Hillary Clinton will be on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart Monday, March 3, at 11PM ET. Here's the press release.

And check out her new ad on national security that began airing in Texas today. Big Tent Democrat wrote it up earlier but comments came in so fast, the thread had to close early. Here's a place to continue the discussion.

The ad says:

It’s 3am and your children are safe and asleep

But there’s a phone in the White House and it’s ringing. Something’s happening in the world

Your vote will decide who answers that call.

Whether it’s someone who already knows the world’s leaders, knows the military - someone tested and ready to lead in a dangerous world.

It’s 3am and your children are safe and asleep. Who do you want answering the phone?

By Big Tent Democrat

So Jay Rockefeller endorsed Obama.

Good for Obama. But my real question is so will Rockefeller follow Obama's judgment on telecom immunity? How about Iraq funding and withdrawal? Think Obama can lead him on THOSE ISSUES? Please?

mcjoan has a good post on it.

By Big Tent Democrat

The Left blogs are in an uproar over this ad:

Not sure what offends in it. It raises a critical question for the Presidency. I think Obama has handled the ads better than the Left blogs: [More...]

By Big Tent Democrat

Polls are all over the place in both Texas and Ohio and polling is NEVER an exact science. But I think extra caution is in order for Texas and Ohio. Why? Because of the demographic split. After Obama's sweeping win in Wisconsin, where he truly eroded Clinton base for the first time, we seem to have settled back into the old breakdowns - Clinton winning whites, women, Latinos, seniors and lower earning voters. Obama winning African Americans overwhelmingly, young voters, men and upper income voters. The margins appears fairly static.

This means the key issue now is who comes out to vote and in what numbers. Each pollster's turnout model will dictate their results. Since predicting who will turnout - the likely voter screen - is always the most difficult part of polling, I think it is fair to say we, and THEY, are all guessing.

At this point, no result will surprise me.

ABC News reports on the implications of Tony Rezko's trial for Barack Obama.

I think one line Obama may wish he never said when defending his toughness is,

"I come from Chicago politics. We're accustomed to rough and tumble," he said.

Chicago politics is well-known for being dirty. Perhaps he should have talked about his experience staying above the fray of it rather than implying he knew how to get into the fight.

By Big Tent Democrat

Matt Yglesias, quoting a Clinton campaign memo, misunderstands this point:

The Obama campaign and its allies are outspending us two to one in paid media and have sent more staff into the March 4 states. . . . If he cannot win all of these states with all this effort, there's a problem.

Matt seems to think the Clinton campaign is alluding to a nomination problem. No, the reference is to the general election. I think it is clear that if Obama wins Ohio OR Texas, he will be the nominee. But if he fails to win both, the Clinton campaign is raising legitimate questions about what this means in a general election, especially in Ohio. I know the Left blogs get their jollies from ridiculing Hillary Clinton and her campaign, but sometimes they DO raise a legitimate issue. It might be nice to think about this one.

NOTE - Comments are closed.

Via Sentencing Law and Policy, Hillary was interviewed by Vibe Magazine last weekend.

VIBE: In your speech, you talked about having first, second, and third chances for children. In the last ten years the rate of incarceration of women has increased exponentially. I don’t think the average person realizes that it’s not 50% or 100%, it’s like 750% in the last thirty years. There are a disproportionate number of African-American men and women who are going to be released from prison with felony convictions. What do we do about that group of people who are effectively disenfranchised when they come out?

CLINTON: Number one, we need to divert more people from the prison system. We have too many people in prison for non-violent drug offenses, which disproportionately impacts on the African-American community. That’s why I’ve been a strong advocate of eliminating the disparity between crack cocaine and powder cocaine [sentencing].

There may have been a reason for it 25 years ago but there isn’t any justification for it now. But it also means that in the prisons themselves, we’ve got to get back to the services that used to be there.

More...

By Big Tent Democrat

As a supporter of free trade and NAFTA, I am in the awkward position of being pleased that Barack Obama appears to understand that his demagoguing on NAFTA may be good politics but not good policy. CTV is standing by its story and names Obama advisor Austin Goolsbee as the person who assured the Canadians that Obama was merely posturing on NAFTA:

[T]he Obama camp did not respond to repeated questions from CTV on reports that a conversation on this matter was held between Obama's senior economic adviser -- Austan Goolsbee -- and the Canadian Consulate General in Chicago.

Earlier Thursday, the Obama campaign insisted that no conversations have taken place with any of its senior ranks and representatives of the Canadian government on the NAFTA issue. On Thursday night, CTV spoke with Goolsbee, but he refused to say whether he had such a conversation with the Canadian government office in Chicago.

As I have said before, journalism does not require suspension of common sense. We now know that CTV is reporting that it was Austin Goolsbee who was the Obama advisor who met with a Canadian official in Chicago and provided the NAFTA assurances. Goolsbee refuses to deny the meeting. It is pretty clear that it did occur. And good for Obama for that.

By Big Tent Democrat

Appealing to "values voters" is a double edged sword for the candidates in this race. The problem is that much of the "appeal" that needs to be made is of the paranoid variety. To really appeal to "values voters" - you must hate the people they hate or find a way to spur the hate to vote for you. In 2004, Karl Rove, who remains the shrewdest (this is a neutral term morally) political operative of recent years, was able to provide hatred of gays and gay marriage to drive this extremist base to vote in droves. George Bush did not have to get his hands dirty. The other thing Bush and Rove did was never apologize for his supporters.

But "The Maverick" John McCain is in a different place. His Media Darling status is based in part on the perception that he does not play footsy with this extremist base. Of course he has to now, while trying to retain his Media image. This problem is amplified because he believes his opponent will be Barack Obama, the first Democratic Presidential candidate who is a Media Darling since JFK. That is why, as Glenn Greenwald discusses, John McCain has a John Hagee problem:

By Big Tent Democrat

Via Chris Bowers, party building Obama style:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Thursday he would be more willing than Hillary Rodham Clinton to work with Republicans.

"Her natural inclination is to draw a picture of Republicans as people who need to be crushed and defeated," Obama said during a telephone interview from Texas with the Cincinnati Enquirer editorial board. "It's not entirely her fault. She's been the target of some unfair attacks in the past."

"I'm not a person who believes any one party has a monopoly on wisdom," Obama said.

(Emphasis supplied.) Indeed. Who needs a Democratic Congress? Not Obama apparently.

NOTE - comments are now closed.

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only.

After his Super Tuesday Debacle, John Zogby went into hiding. He did not poll the next 10 contests. Which is a shame for him as he has long had a strong anti-Hillary bias and no doubt he would have produced polls indicating big Obama wins. But he emerges today, with polls that, not surprisingly are in line with some of the polling that is already public.

The value of a Zogby poll? None. Zip. But it is fun to ridicule him. And I take that opportunity now.

By Big Tent Democrat

Can anyone deny this obvious fact? Of course there is no legal recourse for this as political parties are not subject to equal protection and voting rights requirements.

Does anyone care? Only as an opportunity to bash Hillary Clinton. I hate it when candidate support trumps support for principles.