from the daily Gallup and Rasmussen national tracking polls, which should be a decent barometer of trends heading into Super Tuesday.

Looking at the poll, you can see that people are taking perceptions of viability into account when they decide who to support. After Iowa, when Edwards finished second, he was doing much better than he was after New Hampshire, when he finished third. In the run-up to Nevada, his numbers once again climbed, but when he did poorly there, his numbers dropped.

Meanwhile, Obama, who started climbing after Iowa, leveled off after his narrow defeat in New Hampshire.

Hillary dipped after Iowa, and climbed after New Hampshire.

It's not all viability assessments, however. Hillary's national numbers started dropping after her rancorous debate performance.

Now that Ted Kennedy has endorsed Obama and it's clear that Obama can put together a winning coalition, I suspect -- but can't guarantee -- that Hillary's numbers will slip further.

The question now is whether he can overtake Hillary and win a plurality of delegates by Super Tuesday. If that happens, I would be surprised if she didn't withdraw from the race.

As an Edwards partisan, I have to point out that over the past few days, he's climbed -- along with Obama -- as Hillary has slipped.

That according to Rep. Tim Walz, D-Minn. (h/t georgia10 at Daily Kos)

Jake Tapper debunks a big one:

False Pushback from Clinton Allies

January 28, 2008 1:19 PM

Some supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, are inaccurately saying that her husband's comparison of Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, to Rev. Jesse Jackson came only because a reporter had asked the former president whether a black candidate can win South Carolina, thus raising the subject.

The larger charge is that reporters were falsely painting the president as race-baiting.

It's not true. Clinton brought up Jackson with no mention of Jackson by reporters, and with no mention of the subject of whether an African-American can win by reporters.

Here's the whole transcript:

It's crazy for the Clintons to argue they haven't been engaged in race-baiting.

The only thing they can do is apologize, and hope people accept their apology.

Five weeks after Bill Clinton's interview on The Charlie Rose show, it's useful to look back at what he said then. I think you can pretty clearly see that he outlined the strategy we are seeing today, starting with his dismissive claim that Barack Obama, "by his very nature," was just a symbol.

Bush Mostly Down in Polls Mon Jan 28, 2008 3:46 AM EST The Associated Press, AP Writer

In February 2001, President Bush delivered an economic address to a joint session of Congress; in subsequent years he presented his annual State of the Union address. A look at his approval rating in the Gallup Poll around the time of each speech.

_February 2001: 62 percent approval.

_January 2002: 84 percent.

_January 2003: 60 percent.

_January 2004: 53 percent.

_February 2005: 51 percent.

_January 2006: 43 percent.

_January 2007: 36 percent.

_January 2008: 32 percent.

I just posted three new videos, which you can link to below, or play from the video spotlight bar.

How can we trust Hillary Clinton on Iran?

Hillary Clinton attack Barack Obama...again. John Edwards responds.

Hillary Clinton and the rush to war with Iran.

The fact that race and gender are playing important roles in this campaign should surprise no one. After all, this is the first time ever that the Democratic Party has had a black man and a white woman as the two leading candidates to win the presidential nomination.

For the most part, race and gender have played a positive role in the campaign, but since December, bit by bit, drip by drip, thing have moved towards ugly.

It all started with Bob Kerrey and Billy Shaheen, but Obama didn't bite. After New Hampshire, things worsened, and it wasn't entirely one-sided.

For example, just after Hillary made her dismissive assessment of MLK, Jesse Jackson, Jr. all but accused her not only of shedding crocodile tears in Portsmouth, but also of not caring about blacks in Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina. Two days before Bob Johnson took the stage to attack Barack Obama in Charleston, one of Obama's press aides distributed a list of supposedly racially-insensitive statements uttered by the Clintons.

As a Nevadan, the protests that the Clintons were trying to disenfranchise minority voters on the Strip rang hollow, and apparently the workers there agreed. Meanwhile, the Culinary Union aired an incredibly divisive ad, accusing Hillary Clinton of having no respect for Hispanics. Moreover, the accusuations that the Clintons cheated the Nevada caucus seemed more like a talking point to mobilize blacks in South Carolina than anything grounded in reality.

Be that all as it may, I also thought it was just the back and forth of politics. A bit rough, yeah, but that's politics. Deal with it.

::

Over the past week, however, the Clinton campaign has taken the racial element of this campaign to an entirely new -- and entirely unacceptable -- level, openly discussing a strategy to label Barack Obama as "the black candidate."

On Friday, they succeeded in getting AP political correspondent Ron Fournier to declare them victors in South Carolina before a single vote had been cast. Why? Because, according to Fournier, they were convinced they'd turned Barack Obama into, in their words, "the black candidate."

Yesterday, Bill Clinton added an exclamation point to the Clinton campaign message when -- unprompted -- he compared Barack Obama to Jesse Jackson.

What a sad and pathetic moment for President Clinton. If Hillary Clinton loses this campaign, it's a moment many of us will never forget.

Undoubtedly, Clinton will say he was just giving an example of Democrat who won South Carolina but lost the nomination.

But if that was the point our Rhodes scholar former president was trying to make, then a much better example would have been John Edwards who won the primary, but lost the nomination. When Jackson won, South Carolina was a caucus state.

Clinton's meaning was clear; there can be no doubt.

I don't know the intricacies of the Clintons' strategy, but this much is clear: they think that by polarizing the electorate along racial lines, they can win this election.

It wasn't just about making Barack Obama "the black candidate." They wanted to make him "the candidate of blacks" -- in the process making Hillary Clinton "the candidate of whites."

In short, the Clintons sought to divide us, the American people, to satisfy their agenda.

Divide and conquer.

Win at all costs.

I love winners. I love politicians who will fight with every part of their being, who are willing to savage their opponent to win.

But I can't abide by politicians who, in the name of achieving power, sacrifice the very people they are supposed serve.

No.

No way.

We can't let them do this to our country.