By Big Tent Democrat

Apparently, when you are Barack Obama:

Hillary Clinton and Obama each spent about $130,000 in Michigan while Obama spent $1.3 million in Florida--more than any other Democratic candidate and more than eight Republican candidates, who were eligible to win delegates from the state.

Yes, it seems clear the Florida playing field was NOT level. Obama outspent Clinton in Florida. Let the rationalizations begin.

Update (TL): Jerome at MyDD now has an update on this.

By Big Tent Democrat

While debates over Paul Lukasiak's argument continue to rage, you will not see a post from me on this non-issue. This to me is as silly as the "who stole what from whose position papers" nonsense.

You are welcome to disagree in this non-issue Open Thread. Or debate real issues as you please.

The floor is yours.

By Big Tent Democrat

As, in the day, one of the proponents of what I term the politics of contrast, it was with great interest that I considered Paul Lukasiak's argument (and the reactions to it) that Super Delegates should consider, among other things, which candidate is the choice of Democrats (as opposed to Independents and Republicans who vote in Democratic contests). I myself think it has to be a secondary consideration to the who the overall popular vote winner and pledged delegate leader is. While I abhor the super delegate system (utterly undemocratic), open primaries (because they dilute the voice of Democratic voters, thus weakening their ability to hold their Democratic representatives accountable), caucuses (because of their unrepresentative and undemocratic tendencies ), congressional district apportionment (it also dilutes the choices of voters) and overrepresentation of voters for various alleged "party building reasons (rural voter overrepresentation, etc.), the rules were written not by the candidates, but by the Party, and they were required to play the contest as the rules were written (MI and FL is a different, more damning story of the DNC but let's leave that for now.) That includes playing in the caucuses, taking into account congressional and other factored apportionment, open primaries AND Super Delegates.

Accordingly, it is my view that the pledged delegate count and the overall popular vote count SHOULD BE the primary considerations of Super Delegates and that the support of just Democrats should be a secondary consideration. That said, I also recognize that Super Delegates are empowered to form their own judgment of these things and, if I accept the rules, I must accept their judgments as part of the rules. More . . .

By Big Tent Democrat

Unlike most good government types, I believe that until there is full public financing of political campaigns, the Democratic Party should NEVER give away an advantage when it has one. This year the Democratic nominee is almost certain to have a financing advantage over the GOP nominee John McCain. Senator Barack Obama earlier made a pledge to abide by public financing in the general election if the Republican opponent would agree. John McCain has not only agreed, he is now pressing Obama to honor his pledge. Senator Obama, break that pledge. And do it now. Why? This piece from Obama strategist David Axelrod from Face the Nation provides a clue:

“Bob, we're not backing away [from our public finance pledge]. What Sen. Obama said is, once the nomination is secured, we will sit down with Sen. McCain as the nominee, and we will talk this through," Axelrod said. "Let's get through the primary season, sit down. We obviously want … nobody's been stronger on campaign finance reform than Barack Obama.”

Excuse me Mr. Axelrod, now is the time to break the pledge. You are running against Hillary Clinton, easily the most Media despised candidate we have seen since Al Gore. You will get a free pass NOW. You will not if you wait until McCain is your opponent. The free pass will be gone on this issue against John "McCain-Feingold" McCain. Democrats do not care. You will lose no votes to Clinton over this. But you will lose the Media over this if you wait until you are facing St. John McCain.

Paul Lukasiak, guest-blogging at Taylor Marsh's blog, crunches the numbers of votes cast so far in the Democratic presidential race. Why? Barack Obama is arguing that super-delegates should comply with the "will of the people."

Mr. Lukasiak's premise:

Based on exit polls, among the approximately 16.3 million people who identified themselves as Democrats, over 678,000 more voted for Hillary Clinton than Barack Obama. If we’re going to “let the people decide" who the Democratic nominee would be, shouldn’t we be basing that on the will of Democrats themselves?

Here's the table of votes. His analysis is below, but go read his whole post, I've just reprinted highlights:

It doesn't matter how carefully laws are tailored to preserve a balance between the interests of national security and the privacy interests protected by the Fourth Amendment when those laws are ignored (as they have been in the Bush administration) or when those tasked with releasing private information to the government inadvertently go too far. National attention has focused on the former threat to privacy, but the NY Times reminds us that the latter threat is just as real.

A technical glitch gave the F.B.I. access to the e-mail messages from an entire computer network — perhaps hundreds of accounts or more — instead of simply the lone e-mail address that was approved by a secret intelligence court as part of a national security investigation, according to an internal report of the 2006 episode. ...

The episode is an unusual example of what has become a regular if little-noticed occurrence, as American officials have expanded their technological tools: government officials, or the private companies they rely on for surveillance operations, sometimes foul up their instructions about what they can and cannot collect. The problem has received no discussion as part of the fierce debate in Congress about whether to expand the government’s wiretapping authorities and give legal immunity to private telecommunications companies that have helped in those operations.

How often do the distributors of private information screw up? [more..]

Photo by ABC News)

They hugged as Obama left John Edwards' home after their sit-down today. Elizabeth was at the meeting too.

More tea-leaf reading anyone? Will Edwards wait until after March 4 and Ohio and Texas to announce his endorsement or will he give a much needed boost to Obama in those states? Or, could he be considering endorsing Hillary?

Update: While Obama used the downtime from the weather to fly to N.C. to meet John Edwards and ask for his endorsement, Hillary "pressed the flesh" at local eateries and grocery stores in Wisconsin.

How important is Edwards' endorsement? Poll below.

By Big Tent Democrat

As well as this campaign has gone for Barack Obama, the one field of play where his team has been consistently outmaneuvered by the Clinton team has been on playing the expectations game. Todd Beeton shows Axelrod taking it on the chin from Howard Wolfson this morning on Face The Nation:

By Big Tent Democrat

Via Matt Yglesias, Spencer Ackerman reports how successful Bush has been at exporting our "values" in Iraq:

Then at the end, as people are milling about and chatting on their way out the door, one of the [American Provincial Reconstruction Team] officials tells [an Iraqi] judge how important it is to stand up against terrorism and promote equality and fairness before an impartial system of law. The judge nods at the platitude. "Tell me," he says through a translator, "is it true that in America, Bush can fire prosecutors he doesn't like?"

By Big Tent Democrat

My response - is the Pope Catholic? Via Taylor Marsh, I see Eugene Robinson has, an, um, more nuanced view:

The theme of press bias, however, is woven through the Clinton campaign's narrative of the story thus far. There are two basic allegations: that journalists look at Obama uncritically while subjecting Hillary Clinton to microscopic scrutiny; and that we react with hair-trigger reflexes when attacks on Obama have the slightest whiff of racism but don't seem to notice, or care, when Clinton is subjected to rank sexism.

The first charge is just bogus, in my view.

Whatever you say Gene. How's that NBC gig working out for you? More . . .

Lots of snow in Wisconsin today, so much so that both candidates had to cancel events until tomorrow.

Tea-leaf reading anyone? Who does this hurt the most?

I'm heading out for the afternoon, this is an open thread, all topics welcome. Be nice.

By Big Tent Democrat

NOTE - Comments are now closed.

Matt Stoller writes about a news story that argues Obama is gaining among women. Matt likes that line and allows the important underlying story to be overshadowed. Matt writes:

More significantly, her lead among women has slipped to just 10 points in state.

But what does that mean? It means that, as in MD, VA, and DC, CALIFORNIA and almost EVERY STATE, Obama is winning African American women 4-1. This is not the issue for Obama in terms of a General election. Among women, Obama needs to win white women in a general election.

More . . .