IHT: Obama projects victory but Clinton may be poised to increase clout

By Brian Knowlton
Published: May 12, 2008
WASHINGTON: Senator Barack Obama is acting as if he already has won the Democratic presidential nomination, but Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is poised, ironically, to score two of her most lopsided primary victories and possibly enhance her political clout.
Obama's travel plans in the next two weeks suggest a clear focus on the general election in November - he will visit Missouri, a general-election swing state, on Tuesday, then Michigan on Wednesday and Florida next week, both of them key to the hopes of Democrats in the fall.
But the presidential primary season is not over yet, and polls show Clinton holding a huge edge Tuesday in West Virginia - leading by an average of 36 points, according to three voter surveys cited by the Real Clear Politics Web site. Polling also gives her a 30-point lead in Kentucky, which will vote May 20. She is also favored on June 1 in Puerto Rico, which votes in a primary but not the general election.

Although Obama is expected to win the three other remaining primaries - in Oregon, Montana and South Dakota, ending on June 3 - Clinton's upcoming show of strength should position her better for challenges to come. Those might include the matter of who Obama would choose to join him on the ticket; signals are mixed as to whether she might be interested. They might also make it easier for Clinton to end her candidacy unbowed and on an upbeat note.
Even top Clinton advisers acknowledge that the New York senator faces daunting odds. Terry McAuliffe, her campaign chairman, said Sunday that it was "highly unlikely" Clinton could overcome Obama's lead in elected delegates.

With mounting pressure from fellow Democrats to end a divisive campaign, Clinton has begun shifting her attacks to Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee. She has pledged to support the Democratic nominee "no matter what happens."

On the other side, McCain and his surrogates have considerably sharpened their attacks on Obama, hinting at the outlines of a general-election strategy. The former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, an erstwhile McCain rival who now supports him, blasted the Illinois senator on Sunday as an untested man of scant experience.

"He has not accomplished anything during his life, in terms of legislation or leading an enterprise or making a business work or a city work or a state work," Romney said on CNN. "He really has very little experience, and the presidency of the United States is not an internship."

McCain planned Monday in Oregon to enlarge on his call for mandatory curbs on greenhouse gas emissions, a position closer to those of Obama and Clinton - and to many independent and centrist voters - than to the Republican mainstream or President George W. Bush.

As he plays a delicate game of positioning, McCain has laid out his views on the Iraq war, taxes and judicial nominations, all aimed at expanding his appeal among conservatives. But he received a sharp reminder Monday of the difficulty he may have in nailing down support from the right: Bob Barr, a conservative former Republican congressman from Georgia, announced plans to run for the Libertarian party's presidential nomination.

Barr, 59, helped lead the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, giving him national prominence, and in some circles, notoriety. But Barr left the Republican Party in 2006, disillusioned by what he said was its failure to restrain government growth and by what he considered affronts to civil liberties. He became a sharp critic of the Patriot Act, for example.

His candidacy could take some votes from McCain. And his criticisms of the party might add to pressure on McCain not to move too far toward the center.

In the Democratic race, Obama has effectively ceded West Virginia. He told a crowd Monday in Charleston - in his only visit to the state - that he expected Clinton to draw "many more" votes than he would get. West Virginia is one of the poorest, oldest, most white-dominated states, mirroring the composition of counties in Ohio, Indiana and Pennsylvania that Clinton carried handily.

But Obama emphasized themes meant to play well there: patriotism and love of country.
"My grandfather Stanley Dunham enlisted after Pearl Harbor and went on to march in Patton's army," he said. "My grandmother worked on a bomber assembly line while he was gone, and my mother was born at Fort Leavenworth."

Still, a poll in Kentucky suggested that Obama's race might hurt him there as he campaigns to be elected as the country's first black president. While more than half of respondents in a survey by the Herald-Leader, a newspaper in Lexington, Kentucky, said that his race was not a factor, 1 in 5 said it could hurt Obama's chances, and only 4 percent said it would help.

The newspaper also said that its poll raised doubts about whether Kentucky - which has backed the winning presidential candidate in every election since 1964 - would be a battleground state in the fall. The poll showed McCain leading Obama by 25 percentage points there and Clinton by 12. It had a 4 percent margin of error.

