Obama raised $5.5 $5.7 $6 million in past 24 hours

The Obama campaign says they've raised $5.5 $5.7 $6 million in the past 24 hours, since the polls closed on Super Tuesday. Read More......

Senate Stimulus bill fails by one vote. John McCain was absent.

Today, the Senate's effort to pass the stimulus bill failed to break the GOP filibuster by one vote. One Senator missed the vote. That would be the GOP's front runner, John McCain, who admits the economy isn't his strong suit. Clinton and Obama showed up to vote for the stimulus package. McCain couldn't be bothered:

Despite their return from the campaign trail, Democrats fell one vote shy of the 60 votes they needed to bring forward their preferred economic stimulus bill.

Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, missed the vote.

Bush screwed up the economy. McCain wants to carry the mantle of Bush. That's all we need to know.

Harry Reid had some words for McCain and his GOP colleagues:

It is incredible that not even nine Republicans would join us to strengthen our weakening economy by helping those who need it most. Given a chance to act as a recession looms, more than 40 Republicans today said no to helping 20 million seniors and no to 250,000 disabled veterans. They said no to those who have lost their jobs and no to small business that are suffering in the Bush economy. They said no to helping American families pay their heating bill and avoid foreclosure.

Screwing the economy, screwing disabled Vets, screwing seniors...McCain already is a Bush clone. Read More......

Dobson reiterates that he will not vote for McCain

Dobson is THE leader of the religious right. The big guy. He actually has power and influence. Read More......

Five reasons Hillary should be worried

Hillary's supporters are getting all bent out of shape in the comments on the blog because of the flurry of recent not-so-good news about Hillary's campaign, and our reporting of it. Yes, well, we didn't create the fact that her own campaign fed the perception of her candidacy as inevitable, that she would defeat Obama by yesterday, nor the fact, evident in poll after poll, that Obama has increasing momentum on his side as each day passes. We didn't create the fact that in many states Edwards supporters seem to be flocking to Obama by a margin of 2-1 or greater. We didn't create the fact that for the past 14 months Hillary has been ahead in Massachusetts, and just a few days ago she was expected to win by 11 points (this was a good week after Kennedy endorsed Obama), so that her winning the state last night wasn't an upset, in spite of Chris Matthews' claims to the contrary. Nor did we create the fact that Obama raised twice as much money as Hillary last month and now we find out she's been forced to lend her own campaign $5 million.

Hillary's campaign has fallen and it can't get up, at least not yet. And while I'd like to think that AMERICAblog has the power to bring down a presidential frontrunner with a series of blog posts, her problems aren't due to the analysis Joe and I bring to the issue.

Now take a look at the analysis of Hillary's campaign woes by Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei. It reads like Joe wrote it. That's because it's what smart people are thinking after having read the tea leaves, rather than having drunk the Kool-Aid. Yeah, it sucks when your candidate isn't doing so well. But it's not our fault. And we're not going to sugar-coat the news just because it hurts.

PS And another thing. Joe has been talking about how the upcoming primaries and caucuses look bad for Hillary. Well, read this, from AP:

Penn conceded the campaign would rely on surrogates to campaign for her in most of the states with contests Saturday, including former President Clinton and daughter Chelsea. It was a tacit admission that the former first lady was unlikely to win any of those states outright.

Privately, her strategists also have largely written off her chances of winning the so-called Potomac primary Feb. 9, given the large black populations in Virginia, Maryland and D.C. They also played down her chances in the following week's major primaries — Hawaii, where Obama grew up, and Wisconsin, which has virtually sealed the nomination for other Democrats in years past.

Wisconsin's Democratic electorate is largely liberal and college educated, and its open primary allows independents to vote — all factors that favor Obama.

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Democratic turnout thumped GOP turnout yesterday

The numbers tell the story. Both parties have very competitive presidential contests. And, one more time, Democratic turnout far surpassed GOP turnout -- by almost six million voters. Democrats like their choice of candidates. Republicans don't. The actual numbers of voters are amazing and bodes well for November.
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Post- Super Tuesday: Who won, who lost, what's next, and will Superdelegates steal the election?

Joe and I sat down today with former CNN Internet reporter Jacki Schechner and recorded our post-Super-Tuesday podcast. In this episode, we look at the fallout from Super Tuesday: who really won; who lost; what's next for the various candidates and the various caucuses and primaries; and finally what is up with this crazy "delegate" system and could so-called Superdelegates steal the election?

