The Political Chase

Jeremiah Wright on Bill Moyer’s Journal

For those that are interested and may not know, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama’s former pastor, will be on Bill Moyer’s Journal next week (4/25).

Moyer’s show airs every Friday at 9:00 PM ET where I live, but that probably varies in other locations.

All the news that’s fit to print

What’s that cliche about pictures?

Hillary’s left-wing conspiracy

I’m shocked. Hillary doesn’t like voters. Especially those that are concerned about national security and foreign policy. It must be a left-wing conspiracy

At a small closed-door fundraiser after Super Tuesday, Sen. Hillary Clinton blamed what she called the "activist base" of the Democratic Party — and MoveOn.org in particular — for many of her electoral defeats, saying activists had "flooded" state caucuses and "intimidated" her supporters, according to an audio recording of the event obtained by The Huffington Post.

"Moveon.org endorsed [Sen. Barack Obama] — which is like a gusher of money that never seems to slow down," Clinton said to a meeting of donors. "We have been less successful in caucuses because it brings out the activist base of the Democratic Party. MoveOn didn’t even want us to go into Afghanistan. I mean, that’s what we’re dealing with. And you know they turn out in great numbers. And they are very driven by their view of our positions, and it’s primarily national security and foreign policy that drives them. I don’t agree with them. They know I don’t agree with them. So they flood into these caucuses and dominate them and really intimidate people who actually show up to support me."

But that’s not what Hillary said in the debate Wednesday.

I can see why people would be taken aback and offended by the remarks. And I think what’s important is that we all listen to one another and we respect one another and we understand the different decisions that people make in life, because we’re a stronger country because of that.

Quicksand

Sinking fast.

Despite her campaign’s relentless attacks on Barack Obama’s qualifications and electability, Hillary Clinton has lost a lot of ground with Democratic voters nationwide going into Tuesday’s critical primary in Pennsylvania, a new NEWSWEEK poll shows.

The survey of 1,209 registered voters found that Obama now leads Clinton by nearly 20 points, or 54 percent to 35 percent, among registered Democrats and those who lean Democratic nationwide. The previous Newsweek poll, conducted in March after Clinton’s big primary wins in Ohio and Texas, showed the two Democrats locked in a statistical tie (45 percent for Obama to 44 percent for Clinton). The new poll puts Obama ahead among women as well as men, and voters aged 60 and older as well as younger voters.

One of the more devastating results for Clinton was that a majority of all registered voters now see her as dishonest and untrustworthy. According to the poll, just four in 10 (41 percent) registered voters view the New York senator as honest and trustworthy, while 51 percent think the opposite. This compares with solid majorities of voters who see Obama and McCain as honest and trustworthy (both polled 61 percent).

Duck Dean!

Team Clinton has now started bashing Howard Dean. Since he’s in Hillary’s cross-hairs now, he might want to avoid granting ABC News any interviews until after the nomination is officially decided. That is, if Hillary allows him to remain DNC Chair until then.

He should also consider doing the Google on the Intertubes for anyone he’s ever known or met.

Jake Tapper’s role in Obama-Ayers dust-up

The Boston Globe has a piece today that suggests there was more to ABC’s drilling of Obama on William Ayers than just a conversation between George Stephanopoulos and Sean Hannity. Based on ABC spokesperson Jeffrey Schneider’s statements in the piece, several motives can be spun multiple ways, but regardless of the spin. Jake Tapper is caught up in the mix.

Jeffrey Schneider, a spokesman for ABC News, said the Ayers question arose because it has been in the political ether and addressed by several other news organizations in recent months - and because the network’s own queries to the campaign had yet to yield a comment from Obama….

Among the mainstream reporters looking into the Ayers story, it turned out, was Jake Tapper, ABC’s senior political correspondent. Tapper outlined Ayers’s background in a April 10 blog entry titled "Stormy Weather." He also asked Obama about Ayers on the campaign trail, but didn’t get an answer, Schneider at ABC said.

Hence, Schneider said, the Ayers question was posed in the debate….

Schneider denied any Hannity connection.

Rewind. On April 3, Ace Reporter Jake Tapper indignantly reported he "ran into" Obama in the U.S. Capitol and his "unusually keen sense of smell" detected "cigarette smoke on Obama." Since his civic duty compelled him to inform the public on this very important personal issue, he asked Obama’s campaign if he was smoking and "they denied it." Instead the campaign "insisted" Obama "chewed nicorette."

