I agree with that last sentence completely. Edwards would have been better than either.

What happens if Obama is the nominee followed by an indictment? Dems loose big time.

I can't help thinking that neither Clinton or Obama can win because of all the mudslinging they are about to get hit with. We could be headed for a real train wreck with either of these candidates.

This is just want the Republicans dream about. A close race so their election manipulations can go undetected. DREs are the biggest fraud ever pulled off against honest elections.

I believe Hillary is better able to puncture the thick skin of the Washington establishment. She knows what makes it tick. Obama however, with his 'be nice to everyone' attitude, will get trampled on in no time.

That does not mean Hillary will not compromise. To reach a bipartisan solution however, she may use a variety of methods from her vast arsenal of negotiating tactics.

8) There is no progressive candidate left in the race. Obama is not a progressive. If you're smart you'll take Krugman's word on that. Clinton is also not a progressive.

Of the 2, I think I''l vote for Hillary because she has the better health care plan. In the general, I will certainly vote for the Democrat but I realize I'll be voting for a centrist.

Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives.

- John Stuart Mill
English economist & philosopher (1806 - 1873)

high information voters is a great term.
there used to be fewer, before the internet,
but yes, there is still way too few.

were it different, the definition of that notion and term, 'electability' would be different.
less credence to the old definition would be given.
jimmy carter wrestled well and good with that, for the era he was in.
jimmy did likewise with the notion of politicking and 'realpolitik' and pork barrels and so on.
jimmy was (and is) palpably real, like dennis kucinich, ron paul, ralph nader, barney franks, pat leahy, and others of such stripe, genuine people without disingenuity and with familiarity of the causes and speak plainly, frankly of these things without parsing or mincing of their words -and so inform, and credibly so.

jimmy brought hope by direct action, not oratory. active principles, not rhetorical.

reagan was a criminal. worse, he affirmed the political values of superficial appearances and bullshit.

clinton's duplicity was even worse. he began much of what cheney has carried forward, and failed to discontinue much begun with the first bush (such as the use of depleted uranium for example).

the levers of power may or may not be so fully in washington now.
our elections may not even be so credible any more.

for all this, the issue is us. the citizens. our sovereignty.
let us follow the spirit of our best and not discard them with their failures as candidates or lack of candidacy. let us lead, and lead ourselves rather than debate whom is the lesser evil of choices given us. let us not forget. montel williams just lost his show for daring to maintain perspective, for daring to suggest we all ought strive to be informed of details that matter (or should), like how much blood we pump into our tanks so far this year.

russell means may be a lot of things, but he is a leader. maybe not officially or with official sanction, but he, as a man and citizen, gives me hope. i wouldn't speak much of those whom wouldn't speak much of him but instead be PC and pretend he as nonexistent as evo morales.

whomever the Voters ostensibly put into the white house, elsewhere others lead themselves and others to greater things.

the intense shallowness of washington in the last 2 terms has brought a palpable myopia in the nation that is being rejected as even washington itself is being rejected. even now nader is weighing such considerations.

while obama, with his mannered 99% earnestness, is consequently 100% clueless.

our best leaders nowadays are a few senators, a few teachers, a few historians, a few journalists, a few writers, a few generals, many grunts, and millions of individuals about the world. there are new ways to vote.

russell means and montel williams have cast theirs.

I was surprised to see this in The Independent, I haven't paid much attention to the Rezko deal but the last sentence puts a new light on the 'problem'.

The Chicago street where a dangerous secret from Barack Obama's past lurks
Related Articles

* Inside Story: The people who sell presidents
* Barack Obama: My America
* McCain scents Super Tuesday victory
* Clinton dashes to woo voters in the Mid-west

By Leonard Doyle in Chicago
Monday, 4 February 2008

Nobel prize-winners from the University of Chicago are so thick on the ground on the street where Barack Obama and his family now live that even the estate agents have advanced degrees.

One of them, Stephen Parker (PhD, Egyptology,) was passing the Georgian Revival pile that is the Obama home on Saturday morning, when he saw his boss, Donna Schwan, now a thorn in the side of the Obama campaign. With snow piled up on the footpaths, they chatted in the middle of the road, watched by a team of anxious secret service agents providing round-the-clock protection to the man who could soon become America's first black president.

