Elizabeth Edwards has joined Center for American Progress, (home to the excellent Think Progress blog) as a Senior Fellow on health care issues. She'll also be blogging as part of their rapid response team at the Wonk Room.

While she's not endorsing either candidate, she tells Good Morning America tomorrow she prefers Hillary Clinton's health plan to Obama's:

In an interview with "Good Morning America's" Robin Roberts, airing Wednesday, Edwards — who recently began work as a senior fellow at the liberal think tank, the Center for American Progress — said she believed Clinton's health care plan was more inclusive than that of the Illinois senator.

"You need that universality in order to get the cost savings ... I just have more confidence in Sen. Clinton's policy than Sen. Obama's on this particular issue," she said.

Welcome, Elizabeth.

How many Americans have finished dinner and turned on the TV? Millions. How many are watching the cable news coverage of today's Iraq hearings? How many are watching Dancing With Stars?

Since I got nothing from my perusal of the coverage of the three cable news networks other than McCain flubbed by mixing up Sunnis and Shiites, which he's done before and today corrected immediately, and Hillary and Obama asked a few questions, I'm watching Dancing With Stars (with Sheryl Crow) tonight.

For those of you following the real news, here's a place for you. Please do better than the cable news networks.

Big Tent Democrat wrote earlier about today's SUSA PA poll showing Hillary with an 18 point lead over Barack Obama.

Why is it that the 3 MSNBC shows I caught a few minutes of tonight only mentioned the Quinnipiac poll showing her winning with a lesser margin, going with the meme that Obama is closing the gap big-time? None of the shows even mentioned the Survey USA poll.

From Survey USA: [more]

Via The Tartan, the student newspaper for Carnegie Mellon on a Michelle Obama campaign rally in PA:

While the crowd was indeed diverse, some students at the event questioned the practices of Mrs. Obama’s event coordinators, who handpicked the crowd sitting behind Mrs. Obama. The Tartan’s correspondents observed one event coordinator say to another, “Get me more white people, we need more white people.” To an Asian girl sitting in the back row, one coordinator said, “We’re moving you, sorry. It’s going to look so pretty, though.”

“I didn’t know they would say, ‘We need a white person here,’ ” said attendee and senior psychology major Shayna Watson, who sat in the crowd behind Mrs. Obama. “I understood they would want a show of diversity, but to pick up people and to reseat them, I didn’t know it would be so outright.”

The politics of theater. Can you imagine if a similar request for African-Americans was made by the Clinton campaign? It would lead the evening news. [Hat tip Instapundit.]

By Big Tent Democrat

The new world's greatest pollster, SUSA, has a new North Carolina poll:

Four weeks to the 05/06/08 [NC] Primary, Barack Obama is 10 points atop Hillary Clinton, exactly where Obama was two months ago, according to a SurveyUSA tracking poll . . . [r]emarkable stability within the sub-populations. Among men, over the past 2 months, Obama led by 18, by 13, and today by 15 points. Among women, Obama led by 2, by 3, and today by 6 points. Among whites, Clinton led by 19, by 17, and today by 22 points. Among blacks, Obama led by 65, by 61, and today by 75 points. . . .

(Emphasis supplied.) Again, feels right to me. But I know much less about North Carolina than say, PA.

Barack Obama explained to a fundraising crowd in California this week why his VP nominee would not need extensive foreign policy experience. It's because he has it. Was he joking? No.

Not only that, here's how he described and differentiated his experience from Hillary's to conclude he's more experienced than Hillary or McCain:

"It's ironic because this is supposedly the place where experience is most needed to be Commander-in-Chief. Experience in Washington is not knowledge of the world. This I know. When Senator Clinton brags 'I've met leaders from eighty countries'--I know what those trips are like! I've been on them. You go from the airport to the embassy. There's a group of children who do native dance. You meet with the CIA station chief and the embassy and they give you a briefing. You go take a tour of a plant that [with] the assistance of USAID has started something. And then--you go."