NOW, Can We Connect the Damned Dots.....???

Lewinsky and the first lady
By The Associated Press 17 minutes ago

Hillary Rodham Clinton was in the White House on at least seven days when her husband had sexual encounters with Monica Lewinsky, according to the first lady's calendars released Wednesday. A look at her schedule on days when Lewinsky said she had sexual encounters with Bill Clinton:

_Nov. 15, 1995: The first lady was in a mid-afternoon "meet & greet" photo opportunity at the White House with various Nobel Laureates and their families. That night, Lewinsky had what she later said was her first sexual encounter with the president in the private study off the Oval office.

_Nov. 17, 1995: Mrs. Clinton had no public schedule and was at the White House. That night, Lewinsky said she had a sexual encounter with the president while he was on the telephone in the White House with a member of Congress.

_Dec. 31, 1995: Lewinsky said she and the president had a sexual encounter early that afternoon in a study down the hall from the Oval Office. Sometime afterward, the president, first lady and their daughter, Chelsea, flew to Hilton Head, S.C., to spend New Year's Eve with hundreds of friends during their annual getaway at an intellectual family retreat known as Renaissance Weekend.

_Jan. 7, 1996: On a Sunday afternoon, Lewinsky and the president spent most of the afternoon in the Oval Office. The first lady and the president had a small dinner with 20 people at "the Old Family Dining Room" at the White House.

_Jan. 21, 1996: The first lady had no public schedule, but she and the president privately toured an exhibit at the National Gallery of Art. Lewinsky and the president had an afternoon sexual encounter in the hallway by the private study next to the Oval Office, Lewinsky said later.

_Feb. 4, 1996: Mrs. Clinton and the president attended the National Governors Association annual dinner. Lewinsky said she and the president had a sexual encounter that day, and sat and talked in the Oval Office for about 45 minutes.

_March 31, 1996: Mrs. Clinton toured an archaeological site and museum in Delphi, Greece, and watched a folk dance performance. That day, Lewinsky said she and the president resumed their sexual contact.

_April 7, 1996, Easter Sunday. Mrs. Clinton had no public schedule. Lewinsky said that, at the president's suggestion, she performed oral sex while he was on the telephone in his office.

_Feb. 28, 1997: The schedule shows Mrs. Clinton was in the White House at least part of the day, when President Clinton and Lewinsky had oral sex near the Oval Office, leaving stains on her dress. There were no public events, but the schedule shows Mrs. Clinton had "drop by" events or meetings in the Map Room and Diplomatic Reception Room between 11 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. The schedule also lists plays and a concert that night, but it is not clear whether Mrs. Clinton attended.

_March 29, 1997: On the day when Lewinsky later told independent counsel Kenneth Starr that she had her final sexual encounter with the president, Mrs. Clinton was thousands of miles away in Eritrea. In his grand jury testimony, the president denied this encounter. The first lady that day toured the Martyrs' Cemetery in Eritrea, where she participated in a wreath-laying ceremony and a tree planting. She also visited a health care clinic, spoke to villagers, and toured a polio vaccination room. She visited a woodworking center, held a round-table discussion with the National Union of Eritrean Women and met the country's president.

------------------------

Now remember........

Now that STAIN had to come from somewhere.....here's the question....on the days that Monica and Bill were doin' the do.......what room WAS Hillary in on those days?


Exactly??

Poltico: How Hillary can still win

Sometime in the early hours of Feb. 6, as the meaning of the Super Tuesday results became clear, Hillary Rodham Clinton morphed from front-runner into underdog. And her prospects — in the eyes of the delegate counters, pundits and electronic futures markets — have gone downhill from that moment.

But some Democratic insiders, despite the favorable light the current campaign narrative shines on Barack Obama, do not rule out that a Democratic race that has held nothing but surprises thus far might provide one more. With the primary calendar stretching out for months, the media focusing more intensely than ever on Obama and the Democratic Party’s rules under assault, some Democratic strategists say Clinton retains a path to victory — but little margin for error.