A self-described "Hillary Girl", Ms Schwan, who is trying to sell the plot of land next to the Obama's, muttered an oath about the secret service. "Just let them try and move me," she said. "Thank God this is still a free country." As many voters go into a collective swoon over the charismatic Barack Obama, the candidate promises to help Americans feel good about themselves and their country once again, Ms Schwan is urging a little caution. "I've been there," she says. "It's like going on a hot date with a cool guy, you just don't want to ask too many questions and ruin the dream."

What she was referring to is a simmering controversy about the nature of Mr Obama's relationship with Antoin "Tony" Rezko, a Syrian-born developer who was thrown in jail last week ahead of a major corruption trial. Chicago, the most political of American towns, is where Mr Obama and Mrs Clinton's destinies were shaped. Mrs Clinton moved away a long time ago, but she has lots of friends and supporters here. Even at the nearby Valois restaurant, Barack Obama's favourite breakfast spot and a place where Chicago's movers and shakers come to press the flesh, I bumped into a woman who went to high school with Mrs Clinton.

"I think he was more than a little naive to get hooked up with Rezko," remarked Karen Dennis, "but he is essentially a decent guy, I even know the person who bought the house he sold before he did the Rezko deal."

Born Hillary Rodham, Mrs Clinton grew up Republican in a stately brick house; today named "Rodham Place" in a posh suburb on the city's North side. The neighbourhood is as Hallmark wholesome as when she was growing up. It's a sharp contrast to the overwhelmingly poor, black and troubled areas where Mr Obama landed in the late 1980s when he started out as a young community organiser.

Whoever comes out on top in tomorrow's Super Tuesday vote, a bitter struggle to become the Democratic nominee is expected to drag on for months. There is still plenty of time for mud to fly and the back-story of the political fixer, "slum landlord" and alleged criminal Tony Rezko to become more familiar to Americans voters.

It's a story that can easily be manipulated, and in the hands of Mr Obama's enemies could soon eclipse the uplifting story his work as a community organiser and his efforts to rebuild the lives of black and Hispanic workers shattered by unemployment. The story of his efforts to get asbestos removed from tracts of public housing built in the midst of at least 50 toxic dumps may be overshadowed by his links to the moneyman behind so many Illinois political leaders. Like them, Mr Obama accepted contributions from Mr Rezko, first when he launched his political career to the Illinois Senate in 1995, and while he was going on to achieve national prominence.

Mr Obama began his life as an organiser in Chicago walking the streets of Altgeld Gardens, a blighted neighbourhood where black soldiers returning from the Second World War were housed in virtual isolation from the city. Linda Randle, 53, worked with him on the asbestos issue and now helps at campaign headquarters. "He was a good listener, he walked the neighbourhoods and talked to people about their problems," she said. "The two of us worked together and I'm pretty hot-headed, but he kept me calm with his funny quirkiness which I still see on television."

The problems of Altgeld Gardens are as bad today as when the youthful Mr Obama was here trying to get rival church and community groups to co-operate. Many of the houses are boarded up and gangs of unemployed youngsters roam the streets. The community still gets the short end of things, as Ms Randle explained.

In almost every speech he makes, Mr Obama harks back to his days as a community organiser. In a recent debate he contrasted his time spent working with the poor on the South Side with the six years Mrs Clinton spent on the board of Wal-Mart, something Democratic voters are deeply uneasy about.

Mrs Clinton snapped back at him with her first public mention of the Rezko affair, calling him a "slum landlord". Since then there has been a truce between the two campaigns, as they sought higher ground in the run-up to Super Tuesday. But as soon as Mr Rezko's corruption trial starts in two weeks' time the questions about Mr Obama will resume again, but this time before a national audience rather than tucked inside the pages of The Chicago Tribune.

Mr Obama successfully pushed back at Mrs Clinton's allegation that he represented the "slum landlord" Rezko as a lawyer.

Should Mr Obama win the Democratic nomination for the presidential race, the attack dogs of the Republican Party will be all over the "Rezko scandal". Mr Obama will be attacked for actions which though perfectly legal have left him vulnerable on one of his campaign's key selling points: his good judgement.

