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By Peter Longerich
By Alan Abramowitz
$23
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AP photo / Charles Dharapak
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John McCain won the Republican primary in Florida on Tuesday with a decent lead over runner-up Mitt Romney. Rudy Giuliani, who bet it all on the Sunshine State, came in a distant third.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — Only a week ago, a soaring Hillary Clinton was on a trajectory to close out the nomination. Now her campaign is struggling to refocus on what had drawn voters to her.
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By Eugene Robinson — Playing the race card against Barack Obama didn’t work out quite the way Bill Clinton had hoped. Neither did a reported last-minute personal appeal to keep Ted Kennedy, venerable guardian of the Camelot flame, from joining the Obama crusade. The question now is whether the Clintons understand how the country they seek to lead—and, regrettably, I do mean “they”—has changed.
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Flickr / Joe Crimmings
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By Bill Boyarsky — Although racial politics apparently still has a place in the national discourse, there are times when an emphasis on unity is necessary. According to Boyarsky, Barack Obama’s win in South Carolina last weekend reflects his appeal among voters across a broad demographic range and among the diverse volunteer squad rallying support for him in California.
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Although her chief rival and her husband stole the headlines the last few days, Hillary Clinton is still the favorite heading into the Feb. 5 primaries, mostly because of her leads in key big states. Most polls, however, are out of date at this point and probably won’t catch up until it’s time to vote.
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He’s not exactly clear on this point, but what Sen. John McCain doesn’t achieve through specificity he drives home through sheer repetition: America can expect “other wars” in the future. In this clip he delivers that warning to his “friends” at a campaign stop in Florida.
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wikimedia.org
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It’s been a pretty amazing weekend for Barack Obama. After winning the South Carolina primary by 28 points, he managed to score the endorsements of Caroline Kennedy, who said he has the ability to inspire Americans much as her father did, and Sen. Ted Kennedy, who had been neutral but was so upset with the Clinton campaign’s tactics that he phoned the former president and gave him an earful.
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By Andy Borowitz — After equating homosexuality with bestiality, presidential candidate Mike Huckabee was attacked by a gay tiger.
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AP photo / Gerald Herbert
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Wow, Hillary Clinton’s husband has been très vocal of late, running the gamut of campaign tactics with such alacrity that it almost seems he’s done this before. Bill Clinton’s latest message is one of unity—specifically, between Hillary and the man who could be her Republican rival on the presidential ballot, John McCain.
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By Eugene Robinson — Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys took the stage at a rally for John Edwards in South Carolina on Wednesday, and out of a clear sky it started raining metaphors.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — It was a remarkable moment: A young, free-thinking presidential hopeful named Bill Clinton sat down with reporters and editors at The Washington Post in October 1991 and started saying things most Democrats wouldn’t allow to pass their lips. Updated
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PoliticsTV has assembled the 10 most noteworthy videos from the campaign so far. So relive the memories as Obama gets inspirational, Hillary gets personal and Tancredo just gets weird.
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flcikr / abstract plain
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Dennis Kucinich is expected to announce Friday that he is dropping out of the race for the White House. The Ohio congressman faces four challengers in the primary for his seat in the House. Kucinich’s congressional campaign sent out an “urgent personal appeal” to supporters for donations on Wednesday.
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cnn.com
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On the same day that the Clinton campaign premiered a new attack ad in South Carolina, former President Bill Clinton tried to blame the Obama campaign and the media for heating up the rhetoric. Bill has been dispatched to South Carolina to hold the line against Obama while Hillary shores up support around the country.
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The campaign trail takes its toll on even the most robust constitution, as evidenced by this footage of Bill Clinton nodding off during a Martin Luther King Day speech.
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nytimes.com
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Fred Thompson was supposed to be the political savior of his party, but instead he sputtered and fizzled his way through a disappointing few months of campaigning. After poor showings in every primary and caucus to date, Thompson has decided to call it quits. Next up, Rudy Giuliani?
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The issue of campaign financing was raised once again during Monday’s debate between the Democrats, so we thought we’d check the numbers and see how much the candidates are getting and from whom.
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By Eugene Robinson — Six months ago, Bill Clinton seemed to be settling comfortably into roles befitting a silver-maned former president: statesman, philanthropist, philosopher-king. Now he has put all that high-mindedness on hold—maybe it was never such a great fit, after all—to costar in his wife Hillary’s campaign as a coldblooded political hit man.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — John McCain is feared by Democrats and liked by independents. That, paradoxically, is why he may yet be rejected by Republicans, even though he has bent over backward to satisfy conservative demands.
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By Andy Borowitz — The satirist reports that New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg is still trying to decide whether to buy the U.S. presidency, with the sticking point being the steep price.
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abcnews.com
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Barack Obama has tried to infuse his campaign with a certain loftiness and positivity, but he has grown frustrated by what he describes as “unbelievable falsehoods” coming from Bill and Hillary Clinton. Expect to see a more aggressive candidate who has already promised to “directly confront Bill Clinton when he’s making statements that are not factually accurate.”
