Those Endorsements ...
Endorsements don't usually count for much. But if they're big enough and come at critical moments they can count for a lot. And this string of endorsements Obama has picked up since his narrow defeat in New Hampshire four days ago is, I believe, a major story that has not gotten the attention it deserves.
Since losing the New Hampshire primary four days ago, Obama has been endorsed by Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD), Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Gov. Janet Napolitano (D-AZ). Additionally, he's also been endorsed by Rep. Miller (D-CA), Sen. Kerry (D-MA) and Ned Lamont. But they're in a slightly different category and it's the first four I want to discuss.
The first of these came from Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD) who put out word he'd be endorsing Obama the day after New Hampshire. Johnson is a protege of former Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD). And Daschle has close ties to Obama -- a lot of operatives in the Daschle world went to Obama after 2004. So when I saw word of the endorsement I figured this was something Daschle or his former staffers had helped put together to help stabilize Obama's fortunes after the New Hampshire loss.
But now you have three others -- Nelson, Napolitano and McCaskill. Nelson and Johnson are from very red states while Napolitano and McCaskill are from swing states.
Now, there are a bunch of things you can draw from this spate of endorsements. One is that these folks don't seem worried about themselves running or having their supporters run with Obama at the top of the ticket. And these are people from either very conservative or somewhat conservative states. Despite the fact that Obama is running in some ways to the right of Clinton (at least tonally, as the candidate of unity and bipartisan reconcilation), there are still a lot of questions inevitably being asked about whether the country is 'ready' for Obama, whether that's his race, his name, his background in community organizing, his youth, etc. So these folks think America's ready; in fact, more ready than they are for Hillary.
But that isn't the biggest significance. The key is timing. You don't hit a big time politician like Hillary Clinton when she's down unless you're really against her and you're fairly confident she's not getting back up. After winning in New Hampshire, albeit narrowly and after the clobbering in Iowa, there's been a sense that Clinton may be back on track to consolidating her frontrunner status and perhaps following a modified version of the standard script in which the anointed frontrunner gets a scare in the early states before mopping up the competition as the race goes national. But these four clearly don't want that to happen. In fact, they're sticking their necks pretty far out to help make it not happen. And their endorsements, coming right now, tell me they have some confidence it won't.
--Josh Marshall
Ignorance is Bliss
I don't talk much about international economics because most of it is beyond my comprehension. But am I right to be unnerved by the fact that as a result of the mortgage crisis big chunks of major US-based financial services companies -- Citibank, Merrill Lynch, etc. -- are being bought up not by foreign owners of capital but, in effect, by foreign governments?
--Josh Marshall
Deserves Attention
Maybe there's a reason this isn't as beyond the pale as it looks. But I'm not seeing it.
The Nevada State Democratic party has set up nine at-large caucus locations on the Las Vegas strip for casino workers who might not otherwise be able to caucus on January 19th. Remember, because of the recent Culinary Workers Union endorsement of Barack Obama, casino workers are expected to vote heavily for him.
Now, the Nevada State Education Association (the state teachers' union), which is seen as supportive of Clinton though it has not formally endorsed her, is suing the Democratic party to prevent those at-large caucuses from meeting on the grounds that similar arrangements have not been made for other Nevadans.
I don't know the particulars of how the Nevada caucuses are arranged. But the 'tell' is the fact that the teachers' union apparently didn't think this was a problem until Sen. Obama bagged the key union endorsement. When asked why the union had never approached the state party about this issue until Friday, union president Lynne Warne, tellingly replied, "We're approaching them now."
If there's one thing that's core to the modern Democratic party is that voter suppression tactics are always wrong. Much of the US Attorney purge scandal was at root about Republican voter suppression tactics. I suspect this is doubly wrong -- both in the sense that the suit is meritless on its face but certainly also in the sense that you don't decide how easy to make it for people to vote depending on who you think they're likely to vote for.
Please leave these shameful tactics to Republicans.
Late Update: Jeralyn at TalkLeft thinks there is some substantive merit to the suit. And in the abstract, she may have a point. But following on the distinction I drew above, I think the timing tells the story.
Later Update: ABC's Jake Tapper has more details.