You can listen to the podcast by clicking here. For those who don't know, a podcast is really just a radio show. Click the link and your computer should play it automatically, assuming you have speakers and your volume is turned up.

As always, you can subscribe to the AMERICAblog podcast via iTunes here, or you can subscribe to the podcast's RSS feed here. And you can listen to any of our old shows via either of the two links in the preceding sentence, or you can find them in the Podcast tab in the upper right corner of this page. Read More......

Sign of money trouble, Hillary loans her campaign $5m

From Greg Sargent:

The revelation suggests another emerging dynamic in the race: Now that the campaigns are committed to grinding it out for weeks and weeks, perhaps all the way until the convention. The Hillary camp faces the prospect of being dramatically outspent by the Obama campaign, which has enjoyed huge fundraising success.

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White House: We Tortured and We'd Do It Again

From Froomkin at the WashingtonPost.com:

After years of dodging and dissembling, the Bush administration today boldly embraced an interrogation tactic that's been an iconic and almost universally condemned form of torture since the Spanish Inquisition.

"President Bush would authorize waterboarding future terrorism suspects if certain criteria are met," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said this morning, one day after the director of the CIA for the first time publicly acknowledged his agency's use of the tactic, which generally involves strapping a prisoner to a board, covering his face or mouth with a cloth, and pouring water over his face to create the sensation of drowning.

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More on Hispanic and Women vote

From Chris Cillizza at the Wash Post:

Hispanics: As they did in Nevada's caucuses, Hispanics gave Clinton her margin of victory in several must-win states yesterday. In California, which was an emerging battleground between the two candidates, Clinton won Hispanics by 40 points -- a massive boost for the New York senator considering that Hispanics comprised roughly 30 of the Democratic in the Golden State. The results were similar in other states that Clinton had to have -- in New Jersey she won the Hispanic vote by 35 points, in Massachusetts by 20 points.

The Gender Gap: For nine states covered by exit polling data purchased by The Post, the gender gap on the Democratic side showed up in full force. Taking out the two candidates' home states, the exit polls reveal a vote split clearly down gender lines. Obama won the male vote in all six of the seven non-native son/daughter states (he crushed Clinton by 39 points among men in Georgia) while she won men in Tennessee by three points. Among women, Clinton rolled to double-digit victories in five of the seven states; Obama won women in Georgia by a whopping 28 points thanks to his strength among black voters and beat Clinton by a single point among women in Missouri. The numbers in individual states were eye-popping -- Clinton did 27 points better among women than men in Massachusetts, 26 points better in California and 20 points better in New Jersey.

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5 undersea cables cut

From Gizmodo:

In this strange maritime epidemic, the number of undersea cables cut in incidents around the Middle East and South Asia now totals five, including Sea-Me-We 4 (in two places) and cables run by Flag Telecom located at Alexandria, the Dubai coast, and Bandar Abbas in Iran.

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You all voted for Obama, but the Superdelegates put Hillary in the lead

It's happening. Obama has the most delegates by virtue of your votes, our citizens. But Hillary has the lead in total delegates, 783-709. How is that possible? Because of a bunch of Democratic party officials got together and decided that they prefer Hillary, so they gave her the lead in spite of the fact that you, the voters, gave Obama the lead.

Who says Republicans are the only ones who know how to steal elections?

As we've explained before, in addition to the delegates each candidate wins based upon how well they do in each state, each state's Senators, Members of the House, Governor and certain Democratic National Committee officials are their own delegates and they get to vote too. But they don't get to vote like you get to vote. No. They're already delegates, and they get to choose who they throw their delegate vote behind. So what happens is that so far in this race Obama is ahead. But Hillary has a lead in Superdelegates over Obama, 2-1. Those Superdelegates - i.e., party officials that have nothing to do with your vote - have decided to give Hillary the lead in spite of your vote. How do you like that?

