Another place and time

The news programs are not my style.  I’d rather let it all go and hear about it tomorrow morning.  In the meantime, these Canadians aboard the Bluenose II can take you away…

Pour a glass of wine and dream about swooshing dolphins.

This should warm the cockles of your hearts

Oh, my! I’m a little choked up by this. The Cleveland Plain Dealer is reporting a high number of crossover votes. Normally, I’d be concerned about this, and I *still* am, but look at who they’re voting for:

 A 69-year-old Catholic nun, Sister Ann Marie, was converted to the Clinton camp because of the former first lady’s experience. John Baggett, another ex-Republican for Clinton, said he simply wanted to switch, and Clinton represented a known commodity.

“I’m happy with Republicans, in general,” Baggett, 50, said. “I don’t believe they’ve done a good job the last eight years.”

In Strongsville, middle-aged couple Lucy and Pete See — longtime Republicans — both voted for Hillary Clinton. “I like that she has more experience in foreign affairs,” Pete See said. “The Republican candidate was older than me.

Lucy See said she voted for Clinton as well. “I want to be part of makiing history,” she said.

What can I say? Is the long national nightmare drawing to a close? Is Hillary the Uniter?

Update from the field in San Antonio from Redstar

From the Field: Cheering for Clinton at Las Palmas Library

Sounds like fun. 😉

Some Midday Notes

• We’ve broken a new record today in hits to this blog!  Thanks for stopping by everyone.
• Pay no attention to the exit polls.  Especially in Texas.  They’re meaningless and they just ruin your dinner.  There’s going to be a caucus in Texas anyway so just go about your business until all the votes are counted.  Nothing you can do about it anyway.  Recite serenity prayer.  Do the laundry.  Read a book to the kids.
• I think this poll is saying that Democrats want a backup strategy in case Obama gets nominated and his magic bubble bursts and there is serious buyer’s remorse.  The convention isn’t until August.  There’s plenty of time.  Democrats seem to be thinking strategically.  Oh, and as for taking the VP spot, if I were Clinton, I’d turn it down.  She’d just be another woman doing her boss’ work for him and not getting any credit.  Let him find another sucker for that task.

Anglachel on Campaign by Personality

Anglachel is fast becoming the new Digby to me. She wrote another post on Krugman and Stanley Fish’s pieces about Obama’s campaign. Here’s a highlight:

Unless Iraq is the single issue for you (and it is so salient on the Left because it can be used instrumentally to beat up HRC), Barry’s one-note bleating about how he was smart ’nuff not to support that war and how this explains everything you need to know about him and his foreign policy chops (oh, yeah, that and being a clueless kid in Indonesia) goes over like a lead balloon. What Fish points out is that McCain’s narrative is rooted in his policy stances, and that the personality acts as a supporting player to the policy. You may be revolted by the policy, but most Americans are ambivalent about Iraq war as such (which is a different question that wanting it to end), and someone who can give them a graceful policy exit is to be preferred to one who stakes out the moral(istic) high ground. I don’t think Barry supporters understand how poorly his argument will go over with the general public.

Thus, we get the ironic inversion that the party of policy wonkery may have one of the most talented, informed, skillfull, substantive legislators in recent history, a person eminently suited to cleaning up the steaming pile left behind by the Movement Conservatives, undermined by a personality campaign, while the general could be the Republican rally of substance over style.

Anglachel hits the nail on the head again. Much of the fervor of the lefty blogosphere for Obama can be boiled down to one issue: The Iraq War. Matt Stoller said as much when he voted on SuperDuperTuesday for Obama. For him and many others, the IWR vote trumps everything, even though Obama does not have a value for this missing data point. He can *say* anything he wants. There is no way for him to prove it.

But that’s not the point. The point is that Markos Moulitsas, the great Kos himself, wrote a book about how destructive single issue voting is. It divides the electorate because everyone has a single definition of purity to apply to the candidates. Everything else is ignored. For Kossacks, there are many little individual purity tests. You can not have ties to lobbyists. You can’t have been in government too long (because experience is sooooo outre). You can’t be skillful at negotiations because that is triangulating, *unless* you also haven’t been in government long and therefore have no experience. And God help you if you voted for the IWR, unless your John Kerry. It matters this year because one candidate didn’t vote for it. So, what we have here is a political version of the modified cub factor. (Come to think of it, they’re both from Chicago so what we have here is the full ex-cub factor. We’re doomed!)

That seems to be the kernel at the core of Obama’s mystique, that lack on one data point for the IWR vote. Oh, and the fact that as an amorphous candidate on political philosophy, he is the tofu candidate, absorbing the flavor of any political persuasion thrown on him.

He runs on personality and he will sputter out on personality. When it comes right down to it, when things start going to hell in Iraq later this year and gas hits $4 a gallon and inflation spirals out of control and you can’t get a mortgage or sell your house, Miss Congeniality is not the one you want. No, you want the one who will make you remember the capital of Vermont.

Saltybitch Spends a Weekend in Cleveland

I’m sure it is sexier than it sounds. But let’s hear it from the bitch:

Hi all! An update from the ground in Ohio: Just got home to NYC late last night after unexpectedly spending the weekend getting out the vote for Hillary in Cleveland!!!

