Keith Olbermann eviscerates Hillary: "Look I can be president, I was married to one!"

Tonight on his show, Keith Olbermann eviscerated Hillary Clinton for a good ten minutes for promoting John McCain's presidency over her fellow Democrats. He compared her to Joe Lieberman. He asked "is she equating her time in the East Wing with McCain's time in the Hanoi Hilton?" You have got to watch these videos. They're devastating in only the way that Keith can be. (Hat tip to Al Rodgers' DKos diary.)



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Looks like Michigan may be holding caucuses

So heareth Michigan Liberal. Read More......

The Shortest Comeback in History

From AP:

Hillary Rodham Clinton won't catch Barack Obama in the race for Democratic delegates chosen in primaries and caucuses, even if she wins every remaining contest.

So much for Hillary's comeback. Of course, the media knew this Tuesday night, but it was more fun to pretend like Hillary's momentum (yes, winning a state that she was already expected to win for the past 14 months is now momentum and a comeback) was going to make this an all new race. Now, to be fair, Obama can't reach the magic number of 2,025 total delegates either - not without the help of the Superdelegates. But note that the AP article is now definitively saying that not only can't Hillary reach 2,025 delegates, she also can't even catch up to Obama in terms of pledged (elected) delegates even if she wins every race. That's what we've been saying for the past few weeks. It's over, in terms of elections. Hillary can't catch up to Obama, period. Now all she can do is try to convince the Superdelegates to overturn the will of the people (this is probably the motivation behind her having gone postal the past week, embracing John McCain, telling everyone how qualified he is to be president, etc.) And if the Superdelegates listen to Hillary, and overrule the will of the people by denying the nomination to the first African-American nominee in American history, God help our party, cuz it ain't gonna be pretty. Read More......

Really, Hillary? Name one.

Wow, so during world crises, when America was expecting President Bill Clinton to make the tough decisions, we're to believe that the First Lady was really calling the shots. Okay, I'm game. Name one world crisis, Hillary, where you were the one really in charge, and not your husband, the president. And spare us the "it was confidential" crap. You can't claim experience and then not back up your claims because it's super duper double secret. Just one example will do. What world crisis did you solve when we all thought Bill was the one in charge?

During the brief Q&A; at her meeting, Clinton was asked about her role when her husband answered phone calls during crises in the middle of the night.

"I don't talk about the conversations that I had with my husband in the White House, but obviously I was there for a lot of phone calls at different times of the day and night, and I have a very clear idea of what it takes to be prepared and ready to not only to answer the phone but then to make the decisions that are required depending on what the crisis is."

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Christy at FireDogLake needs a new computer

Her laptop died. If you're feeling generous, help her out. They do good stuff. Read More......

Wash Post reporter: "Women want to be taken seriously but quite often don't act serious."

Keep digging. Actually, this is quite interesting since the author of the piece in question, and the author of that quote, is a woman. Can a woman be sexist against other women? As a guy, I'm curious what the women out there think. (Background on this issue here.) Read More......

An important victory in the House for mental health parity

This is a major step forward for health care in America. For twelve years, the GOP leadership refused to let this bill move forward:

The House voted Wednesday to require equal health insurance coverage for mental and physical illnesses when policies cover both.

The 268-148 roll call was cheered by advocates who have been fighting more than a decade for what has come to be called mental health parity.

Supporters said the measure would help end the stigma of mental illness and create greater access for people needing mental health and addiction treatment.

Opponents warned it could drive up health care costs and force some employers to drop insurance coverage.

The "Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007" was named for the late Minnesota Democratic senator who championed the issue for years and who was killed in a 2002 plane crash.

"It's a historic step," said the late senator's son, David, 42. "It's a civil rights bill for people with mental illnesses and chemical addiction. It forces insurance companies to treat them as they treat others."

Forty-seven Republicans joined 221 Democrats in voting for the bill. Three Democrats voted against it.

The House vote sets the stage for talks with the Senate, which passed a narrower version of the bill last September with support from business and insurance groups.

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Exactly what "threshold" did Hillary Clinton cross that prepared her to be commander in chief?

TalkingPointsMemo, quoting Hillary Clinton today, again suggesting that John McCain is more qualified to be president than Barack Obama (watch video of Hillary repeatedly praising McCain over Obama here):

“I think that since we now know Sen. (John) McCain will be the nominee for the Republican Party, national security will be front and center in this election. We all know that. And I think it’s imperative that each of us be able to demonstrate we can cross the commander-in-chief threshold,” the New York senator told reporters crowded into an infant’s bedroom-sized hotel conference room in Washington.

