Caroline Kennedy made her interest in filling Hillary Clinton's senate seat official this week. While her uncle Teddy is keen on the idea, the dynastic nature of her bid has provoked a resounding backlash in the blogosphere. Among the anti-Caroline offensives being mounted online is this: Caroline Kennedy is less qualified for the Senate than Sarah Palin was for the White House.

Ouch, that's gotta hurt. But is it true?

After confessing, “I’d never thought I'd write this sentence,” Noam Scheiber of the New Republic goes out a limb, asserting, “Palin is vastly more qualified than Kennedy,” even considering the higher office Palin sought. Rod Dreher of the Crunchy Con blog seconds Scheiber's thoughts, adding that “anyone endorsing the Camelot princess for the US Senate owes Sarah Palin a huge apology.”

In a back-and-forth with the ladies of Slate's XX Factor blog, Emily Yoffe takes a different angle on the same point: “However ill-prepared Palin was for the vice presidency, she was chosen because she got elected governor of Alaska. And she did that without money, connections, or a famous name.” Yoffe argues that Kennedy’s appointment would reinforce the have and have-not dichotomy that rules our society. Many have-nots “think there's no point making an effort because everything is already wired for the haves,” writes Yoffe. Kennedy's appointment could help fortify that barrier to upward mobility.

Kennedy’s defenders in the Caroline vs. Sarah debate are likely to make an argument similar to this one by commenter elaine1, posted in response to a Politico story: “Don't compare Caroline Kennedy to Sarah Palin. Caroline is intelligent, savvy, and dignified.” Also standing up for Kennedy is Bernie Quigley on The Hill’s Pundits blog, who contends that Kennedy has shown “true and natural leadership” and that her experience as a mother, lawyer, and philanthropist “is the kind of varied experience the Senate calls for.”

If Kennedy does score the appointment, it won't be just because she has a famous name, but because her particular famous name is one Americans have a uniquely persistent, romantic fascination with. Ruth Marcus, in a recent column for the Washington Post, effusively (and without a hint of irony) sums up that sentiment: "[W]hat a fitting coda to this modern fairy tale to have the little princess grow up to be a senator."

Soon after Barack Obama’s election, women’s groups voiced concerns that prominent cabinet and advisory appointments would, as usual, go mostly to men. But the announcements of Obama’s national security and foreign policy teams have put at least some of those fears to rest.

As A.J. Rossmiller points out in a recent essay for the New Republic, Obama’s choice of Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State, Janet Napolitano to head the Department of Homeland Security, and Susan Rice as ambassador to the U.N. represent important gains for women in policy areas traditionally dominated by men.

Just how shut out of these jobs have women been? Very. According to Rossmiller, “in the 318 total years those positions have been occupied, women have held them for 16.” If Michele Flournoy joins the administration as Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, as has been speculated, these four women can match that threshold in a single term, he adds.

Even more noteworthy, says Rossmiller, is that these appointments have been welcomed “by a collective public yawn”:

Government positions dealing with war-fighting, tough negotiations, and security have for too long been off limits to women, due to prejudice and stereotypes, as well as structural impediments such as military restrictions against women serving in combat positions, a common path for upward mobility in these fields. But despite these long-lasting barriers, no one now questions the toughness or capabilities of these women.

In perhaps another sign of the times, the appointments of Clinton, Napolitano, and Rice were made soon after Ann Dunwoody became the first woman to achieve the rank of four-star general in the U.S. Army. 

Who says the fashion choices of male politicians never turn heads? Barack Obama’s ensemble caught the attention of Politico 44 today, which notes that the tie he wore to introduce his national security team looked remarkably like the one he wore on election night:

It would seem that particular piece of clothing might qualify for the Smithsonian some day, and so would get the wedding dress treatment — you know, stored away and preserved, tucked into a display case, stashed in Obama’s box of memorabilia, which is probably a little crowded by now.

Then again, maybe the president-elect is thinking practically in these tough economic times, and thought such an auspicious tie deserved an instant replay.

Hillary Clinton’s outfit, however, received no commentary. She was spared, at least for today.

We've now spent a good deal of time (that we can never get back) evaluating the ties and have decided that, though they appear quite similar, they are in fact not the same. Fashion police can now retreat. The evidence is below.