Strategists almost universally said Clinton’s only hope is to bring Obama down through more — and more direct — attacks on his readiness to lead. And if that works, Clinton’s road map to victory is simply to start winning. An unexpected victory in Wisconsin on Tuesday would restore her campaign’s momentum. And win or lose there, Clinton, as her campaign has acknowledged, must win Ohio and Texas on March 4.

Then, as the race stretches through the long spring of March, April, May and June, she needs to win the big state of Pennsylvania and — just as important — to win the argument about why she’s winning, the strategists said.

“Is she still in an uphill fight? Yes. But is it an implausible scenario? Absolutely not,” said Paul Maslin, a Democratic pollster who advised New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.

“She’s got to say, ‘I’m winning the hearts and minds of the middle-class Democrats; they’re the ones who are going to decide this race in the fall,’” Maslin said. “And she’s got to say, ‘I’m roughing this guy up for the first time, and it’s working. What do you think the Republicans are going to do to him?’”
(Not all Democrats are so sanguine. One former Clinton adviser, asked to outline a scenario for her victory, gamely did so and then paused. “My real opinion is, it ain’t gonna happen,” he said.)

There’s no secret to where Obama’s weakness lies: Every poll and strategists from both parties have long pointed to both his real and perceived lack of experience. But Clinton’s attempts to contrast her years in public life with his do not seem to have made an impact so far, and she may be forced to turn up the heat.

“She can’t win by affirmatively making the case for herself. Her vote ceiling has been reached, or she’s close to it,” said Dan Gerstein, a Democratic political consultant who is not supporting anyone in the race. “The best thing she can do is either discredit Obama or raise doubts about him.

“I hate to say it, but in certain respects, it’s using the Bush strategy against Kerry against Obama and raising doubts about his willingness to use force to keep the country safe,” he said.

“The Obama people and the pacifists will scream ‘scare tactics.’ But for a lot of people, that’s not scare tactics — they care about national security and the commander in chief responsibility,” Gerstein said.

Clinton’s second line of attack has been a variant on Walter Mondale’s famous jibe at Gary Hart: “Where’s the beef?” Clinton has tried, again without enough success, to paint Obama as a candidate of words rather than substance. Monday, Clinton aides said Obama’s echoing of a rhetorical riff of Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick undermines his candidacy because “Sen. Obama’s campaign is largely premised on the strength of his rhetoric and his promises.”

A Democratic consultant (and Clinton supporter) in New York, Hank Sheinkopf, suggested Team Clinton take that line of argument a step further and compare Obama directly to Patrick, who some critics say has failed to live up to the promise of his rhetoric.

“You have to run the anti-Deval Patrick campaign,” he said. “He’s sure done a brilliant job of governing.”


“Say, ‘It’s the same campaign that’s been done in other places — let’s look at the results,’” Sheinkopf said.

If Clinton stays alive through March, there’s little space for dramatic change before a showdown in Pennsylvania on April 22. And while that’s a state where Clinton’s strong, only unexpectedly wide margins in Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania could restore her lead in pledged delegates.

Her best bet, then, is to make the case to the superdelegates.

“With the superdelegates and the insiders after March 4, electability may be the only case being made on both sides,” Maslin said.

And it’s unclear when the bulk of uncommitted superdelegates will throw their weight behind the front-runner — and whether they will judge that front-runner by his or her lead among pledged delegates or total delegates or by some other count. Certainly, the Clinton campaign will continue to make the case that many of her supporters in Florida have been excluded from the process by a technicality.

Former Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey, who supports Clinton, said he expected the remaining, uncommitted superdelegates to coalesce behind whoever is the front-runner by a count of total delegate support later this spring.

“She’s got to have more of the total delegates,” he said. “Pennsylvania is when the window closes.”
Clinton’s attacks on Obama, however, may hurt her on that front.

“Going negative isn’t likely to appeal to superdelegates,” said another veteran of Democratic presidential politics.

If — and it remains a big if — Clinton can win Texas and Ohio, few expect a swift capitulation from her, even if her margins are narrower than she hopes.

In politics, there’s little harm in playing for time.