“I believe that I’ve done that. Certainly, Sen. McCain has done that and you’ll have to ask Sen. Obama with respect to his candidacy,” she said.

Calling McCain, the presumptive GOP nominee a good friend and a “distinguished man with a great history of service to our country,” Clinton said, “Both of us will be on that stage having crossed that threshold. That is a critical criterion for the next Democratic nominee to deal with.”

When exactly did Hillary Clinton demonstrate that she was able to "cross the commander-in-chief threshold"? When she supported Bush by voting for the Iraq War? When she supported Bush (and Lieberman) on the Iran resolution last September (basically a carbon copy of the Iraq war resolution)? When she went to Kosovo with Sinbad and Sheryl Crow? When she was First Lady of Arkansas? When she was planning the White House Christmas Party?

This is getting ridiculous. It's one thing for Clinton to build herself up. But constantly comparing herself to McCain, constantly praising McCain over the man who may be our candidate in the fall, is beyond annoying. Is that supposed to make her appear stronger? If she wants that comparison, we'll make it. On the most important foreign policy decision of this decade, on the biggest foreign policy disaster in recent American history, Hillary Clinton and John McCain made the wrong call - both sided with George Bush and voted for the Iraq war. If this is the judgment they would bring to the threshold of the Oval Office, if these are the decisions Hillary and McCain are going to be making when the phone rings at 3AM, who needs either one of them. Read More......

Obama raised $55 million in February

The Obama campaign raised $55 million in February alone. Not only did Obama outraise Hillary Clinton by $20 million, Obama's February haul alone is more than McCain's entire campaign fundraising ($54848606.82) through January of 2008 -- and that even includes McCain's shady loans. Of the $55 million, Obama can spend $54 million in the primaries.

Ben Smith has the details and notes:

The vast increase in the number of Obama's donors -- he's now past a million -- indicates how deep a well he'll have to tap for the rest of the year, in the general election, and beyond.

In the primary, the question isn't whether he'll outspend Hillary -- as he did vastly in Texas and Ohio -- but by how much.

More stats from the campaign:

* Contributors: 727,972
* First Time Contributors: 385,101
* Total Contributors – Campaign to Date: 1,069,333

Top that with your nominee, GOP. Also, keep in mind, that McCain is in the middle of a major campaign finance scandal, which is the subject of an FEC complaint against the GOP's nominee. McCain is currently in the public financing system and subject to its limitations. If he exceeds the $54 million spending cap, McCain, the alleged champion of campaign finance reform, is breaking the law. Read More......

Media, don't get bamboozled over the tax return story

I've noticed several mentions in the press of senior Clinton staff saying that Hillary will release her tax returns when other Americans do so, near April 15. Check out what senior adviser to the Hillary campaign Ann Lewis said the other day about this issue:

"Since I have not personally begun to do my tax returns for this year, I suspect that most Ohio voters are a lot like me, which is, they've still begun to think that they've got to pull all their records, I'm not sure how much time they're gonna spend looking at everybody else's tax returns in the next 3 days."

The subtle implication being "come on, who HAS finished this year's taxes this early?!" In addition, Hillary's staff keeps saying that her returns will be released at the "customary" time, around April 15. Well, yes, that's the customary time for THIS year's taxes to be finished. But this April 15 is not the customary time to complete your taxes for 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006, unless you're Leona Helmsley. Hillary's tax returns for those years were completed April 15 years ago, they've never been released, and a simple visit to a Kinkos can get them out to the public right now. Cute answers implying that we're simply talking about this year's returns won't cut it. And it's troublesome that the campaign is trying to confuse the public with their answers. No one can explain why she won't release the papers now. Read More......

Why does losing a state's primary have anything to do with with winning that state in the general?

Some pundits, and Hillary's team, have been arguing that Obama hasn't won enough "big states," so that means he can't beat McCain in the general election. I've been thinking about this, and something doesn't add up.

