Another black mark for the Drudge Report. After leaking today that Prince Harry was serving on the front lines of Afghanistan, the Timesonline reports Harry now must leave for security reasons.

Emergency plans to extract Prince Harry from Afghanistan were being drawn up last night after the news leaked that he had been on a secret combat tour in Helmand province since before Christmas.

He has been working in Helmand province as a Forward Air Controller – responsible for providing cover for frontline troops – and has been personally involved in clashes with Taleban guerrillas. His four-month deployment had been kept secret because of a Ministry of Defence agreement with news organisations, including The Times, but the details can now be made public after the news leaked out overseas and on the internet.

One Australian news magazine, New Idea, reported Harry's deployment a month ago, but it was not until it was carried yesterday on the Drudge Report, a major American website, that the news embargo was lifted.

Harry no doubt will be disappointed. He wanted to fight in Iraq, but that was deemed too dangerous because he'd become a target so he was deployed to Afghanistan. [More...]

Barack Obama wrote a letter outlining his support for the Gay. Lesbian, Bi and Transgender community today.

Hillary Clinton established the LGBT Americans For Hillary Steering Committee in June, 2007, outlining her years of support for the LGBT community.

As president, Clinton has pledged to end the divisive leadership of the past six years and work with the LGBT community to make sure that all Americans in committed relationships have equal economic benefits and rights. She also will work to end discrimination in adoption laws. As a U.S. Senator, she has worked to expand federal hate crimes legislation and pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, and will sign the legislation into law once she is in the White House. She will also put an end to the failed policy of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

For the record, both Hillary and Obama support expansion of crimial hate crime laws. I oppose them. Sentences for crimes are already sky high. Punish the act, not the thought behind it. Civil suits are one thing, I'm okay with that. But leave our criminal laws out of this.

That being said, Obama's a little late to this party. Not to mention, this sentence in his letter is a little disturbing. It's the now expected Obama pull-back.

Just as important, I have been listening to what all Americans have to say. I will never compromise on my commitment to equal rights for all LGBT Americans. But neither will I close my ears to the voices of those who still need to be convinced. That is the work we must do to move forward together.

What's he promising? If you think something other than compromise, read it again. It's compromise.

Update (TL): What a great surprise. I just got back from taking the TL kid to dinner (to celebrate his taking the Colorado bar exam Tues and Weds) and there are contributions from so many of you -- big and small -- all are very appreciated. More people donated today than ever before. Even the $5.00 donations are appreciated. All of you have been a huge help given our traffic surge the past week which has overwhelmed our server. Our second server should now be in place. Thanks to all of you.

By Big Tent Democrat

Congrats to Hillary and very likely to Obama for their record fundraising. Now how about a little bit for TalkLeft?

Site traffic has boomed raising costs significantly. The links are available on the right hand side.

Your help would be greatly appreciated.

Update, snail mail and anonymous donation details below:

By Big Tent Democrat

Throughout 2007, I urged Democrats to adopt a confrontational strategy with the Bush Administration and Republicans on Iraq. I believed such a strategy was not only the right thing to do, it was the politically smart thing to do. But Democrats failed time after time, capitulating to every Bush demand. Two notable Democrats in the Senate fought against these capitulations - Russ Feingold and Chris Dodd. The rest, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, were notably lacking in leadership.

Not surprisingly, this lack of leadership has been seized upon by John McCain. Chris Bowers writes:

[N]ow McCain is pushing both sides of the blurring strategy, using surrogate James Baker to argue that even those in favor of withdrawal plan to leave troops in Iraq for a long time. . . . So, McCain wants to end the war, but to do so with "honor." Also, he is in favor of a timetable, but like everyone calling for Iraq withdrawal, including Barack Obama, he knows that American troops will stay in Iraq for "a long time to come."

And so, we arrive at the full-blown Iraq Blurring Strategy from John McCain. No one wants to end the war more than he does. In fact, he is in favor of withdrawal. However, everyone who favors withdrawal, like Barack Obama, also wants to leave large numbers of residual forces in Iraq.

More...

Two news items from Chicago today. The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals denied an appeal bond for Conrad Black, while granting one to his two co-defendants. The British publishing magnate must report Monday to a federal prison in Coleman, Florida to start serving his 6 1/2 year sentence.

While the Court said there's a substantial issue on the fraud convictions (which, if decided in defendant's favor, likely would result in a reversal or new trial being granted) it found no such issue on Black's obstruction of justice conviction. The old coverup -- it gets you every time.

In the Anton Rezko trial which begins with jury selection Monday, the judge ruled today that photos of Rezko's mansion will come into evidence because it shows his opulent lifestyle and some of the alleged unlawful fundraising activity took place there.[More...]

