By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only

This is amusing to me:

A long time ago I said that Team Clinton hates [the Creative Class blogs] and that, if nominated, they will marginalize us and undo all the hard work we've put in . . .

Yes, and Obama has always been a "fierce supporter" of the "Creative Class" blogs:

Andrew Sullivan is crowing over a swipe Barack Obama took at Daily Kos, saying:

"One good test as to whether folks are doing interesting work is, Can they surprise me? And increasingly, when I read Daily Kos, it doesn't surprise me. It's all just exactly what I would expect."

BTW, here is Ezra Klein in his full hypocritical glory:

Steve's Audio has a post up on our economic condition using the Little Pink Houses video I took in Iowa at a John Edwards campaign event.

Steve notes that in 1967, at the end of his first year in college, gas was 21 cents a gallon and his parents bought their home for $27,000.

When I moved to Colorado in 1971 to start law school, I have a vivid recollection of driving to Target (a novelty in itself for someone from the East Coast) in my yellow mustang convertible with the top down, and stopping on the way for gas and to buy a pack of Marlboros. I remember it because they were the same price: 26 cents a gallon and 26 cents a pack.

My first apartment in law school, a one bedroom in Capitol Hill, right off Colfax (not a ritzy area but decent enough) was big and bright, and the rent was $125.00 a month. Like Steve, I had a minimum wage job for $1.35 or so an hour, working for the same record store chain I had worked for in Ann Arbor during college.

Steve crunches the numbers: [More...]

By Big Tent Democrat

When you read a Zogby poll, you have to try and figure out what he is trying to do. He is not just giving you numbers. He is massaging a storyline. Right now, Zogby's reputation is in tatters, so one would think he would just be trying to get it right. But I think there is more to it. I think he is trying to present a narrative. So what narrative do we get from this?

"Undecideds breaking to Clinton" is what he is trying to sell here I think. And he will try and sell that as some great Zogby insight. Is it true? Probably. They have in every other big state contest. But Zogby is a charlatan so beware Clinton supporters.

By Big Tent Democrat

Politico writes:

Nothing but petty, process-oriented questions, asked in a prosecutorial tone, about the Democratic front-runner’s personal associations and his electability. Where was the substance? Where was the balance?

Where indeed. Hillary Rodham Clinton and her aides have been complaining for months about imbalance in news coverage. For the most part, the reaction to her from the political-media commentariat has been: Stop whining.

That’s still a good response now that it is Obama partisans — some of whom are showing up in distressingly inappropriate places [They are referencing the Obama News Network, NBC] — who are doing the whining.

Boehlert's Revenge:

By Big Tent Democrat

With this title, Krugman's Latest Attack On Barack Obama Not Supported By The Evidence, you knew that a reasonable and rational counterargument would not be forthcoming. But the extent of Abramowitz's disingenuity is pretty stunning.

First, Abramowitz ignores Krugman's points on the bad politics and economics of Obama's statements. Which I took to be the main point of Krugman's column. But even on the "sociology," Abramowitz either misses or mistates Krugman's point. I'll explain on the other side.

It's Friday night. Time to lighten up. It's very funny.

This is an open thread.

However unlikely, it's still possible Obama could lose PA and the nomination. If nominated, he could lose the election. Here's how, by a senior editor at The New Republic. It begins:

Some liberal commentators have downplayed the effect of Barack Obama's recent fundraising speech in San Francisco. But that's wishful thinking. Along with the revelations about Obama's pastor Jeremiah Wright, his remarks in San Francisco will haunt him not only in the upcoming primaries in Pennsylvania, Indiana, Kentucky and West Virginia, but also in the general election against John McCain, assuming he gets the Democratic nomination.

Go read the rest, and let us know what you think.

(Comments now Closed)

Barack Obama is hoping that a massive expenditure of cash on advertising will buy him the vote in PA and end Hillary Clinton's campaign:

Barack Obama is to mount the biggest advertising blitz of the presidential campaign this weekend ahead of Tuesday's Pennsylvania primary to try to force Hillary Clinton out of the race.

....Obama hopes to deliver a knock-out blow by outspending her in advertising. With tens of millions from fundraising at his disposal, he plans to spend well over $2m (£1m) on ads in the run-up to the primary, at least twice as much as the cash-strapped Clinton campaign.

Obama has earmarked $465,000 for Philly alone in the final days to Hillary's $91,000.

Obama's strategy, which he has deployed time and again during his political career, is that the more money spent on advertising, the higher the odds of winning an election.

If you want to help Hillary out, go here.

Jose Padilla has been shipped to Supermax in Florence, Colorado, known as Alcatraz of the Rockies. He'll be joining Ted Kaczinski, Eric Rudolph, Zacarias Moussaoui, Richard "shoe bomber" Reid, OKC conspirator Terry Nichols and others. Padilla was convicted in August and sentenced to 17 years. He's got 13 years left.

Padilla attorney Michael Caruso said in an e-mail Friday that Supermax is "a living hell" where inmates spend most days in 7-foot-by-12-foot cells and have little contact with the outside world. Caruso noted that others convicted of supporting terrorism, such as the "Lackawanna Six" group in upstate New York, were not sent to the nation's toughest prison.

Caruso called the decision "yet another example of Jose being treated differently and in a more punitive fashion than others who have been accused of similar crimes. I genuinely fear that Jose's mental health will erode to an even greater degree."

More on the life awaiting Padilla at Supermax below:

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only

In a response I took to be directed at Jerome Armstrong, Tom Watson and me, Markos writes:

You know those rabid Clinton supporters who think everyone is a sellout because of inadequate Hlllary worship (like this site, Keith Olbermann, Howard Dean, Stephanie Miller, etc)

I do not know what Howard Dean and Stephanie Miller have to do with it, but if Kos is equating his site to Olbermann's antics, that is saying he is proud to be a Hillary Hater. But to bring Markos back to the point, he endorsed this:

It's bizarre, but I don't really consider [Hillary Clinton] a Dem any more.

If refraining from saying Hillary Clinton is not a Democrat constitutes Hillary worship for Daily Kos, I think he confirms my point - the destruction of the Clinton Wing of the Party, Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Legacy is what his web site is about now. Drumming Clinton supporters out of the Democratic Party is what his web site is about. If that is what Barack Obama's campaign will be about in November, he will lose. The Creative Class Wing of the Democratic Party is not enough.

Bump and Update: There is joy in the Tony Rezko household tonight. The Judge ordered him released on bail, with a condition of home confinement.

*****

Tony Rezko's friends and family have put together $8 million for his bail. The Judge has said she will rule today on whether she will grant him bail with a condition of home confinement.

By Big Tent Democrat

Paul Krugman speaks for me:

[T]he suggestion that the American heartland suffered equally during the Clinton and Bush years is deeply misleading. In fact, the Clinton years were very good for working Americans in the Midwest, where real median household income soared before crashing after 2000.

[I]f I were a Democratic Party elder, I’d urge Mr. Obama to stop blurring the distinction between Clinton-era prosperity and Bush-era economic distress. . . . [L]et’s hope that once Mr. Obama is no longer running against someone named Clinton, he’ll stop denigrating the very good economic record of the only Democratic administration most Americans remember.

To the "Creative Class," that might mean I am "not a Dem." But it is what I think. I am glad to be in Krugman's company on this.