Barack Obama responded to Hillary Clinton's MTP appearance by proving he indeed is a rough and tumble political fighter, not for Democratic values, but for himself:

. . . Sen. Clinton made an unfortunate remark, an ill advised remark, about King and Lyndon Johnson. I didn’t make the statement. I haven’t remarked on it . . . the notion that somehow this is our doing is ludicrous

Stop right there. Obama's campaign in fact has pushed this talk for days now. Obama is being misleading at best and mendacious at worst. But he is just a pol fighting for his own political fortunes. Then Obama misleads on what happened on MTP today:

I have to point out that instead of telling the American people about her positive vision for America, Sen. Clinton spent an hour talking about me and my record in a way that was flat-out wrong.

Tim Russert spent an hour asking questions about you, Senator. How is that Senator Clinton's fault? Very misleading of Obama. Again Obama the political fighter for his own cause emerges. Finally, Obama is not honest when he says:

South Carolina may be the end for John Edwards if he comes in third. It seems, once again, he's displaying his preference for Obama over Hillary. At a campaign event at a predominantly black Baptist church today Edwards said :

"I must say I was troubled recently to see a suggestion that real change that came not through the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King but through a Washington politician. I fundamentally disagree with that," Edwards told more than 200 people gathered at a predominantly black Baptist church. ...."Those who believe that real change starts with Washington politicians have been in Washington too long and are living a fairy tale," he said.

and,

"As someone who grew up in the segregated South, I feel an enormous amount of pride when I see the success that Senator Barack Obama is having in this campaign," said Edwards. He the added, with a laugh: "Some days I wish he was having a little less success."

I'm not comfortable with Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano's endorsement of Obama. She's another law and order prosecutor-turned-politician. She's a former U.S. Attorney who also served as Arizona Attorney General. She's also been mentioned as a possible vice presidential candidate.

During her 2002 election campaign, she was heavily endorsed by that wacko sheriff, Joe Arpaio (the one puts juveniles on chain gangs, makes inmates wear pink underwear and dui offenders bury the dead, who has prisoners sleep in tents and whose immigration solution is to jail the undocumented.) Arpaio had big praise for Napolitano when an anti-Napolitano ad cropped up in her 2002 race:

Sherriff Joe: This Is Sheriff Joe Arpaio with an Urgent Message. Janet Napolitano Has Been Attacked with the Most Vicious TV Ad in Arizona History. The Ad Is Outrageous and Untrue. As U.S. Attorney, She Was the Number One Prosecutor of Child Molesters in the Nation. As Our Attorney General, Janet Napolitano Has Stood with Law Enforcement to Protect Our Families. This Is Joe Arpaio. Join Me in Rejecting the Attacks Against Janet Napolitano.

Napolitano is a Democrat in a red state with high approval ratings from Republicans. The New York Times says she allowed Arizona's enforcement-only, "toughest in the nation" immigration bill to become law there.

If Obama wants the backing of a law and order politician like Napolitano, fine. It's just one more reason I don't believe he will be a progressive on crime issues if elected President.

[Update below:]

Of course Senator Dick Durbin, a fine man and politician, is doing the work of the Obama campaign when he says:

I’m really troubled by his questioning the sincerity of Barack Obama’s opposition to the war in Iraq . . .

Durbin, a staunch Obama supporter had no qualms apparently when Obama was accusing Clinton and DURBIN (and McCaskill, Nelson et al) of fomenting war with Iran when they voted for the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment:

Michael Keller is a computer programmer from Tampa who joined the Florida National Guard where he was in charge of oversight at Abu Ghraib prison. His goal was to protect the inmates. He has written a new book, Torture Central: E-mails from Abu Ghraib. From the St. Petersburg Times:

Keller provides new details of the torture he witnessed at Abu Ghraib.

"The detainee is then laid flat on a medical litter, and another litter is placed on top of them producing a sandwich effect," he wrote in Torture Central: E-mails from Abu Ghraib. "The two litters are then tightened together with ratchet straps, creating a vice. The detainee remains crushed between the litters for one hour, with the guard checking every 15 minutes to ensure that the detainee still has a pulse."

There were other abuses, including those involving children: [More...]

DemfromCt, the daily kos Contributing Editor, has always given pollsters a regard they simply do not deserve. This is reflected in his post on the excuse making from pollsters on their New Hampshire debacle. His post takes seriously all the excuse making they present and ignores what is obvious to anyone who can avoid buying the pollster spin - the Media Misogyny galvanized women voters to support Hillary. Instead Dem buys into this nonsense:

The "Wilder Effect (aka the Bradley effect)." This is worth a good look. Kohut raises this in his NY Times article from his own experiences a few years back with David Dinkins, running in NYC for mayor (he's the undistinguished Giuliani predecessor)

More . . .