A new Texas Rasmussen poll shows Obama at 48%, Hillary at 44%. But, those numbers should be within the margin of error, and:

Eight percent (8%) remain undecided and another 12% say it’s possible they could change their mind. That latter figure includes 3% who say there’s a good chance they could change their mind.

Also,

• 73% of the undecided have a favorable view of Hillary compared to 69% for Obama (among all voters, it's 76 favorable for Hillary and 75 for Obama.
• Obama leads by sixteen points among men, but trails by nine among women.
• Hillary is still leading among Hispanic voters by 7 points.
• 79% believe Hillary "would be at least somewhat likely to win the White House if nominated" compared to 78% for Obama.

A negative: Obama's NAFTA spin about Hillary is working.

Bottom line: This is a fluid race where either candidate could win.

(Update (TL): More than 1 in 100 Americans are now in jail or prison. As TChris writes below, it's staggering. America: Prison Nation. #1 incarcerator in the world.)

Consider this:

With more than 2.3 million people behind bars at the start of 2008, the United States leads the world in both the number and the percentage of residents it incarcerates, leaving even far more populous China a distant second, noted the report by the nonpartisan Pew Center on the States.

Before you start chanting "We're number 1," consider the cost of living in Prison Nation:

More than one in 100 adults Americans is in jail or prison, an all-time high that is costing state governments nearly $50 billion a year, in addition to more than $5 billion spent by the federal government, according to a report released today.

If you're thinking "there must be a better way," you're right:

By Big Tent Democrat

So says Hillary campaign on conference call.

$30 million of it in grassroots donations. 300K total donors in Feb., over 200K new donors.

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only.

I agree with Kos about 85% of the time. You have been reading a lot about the 15% we disagree about. Here is one where we agree. Markos wrote:

The "reformer" groups betrayed their idiocy during their efforts to regulate blogs, and now confirm that early prognosis by putting pressure on Obama's law-adhering behavior while continuing to ignore McCain's blatant lawbreaking.

The Common Causes and Democracy 21s and Public Citizens like to rail about "compromised" politicians, but they're proving in vivid color that they, themselves, are not immune to being compromised . . .

More than that, the "reforms" they obsess about are empty platitudes about nothing of substance. But that does not change this fact - Obama is losing and will continue to lose the spin war on public financing in the general election. Rip the scab now Senator Obama while Senator Clinton is your opponent -- break the pledge NOW. The Media will take it easy on you now, not later if you are running against McCain.

If passing a FISA fix is "an urgent priority," as the president insisted today, one wonders why he won't agree to sign a temporary extension of the last fix that he thought was so "urgently" needed. As Harry Reid noted today, the president's refusal to sign any law that doesn't immunize telephone companies from their allegedly illegal behavior demonstrates the president's true priority ... and it isn't national security, as much as he tries to spin it that way.

If the final legislation does not include protection for the companies, a wave of lawsuits could reveal how the United States conducts surveillance “and give Al Qaeda and others a road map as to how to avoid surveillance,” Mr. Bush said.

Lawsuits might reveal that the administration conducted surveillance illegally, but that information is more harmful to the administration than it is helpful to Al Qaeda. As for a "road map," the president doesn't explain why classified information would miraculously become public simply because a lawsuit proceeds. Surely courts are positioned to balance the need to protect legitimate national secrets against the need to remedy violations of the law.

The president's back-up argument is that lawsuits are "unfair" to telcoms that were told by "government leaders" that "their assistance was legal and vital to national security." If such assurances were actually given (by whom exactly, we might wonder), and if telcoms had reason to believe the administration's interpretation of the law was reasonable, perhaps the telcoms would have a gripe. In the absence of litigation, however, none of those facts are established. And if the telcoms indeed acted legally, they have no need for immunity, a point stressed today by Senator Kennedy:

This is pretty funny. Last night I wrote a very positive post on Matt Gonzale's article about why he is not supporting Barack Obama. (Comments now closed on it, so you can continue to address it here.)

I mentioned that he was a former Democrat, public defender and the Green candidate for Mayor in San Francisco in 2003, garnering 47% of the vote against the traditional Democrat, Gavin Newsom.

He's also a change progressive who isn't buyng Obama's change meme. He detailed Obama's legislative record as U.S. Senator to explain why.

Just two days earlier, I wrote an op-ed, Will the Real Ralph Nader Please Stand Up? critical of Ralph Nader's decision to run for office.

And in the "you can't make this stuff up" category, Ralph Nader has just announced he has selected Matt Gonzales as his running mate.

By Big Tent Democrat

Speaking for me only.

Media Matters documents this. I am sure I am just being hysterical here in seeing this also. Nah, I am a man. I can not be hysterical. But I am a hot head. Latino man. Check. That description works.