Now, if Hillary ends up having the lead in delegates but Obama wins anyway by getting most of the Superdelegates I'll be just as upset. This is no way to pick a president; a bunch of mostly-white mostly-rich mostly-men getting together and deciding if we're smart enough to pick our own candidate. If either candidate has fewer "real" delegates than their opponent, but wins by virtue of their Superdelegates, I think you're going to see a civil war. Imagine what will happen in the black community if a bunch of white Democrats are perceived to have taken the election away from the first black presidential nominee? Imagine how they're going to feel towards the Democratic party in the future? And for that matter, imagine how Hillary voters are going to feel towards Obama if she wins the real delegates but he wins by virtue of the Superdelegates?

Our system is a joke. They ought to split the Superdelegates now, 50-50 and be done with it.

PS Similar story if Florida's and Michigan's delegates are suddenly reinstated. Those delegates are gone, the candidates didn't campaign in those states, if those delegates are reinstated it is nothing short of an effort to steal the election. The only way you could reinstate Florida's and Michigan's delegates would be to set up caucuses in those states, let the candidates campaign for real, and then have the caucuses decide the delegates. That way you have a real campaign for votes and not some retroactive effort to throw the election by pretending we had a real election in Florida and Michigan when we did not. Read More......

Obama increased his share of women and white vote, Hillary rocked Latinos

MSNBC

For the first time this year, McCain ran first in a few states among self-identified Republicans. As usual, he was running strongly among independents. Romney was getting the votes of about four in 10 people who described themselves as conservative. McCain was wining about one-third of that group, and Huckabee about one in five.

Overall, Clinton was winning only a slight edge among women and white voters, groups that she had won handily in earlier contests, according to preliminary results from interviews with voters in 16 states leaving polling places.

Obama was collecting the overwhelming majority of votes cast by blacks — a factor in victories in Alabama and Georgia.

Clinton’s continued strong appeal among Hispanics — she was winning nearly six in 10 of their votes — was a big factor in her California triumph, and in her victory in Arizona, too.

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"Rare" February tornadoes killed at least 44 yesterday. Storms continue today

Those fierce storms ended up killing 44 people yesterday. The word "rare" has been used repeatedly today to describe tornadoes in February:

More than 50 tornados hammered the South overnight, flattening cars and buildings, ripping up trees and leaving at least 44 dead.

The rare winter occurrence became one of the deadliest storms in history for the month of February, and the rampage wasn't over.

By early this morning, New Orleans, Alabama and Georgia were all under a tornado warning, as the storm moved menacingly eastward.

The rash of twisters, spawned by violent thunderstorms, tore through seven states, including Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and Mississippi

The temperature is going to hit 75 today in DC and we might get strong thunderstorms. That's rare for February, too.

AP's YouTube channel has storm chaser video from yesterday:
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State Victory Breakdowns -- and what will Mitt do?

Below are the states won by the respective candidates. We'll compile the breakdown of delegates throughout the day.

Big question for today is: What does Mitt do? There's a big meeting in Boston today to "consider their next steps."

Democrats

Clinton: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Tennessee

Obama: Alabama, Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Utah

New Mexico is still undecided -- and very, very close. Vote counting starts again at 11:00 a.m. Eastern.

Republicans

Huckabee: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, West Virginia

McCain: Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma

Romney: Alaska, Colorado, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, Utah Read More......

Wednesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Super Tuesday was so much more interesting and exciting than anyone could have imagined a couple months ago.

Big night for Huckabee. He's on the Today Show this morning doing a victory lap. McCain didn't wrap up the GOP nomination. The right wingers still don't love McCain - and it looks like they never will.

This thing will be going on for awhile now -- on both sides.

Those storms last night were brutal. Just brutal...and in February? It's 66 degrees right now in DC. That's not right.

Oh, don't forget what happened on Wall Street yesterday -- a 370 point drop. Could be another wild day in the markets, too.

So, lots to discuss. Have at it. Read More......

Results still arriving for New Mexico

UPDATE: 5:45AM EST - Obama has grown his lead from around 70 votes to over 500 votes over Hillary with 85% counted.

UPDATE: 4:50 AM EST - Obama 49%, Hillary 48% in New Mexico with 80% reporting.

At 3:59 AM EST, the count is only 54% with the lead going to Hillary (48%) over Obama (46%). Here in Paris, lots of smiling faces as American Democrats living here had the opportunity to vote in the primaries, in person. People talking about 'making history' in the room and a steady flow in the evening. The Obama voters seemed to out number Hillary voters and surprise that Hillary supporters were MIA while the Obama team had customized posters and real people. It was odd not to see a single person promoting Hillary, with only a basic hillaryclinton.com poster taped to a wall. Read More......