--Josh Marshall
Dead Even
As you know we keep pretty close tabs on polls here at TPM. And I can report that in our informal reader-email-based poll of readers who think we should come clean with our covert support of Obama and readers who think we should come clear with our secret support of Hillary, the numbers are running at about 50%-50%.
--Josh Marshall
Nope
John Judis explains why the 'Bradley effect' -- the propensity of white voters to lie to pollsters about their willingness to vote for a white candidate -- doesn't add up as the explanation for Hillary's surprise win on Tuesday.
--Josh Marshall
Mitt-nertia
Daniel Gross explains why Mitt is probably going to crash and burn in Michigan.
--Josh Marshall
Taking a Deep Breath
It is remarkable, or perhaps it's not so remarkable, how rapidly this punching match over race has escalated between the Clinton and Obama camps. Even calling it that is perhaps controversial in itself.
I'm discussing this with you because it's quickly become a complicated editorial issue for us to deal with.
It's genuinely unclear to me how much one side or the other is consciously pushing this, how much it's escalated based in part on misunderstandings, or whether, in a somewhat related fashion, hyping journalistic accounts has given the engagement a life of its own.
Some of the statements recently attributed to the Clintons have seemed at best awkward in how they're discussing race and the civil rights movement, others have struck me as unobjectionable statements interpreted in a tendentious fashion.
You can see in our news section we've picked up the story just out from The Guardian which quotes some unidentified "Clinton advisor" saying: "If you have a social need, you're with Hillary. If you want Obama to be your imaginary hip black friend and you're young and you have no social needs, then he's cool."
Now, as I said, I have a bit of a hard time knowing what's going on here. If this is really the word the Clinton campaign wants its surrogates putting out, they're really much stupider than I could have imagined. On the other hand, 'advisor' is a notoriously slippery phrase that can mean almost anything. Campaigns have hundreds, perhaps thousands of people who in one fashion or another 'advise' them. A lot of those people aren't under any kind of real control. And if a reporter talks to enough of them one of them is bound to say something stupid. On the other hand, you have to rely on the journalist and the news outlet not to send you down the wrong path or give you the sense that this is a Clinton insider rather than just someone spouting off.
Race is an inherently compromising issue in American culture and politics. And some of what I think is happening here is that it is ricocheting in all sorts of directions in this campaign which is about the heart of the Democratic party.
I don't have any global answer here. This has spiraled pretty far in the last 48 hours. And I'm just now taking stock of it again. Like I said, it's not completely clear to me the mix of intention, inertia and accident involved. But this is explosive. So we're going to do the best we can to tell you what's happening, not to hold anything back but also to be conscious of each step we take as we report on and thus in a real sense relay these increasingly inflammatory statements and reports.
--Josh Marshall
By Way of Explanation
Bill Clinton: Obama's candidacy isn't the "fairy tale"; his Iraq war opposition is.
--David Kurtz
Huck's Secret Weapon?
Who knew that Mike Huckabee has a state-of-the-art, multi-million call push-polling operation fueling his presidential bid? It is, technically, an independent operation. But one of the premier push-polling operations, Common Sense Issues, who we reported on last year when they were Common Sense Ohio, is going all out for Huckabee in primary states around the country. And they seem to be pulling most or all of their money from existing Huckabee backers.
They made tons of calls in Iowa and New Hampshire. They're now making calls in Michigan and Florida. And they've already made 1 million calls for Huckabee in South Carolina, even though those calls appear to be illegal in the state (the group argues the law should not apply to them).
--Josh Marshall
Bye Rudy ...
It's bad enough that Rudy's had to ask his top staff to go without pay so that his campaign can conserve money for the do-or-die (for Rudy) Florida primary on January 29th. Now comes word that Rudy has fallen into a tie with John McCain in New York.
The most recent poll of his do-or-die state of Florida has him running third, six points behind Huckabee and two behind Romney. Seventeen polls have been taken in Florida since September 12th. And before the most recent one, only one of those did not have Rudy in the lead.
Late Update: I'd never thought of this from this angle. But TPM Reader CS makes a good point ...