"You do that in eighty countries--you don't know those eighty countries. So when I speak about having lived in Indonesia for four years, having family that is impoverished in small villages in Africa--knowing the leaders is not important--what I know is the people. . . ."

"I traveled to Pakistan when I was in college--I knew what Sunni and Shia was [sic] before I joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. . . ."

[More...]

By Big Tent Democrat

Glenn Greenwald, Marcy Wheeler and mcjoan have been all over Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey over a phantom phone call Mukasey has been referencing in arguing for telecom immunity in FISA. Greenwald reports a major development:

I just received the following statement from the Vice Chairman of the 9/11 Commission, Rep. Lee Hamilton, in response to my inquiries last week (and numerous follow-up inquiries from readers here) about Attorney General Michael Mukasey's claims about the 9/11 attack and, specifically, about Mukasey's story that there was a pre-9/11 telephone call from an "Afghan safe house" into the U.S. that the Bush administration failed to intercept or investigate:

I am unfamiliar with the telephone call that Attorney General Mukasey cited in his appearance in San Francisco on March 27. The 9/11 Commission did not receive any information pertaining to its occurrence.

Mukasey has some splainin' to do.

By Big Tent Democrat

The NYTimes reports:

Senator John McCain of Arizona, poised to become the Republican Party presidential nominee, argued against what he described as “reckless and irresponsible” calls for rapid withdrawal from Iraq, and said a premature departure of American troops would be “a failure of moral and political leadership.” . . . [H]e said that with the addition of five extra combat brigades last year, “this improved security environment has led to a new opportunity.” Today, Mr. McCain said, “it is possible to talk with real hope and optimism about the future of Iraq and the outcome of our efforts there.”

More . . .

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only

Anyone wondering if NBC believes in wall to wall coverage of Hillary Clinton, even as they declare the Dem nomination race over, need only read the daily transcript of KO Keith Olbermann's Obama Screedcast Against Clinton. The first 30 minutes of Monday's version were devoted to attacking Hillary Clinton. But this was the highlight moment:

[DANA MILBANK:] . . . But in the interview, as people have found out, well, basically the guts of the story are true and probably, this woman [Trina Bachtel], had she gotten better care, things would have turned out better. The problem is, when you‘re in this sort of exaggeration position as previously Al Gore and John Kerry found themselves in, it‘s very hard to escape this. So, even a fairly innocent one like this, is just one more piece on the pile.

(Emphasis mine.) Keith Olbermann, NBC, the Media and the "progressive blogs" are now doing to Hillary Clinton what the Media did to Al Gore in 2000. This is what the "progressive blogs" and the Obama News Network (NBC) are about. As eriposte shows, the progressive blogosphere and its news reader mascot (Olbermann) died this campaign season. May they be reborn soon. More . . .

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only

The new world's greatest pollster, SUSA, releases its latest Pennsylvania poll:

[I]n Pennsylvania today, 04/08/08, two weeks to the vote, Hillary Clinton defeats Barack Obama 56% to 38%, according to a SurveyUSA poll. The results are almost identical to a SurveyUSA poll released one month ago. Then, Clinton led by 19. Today, 18. . . . Summary: The complete absence of movement among whites and among women is striking. Among white voters, Clinton polled at 61% in all 3 tracking polls. Among women, Clinton was at 62% a month ago, 62% last week, and 61% today. These two unwavering core constituencies help make Clinton so formidable in the Keystone state.

This sounds right to me. NOTE - Comments are closed.

I'm sure there's lots of news today, but I won't be around to write about it for several hours, so here's a place for you to fill us all in with what's going on and your thoughts.

As always, please keep it civil.

NOTE - Comments closed.

U.S. District Court Judge Jack Weinstein ruled this week that juries should be told before they deliberate if a defendant is facing a mandatory minimum sentence. The 236 page opinion is available here (pdf). [Hat tip to Sentencing Law and Policy].

As a result of his ruling, a child p*rn defendant caught a break. That alone has been enough to make the media take notice. But defense lawyers face this every day with drug defendants. [More...]