So, as evidenced by the Tapper’s April 3 piece, he is angry, which is exacerbated by not getting the answers he wants on Ayers.  One week later Tapper publishes his "Stormy Weather" piece, and five days later the whole deal breaks out in the debate before 10+ million people. Sounds like Tapper got the revenge he was seeking and the "political ether" was more ABC’s angry mob than anything else.  Moreover, it gives Schneider plausible deniability to take some of the heat off of Stephanopoulos. It by no means absolves the Stephanopoulos-Hannity connection either.

I don’t know what line of questioning Tapper was pursuing before the Stormy piece, but an argument can be made that Obama might could have defused the situation in advance if he had answered Tapper’s questions earlier. Then again, Obama may have decided it was better to defend himself publicly and turn the whole thing around on ABC.

Whatever the case, the Ayers link is little more than fodder for Clinton and the GOP wingnuts.

SC Gov and top GOP VP contender sways port authority deal to campaign donor

S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford is frequently mentioned as a top candidate for vice president on John McCain’s ticket. Democrats may agree Sanford, who is also a former U.S. Representative, is an ideal running mate for McCain, especially in future debates if ABC News’ journalistic standards become the norm.

Sanford made a big splash on the national scene in 2004 when he carried two pigs, literally, into the state’s capitol to taunt lawmakers over pork-barrel projects. While his pork-barrel antics may be easily dismissed as levity, Sanford may have trouble dodging recent allegations of improperly influencing a property deal between the S.C. Ports Authority and a Sanford donor.

Via The State:

Gov. Mark Sanford tried to persuade the then-chairman of the state’s Ports Authority to sell a piece of coastal property to a Sanford donor instead of another developer who’d submitted a higher bid, according to former S.C. Ports Authority Chairman Bill Stern.

Stern, who was testifying before a Senate committee today as a nominee for another term on the Ports board, told lawmakers Sanford asked him to reconsider Hilton Head developer Jim Chaffin’s bid for port property in Beaufort County appraised at $27 million.

Another developer bid $26 million for the property. Chaffin is a Sanford donor according to a report by the Associated Press. His bid was reportedly much lower.

Carnac the Magnificent

Snark!

This is out of sequence, but…the third paragraph in this excerpt from the Times is almost worth framing. That’s a potent jab and done without making a single negative comment.

Moving on to the remaining two grafs…. I suppose not getting much sleep last night has effected my attitude this morning, but I’m getting rather tired of the prophecies and wisdom about what people purportedly think and will do, when there is no evidence whatsoever to support such claims and assertions. When did Carnac become a member of Team Clinton?

Superdelegates Unswayed by Clinton’s Attacks - New York Times

Clinton advisers acknowledged that they had not seen short-term evidence that their attacks on Mr. Obama were winning over many superdelegates, and they acknowledged that he had picked up more in recent weeks — though she maintained a narrowing overall lead in them. They predicted, however, that the mounting scrutiny of Mr. Obama would lead superdelegates to cool to his candidacy and come to see her as more of a known quantity, battle tested, and shrewd about the best ways to beat the presumptive Republican nominee, Senator John McCain, in the fall.

“When it comes to picking a candidate, automatic delegates don’t want to guess about what lies behind Door No. 2, they want to know,” said Phil Singer, a Clinton spokesman. “The debate raised more questions about Senator Obama than have been answered, and that means that automatic delegates are likely to keep their powder dry as the process moves forward.”

In response, an Obama spokesman, Hari Sevugan, said Thursday: “Since Feb. 5, Senator Obama has garnered the support of 80 superdelegates to Senator Clinton’s 5. We’ll let the results of Senator Clinton’s ‘kitchen sink’ strategy speak for themselves.”

Stephanopoulos lame response

I want to do one update before calling it quits for the night.

George Stephanopoulos gave Greg Sargent several lame excuses for his pathetic performance in the Democratic debate last night, however, I want to focus on one for now.

When I asked him whether asking about Obama’s derelict approach to his flag lapel pin risked making it look like right-wing frames were dictating the line of questioning, Stephanopoulos said:

"Sure, there’s a risk." But he added: "If you look at the fall campaign, there are some clear signals from Senator Obama’s opponents that all of these issues are going to be put together in a general argument. They all go back to that same theme."

It doesn’t get much clearer than that. Stephanopoulos admitted, in essence, there was no journalistic integrity associated with the questions asked. Instead, it was talking points developed by Hillary and wingnuts like Sean Hannity.

That’s a problem, but it’s just part of a much larger problem — the media. I’ve spent several hours digging into the media machine — trying to better understand what is behind events like last night and more importantly, what promotes the endless news cycles filled with trash like Bittergate and the Wright controversy.

I need to pull a few things together before I can actually post what I have found at this point. Therefore, I’ll be posting more on the bigger picture tomorrow.