The conventional wisdom on Rudy's Super Tuesday "strategy" has been universally described as "risky" and occasionally "crazy."To me this provides a direct window into his judgement and how he would govern as President and it's not a flattering picture. Is he the kind of president who would
go with a high risk, high reward strategy all the time? It sure gives me pause.I'm surprised the other candidates have not used this as a way to paint Rudy as a risky or crazy choice for President. It could dovetail
with some of his other judgement problems like Bernie Kerik & dealing with his ex-wives & children.Poor judgement is not just limited to Bernie Kerik. His whole election strategy suffers from poor judgement as well.
As I implied above, I think we're past the point where anyone really needs to use this against Rudy. But it's a really good point. This is out there as a really good example of the guy's judgment. Who sold him on this idea?
--Josh Marshall
Huckabee: Fred Needs Some Metamucil
The high quality of the discourse from last night's GOP debate carried over to today:
--David Kurtz
Today's Must Read
What really happened between those Iranian speedboats and the U.S. Navy?
--David Kurtz
Highlight Reel: South Carolina Ronald Reagan Debate
Who was the big winner in last night's FOX News-sponsored GOP debate from South Carolina? His name was Ronald Reagan ...
Late Update: Here's Election Central's Debate Roundup.
--Ben Craw
Cracks
From the NYT ...
Representative James E. Clyburn of South Carolina, the highest-ranking African-American in Congress, said he was rethinking his neutral stance in his state’s presidential primary out of disappointment at comments by Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton that he saw as diminishing the historic role of civil rights activists.Mr. Clyburn, a veteran of the civil rights movement and a power in state Democratic politics, put himself on the sidelines more than a year ago to help secure an early primary for South Carolina, saying he wanted to encourage all candidates to take part. But he said recent remarks by the Clintons that he saw as distorting civil rights history could change his mind.
“We have to be very, very careful about how we speak about that era in American politics,” said Mr. Clyburn, who was shaped by his searing experiences as a youth in the segregated South and his own activism in those days. “It is one thing to run a campaign and be respectful of everyone’s motives and actions, and it is something else to denigrate those. That bothered me a great deal.”
--Josh Marshall
Rock On!!!
NYT's Kit Seelye on Fred ...
9:41 p.m. | Confrontation at Sea Mr. Thompson rocks tonight. Asked about the recent confrontation between United States warships and Iranian speedboats, he suggests casually that if Iran’s Revolutionary Guard becomes more hostile, the Iranians will see those virgins they’ve been looking for.
Special thanks to TPM Reader TT.
--Josh Marshall
Debate Blogging (Secessionville Edition)
Not sure I've ever seen the national anthem sung before a debate.
9:16 PM ... I find it fascinating that they just managed to have a highly technical and detailed discussion of economic and fiscal policy that was nevertheless complete nonsense.
9:24 PM ... We can be a shining family on a hill.
9:25 PM ... Fred Thompson would seem a lot more hardcore tearing into Mike Huckabee if he didn't keep having to look down at his notes to remember what his answer was.
9:35 PM ... Brit Hume is really a piece of work. The Captain of that Cruiser in the Gulf reacted "passively" because he didn't open fire on those Iranian speedboats.
9:39 PM ... Say what you will about McCain, he can't put silly Brit Hume in his place on this second-guess the Navy captain question.
9:42 PM ... There Brit is again with "passive".
9:52 PM ... Ron Paul is really making the most of being allowed to rejoin the Fox debates. He's taking over the whole thing.
10:13 PM ... Hadn't noticed this before. But on more than half his questions, Fred Thompson runs out of things to say before his time has run out. And then he goes into like a free association cliche fugue. Check him out next time he draws a question. (He's also hit the tanning booth, but that's admittedly less substantive.)
10:37 PM ... Wonderful, another completely surreal Frank Luntz focus group. Only this time it's Fred Thompson whose personality cult they've joined. It's really like watching an informercial.
10:39 PM ... Remember that Frank told TPMmuckraker's Paul Kiel that he tries to get repeaters to come to his focus groups.
--Josh Marshall
GOP Eating Its Own
Your candidate is more liberal than my candidate!
Is not!
--David Kurtz
Next Stop Secessionville
Let's put this together. South Carolina should be Mike Huckabee's state. John McCain is rising in South Carolina. Mike Huckabee's got the push-poll kingpins in his back pocket.
Hmmm ...