Barack's Big Night

The campaigns are in full spin mode touting their victories tonight, which is to be expected. But, it is hard for me to see this as anything but a big night for Barack Obama. Or, as Markos put it, a "Huge Night for Obama." Obama won 13 states to Clinton's 8 victories (New Mexico is still to be decided). Obama will probably end up winning a few more delegates tonight than Hillary. NBC's Chuck Todd predicted Obama will secure 841 delegates to Clinton's 837 delegates. Almost a split decision, but he's still ahead.

Worse for Hillary, Obama has the momentum, and has for some time. Stretching out the calendar only helps Obama. He has been steadily catching up to Hillary in state after state, poll after poll -- that's why so many of today's states were actually in play tonight, when most weren't just a couple weeks ago. He has more money than Hillary. And after tonight, even more money will pour into the Obama campaign. Obama outraised Clinton by almost 3 to 1 in January. And the upcoming election calendar favors Obama. There are several caucuses this weekend, including Washington and Maine. Next week is the so-called Chesapeake primary (DC, MD and VA). Obama is expected to do well in all of them. Hillary Clinton had some big wins tonight to be sure -- but they were in states she was always expected to win. As Markos noted tonight: "She didn't exceed expectations anywhere. She lost states she led big in just a few weeks ago." (Hillary was recently ahead in Connecticut, Missouri, Georgia, Alabama and Minnesota, and then lost them all today. And she won California and Massachusetts, but she was always ahead in those states (see CA and MA).) And in any case, she failed to deal Obama a knock-out blow. Even worse, she lost to him in terms of the number of states won, and it looks like she may lose to him in terms of total delegates won.

As with every campaign, we have to deal with the reality of where things stand today. But, sometimes it does help to take a step back. Obama was practically unknown as a serious contender a year ago. He was running against the vaunted, inevitable Clinton machine. Last year, it was the conventional wisdom, we all agreed, that Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic nominee and the race would be wrapped up on Super Tuesday. That didn't happen. Her aura of invincibility is gone. Her inevitability is gone. She's now having to accept debates on Fox News (something she swore off of last year) in the hopes of generating momentum and getting some free air time (because she can't afford much more paid media). That says she's worried. As did her claim of victory in Florida last week, a non-primary where no one campaigned (well, almost no one) and where there were no delegates at stake.

Hillary Clinton is a formidable candidate. If she gets the nomination, she'll be a terrific president and we'll heartily support her. But, today, I think the tide turned against her. She was supposed to win today, the nomination was supposed to be hers. She didn't, and it isn't. It was a much better day to be Barack Obama than Hillary Clinton. Read More......

McCain wins Missouri. Obama now the apparent winner there and he captures Alaska

Several news sources called Missouri for Clinton already. I believe the Clinton campaign was touting its victory there, too. But it looks like she lost. Obama is now in the lead by 6,740 votes with 99% of the precincts reporting. Votes are still coming in from Boone County (home of the University of Missouri) and St. Louis County ( in both counties Obama is winning over 60% of the vote).

A very key point about Missouri, which is widely viewed as the ultimate swing state in presidential elections, is today's massive Democratic turnout as compared to the GOP. With 98% of the precincts reporting, over 794,000 Democrats voted compared to 541,000 Republicans. (Hat tip to TP for pointing this out.)

Obama won Alaska too. Read More......

Delegate count estimate

From CNN, the estimate so far, but still not the final count for the evening:

McCain 743
Romney 321
Huckabee 225
Paul 12
Total needed for nomination: 1,191 Read More......

Hillary and McCain win California

NBC just called California for Clinton and McCain. Read More......

Clinton and Obama neck and neck in Missouri

UPDATE: Obama just jumped ahead by 5,000 votes.

Missouri was one of those bellwether states that we were all supposed to watch tonight. Well, Clinton and Obama are in a virtual tie, 49%-49%. Hillary is currently ahead by 3,200 votes, with 3% of the precincts not yet in. She was ahead by 20,000 votes about half hours ago. It remains to be seen if Obama can catch up, and in any case, they're going to split the delegates anyway. But still, it's a nice symbolic victory for either campaign to be able to say that they "won" the state. Read More......