He now describes as "boneheaded" a financial deal he made with Mr Rezko to buy a strip of land, just 10 feet wide, from the plot Ms Schwan is now trying to sell. His difficulty is that he made the property deal at a time when his political sponsor and former close friend Rezko has been indicted on federal corruption charges, an affair that was blasted all over the Chicago media.

NYT

Clinton, Obama, Insurance

By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: February 4, 2008

snip snip

But the big difference is mandates: the Clinton plan requires that everyone have insurance; the Obama plan doesn’t.

Mr. Obama claims that people will buy insurance if it becomes affordable. Unfortunately, the evidence says otherwise.

After all, we already have programs that make health insurance free or very cheap to many low-income Americans, without requiring that they sign up. And many of those eligible fail, for whatever reason, to enroll.

An Obama-type plan would also face the problem of healthy people who decide to take their chances or don’t sign up until they develop medical problems, thereby raising premiums for everyone else. Mr. Obama, contradicting his earlier assertions that affordability is the only bar to coverage, is now talking about penalizing those who delay signing up — but it’s not clear how this would work.

So the Obama plan would leave more people uninsured than the Clinton plan. How big is the difference?

To answer this question you need to make a detailed analysis of health care decisions. That’s what Jonathan Gruber of M.I.T., one of America’s leading health care economists, does in a new paper.

Mr. Gruber finds that a plan without mandates, broadly resembling the Obama plan, would cover 23 million of those currently uninsured, at a taxpayer cost of $102 billion per year. An otherwise identical plan with mandates would cover 45 million of the uninsured — essentially everyone — at a taxpayer cost of $124 billion. Over all, the Obama-type plan would cost $4,400 per newly insured person, the Clinton-type plan only $2,700.

That doesn’t look like a trivial difference to me. One plan achieves more or less universal coverage; the other, although it costs more than 80 percent as much, covers only about half of those currently uninsured.

As with any economic analysis, Mr. Gruber’s results are only as good as his model. But they’re consistent with the results of other analyses, such as a 2003 study, commissioned by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, that compared health reform plans and found that mandates made a big difference both to success in covering the uninsured and to cost-effectiveness.

And that’s why many health care experts like Mr. Gruber strongly support mandates.

Now, some might argue that none of this matters, because the legislation presidents actually manage to get enacted often bears little resemblance to their campaign proposals. And there is, indeed, no guarantee that Mrs. Clinton would, if elected, be able to pass anything like her current health care plan.

But while it’s easy to see how the Clinton plan could end up being eviscerated, it’s hard to see how the hole in the Obama plan can be repaired. Why? Because Mr. Obama’s campaigning on the health care issue has sabotaged his own prospects.

You see, the Obama campaign has demonized the idea of mandates — most recently in a scare-tactics mailer sent to voters that bears a striking resemblance to the “Harry and Louise” ads run by the insurance lobby in 1993, ads that helped undermine our last chance at getting universal health care.

If Mr. Obama gets to the White House and tries to achieve universal coverage, he’ll find that it can’t be done without mandates — but if he tries to institute mandates, the enemies of reform will use his own words against him.

If you combine the economic analysis with these political realities, here’s what I think it says: If Mrs. Clinton gets the Democratic nomination, there is some chance — nobody knows how big — that we’ll get universal health care in the next administration. If Mr. Obama gets the nomination, it just won’t happen.

I think Clinton said something like that. I would agree with what you're saying about McCain's chances against the Democratic candidate in a political bubble, but I really think given McCain's self-described weakness in economic issues, he just won't be able to pull it off. I think chances are pretty good that things are going to be pretty bad by the time we get to November, and McCain just won't have the answers people will want to hear.

that is, i hope you're correct and "any dem" can beat any republican who fails to talk about the economy properly.

but i lean towards ian's analysis: too many low information types see mccain as a 'good choice' and 'straight shooter.' and too many progressives kid themselves about the true depths of racism and sexism in this country, most esp behind the closed drapes of the voting booth where no pollster can follow.

You're starting to sound like me. A realist.