The notion that Obama (or Hillary, for that matter) loses a state to another Dem challenger in a primary, and therefore they will lose that state to John McCain in the general election, is based on some pretty faulty logic. It assumes that all of those Democratic voters who voted for the non-Obama Democrat will now vote for McCain in the fall because they can't have Hillary (or will vote for McCain in the fall if they can't have Obama). Why is it not possible, and highly likely I would argue, that the overwhelming majority of Democrats (and Independents) are going to vote for the Democratic candidate in the primary AND the fall general election regardless of whether that candidate is Hillary, Obama, or Mickey Mouse? I know I will.

And what success really depends on is how many Dem voters are in the state as compared to GOP voters, and which way independents will swing. If we outnumber them, we'll likely win. If they outnumber us, they'll likely win. (It doesn't really matter if my guy or your guy wins the Dem primary but Dems are only 1% of the voters in the state and Republicans are 99% - then both of our guys are gonna lose in the fall.) The second factor is whether Democratic voters will abandon our candidate should their first choice no longer be on the ballot. Only Hillary and Obama can tell us whether they plan on trying to unify the party or split it come the fall.

It's a bit like offering me a choice of my two favorite desserts, brownies or chocolate chip cookies. I'd probably take the cookies, but that doesn't mean that a week from now, when the cookies are all gone, I'd turn down the brownies in spite and choose spinach instead. Okay, a bit sophomoric, but you get the point. It's presumptuous, and wrong, to assume that Democrats will become Republicans simply because they can't get their first choice. Or more generally, it's wrong to assume that a vote for Hillary is a vote against Obama (or vice versa). The overwhelming majority of us are going to vote for the Democrat, period. Not only is John McCain not our second choice, he's not even on the menu.

(UPDATE From Joe: I went back and looked at the results of primaries in 1992, which were much less competitive than this year. Bill Clinton lost the primaries/caucuses in Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont, but won them all in November, 1992.) Read More......

Bush May Fire CentCom Chief Adm. Fallon, Replace With Commander More ‘Pliable’ To War With Iran

We need a president who isn't going to get us into yet another dumb war.

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Hillary: If you want to see my tax returns, you're acting like Ken Starr

From The Hill:

Ann Lewis and Howard Wolfson, top aides to Clinton, held a conference call with reporters in which they said that Obama’s calling on the former first lady to release her tax returns were similar to attacks from the GOP that the Clintons have faced before.

“I for one do not believe that imitating Ken Starr is a way to win a Democratic primary for the presidency,” Wolfson said.

Methinks the lady doth protest too much. Especially after it was Hillary who made "Mr. Lazio, release those tax returns" a key part of her 2000 Senate campaign against Republican Rick Lazio. Back then Hillary said it was "frankly disturbing" that a candidate would waffle over when they were going to release their returns. But now that she's the one waffling, saying she may release them "around" April 15 (if we're lucky), suddenly it's the Spanish Inquisition to expect her to be true to her previous word. (Obama released his returns a year ago.)

And a quick word about the "around" April 15th quasi-promise. Does around April 15 mean before or after the final important primary in Pennsylvania on April 22? And even if it's before April 22, how much before? Is Hillary planning on dumping 7 years worth of tax documents on the media with only days to go before the Pennsylvania primary, so there's no time for the media to fully vet the documents, no time for Democratic voters to find out what's in them and have all the facts before voting? Why not just release them now? It costs a dime to go to Kinkos. What is Hillary hiding that she would invoke Monica - Monica! - in order to change the subject?

Hillary's campaign also argues that there are 20 years of her tax returns already released to the public. Well, yes - from 1980 to 2000. It's now 2008. We don't get to see the last 8 years? That's an odd standard, and in any case, she didn't demand in 2000 that Rick Lazio only release his returns pre-1992.

One more thing. This of course now means that Hillary was the one acting like Kenn Starr when she demanded that Lazio release his returns. Read More......

House Republicans call in the FBI to help find their missing money -- and there is lots of missing money

And, these are the people who want to manage America's money. No wonder the federal budget was such a disaster under GOP control. They can't even keep track of their own campaign money:

The [National Republican Congressional Committee] has acknowledged publicly that it was aware of “irregularities in our financial audit process” and that it had called in the F.B.I. in February because “these irregularities may include fraud.”

But until now the committee has not acknowledged that any money was missing from its bank accounts or that the financial irregularities might extend beyond the national committee to the campaign funds of individual Republican lawmakers who also worked with Mr. Ward, a longtime party operative.

The Republican officials said they could not discuss the details of their findings on the record because of the continuing criminal investigation.