Here's Obama on election night:

And here he is announcing his national security team:

By the time Tina Fey emerged onto the cultural landscape in 2000 as an anchor on Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update” segment, the Second City alum was already the show’s head writer, quietly shepherding the comedy institution into its late-'90s renaissance and noticeably improving its ratio of funny-to-bad sketches.

Her star continued to rise with the razor-sharp satirical sitcom 30 Rock, which premiered in 2006 and solidified her status as the embodiment of geek chic in an entertainment climate where brainy, funny women are tragically undervalued. Fey has carved out a career in which she accomplishes the seemingly impossible feat of injecting savvy cultural and political commentary into mass entertainment, with her cerebral, rapid-fire monologues on “Update” and then with the surprisingly subversive 30 Rock.

But no one could have predicted Fey’s next act until August 29 of this year, when John McCain announced Sarah Palin as his running mate. The world pounced on the striking similarity between Fey and the VP candidate, and Fey didn’t disappoint. She has returned to Saturday Night Live to lampoon the candidate’s disastrous interviews with Katie Couric and her debate against Joe Biden, and delivered a speech with Hillary Clinton as played by longtime collaborator Amy Poehler. For her part, Palin has joked about honing her own Tina Fey impression, telling reporters she dressed as Fey for Halloween. (When? Last year?)

This week, Fey signed a multimillion-dollar book deal for a collection of humorous essays in the vein of Woody Allen and Nora Ephron. She appears undaunted by relative missteps like the box-office flop Baby Mama or her shilling for American Express, and now wields enormous cultural influence—as writer, performer, and human barometer of that uniquely American nexus of politics and entertainment.

Fey doesn’t necessarily relish her newfound cultural clout, however. As successful as her Sarah Palin gig has been, Fey hopes it doesn’t last long: “I want to be done playing this lady November 5,” she said backstage at this year’s Emmys. “So if anyone could help me be done playing this lady November 5, that would be good for me.”

We’ll do our best, Tina.

Image by David Shankbone, licensed by Creative Commons.

After days, weeks, months of fretting about how to keep Bill Clinton’s mouth shut, the former president showed last night what he can do when unleashed.

Bill has been credited with sinking his wife’s campaign and then, fueled by bitterness, turning his sights to Obama. None of that was on stage last night. He not only delivered the most clear-eyed analysis of why Americans should vote with the Democratic Party, he explained why they should vote for Barack Obama (a distinction not made by his wife a day earlier). Beyond that, he showed why he can be a campaign asset: He’s a scary smart diagnostician of the country’s woes and what’s needed to heal them.

Andrew Sullivan, who’s more than upfront about his “personal disdain” for the man, had this to say about the speech:

Tonight, I think, was one of the best speeches he has ever given. It was a direct, personal and powerful endorsement of Obama. But much, much more than that: it was a statesman-like assessment of where this country is and how desperately it needs a real change toward reform and retrenchment at home and restoration of diplomacy, wisdom and prudence abroad.

It was a night of redemption for more than just Bill, though. Senator John Kerry, the Dems’ 2004 loser, rallied to his moment.

There’s a lot of blogster buzz about how the networks cut away from Kerry’s speech to, as TPM’s Josh Marshall puts it, “feature their yakkers.” (One word: C-SPAN.) Kerry’s speech is indeed worth revisiting for anyone who missed it. It got off to a wobbly start, but eventually took off. The highlight is a Jon Stewartesque debate Kerry recreates between Senator McCain and Candidate McCain.

I have known and been friends with John McCain for almost 22 years. But every day now I learn something new about candidate McCain. To those who still believe in the myth of a maverick instead of the reality of a politician, I say, let’s compare Senator McCain to candidate McCain.

Candidate McCain now supports the very wartime tax cuts that Senator McCain once called irresponsible. Candidate McCain criticizes Senator McCain’s own climate change bill. Candidate McCain says he would vote against the immigration bill that Senator McCain wrote. Are you kidding me folks? Talk about being for it before you’re against it.

Let me tell you, before he ever debates Barack Obama, John McCain should finish the debate with himself. And what’s more, Senator McCain, who once railed against the smears of Karl Rove when he was the target, has morphed into candidate McCain who is using the same “Rove” tactics, the same “Rove” staff, the same old politics of fear and smear. Well, not this year, not this time. The Rove-McCain tactics are old and outworn, and America will reject them in 2008.

Watch Kerry's speech:

And Clinton's, too:

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here. 