But for Mr. Integrity McCain, lets not forget that he was one of the Keating Five in the 1980's S&L Loan Scandal. Taking bribes from S&L's to ignore the dire economics of these financial institutions that ultimately failed to the tune of billions and billions of dollars. That whole affair wiped out everyone BUT McCain. Why, I'll never know. How he retains any image of integrity I will never know.

Ummm, I think we are today in a Mortgage loan scandal as well, that will continue to unwind through 2008. So that gives the dirt in McCain's past some legs. He has a real tendency to skirt the rules for the financial community when appropriately bribed.

By Dean Baker - February 4, 2008, 5:14AM

TPM Café It’s not often that I take issue with Paul Krugman’s economics (at least not recently), but he does misrepresent the issues in going after Obama on health insurance mandates.

The simple story is that any effort to establish national health insurance will require some anti-free loader mechanism to prevent gaming. The logic is straightforward. Everyone agrees that we want to get rid of the current practice under which insurers are allowed to charge fees based on people’s health. Under this system, people with serious illnesses either must pay exorbitant fees or will be unable to get insurance altogether. (Insurance companies lose money if they insure people with high bills.)

Under a reformed system, we will require a standard fee under which everyone pays the same rate regardless of their health history. However, this creates a situation in which it doesn’t make sense for healthy people to pay for insurance. Why not just deal with minor health related costs out of pocket? You can wait until you get sick and then buy into the system and pay the standard rate.

That works for healthy people, but it would destroy the system because the only people buying insurance would be those with relatively high bills. This means that insurance would be very expensive, which of course encourages more people to play the “wait till I’m sick strategy.” The end result is that the system collapses, because only the very sick would ever find it worthwhile to buy insurance.

One way around this problem is to mandate that everyone buy insurance. Senator Clinton has proposed a mandate as an explicit part of her plan. Senator Obama has attacked Clinton for this mandate (sometimes unfairly). By contrast, he has suggested that we can get near universal enrollment through other mechanisms. Specifically, he has suggested that we can have a system of default enrollment, whereby people are signed up for a plan at their workplace.

People would then have the option to say that they do not want insurance, so they are not being forced to buy it. However, they will then face a late enrollment penalty if they try to play the “healthy person” game. When they do opt to join the system, at some future point, they will have to pay 50 percent more for their insurance, or some comparable penalty for trying to game the system.

A system of default enrollment will ensure that people do not remain uninsured due to inertia. A system of late enrollment penalties will ensure that people don’t try to game the system.

Is the Obama mix as good at reaching universal or near universal insurance as the Clinton mandate? The reality is we don’t know. It will depend on many factors, most importantly the sanctions that are imposed under both systems (i.e. the penalty for not getting insurance with the mandate, and the late enrollment penalty in the Obama system). Krugman is wrong to say that a mandate is necessary. We can get to the same place with Obama’s approach; it really depends on the details.

And they did what they did to get this far. Edwards wasn't willing to toe the line, and you see where that got him. Although I'm very disappointed with both Obama and Hillary for their lack of leadership on the FISA issue, and may still go with Edwards tomorrow to register my displeasure, Hillary's plans and positions are the more progressive of the two.

I don't really see why beating MCain is going to be tough. Just keep playing that clip of him singing Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran. And keep on bringing out his connection with the bad bankers of yesteryear (Keating five) and linking it to the bad bankers of today. Get him to lose his temper poorly a couple of times. He seems eminently beatable.

I agree with points 3) to 10) completely. No disagreement from me there. So let me just comment on 1) and 2) ..... I know for a fact no one on here is as politically wise as Krugman, least of all me. And I agree with Krugman here too. But that doesn't mean there aren't other reasons to support Obama, which he didn't cover. I think there's so little contest between Obama's weaknesses and Clinton's weaknesses that if you or me were to put up a counter op-ed on why progressives shouldn't support Clinton, it would easily look more persuasive than Krugman's. It's not like he even made the case for Clinton, just one against Obama. He didn't even mention Clinton much, and it's easy to understand why.
As for Rezko, it is a problem, but what candidate doesn't have some dirt on them? I mean is that it? Voters will forgive if you goofed up on one thing of luke-warm importance.