--Josh Marshall
The Horse's Mouth: Is The Politico's big mea culpa just talk or will it lead to action?
--David Kurtz
Talk about phoning it in ...
Turns out Maureen Dowd's Hillary-whacking column written from New Hampshire on primary night was actually written from Jerusalem.
--Josh Marshall
Rove Gives Us a Preview
I'm probably not going to stun you by telling you that Karl Rove is using racial code words. But as long as we're talking about Andrew Cuomo's decision to stick his foot so far into his mouth that it's coming out of his behind, you really must read Karl Rove's piece on New Hampshire in today's Journal oped page.
I'll just pick out the highlights, but in the course of a single column Rove manages to flag Obama's "trash talking", "his days playing pickup basketball at Harvard", and the alleged fact that "he is often lazy."
It's January. Obama's five days as frontrunner are over, at least for the moment. So you can just imagine how dirty this is going to get.
--Josh Marshall
Wire Reporter With Sense of Humor?
From Reuters:
Passing through a tiny "Door of Humility", U.S. President George W. Bush made a pilgrimage to the traditional birthplace of Jesus on Thursday in the West Bank.
--David Kurtz
TPMtv: WTF?
Well, Tuesday night certainly didn't turn out like we thought. So in today's episode we take our stab at explaining what happened as well as expressing our complete bewilderment about what's going on on the Republican side ...
--Josh Marshall
Businessmen First, Patriots Second
Supporters of telecom immunity argue that the telecoms were doing their patriotic duty by caving to Administration requests for illegal wiretapping. That patriotism apparently has its limits: like when the government fails to pay the wiretapping phone bills.
--David Kurtz
Music to My Ears
Hugh Hewitt and Rick Santorum discuss how McCain is a phony conservative and Mitt Romney is still poised for victory.
--Josh Marshall
El Movimiento!
I'm not sure I'm yet able to build up too big a head of steam about Mike Bloomberg's ridiculous push to run for president this year. But please. Let's not call it "Bloomberg for president movement." I'm completely happy with him as my mayor. But to call yourself a 'movement' you at least need to go through the motions of hiring some astroturf groups to gin up some phony support.
--Josh Marshall
Enough
I was going to write a post like this. But I'm glad someone else has done it better than I could (see this diary up at Daily Kos). In the wake of the stunning results out of New Hampshire on Tuesday night, I've gotten more emails than I care to admit claiming that the only reasonable explanation for the discrepancy between the polls and the results is that the voting machines were 'hacked'.
There is so much screwed up about this reaction that it's difficult to know what part of the perversity to grab on to. (For a discussion of the factual and logical errors behind the claims of hacking, see the post I linked to above.) First is the notion that public opinion surveys and even exit poll data is so reliable that any substantial discrepancy between those numbers and the official result is prima facie evidence of tampering. That is simply absurd.
There is also something perverse about the quick knee-jerk reaction to assume that any election that dramatically doesn't go your way was stolen. It stems from the same fidelity to assumption and desire over fact that so many of us have excoriated in the present administration. There is a sullen childishness at work in this thinking that no robust political movement can ever be built on.
Now, before you write in, I too think that electronic voting machines with no paper trail are a big problem because they're too insecure and they make confirmatory recounts impossible. But the possibility or danger of tampering is not a license to assume it or imagine it -- in the absence of any evidence -- any time the vote doesn't go how we'd like.
--Josh Marshall
Today's Must Read
Remember the U.S. "benchmarks" for Iraq?
Now there's a new catchphrase in town: "Iraqi solutions."
--David Kurtz
Breaking . . .
John Kerry endorsing Obama.
Late Update: Who will Ted Kennedy endorse?
Later Update: Watch the video of Kerry.
--David Kurtz
Endorsements
Sen. Johnson (D-SD) endorsing Obama.
Remember, Obama has strong ties to the Daschle world. And Johnson is Daschle's protege.
--Josh Marshall
Whackhawk Down?
Larry Johnson explains how right-wingers are up in arms over the fact that an 'Islamofascism' yakker named Stephen Coughlin has been canned at the Defense Department.