It's always a criminal investigation with the Republicans. Always. From Bush on down. Read More......

Within Team Clinton, the Penn Wars continue unabated. The campaign dysfunction continues.

For everyone who remembers the 1990s, there was never a dearth of drama coming from the Clinton White House. Never. Some of it trumped up the right-wing noise machine, some of it legit. Seems that old habits die hard in the Clinton camp. Today, even in the wake of the wins on Tuesday night, the internal battles of the Clinton campaign are on the front page of the Washington Post. Last night, John posted it and the article is worth a deeper look and raises important questions. If this is what we can expect from the Clinton campaign, is this how a Clinton administration will function, too?

For any political junkie, the Post piece is a must read. It's full of back-biting and blaming each other. The main culprit is Mark Penn. Oh, and for those who may be thinking that the Post is dredging up old news (from last week) to make the Clinton campaign look bad, a lot of this is very recent (from this week) -- and it comes from within:

Penn declined to respond when reached yesterday, but he has been firing back in conversations with compatriots in recent days, arguing that he never had control of the campaign's finances or organization, instead blaming Ickes, Solis Doyle and her deputy, Mike Henry, who resigned. "Mark Penn's point is: 'I didn't do any of the spending,' " said a campaign colleague who has heard the argument. "Penn's whole point is: 'To say I had control of the money is crazy. Patti was in charge.'"

And so strangely enough, a moment of victory for the Clinton camp somehow feels less than victorious. "Mark blames Patti and Patti blames Mark in a circular firing squad," said an adviser who has worked for both Clintons and watched Penn, Solis Doyle, Ickes, Wolfson, Grunwald and others go at it for months. "What they don't realize is that everyone else blames them -- all of them."

Seriously, when it comes to the Clintons and their top advisers, the drama never ends. And, while the Post article is fascinating (as are this one and this one, too), it's actually disturbing how many of her staffers run to the media to air the campaign's dirty laundry. That's never a good sign in this town. They seem to know the campaign is a mess and their actions are counter-productive, but can't help themselves. Hillary knows it's a mess, too, but she lets it go on and on. She keeps telling us she's a leader, but if this is how she leads, we're in trouble. It's no way to run a campaign, but it's definitely no way to run a country.

One other line stuck out:

"The greatest challenge going into the campaign," a senior campaign aide said with a sigh, "was the management of Bill Clinton."

That was one of the biggest challenges of the Bill Clinton administration. And, it doesn't look like much has changed. Hillary is the last person to be talking about 3AM phone calls... Read More......

Hillary called it "frankly disturbing" that her Senate opponent wouldn't release his tax returns, now she won't release hers

She called it "frankly disturbing" that he refused to release his returns, and now she won't release her own returns when Obama released his a year ago.

Hillary's right. It does look like she's hiding something:

Mr. Lazio pledged to release his tax returns soon after entering the Senate race in May, but had not done so, raising suspicions about whether he had the kind of financial problems that have tripped up other politicians in New York in recent decades.

The campaign of his Democratic opponent, Hillary Rodham Clinton, criticized the delay, asking whether he was hiding something.

And more from one of Hillary's current top advisers:

''Rick Lazio can't explain why it took three months to release his taxes,'' said Howard Wolfson, a Clinton campaign spokesman. ''Now he won't come clean with New Yorkers and reveal the real cost of his reckless trillion-dollar tax plan. It's time for Mr. Lazio to stop playing games and start talking straight.''

How is Hillary going to fight Mr. Straight Talk in the fall when her own campaign isn't holding true to its own "straight talk"? She can't. Another theme Hillary won't be able to hit on.

Oh, and there's more:

Howard Wolfson, the chief spokesman for Mr. Lazio's opponent, Hillary Rodham Clinton, even showed up at a Lazio event in Harlem to fan the flames [over his tax returns].

More from Newsday.com:

[T]he question is why Clinton and Wolfson were so obsessed by Lazio's returns that they were disrupting his events, but they now treat it as an irrelevancy when Hillary's returns are requested. There's occasionally the suggestion that different standards apply to a primary. But that makes no sense, especially when you're already an officeholder. Republicans are entitled to see Hillary's returns before making their decision, but not Dems?

No, it seems more like a reflection of the way Hillary and her team think. Principled people would reason as follows: "Since we made a huge fuss about Lazio's returns in 2000, to be consistent we should be very diligent about being just as transparent as Obama and releasing our own returns this year. Otherwise, we would be behaving like hypocrites."