I have great respect for Paul Krugman. The man has been providing basic ammunition for dealing with conservatives for years. Plus occasionally he has good humor. However, I disagree with his analysis of a health plan, because I think it misses the big picture.

First we need a reality check about the two health plans. They are both what they are: plans. They are not set in stone and they do not even have to be the starting point. Plans are affected by the general political climate and the real power configurations that people have around them. As you remember Hilary had a plan in the past and we saw where it went. And Bill may not have planned to fully deregulate the US economy but he did a pretty good job with it.

The only way that you will get a plan is if you have the political clout to push it through, and it seems to me that Obama will have more of an opportunity for doing that. I do have a sense that he could win big, with concurrent big swings in the Congress. This is the only way to promote a plan. Remember, if you were judging him on his plan I am not sure FDR would have been your choice either. Both their plans were a response to Edwards' and in a way they were a political calculation as to what will fly more easily.

A calculation addressed to an electoral audience. What will be implemented will be based on a different calculation, which is about a very different audience. Primaries are not the same with the position you find your self in when you are in the white house.

Obama's actions as president will therefore be defined by the conditions on the electoral map and by the state of the union's mindset. His readiness to aggressively argue in the course of a televised debate for taxes on the richer is evidence that the mindset of America is changing. The Dems do feel that it is easier to say certain thing. If universal health-care is the winer post-election, then that is what he is going to do and he may even courteously thank Hilary. By then it wont matter, he will be prez.

You tend to ignore Clinton's hawkishness in all this discussion. It will be impossible to effect any plans unless the US starts getting its empire in order. Clinton strikes me as less capable of doing that. As much as I hate my self for saying that I prefer Obama's Brezinski (sorry for slaughtering his name) to Clinton's Holbruke (same here). One was right on Iraq the other not so.

Now scandals:

I think that it is up to the dems to not allow the scandals stick. Attack Attack Attack. That is why a hard VP like Webb maybe a good idea. The Dems will need an attack dog and against the geriatric vet a younger more sprighty vet may be a good idea.

I have not followed the Rezko affair closely. I read in counterpunch something about his connections with a Baathist and this could be bad, but this is also so out of there that a massive show of indignation may kill it. Also think of this: the whole tenor of Obama's change campaign has the advantage of elevating him above what he can present as petty, pathetic politics. I guess I believe it is how well you play the game. Hopefully they have learned from 2004.

McCain is tied at the hip to the war. No matter what else he does, he cannot back off from his support now without losing his base (and chances of election) and he cannot easily tack a new route. Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb! So if the Iraq/Afghanistan wars turn messy again, this is an anchor around McCain's neck. Obama does not have this problem, he can run aginast the war and change his message as needed, he can be quite nimble. McCain cannot, he must support the war and Bush at this stage or die.

So what are the chances of one of the wars turning messy in 2008? I would say pretty damn good reading the latest out of Iraq and Afghanistan. We might not lose one of them this year, but if the death toll clicks up the voters will be out for blood. And their easiest mark is Republicans and especially McCain.

Bush's popularity tracks gas prices, McCain's will track the wars.

Second point is Obama's kumbayah spiel is going to fail, utterly. You can't negotiate with terrorists and hyper-partisans, not even sure how you tell them apart. But the big question here is what does Obama fall back on as a secondary style? Will he run to the left or the right when the chips are down? I get the feeling he'll break left (and hard) but that point is up for debate. But the guy chose to move to IL to engage in Chicago politics. I grew up in Chicago, moving there for politics is like moving to Tijuana for sex ed. The most famous Chicago politician I can remember was Al Capone. Obama doesn't shy from conflict and he doesn't flinch from a good fight.

I wouldn't be filling out Obama's obit just yet, we don't know what he's made of yet. The glimmers I've seen though seem to suggest a much tougher cookie than he is given credit for.

I don't know, but that's some food for thought on Obama/McCain and the "conventional" wisdom.

Re: 5), 9), and 10). It's not about the democrats, it's never been about the democrats. It's only ever been about the electoral college. Billary is too polarizing and will never pass through the eye of that needle. Obama has a fifty-fifty shot.
Re: 3) and 8): Obama is far more progressive than Clinton. She supported Dick's war, Dick's prosectution of the war, Dick's phoney war on Iran -- please do not pretend that she'll stand up to the republicans; when instead she's practiced the Liebermanesque technique of doing one thing and saying another. (At least at this point Lieberman is now relatively consistant as opposed to Clinton's opportunism.)