--Josh Marshall
TPMtv: Five Days in New Hampshire
They say a week is a lifetime in politics. And I'm sure the last week felt like a lifetime for Hillary Clinton. So with Hillary's stunning come from behind victory last night in New Hampshire we went back and picked out what we thought we several of the key moments between her defeat in Iowa on Thursday and her victory yesterday evening. Check it out. You may think it looks different now with the benefit of hindsight ...
--Josh Marshall
Zogby: I did have Hillary coming on strong in New Hampshire — but the sample size was so small I couldn't say so publicly.
--David Kurtz
Jim Sleeper: If I vote for Obama, it will be because my yearning to get beyond race will impel me to roll the dice.
--David Kurtz
The Crazy Uncle of American Politics
Chris Matthews on Hillary's victory: She's only competitive for the presidency because Bill "messed around."
--David Kurtz
Today's Must Read
With the Supreme Court hearing the Indiana voter ID case today, supporters of the law still struggle--mightily--to produce evidence of actual voter fraud.
--David Kurtz
Being for Both
TPM Reader DB ...
Based on what I was feeling, there were two turning points for Clinton in the past week. One was a report that people were chanting "Iron my shirt" at her during a rally. The other was John Edwards' idiotic statements about Clinton tearing up at an event. Mix that in with the subtle media digs at Clinton's gender in recent months (descrptions of what she's wearing, how she "emasculates" men, etc.), and I think you had a tremendous push back from women, and men, who are tired of the misogyny underlying this campaign. It swayed me toward Clinton the past few days, even as I cheered for an Obama coronation.
--Josh Marshall
Evidence of the Late Shift to Hillary?
Hillary ran well among voters who decided their preference late in the campaign.
--David Kurtz
Likable?
A friend points out -- and he's right -- that another key moment in Saturday night's debate, beside Hillary's impassioned statement of her qualifications for job, came late when the moderator asked her about her likability or lack of it.
It was her best moment and Obama's worst ...
--Josh Marshall
What the Heck Just Happened?
As we start the the New Hampshire postmortems, there are two distinct sets of analysis to do. The first is what I've seen on most of the TV commentary. You take the exit poll data from yesterday and compare them to the Iowa exit polls to see what changed in the support for Obama and Hillary. (Relatedly, you can closely analyze what New Hampshire voters said most affected their voting decisions.) It's a useful exercise, and I'm as interested as anyone in what made last night's results different from Iowa's.
But for my money the second set of analysis is far more interesting: comparing the exit poll data from last night to the final rounds of polling before the primary. Why were the results so divergent from the late polling which showed Obama with an overwhelming lead? What happened exactly that the polls didn't show?
Most of the coverage I've seen has conflated the two, explaining what happened in New Hampshire by contrasting it to Iowa and then using that contrast to explain the deviation between the New Hampshire polls and the actual election results. Those are two separate issues, and I'm not sure the analysis for the former holds up for the latter.
--David Kurtz
Making Sense of It
It's hard for me to remember an election where the trend of polling and the final poll results so failed to predict the actual vote. Certainly, there's no example I can remember of it happening in such a high profile contest. In the next couple days we'll probably get a better sense of what happened. My hunch is that the polls were not 'wrong', that they were right in showing a big bounce for Obama, but that there was a late swing in Hillary's direction.
That, however, is just a hunch. And it's undermined, at least to a degree, by the fact that, as far as I can remember, none of the polls showed any slackening of Obama's lead, even though I believe the pollsters were still surveying as late as Monday evening.
Perhaps we'll know more once the numbers are more closely examined. But it will probably remain undetermined to a significant degree.
What's exciting about this, just speaking for myself, is that we're now on to a solid month of campaigning before the big cluster of contests on February 5th. Both candidates have had a riveting win. We've got a real battle on our hands. And I do not think that any of Clinton's critics can say that she won this one by overpowering Obama with money or mobilizing a dominating political machine or by expectations of inevitability and certainly not with the help of a friendly press. However you slice it this was a real victory under pressure. And if she's the nominee she'll be a much better one for it.
I've read a lot of reader emails tonight. And there's one line I've heard a fair amount of that I'd like to take some gentle exception to. A lot of people say that the pollsters and pundits have something to answer for or that they tried to put this away for Obama or close the book on Hillary. The character of reporting is another matter. But polls are usually right. Not always and not exactly. But by and large they have a very good record. It's silly to think that we -- whether 'we' is reporters or political junkies or ordinary voters -- are going to ignore the information that's right in front of us. And why should we?