Taylor Marsh provides the key clip:

Speaking for me only.

Besides the typical Russertian ripping of statements out of context, the topic that was most interesting to me was the discussion of Iraq and the records of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on Iraq.

First things first, Hillary's now familiar explanation of her vote - that she was not voting for war, she was voting to get the inspectors again - does not wash. She cites statements by the Bush Administration that it was not a vote for war, and those statements were made of course, but any rational being knew that was just cover talk. It WAS a vote for war and we all knew it.

Barack Obama stood tall in that moment and argued forcefully AGAINST war and against voting for the Iraq War Resolution. Barack Obama was clearly superior in judgment to Hillary Clinton at that moment.

Now when it comes to evaluating Barack Obama's actions after, including his statements in 2004 saying he did not know how he would have voted if he had been in the Senate, it is clear that Bill Clinton's descriptions of Obama's actions is completely accurate. Greg Sargent has the quote where Obama says he does not know how he would have voted: [More...]

For anyone up early enough to watch, this morning's news shows include:

• Meet the Press: Hillary Clinton
• CNN's Late Edition: John Edwards, Huckabee, Romney
• Face the Nation: Huckabee and Romney
• Fox News Sunday: Giuliani

Chris Matthews: assorted media pundits, no candidates, just spin.

With the news and bloggers returning to a discussion of immigration this weekend as the Democratic candidates vie for the Latino and Hispanic vote (more here) and the Republican candidates try to show they are the toughest on the undocumented, here's ten point immigration reform plan TalkLeft supports:

1. We need a comprehensive program that allows undocumented immigrants from all nationalities and living in the U.S. to obtain legal permanent residency.

2. Future immigrants should also be able to come here legally and safely, have access to permanent residency, and not fear criminal prosecution for unlawful entry or exit.

3. Immigrant workers’ rights should be promoted and protected; employer sanctions and the criminalization of work must be ended. Labor laws should be strictly enforced, and immigrant workers should have the freedom to join unions to improve wages and working conditions.

4. The human rights of all immigrants should be respected in the enforcement of immigration laws throughout the U.S. and at the nation’s borders.

5. Immigrants should be able to adjust their status and reunite with families in a fair and timely way. [More...]

Despite a severe budget shortage, Arizona is set to begin prosecuting 40 to 60 "apprehended migrants" a day.

This is a very expensive program that is unlikely to be a deterrent.

Even with only 40 prosecutions a day, expenses will likely add up to millions of dollars a year for housing, transporting, prosecuting and defending those who are charged.

While a higher number of arrests clearly occur daily in the Tucson sector, trying to prosecute many more on a daily basis clearly would overwhelm the system, various federal officials say.

On the impact: [More....]

Calling George Orwell.

The Independent (UK) reports:

Ministers are planning to implant "machine-readable" microchips under the skin of thousands of offenders as part of an expansion of the electronic tagging scheme that would create more space in British jails. Amid concerns about the security of existing tagging systems and prison overcrowding, the Ministry of Justice is investigating the use of satellite and radio-wave technology to monitor criminals.

But, instead of being contained in bracelets worn around the ankle, the tiny chips would be surgically inserted under the skin of offenders in the community, to help enforce home curfews.The tags, labelled "spychips" by privacy campaigners, are already used around the world to keep track of dogs, cats, cattle and airport luggage, but there is no record of the technology being used to monitor offenders in the community. The chips are also being considered as a method of helping to keep order within prisons.

Civil liberties groups and probation officers in Britain are outraged. [More...]

Todd Beeton reporting on an Obama event in Nevada:

[I]mmigration, as you might expect, is going to be a big issue in Nevada, as it was not in NH. . . . There were two distinct schools of thought represented in the audience, a nativist demo and an immigrant demo and Barack threaded the needle quite ably when he said he supports a path to citizenship but that it's not fair to give them special priv[i]leges, the undocumented population must pay a fine and "must learn English!" That last one got a huge reaction. . . .

(Emphasis supplied.) Perhaps it becomes less surprising to learn, as Taylor Marsh reports, Latinos are firmly behind Hillary:

There is not only "no exodus," but Clinton Hispanic support is mushrooming. Leaders in that community are actively engaged for Clinton here and today had to mean a lot to all of them. Hispanic leaders that the community respect showed up, including local politicians.

One of the reasons I have tepidly supported Obama was because he was not playing to the nativist crowd. It seems that, again, I may have been mistaken.