Not enough younger voters yet, and not enough disgust among older voters to kick us into progressive policies.

The boomer generation remains divided, and not enough of the younger half have yet actually "grown up" and realized just how tricked they've been in their little evangelical and angry young white guy communities.

I just hope neither of them is as bad as I was painting them. I labeled them "Hillary-Joe and Barack O'Lieberman," and I haven't seen much to change my mind. Both are big pals with Joe Lieberman, the anti-Democrat who torpedoed Al Gore's ticket in 2000 and now is happily stumping for the crookedest, angriest paleo right-winger the Republicans could find. Remember the Keating Five? How on earth did McCain ever hold onto his Senate seat after taking thousands of dollars in bribes? Oh yeah--he paid them back...after he was caught.

Hill-Dog's got the DLC machine behind her, and Obama's got that motivational silver tongue. Best point was #3, that Barack Obama is kind of a black Tony Robbins. Even his campaign signature line, "Yes We Can," is right out of a motivational speaker's toolkit.

I just googled "barack obama" "tony robbins" and came up with musings along the same lines, including one by good old "JJ" Walker of Dy-no-mite fame. People are aware of Obama's lack of detail in his speeches. Some attribute it to a lack of substance, others to political cleverness. I think most presidents have their policies shaped by historical circumstances more than not. It takes a truly corrupt idiot like George Bush to go out of his way to create new disasters.

Recovering from Bush's disasters will define the term of the next president, at least as much as any intended new proposals. America is firmly stuck in a Republicans break it, Democrats fix it cycle.

Under such circumstances, it wouldn't be too smart for Obama to roll out lots of specific proposals for social programs, would it?
.
"Adapt or perish." Murphy's Law? Nope, Darwin's Guarantee.

Krugman is a liar and has been lying about Obama. go here to read more: http://factbeat.com/get_story.php?id=176

As for the Rezco thing killing Obama, u could be right author guy. But, I think u might have forgotten that whole travelgate scandal and Rose law firm scandal.

But also there is the newest Clinton scandal with the President of Kazakhstan. its pretty bad stuff and she will get killed on it in the general.

http://factbeat.com/get_story.php?id=202

is the lazy way of trying to get rid of a candidate. And it almost never works, especially for new candidates. The caveat is if the scandal resonates in a manner that seems to display the 'true character' of the candidate beyond those who already dislike them. I think the best example this election cycle is the special treatment afforded Giullianis mistress at taxpayers expense. It resonated because it revealed the true character of the guy. And it is probably why the weird dog thing with Romney did NOT work, it didn't seem to fit with the guy. It is probably why there is now a new wave of stories exploring McCain's explosive temper, because he has a very very explosive temper. It is truly scary and an amazing thing to behold, and it will emerge as an issue this summer.

It's the reason economic scandals never resonate with Bill Clinton, cause he has no apparent interest in money, it is not in accord with his character. But a sex scandal does.

It's why Rezko does nothing to Obama, it does not reflect on his character, it is not revelatory.

It's also why the 'scandal' everyone was in search of for Gore was how he uses so much fuel to get somewhere, or uses lots of electricity in his house. Why not do that to the other candidates? Why. Becuause in the case of Gore it can become revelatory, exposing him as a hypocrite.

It's why a homosexual tryst in a bathroom stall with another man undid Larry Craig - wait, that would probably undo any presidential candidate:)

That's why I'm voting for Obama.

Krugman is stuck on policy details. I'm stuck on electoral votes, and I don't see where Clinton gets enough.

In the West only Hawaii and California are guaranteed for Clinton. Oregon and Washington will be uphill for Clinton (and they weren't for Kerry), as will all the "new Democrat" Mountain states like Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Montana. All these can be in play for Obama, but not for Clinton. Worse, far worse really, is that Clinton at the top of the ticket will make it harder for some wonderful progressives to get elected to the Senate, including three Democratic takeovers: Mark Udall in Colorado, Tom Udall in New Mexico, and Jeff Merkley in Oregon.