It's true I guess that in an abstracted reality we could simply listen to the candidates, ignore all probabilistic data available, go to the polls with no idea of the result and learn the outcome the following morning. But that's not the world we live in nor do I think it's one I'd want to live in.
This result doesn't make me second guess polling and (if you can separate out the reporting that assumed Hillary was headed for defeat from that which engaged in various psychobabble about her) it doesn't make me second guess the reportage either. This is simply an upset, a dramatic, unexpected result. I suspect it came about because of some mix of the Saturday debate and Hillary's moment of unvarnished emotion yesterday. But it might as easily be the case that the Obama surge was just ephemeral and dissipated on its own.
I certainly didn't suspect this outcome for a moment and I strongly suspect that very few in the Clinton campaign did either.
Why that should produce disgust or leave people disenchanted about the incorrect expectations that made it an upset is something I really don't understand. This is just a matter of the fact that no outcome is certain before the votes are cast. And to me, it's one of the exciting and wonderful things about the democratic process.
Both sides have now had transcendent moments. Both sides can plot credible paths to the nomination. And both campaigns have found arguments that appear to resonate with sizable constituencies. It's game on. And as someone who likes politics and loves his country I can't see any reason not to be pleased with that result.
In case you've forgotten, here's what I think was her key moment from the debate ...
And here's the moment from yesterday ...
--Josh Marshall
A Primary Season First
It's the first time that four different candidates have won the Democratic and Republican races in Iowa and New Hampshire since the modern era of primaries was ushered in in 1976.
Late Update: As the esteemed Eric Kleefeld notes, this is not correct. In 1988, Dole, Bush, Gephardt and Dukakis won the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries.
--David Kurtz
Where Are We?
One thing clear out of the GOP race is that that race is blown wide open. McCain has momentum but he's going into states where he can't rely on independent voters. Romney is almost down for the count, but not quite. And he's got plenty of money to keep fighting as long as he wants. And then, oh yeah, Mike Huckabee. He's likely to win South Carolina next week. And he's ahead nationally. Some people think this leaves Rudy still in contention by default. Maybe but I really don't see it.
And on the Democratic side ...
Even if Hillary doesn't win this thing, if she loses by only a percentage point or two, she'll have plenty of claim to a political comeback. More than enough to hearten her supporters and calm any sense that she's getting run out of this race on a rail.
We could be looking at a situation in which the first two contests on both sides -- the ones that usually tell the tale -- have settled very little.
--Josh Marshall
Mittster: Two Silvers, I'm Loving It!
The Mittster discusses his two silvers and one gold, and how if he gets five silvers that will count as a gold, and also how he jogs a lot more than John McCain. Okay, I made some of that up. Actually this speech was seriously weird. I was pretty sure he was going to start hyperventilating and crying toward the end. But he stuck it out. ...
--Josh Marshall
Open Thread at TPM Cafe
We've got a special post all set up for your New Hampshire primary comments.
--David Kurtz
McCain Speech
I'm not above liking John McCain. I liked him in 2000. But that speech was lame. Stiff. Long. And maybe just really self-serving? "I came to you not as a dickhead like Mitt Romney but to tell you the truth ... I am glad you allowed me to say the truth ..."
--Josh Marshall
More
TPM Reader MS ...
I have always had somewhat lukewarm feelings about Hillary Clinton. It took me years to forgive her for her "baking cookies" comment. At the time I had just given birth to my first child and decided to leave my job as an attorney to stay home and take care of my baby. I have been on the fence throughout this campaign, liking John Edwards more than the others. The media coverage of Sen. Clinton has caused my blood to boil. I can not bear to witness blatant misogyny. Gloria Steinheim's article in the NYT this morning was so on the mark. If I lived in New Hampshire, I would have voted for Sen. Clinton today. I would not allow the talking heads to tell me who to vote for or declare this race over. And I certainly was not going to participate in the sexist bs that has been spewing out the mouths of the likes of Chris Matthews.
--Josh Marshall
I thought it would be fair to give a run down of the fringe candidates on the GOP side.
