McCain seems to be the gift that keeps on giving for us Democrats. I found this little <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/10/mccain.strategy/index.html">graf in this CNN article</a> that shows yet another McCain flip-flop!

<blockquote>On Friday, McCain attacked Obama's record on the environment during a campaign stop in the Florida Everglades.

"Sen. Obama has no record of being involved in this issue that I know of," he said. "I will stick by my record and my commitment of many years to reduce greenhouse gas emissions."</blockquote>

Uh, Earth to John McCain here. Have you forgotten that you, Senator Lieberman, and Obama co-sponsored the <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:SN00280:@@@P">SAME BILL ON CLIMATE CHANGE?</a>

Hillary Clinton again plays the race card in her interview with USAToday. This is scorched earth policy in full view, folks, as you can see below:

"I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on," she said in an interview with USA TODAY. As evidence, Clinton cited an Associated Press article "that found how Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

"There's a pattern emerging here," she said.

Clinton rejected any idea that her emphasis on white voters could be interpreted as racially divisive. "These are the people you have to win if you're a Democrat in sufficient numbers to actually win the election. Everybody knows that."

This IS racially divisive, no ifs and buts about it, even though Greg tried to spin away his initial reaction towards Garin's use of this race card earlier today.
link to article is here:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-05-07-clintoninterview_N.htm

Right now, Drudge has a banner headline above the picture of Obama with the caption, "The Nominee," saying that Hillary Clinton gave herself another $6.4 million dollar loan in the past month and that she'll be giving herself more money.

**DRUDGE EXCLUSIVE 8:59 EM ET**: Senator Clinton has made another multi-million dollar loan to her campaign. She gave $6.4M in the past month and will be giving more... Developing...

As a deaf woman, I hope to see the media pick this up because this shows the callous disregard that John McCain has towards disabled constituents. The story is below:
<blockquote>At least 20 disabled activists, most of them in wheelchairs, were arrested outside Sen. John McCain's offices Tuesday after being refused a meeting with the GOP presidential nominee-to-be over a bill to expand Medicaid coverage to more people who want in-home care.
Capitol Police Sgt. Kimberly Schneider said about 20 people from the group were arrested outside McCain's office in the Russell Senate Office Building on Tuesday and charged with unlawful assembly.

McCain's Senate chief of staff said the protesters turned down an offer to meet immediately with McCain's aides. Mark Busey said he didn't know McCain's position on the legislation but would ask. The chances are slim, however, that the senator himself would be meeting with members of the group.</blockquote>
The bill being discussed here is the Community Choice Act of 2007, which amends the Social Security Act to allow those who are disabled to elect to have their Medicaid coverage for nursing home costs to be directed to home based or community based care instead, so that they may be allowed to stay at home instead of an institutional setting. 
Senator Tom Harkin, God bless his heart, sponsored this important piece of legislation. Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are among the co-sponsors of the Community Choice Act of 2007. 
Also, Howard Dean, the current DNC Chair, issued a press release about the arrest of the ADAPT members at John McCain's office:
<blockquote>"At a time when John McCain is on the campaign trail talking about health care choices, he refuses to explain why he opposes a bill that would let Americans with disabilities choose how and where to live, work and receive care. I am proud to lead a Party that supports the fundamental right of every single American to make his or her own choices about where to live and work. Apparently John McCain and his staff would rather let activists get arrested outside his office than explain his position on this critical issue. John McCain is either profoundly out of touch with the needs and challenges confronting Americans with disabilities or just doesn't care. Either way, he's the wrong choice for Americas future."</blockquote>
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/1/212337/6833/95/507406

The Clinton campaign said that they would release their March fundraising numbers on the 20th, however, the 20th is a Sunday, and the FEC rules clearly state you cannot file a FEC report on a weekend, so the fundraising numbers should be reported today. Will TPM press on the Clinton campaign to release their FEC report today?

I see that the Clinton campaign had to amend their July 2007 numbers earlier this week on 4/13/08. Surely they can get in their March 2008 numbers now, can't they?

Will TPMElectionCentral call upon the Clinton campaign if they are going to publicly release their March fundraising numbers? It was reported that they raised up to $20 million dollars, which was half of what Obama had raised in March to the tune of $40 million dollars.

The Clinton camp claimed that most of their March money was earmarked for the primary. The FEC report release by the Clinton camp should prove that to be true or false. Also, I would like to see more reporting about whether vendor bills are still being unpaid by the Clinton campaign. I've heard reports that the Clinton camp prefers to pay media buys first before paying vendors. If this trend continues, it signals financial trouble for the Clinton camp which will not be of good stead to them in the general election campaign.

Sam Stein has a terrific post at <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/08/bill-clintons-ties-to-col_n_95651.html">Huffington Post</a> about the ties between President Bill Clinton and President Uribe's Colombian government.

