Joe Lieberman: “I Personally Checked John McCain’s Bearings”: “I just want to report that this morning I personally checked John McCain’s bearings. He has not lost any of them. They are all in really great shape.”

I’m not even going to comment on this one.

Sen. Clinton and the Campaign - New York Times: “Yes, there is a pattern — a familiar and unpleasant one. It is up to Mrs. Clinton to change it if she hopes to have any shot at winning the nomination or preserving her integrity and her influence if she loses.”

It goes straight to a fundraising form. For reals.

Back in college, I was a big fan of a band called “Cause and Effect.” They were reminiscent of Depeche Mode, but had a slightly different sound which mutated after one of their two members died of an asthma attack. When they regrouped as a trio and released a second album, the first single was a track called “It’s Over Now”.

“I guess it’s over now
I think we’ve reached the end”

That song came to mind after yesterday’s Democratic primary results emerged. I expected (and predicted) that Clinton would win Indiana while Obama would triumph in North Carolina, but this so called “split decision” was nothing of the sort. It was an Obama victory, pure and simple. After trimming Clinton’s margin to 2 percentage points in Indiana while hoisting the trophy of a 14-point North Carolina victory, Obama’s speech felt like a victory speech. Even after a few minutes, one fact became evident.

Obama’s back.

This was not the tip-toeing, cautious, defensive Obama of the past several weeks when he was dogged by Reverend Wright’s damaging speeches. This was the confident, assertive Obama of “Houston, I think we’ve achieved liftoff” of the post-Wisconson era.

What happened? Clinton NEEDED a decisive victory last night to stay competitive by any stretch of the imagination (in reality. let’s face it, it’s been a long shot for some time now). She needed to chip away at Obama’s lead. It didn’t happen. Will she bow out? Probably not. Why should she? Even if there’s the slimmest of chances that some disaster could befall Obama, why drop out? Look, even Ron Paul is still in the race.

Staying in keeps Clinton in the national spotlight, even if it’s at the edge of the spotlight. The spotlight is where you have to be to succeed in politics, and Clinton has still got plenty of time to build her career in the Senate (and even to plan a future White House run). She can keep pressure on her to drop out to a minimum by cutting down the anti-Obama rhetoric. There’s less pressure now that the hope of victory appears to have slipped completely out of reach.

It’s over now. And it’s all right with me.

Barack Obama today dealt his rival Hillary Clinton a devastating blow with a decisive win in the critical territory of Guam. This territory is thought of by many as a political bellwether and was seen as a “must win” for Clinton. With a final vote tally of 2264 to 2257, Obama not only won, but did so with an impressive 7-vote margin. Many political pundits, as well as superdelgates, were watching this race closely. The results do not spell good news for Clinton’s flagging campaign, which clung to a recent victory in Pennsylvania in an attempt to reenergize. Had she been able to keep Obama’s margin within 1-2 votes, she might have been able to stem the now-expected tide of superdelegates to Obama’s camp. Her only hope now is to cling to an expected victory in Indiana’s upcoming primary as evidence that her campaign still has some credibility. For many Democratic Party insiders, however, this will likely be too little, too late.

This has been a tough few weeks for Barack Obama. Having seeming weathered the initial storm of the (in my opinion overblown) Wright controversy, he got himself into trouble with his “What’s the Matter With Kansas” inspired comments about rural voters. He was put off balance by guilt-by-association style questioning at the recent Democratic debate. His Pennsylvania loss, despite being widely predicted for weeks to months, bolstered Clinton support and fueled her questioning of his candidacy. The balance of press coverage has tipped in her favor. Superdelegates and donors allke are helping to keep her campaign afloat. News from his side has been almost non existent.

Despite all this, Obama is still decisively in the lead with respect to delegates and will almost certainly lock up the nomination. To do so by laying low and waiting out the clock, however, would be a big mistake. Obama needs to come back fighting. A tepid victory marked by a string of losses is not going to look good, and will not inspire Democrats to rally around their candidate.

Obama needs to start making strong stances and set out his vision for the country. He needs to increase visibility and promote his personal brand. This election is about more than winning by technically gaining a few more delegates than your opponent. He seems to finally be getting this message with increased visibility of his less serious side on the basketball court and, more importantly, with a firm split from Wright after it became clear that Wright was in not looking out for anything but his own image.

Some damage is already done and I don’t see much hope of a victory in Indiana, but there is still time to reenergize his campaign for a strong finish.

Today’s primary in Pennsylvania strikes me as rather unexciting. There are a few options:

a) A single digit win for Clinton
b) A double digit win for Clinton
c) A win of any sort for Obama.

Many are predicting outcome a, which really doesn’t change much in the election. There will be more pressure for Clinton to drop out with a small victory, but ultimately her campaign will treat this as a victory and the battle will continue on.

Outcome b will give Clinton’s campaign a boost, but still is unlikely to change the outcome of the future races and, ultimately, the nomination.

The only significant outcome would be option c, but polls are suggesting this will be highly unlikely. The only place polls completely missed the winner was in New Hampshire, but that appears to have been an outlier. Generally, Clinton has done slightly better than predicted by the polls, most likely because “undecided” voters tend to go with Clinton, probably because she is better known and thus considered “safer”.

I predict a 10-point victory for Clinton, and she may even creep into the low double-digits. We’ll see tonight.

I can’t believe I lost two hours of my life watching that debate. Nearly an hour of questions rehashing the nonsense that’s been passing for news in the election. I learned nothing about the candidates and watched both fumble around with uncomfortable questions about people not involved in this election.

The second half was a little more reasonable, though still embarrassing for ABC. Gibson was the most outrageous, sounding like a panicked stockbroker when grilling the candidates on whether they were going to raise capital gains taxes. Stephanopolous didn’t seem to have much to contribute either.

Both Obama and Clinton had a fairly rough time, with Obama facing numerous questions about various people who had some sort of association with him (some more than others) and Clinton essentially having to admit she flat out lied about what happened in Bosnia.

Clinton did seem better prepared, however. Her answers were firm and confident, while Obama was clearly shaken from the first hour.

Overall, not a productive use of the time. Maybe there’s only so much more to add if you’ve already had 20 debates. We’ve past the point of diminishing returns.

Remember when, before the New Hampshire primary, Hillary was asked, “How do you do it? How do you keep going?” CNN may have the answer…

Daily Kos: Five Ways Clinton Leads Obama: “Hilllary Clinton has won New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, and New York.  By contrast, Obama has failed to win a single state with the word ‘New’ in its name.  Obama’s failure among self-proclaimed new states, raises serious questions about his supposed strength among young voters (new people) and his supposed message of change (new policies).”

Maybe I should reconsider my support of Obama…this is a metric that carries a lot of weight. Pay attention, superdelegates!