“There are a few ways that the Clinton campaign can come back — and while it won’t be easy, it’s not beyond them,” Ken Baer, an unaligned consultant and editor of the journal Democracy, wrote in an e-mail.

“And there are a few ways that are totally beyond their control: 1) Obama has a massive gaffe, 2) there is a terrorist attack or other major foreign policy crisis that gets people yearning for a steady hand or 3) there is a revelation of some sort of Obama scandal that gets Democratic voters to take a pause.”

TM & © THE POLITICO & POLITICO.COM, a division of Allbritton Communications Company

BREAKING: Hostage Situation at Hillary Campaign HQ

A man who claimed he had a bomb strapped to his body walked into a Hillary Clinton campaign office in Rochester, N.H., and has taken at least one and as many as four hostages, sources say.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said it is "a hostage situation involving a Clinton staffer."

One federal law enforcement official told ABC News there are four possible hostages at the Clinton office, but that there was no federal involvement at this time.

Clinton was not at the New Hampshire office at the time, and canceled an appearance at the Democratic National Committee office in the Washington, D.C., area, Dean said.

ABC News' David Wright, Pierre Thomas and Jason Ryan contributed to this report.

Developing...

The Barack Attack

It looks like the always poised Hillary Rodham-Clinton is suffering from a really progressive case of B.O.

B. O., in this case stands for Barack Obama.

A few weeks ago, Clinton had the whole thing wrapped up. But just
like her husband in his initial Presidential run, Obama has come out of nowhere to give
Mistress Hill a run for her money.

Read this article from the Concord Monitor:


Two weeks after speaking to a sell-out Manchester crowd of more than
1,600, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama is reaping the
benefits of his visit. If the Democratic primary were held today, Obama would be in a statistical dead heat
with New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, according to a new Monitor poll. Last month,
a Monitor poll showed Clinton trouncing her opponents, with Obama lagging 23 points behind.

"I'm not surprised, because Barack Obama got five days of constant media
attention in New Hampshire," said Jim Demers, a lobbyist
and former Democratic lawmaker who accompanied Obama throughout the
senator's New Hampshire visit. "Obama has
demonstrated to the people of New Hampshire that he's a top-tier candidate."

Although Clinton commands considerable support among likely Democratic
primary voters, she struggles in general election match-ups, according to the
poll. If the contest were held today, both Arizona Sen. John McCain and former
New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani would prevail over Clinton. Obama, in contrast, would eke out a
slight win over both Republican candidates. Former Democratic vice presidential
nominee John Edwards is neck-and-neck with the Republicans.

"There are a lot of independents. These are the same people who loathe
Bush, loathe the Iraq war," said Del Ali, president of Research 2000, the
Maryland-based nonpartisan polling firm that conducted the poll for the Monitor
last Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. "But deep down, they don't like Hillary
Clinton."

As the 2008 presidential primaries near, the Republican field has also
become increasingly competitive. Giuliani closed the gap with McCain in recent
weeks, turning an 8-point deficit into a slight lead, according to the poll.
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former House speaker Newt Gingrich trail
behind, with 10 percent and 8 percent respectively. The poll shows Giuliani
garnering 26 percent to McCain's 25 percent. "McCain can't take New Hampshire
for granted the way he counted on them six years ago," said Dante Scala, a political scientist at St.
Anselm College. "If Giuliani could break through anywhere, it would be in New
Hampshire, with a large number of independents and a large number of relatively
moderate Republicans. He has the opportunity to cause John McCain a lot of
grief."

This time around, McCain can no longer rely on being a fresh face, said
Edward Mosca, a former chairman of the
Manchester Republican Committee. "You've got a limited shelf life in politics,
and he's been out there for a while," Mosca said. "I think
McCain's biggest obstacle in the primary is that he has the highest
expectations."
Roughly one year out from the New Hampshire primary,
political observers cautioned that polls offer little insight into the 2008
presidential contest. History books are full of candidates who led the polls but
lost the race: Bush, for example held a double-digit lead over McCain in a
University of New Hampshire poll conducted nine months before the primary.
McCain proceeded to rout his opponents.