In last night’s speech at the Democratic National Convention, Hillary Clinton said: “Those are the reasons I ran for president. Those are the reasons I support Barack Obama for president.” 

Steve Kornacki  reports for the New York Observer that the line was supposed to read: “Those are the reasons I ran for president. Those are the reasons I support Barack Obama. And those are the reasons you should too.”

Two commenters on the New York Observer site were not amused. One anonymous poster said, “Christ, people—she told people like twenty times to vote for Barack Obama! Stop continuing this ridiculous rift story.”

What do you think? Is it time to move beyond the subversive Clinton story? Or are you waiting for Bill’s speech tonight?

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

Hillary Clinton did her duty last night. She threw her support behind Barack Obama and delivered the requisite sound bites. There was “No way. No how. No McCain.” And a favorite here in Minnesota, “It makes sense that George Bush and John McCain will be together next week in the Twin Cities, because these days, they’re awfully hard to tell apart.”

What she didn’t do was say much about Obama’s platform, leadership abilities, or vision. In a 23-minute speech, Obama the candidate (versus Obama “the Democrat who is not me”) got about 3 minutes of time—and that's a generous tally. For a speech that’s drawn most of the convention’s limelight, that’s a big void. It was evident, as the New York Times reports, that Obama’s team had little input in its writing.

We could see more of the same tonight, when Bill takes the stage. We’ll definitely hear about Hillary. But given reports of Bill’s bruised ego and his lust for recognition of his accomplishments in office, we could get not only a primaries flashback, but a ’90s flashback, too. Here’s hoping he saves some room in his speech for the nominee.

Watch Hillary’s speech:

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

UPDATE (8/27/2008, 5:00 p.m.): My colleague Elizabeth Ryan points me to some choice analysis by Anne Taylor Fleming at the Washington Independent:

Yes, she endorsed Obama—mentioning him at least a dozen times. But what she endorsed was the candidate — not the man. He had no flesh on him. He was the Democratic candidate, and that was enough for her.

There was no talk of Obama’s passions, his career, their shared goals and ideals. Of course, she reaffirmed the big “D” democratic values. We’re for the forgotten, the working class not the upper class. We’re for energy independence and a restitution of the respect America used to garner around the world, so squandered in the last eight years. We’re for health care and hope and change. That’s why I ran, she said—underscore “I.” She never said that’s why Barack Obama is running. It was a passionate but strangely impersonal—almost totally impersonal —endorsement.

Hillary had the unenviable task of forging unity last night, but Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer delivered the near impossible: A rousing speech on energy policy that had folks hootin’ and hollerin’. 

Schweitzer hammered home the key principles that Democrats need to keep drilling into voters’ heads until November. First, there are several energy avenues that don’t wreck the planet and don’t rely on “petro-dictators.” Second, all those avenues lead to American jobs that can’t be outsourced. 

We need to break America's addiction to foreign oil. We need a new energy system that is clean and green and American-made. We need a president who can marshal our nation's resources, get the job done, and deliver the change we need.

That leader is Barack Obama. [Crowd shouts Obama’s name.] Yeah, that’s what I like to hear. Barack Obama knows there's no single platform for energy independence. It's not a question of either wind or clean coal, solar or hydrogen, oil or geothermal. We need ’em all to create a strong American energy system, a system built on American innovation.

After eight years of a White House waiting hand and foot on big oil, John McCain offers more of the same. At a time of skyrocketing fuel prices, when American families are struggling to keep their gas tanks full, John McCain voted 25 times against renewable and alternative energy. Against biofuels. Against solar energy. He even voted against the wind energy.

This not only hurts America's energy independence, it could cost American families more than a hundred thousand jobs. At a time when America should be working harder than ever to develop new, clean sources of energy, John McCain wants more of the same. [Boos.] Wait till you hear this: And he has taken more than a million dollars in campaign donations from the oil and gas industry. [Boos.] Woah. Now he wants to give those same oil companies another 4 billion dollars in tax breaks. [Boos.] Four billion in tax breaks for big oil?

That's a lot of change, but it's not the change that we need.

Watch the video:

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

Twitter isn't the only new website that's changing the party conventions. This week’s gala also has the distinction of being the first Demcoratic National Convention of the YouTube era. Throngs of delegates, protestors, and journalists (professional or otherwise), armed with video cameras, are descending on Denver and swarming the Pepsi Center in hopes of capturing a politician’s gaffe, a protestor’s stunt, or a police officer’s unwarranted action.