You're sticking to ideology and progressive purity here, Ian, but I urge you to stick to strategy if you want Republicans out of the White House, and out of Congress. This IS a battle for the soul of America, and for far better leadership of the Free World, and Clinton can't win it.

1) Neither plan will work, even if they pass. I suspect they both know that (see Massachusetts).

2) The Independent piece has zero content. The Chicago Tribune has said "nothing there". The Chicago Sun-Times (home of Robert Novack) hasn't got anything either. Of the current players, no one is cleaner (and I'm including the Rs here).

3) Motivational speakers (as a vocation) have a deservedly bad name. Like lawyering, it kind of depends on what you do with the skill.

4) I don't think either Clinton or Obama bear any resemblance to Dukakis.

5) Just keep publishing the "hug" picture. McCain loses the rabid base - they hate him and will stay home. He is attractive to conservative leaning independents, (which I suspect is mostly name recognition, thus easily eroded), and both Dems make inroads on that crowd.

6) That argument can be made about anybody and usually is. Obama's appeal isn't of the "cute, cuddly, needs protection" variety. If the Sun-Times could have brought him down, they would have.

7) True.

8) Probably true, in both cases.

9) It hurt them in SC. If he starts doing it again, it will hurt them again. That's why he's not allowed to ad-lib anymore.

10) Maybe, but almost certainly not for the same reasons. Both have become trapped by their own rhetoric on some issues (foreign policy - appeal to the security voter). There's no need to maintain a false consistency once elected (Gov. Bush held opposite positions on anything FP related relative to Pres. Bush). The big issue will be the economy. 33% of Clinton's individual fundraising is from donors of $4,600. You (most likely) dance with them that brought ya.

Krugman and Obama have something personal going on which reflects positively on neither. Neither Clinton nor Obama have had good blogger outreach, but we're still a pretty small minority.

And while I think mandates on people who wish to play the game are fine, there's enough small-l libertarian in me that I think mandates simply based on drawing breath suck.

The piece sounds to me like the flip side of the argument that Rush Limbaugh and the other conservative talk show hosts are leveling against John McCain. He's not, in their view, a true conservative and therefore not worthy of their vote for president. They would rather have a four year Clinton or Obama presidency than have a republican in office who is not an conservative ideological purist. The argument is that this would punish the republicans and thus bring them around to the true light.

As a liberal democrat I see no value in this kind of internecine warfare because the best and most electable candidate (Obama) fails to pass some ideological litmus test on healthcare. I can live with either Obama's or Clinton's proposals. They both suck. Universal single payor is the only sensible approach, but that won't get either elected. Remember, the object is to get a democrat in the White House. Flyspecking their differences is a joke considering the fact that these platform positions never actually become law intact.

The positions of "progressives", most of which I agree with, are aspirational at best, and not viable politics. John Edwards' dismal performance is ample proof of that. Yes, Barack Obama is a motivational speaker. He's motivating legions of people who have been disenchanted with the political process to go out and vote. Democracy is always a good thing and in the case of Obama there is actually some "there" there. It is a favorite canard among progressive to say there is no substance to it. I have heard many of his speeches and the debates and think otherwise. He is committed to ending the war, ending illegal domestic spying, reversal of the Bush tax cuts for the rich, shutting down the illegal prisons, decent treatment for returning veterans, deficit reduction, a foreign policy based on actual diplomacy, restoration of habeas corpus, improvement of our educational system, restoring the separation of powers, saving social security and medicare and transcending the partisan divide for the better good of the people.

The last big effect the strict ideological "progressives" had in presidential politics was the George Bush presidency guaranteed by the Nader voters.

Some interesting points. I would note that Clinton's personal popularity versus enthusiasm for him back in the White House as first spouse are slightly different issues, and on the latter, it's changed somewhat, per Greg Sargent:

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/horsesmouth/2008/02/another_poll_sh.php

So yes, overall your point is correct, but there's some nuance there. His attack dog role has certainly turned off some bloggers and some of the general public, but it may not matter much, especially if Hillary is the nominee. The larger point of Sargent, too, is that Beltway pundits continue to hate Bill far more than the public.