<blockquote>Former President Bill Clinton has earned hundreds of thousands of dollars speaking on behalf of a Colombia-based group pushing the trade pact, and representatives of that organization tell The Huffington Post that the former president shared their sentiment. In June 2005, Clinton was paid $800,000 by the Colombia-based Gold Service International to give four speeches throughout Latin America.

......

"He was supportive of the trade agreement at the time that he came, but that was several years ago. In the present context, I don't know what his position would be. It is not only about union trade rights. It is about what benefit or damage it can do to the US economy," said Franco. "Events with the Clinton campaign [concerning Mark Penn] are not good at all for the trade agreement... Right now it became a campaign issues and that is sad, because it needs to go through."

.....

But evidence that the former president has been sympathetic to Colombia's position is widely known. In 2007, Clinton met personally with and accepted an award from Colombia's controversial president, Alvaro Uribe, during a time when the country was attempting to improve its image within the United States.

........

Moreover, Clinton has helped Frank Giustra, one of the biggest donors to the Clinton Global Initiative, score meetings with high-ranking Colombian officials. Giustra has several business interests in the country, and both he and Clinton have collaborated on an effort to fight poverty in developing world by partnering up with mining companies in Colombia and elsewhere.</blockquote>

Given the ties of President Clinton to Uribe, and his support of international development in Colombia, and his association with Mark Penn, the union-busting lobbyist campaign/strategist, on his wife's campaign, it begs the question:

<blockquote>"Is Hillary Clinton's record on the free trade agreement with Colombia just double-talk when her own husband is friends with the Colombian President, who has killed labor organizers, and still employs Mark Penn on her staff, who tried to help the Colombian government push the free trade agreement deal for a year?"</blockquote>

That's my question that I hope to see answered by the media.

Eric Kleefield, in his post here, posted the audio of this morning's conference call with the Clinton campaign, and a short summary of the conference call, which was about breast cancer research funding.

For Once, No Politics On Hillary Campaign Conference Call By Eric Kleefeld - April 7, 2008, 1:25PM

The daily Clinton campaign conference call, usually consisting of the daily slam against Obama followed by a freewheeling Q and A, took an unusual form this morning.

Instead, the call was purely about policy, focusing exclusively on questions about Hillary's new initiative on breast-cancer awareness — perhaps because the campaign is determined not to have to answer any more questions about Mark Penn's departure.

However, Eric left out one major detail, which Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic picked up in his post here below:

Demoted Hillary Clinton strategist Mark Penn may no longer have the coveted title of chief strategist, but he remains a key member of the campaign's senior staff.

Mr. Penn took part on the campaign's morning message call this morning, as usual.

This afternoon, he is also scheduled to be on a call with Clinton and other aides to begin to prepare for Saturday's presidential debate in Philadelphia.

Mr. Penn "is still going to be very much involved," a senior campaign official said.

Indeed, it is not clear precisely what Mr. Penn's title-change entails, other than a public rebuke, although the official said that "there is a difference between being in charge and being one of many voices.

Why was this important detail left out? If Mark Penn is still participating in conference calls, dispensing strategic advice and polling, then he really wasn't kicked off the campaign, was he? He's still in the forefront, it seems, minus a proper campaign official title.

I don't understand why Clinton is proposing to seat Alan Greenspan, and Bob Rubin of Citibank, on a panel to address the subprime mortgage mess.

Alan Greenspan was the one who suggested that Americans buy into subprime mortgages during the period of low interest rates. He's the one that pretty much started this whole subprime mess with his comments below:

"Innovation has brought about a multitude of new products, such as subprime loans and niche credit programs for immigrants. . . . With these advances in technology, lenders have taken advantage of credit-scoring models and other techniques for efficiently extending credit to a broader spectrum of consumers. . . .

Where once more-marginal applicants would simply have been denied credit, lenders are now able to quite efficiently judge the risk posed by individual applicants and to price that risk appropriately. These improvements have led to rapid growth in subprime mortgage lending . . . fostering constructive innovation that is both responsive to market demand and beneficial to consumers." (emphasis added)

-Remarks by Chairman Alan Greenspan on Consumer Finance
At the Federal Reserve System’s Fourth Annual Community Affairs Research Conference, Washington, D.C. April 8, 2005

And Bob Rubin, of Citigroup, is facing the credit crisis as well along with the subprime loan mess. So why put someone with a clear conflict of interest on such a panel? This puts into question Clinton's judgement about people she says would solve problems, when those same people have been complicit in the original problems!

Senator Obama's campaign just released a video of the candidate on Youtube opposing the comments made by Reverend Wright, his former poster. The link to the video is below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7piGy0u43c

Feel free to share this so that it goes viral! Send it out in e-mails, blog postings, and on Facebook, and on digg! as well.

I have to say I've been impressed with how the campaign has reacted to this, first with the HuffingtonPost blog posting, the quickfire media appearances, and now the YouTube video. I don't think McCain did this about Vickie Iseman.