The footage is already piling up: There's a Fox News crew accosted by angry protestors, a clash between anti- and pro-abortion rights advocates, and disgruntled protestors being corralled by police (though the inclusion of the word “RIOT” in the clip’s title might be overselling the scuffle). There’s also an interview with Hillary Clinton supporters—not quite as formidable as the media would have us believe—reasoning that their candidate still has a chance of clinching the nomination.

Inside the convention itself, small gatherings and speeches that might get passed over by national networks are being captured by the video sharing site. These include a standout speech by Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) at a breakfast meeting. Also inside the walls of the convention center, a video meme is growing in strength as conventioneers shoot “I Nominate Barack Obama Because…” clips at the YouTube booth in the lobby. 

For busy people who missed the live television broadcasts, YouTube is also a good place to find clips from network coverage of the convention, such as Ted Kennedy’s opening-night speech. Though interested viewers should watch these clips now, since they clearly violate copyright laws.

Image courtesy of jonsson, licensed by Creative Commons.

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

Thanks to the Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson for putting all the oppressive Democratic hand-wringing in perspective this morning:

Since I landed here Saturday night, though, I haven't heard a lot of Democrats crowing about the terrible whuppin' they're about to administer. I've heard predictions of victory, yes, but also a lot of questions. Will Hillary Clinton's die-hard supporters refuse to lay down their arms, even if their champion begs them to? Will an unreconciled Bill Clinton steal the show? Will Obama's acceptance speech at Invesco Field be so stirring and poetic that the Republicans will slam him again for excessive eloquence?

In other words: Are Hillary Clinton's followers, many of whom care deeply about women's issues, ready to accept a Supreme Court majority that would do away with Roe v. Wade, which John McCain would surely deliver? Has Bill Clinton forgotten everything he ever learned about politics and forsaken his lifelong loyalty to the Democratic Party? Would Obama be wise to effectively renounce the use of his great oratorical gifts, which constitute one of his most powerful and effective weapons?

All these questions are just excuses to fret. Unlike Republicans, Democrats like to obsess about what could go wrong. It's kind of a partisan hobby. 

The trick this election, Robinson says (paraphrasing Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell), is to "quit whining about it and just go out and win "

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

Ahh, prepackaged conventions. What’s the media to do? How about rehash the primaries? Hence, we have the Hillary Clinton narrative that just won’t die: The party’s divided, delegates are going to spoil the convention, chaos will reign (cross your fingers).

The Columbia Journalism Review’s Campaign Desk smacked down the tired media meme last week. Choice moment:

[T]he angry-women-will-sink-Obama myth is yet another example of the media confusing activist opinion with public opinion in general. And public opinion generally defies such a simple—if dramatic—storyline.

But the media’s not the only one dumping gasoline on a dying fire. There’s also the McCain camp, which just released this ad:

Kevin Drum, newly blogging for Mother Jones, surmises that “the folks running McCain’s war room are getting cabin fever or something.” But that could be a good thing:

Maybe an attack ad this transparent will be just the thing to finally get all those ex-Hillary supporters fully on board with Obama.

Drum points to some savvy analysis by Jonathan Cohn at the New Republic, who notes that despite all the hand-wringing about party unity, the Democrats are remarkably in step with each other:

[F]or all the talk of disunity, the really remarkable story about the Democrats right now is the absence of meaningful dissent on the party's agenda. When it comes to substance, the Democrats are arguably more united than they have been since the early 1960s. Yes, you can find divisions on both domestic and foreign policy, on everything from the relative priority of deficit reduction to America's response to Darfur. But these debates don't match the kind we've seen in the past.

For her part, Hillary had this to say about McCain’s ad blasts this morning at a breakfast for the New York delegation: “I’m Hillary Clinton, and I do not approve that message.”

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

Little “real news” is expected to come out of Denver and St. Paul, and any potential drama—from unhappy Clinton loyalists, for instance—is being carefully planned for.

But this wasn’t always the case. Detailing the events of the 1948 Democratic National Convention for the Huffington Post, Chris Weigant writes, “The Democratic National Convention back then did have dramatic events showing the party not just divided, but actually splintering into factions and birthing a new (but, thankfully, short-lived) third party as a result. All this from the convention floor itself.”