It was a tremendous experience (never done anything like that before). The crowds volunteering at both Cleveland offices were diverse along all cultural ranges – age, sex, race, class, etc – completely defying the way Hillary’s demographic is portrayed in the media.

Among various other tasks, I was able to do a lot of canvassing, and going door-to-door was my favorite part of the weekend. Lots of strong positive support for Hillary in District 10 (6 delegates, I think)! There were many people still undecided and making up their minds, but not, from what I could tell, a huge number of people strongly and obstinately supporting Obama. In fact, through clear discussions and expressing our own passion for Hillary’s candidacy, I think we were really able to swing some people into her corner.

Sunday night I got to attend Hillray’s event at the Ohio State campus in Cleveland. I’d never seen her speak in person. It was unbelievable. So much strength and yet backed with an overwhelming compassion and a winning charisma. And her ability to control the energy of the room was uncanny, masterfully bringing us from enthusiastic thunderous cheers of support to absolute breathless silence, hanging on her every word. As she related intimate tales of interactions with people on the campaign trail, it really felt like she was speaking one-on-one to each of us there. The crowd was again widely diverse along all lines, and seemed to really love her. At the end of her speech, she stayed shaking hands and signing autographs for an eternity, making focussed connections with each supporter. I was so proud to be there working on her behalf.

I really think she’s going to take Ohio, though of course it’s all up to them now. And like all of you, I will be on pins and needles all day. I’m planning to go in to the New York hq to make a last-ditch effort at phone calls today after work, and so will likely watch at least some of the returns from there.

If anyone has too much time on their hands today for their own mental good, take to the phones! There’s still a chance to reach someone out there in Texas and Ohio who hasn’t voted yet and is not sure who they’re supporting. We can communicate our passion to them and help Hillary take the nomination! You can do it from the comfort of your own homw – just go to http://www.hillaryclinton.com and click on the link to make phone calls. It’s really easy to do and will help quell your nerves.

Bitch is the new Black! Hillary for President!

Saltybitch says Cleveland *is* sexier than it sounds so can we assume that someone got lucky last weekend?  Saltybitch says no but it does bring up some possibilities. 😉

Like, maybe it can be a new slogan: “Campaigning for Hillary is the best way to get laid” or something like that. We gotta work on it.

Tuesday: Om Mani Padme Hummmm

Okay, guys, today is the big day. It’s really big. It’s high stakes. It’s do or die, now or never, fish or cut bait (whatever that means).

I can’t watch.

If you’re like me, the anxiety at some point crosses a critical threshold and it just becomes impossible to focus. Panic sets in, heart starts to race, coworkers seem like obnoxious interlopers. Don’t let it get to you. If you have xanax, take it. Otherwise, take periodic breaks during the day and focus on something else, like, er, work! Yeah, that’s the ticket! Try to finish a project. Write your monthly summary. Balance your checkbook, unless this contributes to your anxiety, in which case, don’t. Or read some of the tasty links below.

One announcement: Occasionally, something you wrote may end up in the moderation queue. Don’t take it personally. There are trigger words that automatically dump comments there. These words are mostly innocuous but when used during this primary season, they need to be examined in context. Most of these comments are fine and I approve them. However, I live on EST and when it gets late, I fall asleep and the queue doesn’t get cleared until morning. If your comment got stuck in the queue overnight, I hope you’re not too PO’d. It keeps the riff-raff out and I really do read every one.

• redstar, who got stuck in the queue last night, sends this account of her campaign experience in San Antonio. An expanded version of her report can be found at The Redstar Persepctive. I love reading on the ground reports so if Tucsonlynn or redstar post updates, I’ll move them to the front page. You can find redstar and friends at The Hillary 1000.
• A couple of you wanted videos of Obama’s ill-fated press conference from yesterday. So, here they are. I watched them with the sound off and I don’t think he’s being deceptive, although he does look a little panicky about 1/3 of the way in. His hand motions are very distracting but he’s using his right hand, meaning he’s thinking mostly left brain and therefore more analytical? Is that how you interpret that? I read somewhere that lying is accompanied by shifting eyes up and to the left, as if to access the more creative part of the brain. (Here’s another lie detection page) Anyway, it didn’t strike me that he was fibbing about anything although his answers were rambling and labyrinthine. It’s probably better for him if he doesn’t go on at length. The less said the better. What am I thinking?! If the press wants to misread everything he says (“He is the messiah. Only the true messiah denies his divinity.”) let them. He’ll learn, er, but hopefully not before Clinton beats him.
• For those of you who really want to take your mind off of the primary, see The Tolkien Crackpot Theories page. (The one concerning Tom Bombadil is a dirty campaign slur put out by orcses) And this poem comparing Lembas to Twinkies is a classic:
  

  All golden Twinkies do not glitter,
  Not all consumed Twinkies are tossed;
  The old that is preserved does not wither,
  Their yellow-dyed color is not lost.

  In the stomach a fire shall be woken,
  A Tums from the bottle shall spring,
  Renewed shall be revulsion unbroken,
  Hostess cakes again are the thing.

• One more thing: In case you didn’t set your DVR, here is part 1 of the showdown between Jon Stewart and Hillary Clinton.

Add your favorite distractions to the comments and hang in there.