At the moment, it's Rudy about 300 votes ahead of Ron Paul.
--Josh Marshall
Mittmania!
This has be one of funniest, truest and most brutal blind quotes I've seen in some time (from ABC) ...
When asked what made the difference in Romney's projected loss to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., one Romney advisor simply said, "Authenticity." Romney called to congratulate McCain at 8:20 p.m.
--Josh Marshall
TPM Reader AL pipes up ...
I'm a woman (Obama supporter) who has no particular issues with Hillary -- liked the Clinton administration, think she's competent, etc. I'd vote for her in the general. But the idea that people would vote for her simply because they're "outraged" over media coverage these last few days is incomprehensible to me. I live in DC and follow politics VERY closely, but even I don't watch that idiot Matthews or any of the cable talking heads; I tune them out completely. So, first, it's hard for me to imagine that people in NH who are already bombarded with candidates, ads, etc., are spending their free time watching that crap and getting outraged about it. Second, if they are, and that's how they're making their voting decisions, then they're idiots. Voting to disprove a media narrative has to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Truly.
--Josh Marshall
Late Shift?
TPM Reader JS chimes in ...
I almost wonder if more Dems didn't vote for Hillary to counter the BS media narrative about rejecting the Clintons once and for all. I say this as someone who has given 1500 bucks to Obama, gone to several of his events out here in CA, met him, and plan to vote for him. Part of me, however, was so pissed about this media narrative about Hillary and the Clintons in general that I had in the back of my mind that I would consider voting for her just to piss the media off. That's not going to happen now as it appears we have a real race, but still . . . do you see what I am saying? I mean this whole weekend we see people like Andrea Mitchell and Chris Matthews salivating over how the Democrats "rejected the Clintons" and want to puke. I am for Obama not because I am against Clinton (either one), but because I am for Obama. That's it. I think he is the best of the big 3 dem candidates. Would I be happy to vote for Hillary or Edwards in the general? Hell yeah. Did I think Bill Clinton was a great President? Yes. And I think Hillary would probably be pretty good too. This whole media narrative sickened me.
TPM Reader DB too ...
I have been an Obama supporter since 04, gave money to him this year, own the t-shirt, etc., etc. But the sexist bullsh-t these past days (I am a woman) from the media is making me root for her to win this tonight. The only thing I dread if she wins tonight is the inevitable story from the media that this proves that white america really won't vote for a black man, the resulting made-up defection of Obama's made-up new found black support, etc., etc.
--Josh Marshall
In For a Surprise?
Whatever the final results are tonight it seems clear the final polls missed some late movement in Hillary's direction -- to put it mildly.
--Josh Marshall
McCain
MSNBC and Fox both calling it for McCain. And ABC.
Late Update: Where to for Mitt? Not pretty.
--Josh Marshall
Too Close
The news of the last 72 hours ginned up a lot of expectation that Obama would crush Hillary tonight. But the polls have just closed and the nets are calling it too close to call.
--Josh Marshall
Fibber
As long as we're waiting for the numbers, some more Rudy fun. From ABC ...
Though former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani has generally attributed his poor showing in New Hampshire to a campaign strategy that focuses on larger, delegate-rich states holding later contests, statistics compiled by ABC News indicate that he was clearly competing to win in the Granite State as hard -- if not harder -- than many of his rivals.Statistics compiled by ABC News Political Unit and ABC News' team of off-air reporters indicate that Giuliani held more events in this first-in-the-nation primary state than any other Republican except for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in neighboring Massachusetts. He also spent more on TV ads than anyone except for Romney and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.
--Josh Marshall
Out of It
Whatever happens tonight, there's going to be a lot of elation and a lot of bitter disappointment. The only question is who gets what. So I think it's always good to start the night with some good news that can bring us all together.
As you know, Rudy Giuliani premises his whole campaign on a late-primary strategy. Basically ignore the first, high-profile, small state contests, and focus on the mega-states on Feb.5th, where the real delegate count is.
The key state for Rudy, the pivot, is Florida at the end of January. A big state a week before the big night where Rudy has invested tons of time and resources. The plan is he comes in first there and sets the stage for his boffo break out on Feb. 5th.
Alas, the latest poll shows Rudy now down in fourth place.
--Josh Marshall