As MSNBC continues to hyperventilate over the breach of Barack Obama's "passport file", I'm wondering, what's in a passport file? They aren't saying his State Department file was breached, only his passport file. I thought a passport file is just a file for your applications. When I get visas to travel to other countries, I apply to their consulate, not the U.S.

Bill Clinton's passport files were breached in 1992 when some pages were found missing and the FBI launched an investigation. So what's in a passport file?

Typically such files, which are maintained for all people who receive passports, include materials like passport applications and supporting identity documents.

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By Big Tent Democrat

Keith Olbermann is reporting that there has been a "security breach" of Senator Barack Obama's "passport information." The State Department has confirmed that 2 contract employees of the Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs have been terminated for accessing the Obama passport file. This occurred in January apparently.

Sounds like two dopes to me. I must ask, is there something secret about where Obama has traveled? I am surprised no one has asked Obama to release all his passport information actually. Check that, actually I am not surprised.

Howard Fineman is acting the fool as usual. (Yes, he is insinuating that Clinton is involved. I kid you not.) [More...]

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only

We at Talk Left have always really liked John Cole and his site Balloon Juice, even when he was still a Republican. But I think he and other Barack Obama supporters do Obama no favors with these type of statements:

By Big Tent Democrat

McCain aide suspended:

A McCain campaign aide actively pushed an incendiary, racially-charged video that uses the controversial words of Barack Obama's pastor to tar Obama as unpatriotic -- despite the fact that McCain himself has suggested that Obama shouldn't be held accountable for Wright's views.

The aide, Soren Dayton, who works in McCain's political department, has been suspended from the campaign, a McCain spokesperson, Jill Hazelbaker, confirmed to me.

Suspended? Why wasn't he fired? This is weak from McCain. If you are going to play dirty, then fess up to it. Suspension is clearly not enough. Firing is required.

I'll be at work the rest of the afternoon. Here's an open thread where you can pick the topics and discuss.

Please be civil.

BTD - Comments closed.

Bump and Update: Michigan Legisature adjourned without taking up the revote plan. More here and here.

There's only one fair solution left: Award and seat the delegates per the first primary vote. Obama made his bed, he can now lay in it.

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Obama Again Asks for 50/50 Delegate Split in Michigan

Barack Obama is back to his unfair plan of demanding 50% of the delegates in Michigan.

I explained in detail last week why this is unfair and I'm going to say it again here.

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.

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By Big Tent Democrat

Franklin and Marshall's latest PA poll shows Hillary Clinton doubling her lead in the Keystone State:

Hillary Rodham Clinton has doubled her lead in Pennsylvania and now has a majority of Democrats’ support, according to a new poll out today. Clinton now leads Barack Obama 51 percent to 35 percent among likely Democratic primary voters, according to the Franklin and Marshall College Poll. In February, the same poll found that Clinton was ahead by half that margin, 44 percent to 37 percent.

More . . .

Kerry says Barack Obama can bridge the divide on religious extremism because of his race.

The FBI is up to new tricks:

The FBI has recently adopted a novel investigative technique: posting hyperlinks that purport to be illegal videos of minors having sex, and then raiding the homes of anyone willing to click on them.

Undercover FBI agents used this hyperlink-enticement technique, which directed Internet users to a clandestine government server, to stage armed raids of homes in Pennsylvania, New York, and Nevada last year. The supposed video files actually were gibberish and contained no illegal images.

Today it's kiddie links, what will it be tomorrow? Links to sites offering information on growing pot? Links to sites offering prescription medicaton? Links to sites critical of the Government?

Be careful where you click, you may be next. [Hat tip to Blawg Review.]

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was disbarred today. The court said he perjury conviction was a crime of moral turpitude.

The former White House aide was found guilty a year ago of obstruction of justice and lying. Those are considered crimes involving "moral turpitude" that under the law require disbarment, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals ruled.

The court had previously suspended Libby from the practice of law in Washington. President George W. Bush in July commuted Libby's 2-1/2-year prison sentence, enraging Democrats who accused Bush of abusing his power.

Libby did not challenge the disbarment.

A new study by Harvard sociologist Robert Sampson finds that rising immigration rates in communities do not result in rising crime rates.

studied crime and immigration in 180 neighborhoods in Chicago over seven years, found that first-generation immigrants were 45 percent less likely to commit violent acts than third generation Americans.

"Immigrants have lower rates of crime and there is a negative correlation between the trends," Sampson said in an interview.

The results of Sampson's study showed that incentive to work, ambition and a desire not to be deported were common reasons cited for first generation immigrants, especially Mexicans, not to commit crimes.

Sampson also studied data from police records, the U.S Census and surveyed more than 8,000 Chicago residents. The study showed there was significant immigration growth, including illegal aliens-in the mid-1990s, peaking at the end of the decade.

But during that time the national homicide rate plunged. Crime also dropped in immigration hot spots, such as Los Angeles, where it fell 45 percent overall, San Jose, Dallas and Phoenix.

I hope this is one myth we can now leave behind us. It matches another study I wrote about here, urging an end to the politics of bigotry and fear .

As Big Tent Democrat wrote below, Obama is the obstacle to the Michigan re-vote.

Ten of Hillary Clinton's individual donors have pledged $12 million for a revote.

Barack Obama tells CNN:

In a CNN interview, the Illinois senator recalled Clinton's statement last fall that Michigan's primary was "not going to count for anything."

"Then, as soon as she got into trouble politically, and it looked like she would have no prospects of winning the nomination without having [Michigan and Florida] count, suddenly she's extraordinarily concerned with the voters there," Obama told CNN. "I understand the politics of it, but let's be clear that it's politics."

His spokesman says: [More...]