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washingtonpost.com
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Hillary Clinton won more support among Nevada caucus-goers on Saturday, but the Obama campaign will likely end up with more actual delegates. Clinton drew significant support from Latino caucusers, despite a controversial lawsuit that was rejected by a court Thursday. Defended by both Hillary and Bill, the suit had tried to make it more difficult for casino workers, many of them Latino, to caucus. Updated
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washingtonpost.com
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John McCain dashed Mike Huckabee’s hopes of a strong showing in the first Southern primary with a big victory in South Carolina on Saturday. McCain famously lost a nasty contest with George W. Bush there eight years ago. By contrast, Mike Huckabee said his rival’s campaign was “civil and good and decent.”
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By Amy Goodman — One pundit called the Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas “a lovefest.” It may well have been, but only because the corporate sponsor of the debate, General Electric-owned NBC News and its cable news channel MSNBC, rescinded its invitation to candidate Dennis Kucinich.
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AP photo / Charlie Niebergall
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The subject of race has gotten major—some would say excessive—play in recent Democratic debates, but judging from this New York Times report, we can expect more on this matter from Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in coming weeks. That’s because, as the paper put it, “If any election can prove that Southern blacks are not a monolithic voting bloc, it is this one.”
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On behalf of his faux-fave candidate, (real) Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, pseudo-pundit Stephen Colbert performs his own brand of negative campaigning, taking to the phones to quiz voters about how their potential support for Huckabee rival John McCain might change if McCain were to have fathered an “illegitimate pirate baby,” among other alarming scenarios.
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Following presidential candidates from state to state as they shake hands, kiss babies (and backsides, some might say, in the figurative sense) and promise to be the Best Prez Ever! must get tiresome for reporters on the campaign trail. In this clip, it’s hard to say if the grind got to AP scribe Glen Johnson or whether Mitt Romney’s claims about eschewing lobbyists made him snap.
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By Eugene Robinson — In the coming general election campaign, voters will be faced with a clear choice on the major issues. It is the ongoing primaries that force us to figure out not just who the candidates are, but who we are as well.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — Clinton and Obama would court failure by ignoring the white working class, a group that has reasons to be discontented.
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By Marie Cocco — A truce has been called in the racial feud between Clinton and Obama, but not before it stained both with the residue of their own follies. The resulting peril for the Democratic Party is great.
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AP photo / LM Otero
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Mitt Romney has captured a crucial victory in Michigan. He had desperately needed to win in a big state. The outcome of the latest primary means Republicans have three proven candidates in contention for the nomination.
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This video makes the case that Democrats should do everything in their power to keep Mitt Romney, and his millions in negative campaign ads, in the race.
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politico.com
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Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney is engaged in a make-or-break contest in Michigan, and his eleventh-hour mailers to supporters are striking an urgent note, as evidenced by this recent swipe at rivals John McCain, Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee over their stands on immigration.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The turmoil in the Republican presidential contest, which seems to produce a new front-runner every month, owes to President Bush’s unpopularity and the fact that even members of his own party want to turn the page on the last seven years.
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By Eugene Robinson — It turns out that Toni Morrison’s famous line about Bill Clinton as “our first black president” was just a bon mot. If the Clintons took it as a sign of African-Americans’ unconditional fealty, they were mistaken.
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kennyonfarrow.com
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In case you missed this weekend’s fireworks, Hillary Clinton went on “Meet the Press” and accused the Obama campaign of, among other things, distorting her Martin Luther King Jr. comments and agitating racial tension. Barack Obama dismissed the accusation as “ludicrous,” because, he said, he hadn’t even commented on Clinton’s remarks.
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nytimes.com
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Two new polls, one from The New York Times and CBS News and the other by The Washington Post and ABC News, show John McCain at the head of the Republican race nationally. The same polls also show Barack Obama closing the gap with rival Hillary Clinton, who still maintains a lead, though by a much smaller margin than previously.
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observer.com
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While mulling Hillary Clinton’s surprise win, the pundits might want to consider her turn to negative campaigning. Arianna Huffington has collected some of the more distasteful examples, including a direct mailer to New Hampshire women that falsely portrayed Barack Obama as soft on choice (he has a glowing rating from both NARAL and Planned Parenthood).
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By Andy Borowitz — The humorist looks into his crystal ball and tells us what to expect from the candidates, George W. Bush and even Monica Lewinsky.
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By Bill Boyarsky — Hopefully, the results of the New Hampshire primary will eliminate the words hope and change from his presidential campaign. Maybe I am too cynical or too old or too disillusioned from being burned by past failed crusades. But words and elevated oratory are not enough for me.
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By Eugene Robinson — Pollsters and pundits were quick to discount race and the so-called Bradley effect as factors in Barack Obama’s narrow loss to Hillary Clinton in the New Hampshire primary. Given that the same pollsters and pundits (OK, me too) were so wrong about the outcome, I think we ought to take a closer look.
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By David Sirota — This real-life regular guy is forthrightly emphasizing the issue of class in America—which makes the Establishment mighty uncomfortable but invigorates the presidential campaign.
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By Marie Cocco — If there’s a reason women came out to support Hillary in New Hampshire, it might be the unabashed sexism she has had to endure.
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By Ellen Goodman — Within the voting booths, many female voters in New Hampshire could not deny that the senator was a survivor of the societal battles that had scarred them over the decades.
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By Joe Conason — Conspirators with a “Swift boat” style are looking at the Illinois senator and sharpening their knives. One of their delicious subjects of attention is the candidate’s provocative spiritual adviser.
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A Cooler Century? Wait and See
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