By Big Tent Democrat

The normally astute Mark Schmitt writes something incredibly absurd:

With the elected officials who are superdelegates now split evenly between Obama and Clinton, it seems that there are now two congressional parties, defined not by ideology but by attitude: On one side, older liberals like Ted Kennedy joined with those elected more recently who have the combativeness necessary in the Bush years; on the other side, a middle-generation elected and brought up under the assumptions of the '80s and '90, very roughly speaking.

(Emphasis supplied.) Say what? Ben Nelson? Tom Daschle? Kent Conrad? Claire McCaskill? This is one of the silliest statements I have read in a season of silly statements. Yes, the post partisan Obama Unity Schtick has been VERY appealing to the Fighting Dems. What a freaking joke.

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only

Who was Trina Bachtel? According to this NYTimes story:

Trina Bachtel . . . die[d] last August, two weeks after her baby boy was stillborn at O’Bleness Memorial Hospital in Athens, Ohio.

This has become a new source for Clinton Derangement Syndrome at an Obama blog because:

I'll be out and about today. If you've got something to talk about, here's a place. Please be civil.

Richard Crawford, a founder and past national president of the American Society of Trial Consultants (not a lawyers' group) lists his top ten myths about jury trials.

I haven't yet read them all, but No. 7 leapt out at me. " 7. A trial is about discovering the truth."

I agree that's a big myth but I would give a different explanation. Mr. Crawford says trials are about justice, not truth. One can hope truth (or justice) will be reflected in the outcome, but a criminal trial is only about a testing of the evidence and whether the prosecution can prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

Semantics, maybe, but it's an interesting list on the whole.

By Big Tent Democrat

With Obama's new 50-50 proposal for the Michigan delegation (BTW, I guess the whole deterrence thing is out the window now), it is now fashionable with some Obama supporters to forget that it was Barack Obama who blocked a Michigan revote. This memo from the Obama campaign establishes that Obama did block the Michigan revote:

Assuming there will be no new primaries, how would you solve the problem with FL and MI?

The raw vote numbers:

• Florida Primary Results (Jan. 29, 2008)(from the Secretary of State's Office)

Clinton 870,986 49.8%
Obama 576,214 32.9%
Edwards 248,604 14.4%

• Michigan Primary Results (Jan. 15, 2008)(from MI Secretary of State's office)

Clinton 328,309
Chris Dodd 3,845
Dennis Kucinich 21,715
Mike Gravel 2,361
Uncommitted 238,168

Two murderers were sentenced in federal courts in Missouri yeterday.

Lisa Montgomery got the death penalty in federal court. She will be the third woman on federal death row. Her crime: She cut the fetus out of a woman who was 8 months pregnant. She wanted the baby because she had told her husband she was pregnant and felt she had to produce one. She is mentally ill, likely a result of the sexual abuse she suffered as a child. The baby lived and is healthy, and has been returned to the family.

Other women on federal death row:

Since 1927, only two women have been executed under the federal system, both in 1953. Ethel Rosenberg was the first, sent to the electric chair after her and husband Julius were convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage for passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union.

Bonnie Heady was sent to the gas chamber with her lover Carl Hall for the kidnapping and murder of a 6-year-old boy in Kansas City. Mary Surratt was hanged by the U.S. government in 1865 for her involvement in the conspiracy to assassinate President Lincoln.

Timothy Krajcir, 63, is a serial killer who pleaded guilty to murdering five woman on separate occasions. He got a life sentence by making a deal to plead guilty in exchange for the Government not seeking the death penalty. [More...]

A few weeks ago I wrote a long post on why Barack Obama's suggestion that he and Hillary split the Michigan delegates 50/50 was tanatamount to vote-stealing:

On January 15, 2008, 594,398 Democrats went to their polling places and voted in their state's primary. The official Michigan election results are here.

328,309 Democrats in Michigan voted for Hillary Clinton. She won all but two counties, Washtenaw and Emmet. 238,168 voted uncommitted. 21,715 voted for Dennis Kucinich. 3,845 voted for Chris Dodd. 2,361 voted for Mike Gravel.

Hillary got 55% of the vote. The uncommitted, who either were truly uncommitted or for Obama, Edwards or Biden, all three of whom voluntarily withdrew their names from the ballot, got 40%. Kucinich, Dodd and Gravel won 5% of the vote.

Barack Obama now proposes he get 50% of the state's delegates. That would be vote-stealing. It would be disenfranchising 5% of Hillary's voters. It would be assuming that every uncommitted voter and every voter for Kucinich, Dodd and Gravel now want their vote to go to Obama.

That's called stealing an election.

Obama prevails in this crazy theory at his peril. There will be hundreds of thousands of Democrats across the country who will refuse to vote for him in November, thinking better a Republican than a cheat.

Obama is still pushing this unfair solution. My DD has a copy of the e-mail his campaign sent out today: [More...]

Has Barack Obama peaked? That's one reading of the NY Times/ CBS poll of registered voters of both parties released today:

Senator Barack Obama’s support among Democrats nationally has softened over the last month, particularly among men and upper-income voters, as voters have taken a slightly less positive view of him than they did after his burst of victories in February, according to the latest New York Times/CBS The survey suggests that Mr. Obama, Democrat of Illinois, may have been at something of a peak in February, propelled by a string of primary and caucus victories over Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, and that perceptions of him are settling down.

More...

Both candidates agree the popular vote count will be an important factor for superdelegates to consider in deciding how to cast their vote. It's one of several, others being their view of the candidate's electability in November and the pledged delegate totals.

So, how many human beings have gone to the polls so far and cast votes for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama?

The popular vote total is the votes cast by individuals in state primaries. Caucus votes don't count in the popular vote total because they are counted in terms of delegates, not votes, and many states don't count the number of people attending caucuses. More on this below.

Sources and Methodology below:

Hillary and Bill Clinton released their tax returns today for the years 2000 to 2007. Previous years had already been released.

The Clintons have now made public thirty years of tax returns, a record matched by few people in public service. None of Hillary Clinton's presidential opponents have revealed anything close to this amount of personal financial information.

What the Clintons' tax returns show is that they paid more than $33,000,000 in federal taxes and donated more than $10,000,000 to charities over the past eight years. They paid taxes and made charitable contributions at a higher rate than taxpayers at their income level.

The individual tax returns are available at the above link. Now, let's talk about John McCain:

Following Clinton's tax return release, DNC Communications Director Karen Finney released a statement "on John McCain's 26 year history of refusing to release his tax returns":

"While both Democratic candidates for president have released several years worth of full federal tax returns, John McCain has not. As a self-professed champion of disclosure and ethics, John McCain should explain why for the past 26 years he has not seen fit to provide this important financial information to voters. Presidential candidates have disclosed several years worth of returns for decades, John McCain stands as a disturbing exception."

Update: Comments at 200, thread now closed.

Tonight is the BSG premiere. So who is the unrevealed Cylon? Guesses only. No spoilers. This is an Open Thread. I won't be around but J should be back later.