"You will have this tremendous amount of energy and motion to secure
the allegiance of about 5,000 people," said Charlie Arlinghaus, president of the Josiah
Bartlett Center for Public Policy. "And nobody else is going to start paying
attention until after the summer."

But the poll does reflect name recognition, and it may hint at the
direction in which voters are leaning, analysts said.

Obama's surge in popularity is "name
recognition of an unknown, that's what's really surprising about it," said Arnie Arnesen, a political analyst and former
radio talk show host. "We're so yearning for something different, and what we
think we know about everyone else doesn't excite us."

Voters interviewed Friday afternoon echoed Arnesen's comment. Lenny Young of Concord
compared Obama's charisma to that of John F.
Kennedy. "He seems to have it," Young said. Although Young first heard of Obama during the senator's 2004 campaign,
it wasn't until Obama visited New Hampshire that he took
notice.
Concord resident Mike Sheehan had this
advice for the first-term senator: "Ride the wave." Obama's relative lack of experience - an
oft-cited criticism - is also an asset. "You figure in six years, only bad
things can happen," Sheehan said. As for Clinton, "you either
love her or you hate her," Sheehan said.

Excitement about a possible Obama run was also
reflected last week in an Iowa poll. If the Iowa Democratic caucus were held
today, former vice presidential nominee John Edwards and Obama would each secure 22 percent of the
vote, according to the poll, which was conducted by Research 2000, which also
conducted the Monitor poll.

A Clinton visit, however, would also likely boost her numbers, Demers said. "I don't think anyone can
underestimate Senator Clinton coming in, with her level of name recognition, the
role that her husband will be able to play in the campaign and the amount of
money that she has and is able to raise."

On the Republican side, Giuliani appeals to tough-on-terrorism social
moderates, Ali said. "They've turned off of McCain because of his visits to
Jerry Falwell," Ali added. During his 2000 White House bid, McCain called
Falwell, a prominent evangelical, one of the "agents of intolerance." McCain has
since met with Falwell, and recently delivered the commencement address at
Falwell's Liberty University.

The challenge for Giuliani, who is pro-choice, will come after New
Hampshire, political observers said. "I wouldn't be shocked if Giuliani won New
Hampshire," Ali said. But "what's going to happen when he goes to South
Carolina?"

In addition to the challenge from Giuliani, McCain also struggles with
his stance on the war. While most prominent lawmakers are focused on withdrawing
from Iraq, McCain has called for an increase of troops to quash the insurgency.

Support for the conflict in New Hampshire is at an all-time low,
according to the poll. Three years ago, 79 percent of Granite State voters rated
Bush's performance in handling the conflict excellent or good. Today, that
figure has plummeted to 29 percent. The vast majority - 60 percent of voters -
want troops to begin withdrawing before 2010.

Research 2000 used randomly generated telephone numbers to interview
600 likely voters. Those interviewed - 184 Democrats (31 percent), 193
Republicans (32 percent) and 223 voters who identified themselves as
independents (37 percent) - reflect voter registration numbers statewide. The
interviews included 288 men and 312 women. The poll has a 4 percent margin of
error.

For questions about the Democratic primary, Research 2000 polled
Democrats and individuals who identify as independents but said they would
likely vote in the Democratic primary. The same strategy was used for questions
about the Republican primary. In order to poll 400 likely voters about each
primary, Research 2000 conducted an over-sample, interviewing additional
residents.

Apart from who's up and who's down in the primary polls, support for
Edwards and Obama in the presidential match-ups
reflect a larger political trend, Scala said. "These
results reflect that New Hampshire is a purple state that leans toward the
Democrats."

The one thing that may put a cap on all this is a certain mindset that is still previlant in many parts of the country.

There are people who will not vote for either a black man or a woman, even though either would be the better choice (which is why Condoleeza is not running.....a being single and she hits the trifecta!). You would think we would have evolved by now. Some have, many have not.

So if either runs, the GOP will run a white, male, married gentleman.....probably, unfortunatly, McCain...and just sit back and do nothing. They may not have to.

One simply can hope that either Barack or Hillary can motivate those who have evolved in to a strong enough voting bloc to block the racists and the sexists.

yes, one can hope.