Looking further back, the Atlantic offers up historic convention perspectives from its archives dating to 1884. Articles covering the 1884, 1936, 1968, and 1980 conventions trace the impact of radio and television, analyze the shortcomings of the process, and provide an interesting look at the road to the modern convention.

The story of that modern convention is really a “tale-of-two-conventions,” according to Andrew Ferguson of the Weekly Standard. Ferguson writes, “As the party conventions grow wan and meaningless, drained of all surprise and news value and practical importance, they have been kept alive by the second convention, the journalists’ convention, which in contrast grows larger, more elaborate, and more robust every four years.” (Thanks, Harper's.)

For more of Utne.com’s ongoing coverage of the Democratic National Convention, click here.

No surprise here: A report by Media Matters for America found that Maureen Dowd has “frequently characterized” the 2008 Democratic presidential candidates “using gendered language, specifically characterizing Clinton as masculine, and Obama and Edwards as feminine.”

For those of us who preserve our sanity by avoiding her column altogether, the report serves as a helpful reminder to continue doing so.

(Thanks, Bookforum.)

What’s next for Hillary? The blogosphere speculates:

Ben Smith over at Politico lays out the fallout from last night’s historic primary finale in broad strokes:

Clinton is the strongest runner-up in the history of Democratic politics, a status that gives her an unusual amount of leverage on her rival, Barack Obama. But she’s also hemmed in by the reality that to be seen as a half-hearted campaigner for Obama, or worse, as causing his defeat, would be political suicide.

She especially needs help restoring support from an African-American community that had been her base – assistance that can only come from Obama’s fulsome embrace. She could use Obama’s help raising money to retire her debts, something she signaled with an aggressive online appeal for cash last night. Her supporters assume she has earned the prime speaking slot at the Democratic National Convention that Obama can bestow.

Those around her say that beyond the mundane negotiating points – a half hour in Denver, help raising money – there is a more personal, less tangible demand that she be accorded the respect she feels she earned in an historic bid that brought her closer to the nomination than any other second-place Democratic finisher.

TPM Election Central has a handy little round-up charting which players are saying what about the VP question. As for Hillary’s non-VP options, Andrew Sullivan at the Daily Dish puts his money on a health czar–type position:

My bet: The presumptive nominee will publicly offer Senator Clinton the lead role in his administration for healthcare reform. He may have to doll up the title to make it appear grander than HHS but some kind of cabinet level health czar position might work. Her fallback position is to offer to spearhead the legislation in the Senate - why not name the bill after her? - and campaign on this subject for the ticket through the fall. Offering her healthcare may be too petty for her privately; but that's why it calls her bluff on the whole "I'm-just-doing-it-for-the-little-people" schtick. How can she be seen to treat healthcare reform as an insult to her stature? If it's her cause celebre, how can it be beneath her?

Fantasy Team Of Rivals time: Clinton gets healthcare; Edwards gets poverty; Gore gets the environment; the other Clinton is made secretary of state.

He can offer, can't he?

And here’s David Corn at MoJoBlog:

It could well be that party leaders--out of kindness, respect, and worry (over whether her supporters will eventually swing behind Obama)--afford Clinton a few days to process her defeat. After all, this historic race was damn close, as so few nomination contests are. But this is politics, not therapy. So the grace period won't be long.

Understandably, the Senator from New York who almost became the first woman to win a major party's presidential nomination has put off this decision for as long as she could. And her performance in the final weeks of the campaign has strengthened her future presidential prospects. Should Obama lose to McCain, Clinton and her supporters could use these late-contest wins to bolster an I-told-you-so argument that would come in handy for the 2012 campaign. But if she does not play nice soon, she puts her future within the party at great risk.

As for myself, I’m having a tough time even conceiving of Hillary as the VP nominee. My thoughts are too clouded by resentments at all the underhanded and potentially damaging jabs she’s thrown at Obama and all the political maneuvering she and her surrogates are orchestrating right now. I do think, though, that it’s important to take a step back and consider the plain question of whether or not she’d be a good vice president. You wouldn’t know it from her campaign, but way back before Election ’08 got rolling, the woman was well respected for her expert maneuvering in the Senate, how she nurtured people’s trust, built consensus, and crafted meaningful legislation. And Bosnia trip or no, she does have important foreign policy experience and knowledge. Call me naïve, but I think it would be interesting to have a conversation not about what her candidacy as vice president would mean politically, but what it would mean qualitatively. 