But that's not what they're doing. So the reasoning is apparently this: "We acted like Lazio's tax returns were a big deal in 2000 because it was in our self-interest to do so, and this year we'll act like our returns aren't a big deal because it's in our self interest to do so. We don't act on principle, and we don't care about being consistent, and we don't care about being hypocritical."

Is there another explanation? If not -- what a great role model for our daughters!!!

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Thursday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Yep, it's going to be a bumpy ride to get a Democratic nominee. That kitchen sink is going to be thrown back and forth and back again. Game on.

But, if any of that gets you down, just think of the event at the White House yesterday. Bush-McCain, McCain-Bush, Bush-McCain. They really are the McSame.

Get it started.... Read More......

Industry fights for legal right to pollute, even if it kills us

Considering how industry-friendly the Bush EPA has been, giving in to industry demands will come as no surprise. The only real surprise is that we allow industry to sicken and kill so many Americans, just so they can make a buck. And for those who become sick, what about those costs? Don't they count? The EPA has already shown a willingness to ignore Supreme Court directives and yet they still don't care.

On the other side are experts who conclude that tens of millions of people, particularly the elderly and small children, are being harmed by poor air quality.

EPA said last summer that the current health standard - no more than 80 parts of ozone for every billion parts of air - does not provide needed protection against asthma, heart attacks and respiratory problems.

EPA has estimated a reduction to 70 parts per billion could result annually in 2,300 fewer nonfatal heart attacks; 48,000 fewer respiratory problems, acute bronchitis and asthma attacks; 7,600 fewer respiratory related hospital visits, and 890,000 fewer days when people miss work or school.

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FBI asks Americans to trust them

This time they're really going to get it right and stop spying on Americans. How can we be sure? Because they said so. Don't you have to actually show some results in order to win back trust?

Testifying at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Mueller raised the issue of the FBI's controversial use of so-called national security letters in reference to an upcoming report on the topic by the Justice Department's inspector general.

An audit by the inspector general last year found the FBI demanded personal records without official authorization or otherwise collected more data than allowed in dozens of cases between 2003 and 2005. Additionally, last year's audit found that the FBI had underreported to Congress how many national security letters were requested by more than 4,600.

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Bush EPA ignores Supreme Court directive

They are not even trying to make up excuses, which makes this even more amazing. They just shrug their shoulders and mumble "I dunno" and go about their business. Has there ever been such contempt for the rule of law? Read More......

Wash Post bombshell: Hillary campaign meltdown

Two days after her victory on Tuesday, this will likely be all the news on Thursday. It's not the kind of thing she'll want to be talking about, how all her top staffers hate each other.

For the bruised and bitter staff around Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Tuesday's death-defying victories in the Democratic presidential primaries in Ohio and Texas proved sweet indeed. They savored their wins yesterday, plotted their next steps and indulged in a moment of optimism. "She won't be stopped," one aide crowed.

And then Clinton's advisers turned to their other goal: denying Mark Penn credit.

With a flurry of phone calls and e-mail messages that began before polls closed, campaign officials made clear to friends, colleagues and reporters that they did not view the wins as validation for the candidate's chief strategist. "A lot of people would still like to see him go," a senior adviser said.

An interesting find buried in the article: It was Penn who gave Bill Clinton the "Jesse Jackson" line that started the never-ending string of racially-tinged bimbo eruptions from the campaign:

At 8:53 p.m. on Jan. 26, the day of the election, Penn sent an e-mail to the senior campaign staff comparing Obama's victory there to Jesse L. Jackson's two wins in the 1980s. Bill Clinton repeated that comparison to reporters shortly afterward, generating even more anger among African Americans who perceived it as a way of marginalizing Obama by portraying him as a black candidate who appeals only to black voters.

Another fascinating tidbit: DLC head Bruce Reed gave Hillary her "change your can Xerox" line.

In Austin on Feb. 21, Clinton had a solid debate performance, although her aides groaned as she accused Obama of offering "change you can Xerox." The line, advisers said, was offered during debate preparation by Bruce Reed, a Clinton White House official, but onstage it came across as forced and drew boos.

Nice to know that the Joe Lieberman wing of the Democratic party has the inside track on Hillary's talking points. No wonder it's sounding increasingly like Karl Rove is writing her anti-Obama talking points. Read More......