Image by  Nrbelex , licensed under  Creative Commons . 

Over at Politico, Daniel Libit has assembled a guide to “undisciplined messaging,” the new buzzword for verbal gaffes by the three main presidential contenders. Throughout this year’s seemingly interminable race to the White House, every aside and impromptu remark by the candidates has been pounced upon, dissected by the media with unprecedented scrutiny, and exploded into non-issues that dominate the news cycle, often to the exclusion of any substantive discussion about more important issues like, say, the war in Iraq or the ailing economy. Libit takes us on a tour of this election cycle’s undisciplined messages, from Hillary Clinton’s strange assassination remark to Barack Obama’s offhand “sweetie” to various comments by staffers and surrogates, considering whether each example betrays a more sinister undercurrent of racism or sexism, or is simply a bizarre off-message excursion.

Image by aussiegall, licensed under Creative Commons. 

The buzzer hit 7:30, the networks called North Carolina for Barack Obama, and the racial rhapsodizing began. 

FOX predictably buzzed about Obama’s weaker showing among whites, compared to Hillary Clinton’s, and his windfall backing from blacks. Not-so-subliminal message on repeat: Can this guy really win whites?  

Over at CNN, demographic hashing similarly swirled. Thanks, then, to Jeffrey Toobin for pointing out the obvious: Obama couldn’t have won North Carolina without white support (some 36 percent, according to exit polls). Then he offered a crucial reminder that seems to have vanished amidst the Wright wrangling: That’s how Democrats win in the South, with a slice of white voters and the bulk of black ones.  

Forget the hand-wringing over whether half of Hillary voters will abandon the Democrats if their gal isn’t topping the ticket. (Those sentiments, gauged as they are in the heat of primary battles, are next to meaningless.) After eight years of Bush, that many of those Democrats aren’t going to vote for a Republican out of spite, let alone one who wants to perpetuate war in Iraq, roll back abortion rights, and take the court farther to the edge of right than it already is. The question is: Will those issues be pressing enough to convince black voters to go to the polls after watching the party they’ve been unceasingly loyal to snatch away the opportunity for the first African American to become president.  

Here’s Michael C. Dawson, political science professor at the University of Chicago, over at the Root: 

Should that happen, the Democratic Party will face the Herculean task of trying to mobilize its most loyal constituency—black voters—in the face of deep and widespread black bitterness and active campaigns in the black community encouraging black voters to defect or abstain. You can already hear the angry comparisons. Just like in 2000, the protests will go, an election will have been "stolen." But this time from within the party! Malcolm X's quote about how the rules are changed when blacks start to succeed will also, I bet, be prominently displayed.  

And here’s a piece from McClatchy last week: 

African-Americans have been the Democratic Party's most reliable bloc, giving about 90 percent of their votes to former Vice President Al Gore and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., in the last two presidential elections.

In a close election this year, an African-American exodus from the voting booth could be costly to Democrats, particularly in the South, where blacks are a large proportion of the electorate.

If Obama isn't the nominee, "there would be a significant number of African-Americans who would stay home. They're not voting for (presumptive Republican nominee) John McCain," predicted David Bositis, a senior analyst at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, which researches black voting trends.

Now that North Carolina and Indiana are over, we’ll move quickly to West Virginia and Kentucky, where Clinton promises to soldier on and rack up white-bolstered, lopsided victories. It’s likely that, despite the predominating wisdom that the nomination race is nigh over, we’ll be subjected to more demographic splicing. It’s time to simply acknowledge that both candidates have their demographic battles and bulwarks, and to move onto wrapping things up by nominating the person who’d be the better president.

Posted 2/25/2008
Updated 2/26/2008

On Friday, I peeked beneath the sheets of the New York Times’ love affair with Hillary Clinton. This weekend, the gray lady took it up a notch.

Let’s compare the Sunday headlines:

A1: “Somber Clinton Soldiers On as the Horizon Darkens” [illustrated by gigantic presidentially stoic image of Clinton soldiering on]

Inside, on the jump: “On Center Stage, a Candidate Letting His Confidence Show” [illustrated by said candidate smiling while leaving the stage at a press conference]

Reporter Michael Powell diagnoses the sinister truth behind Obama’s smile:

A touch of cockiness is discernable in his manner now; he is like a gambler convinced his every dice roll will come up double sixes.

Then, like a jilted reporter, Powell goes on to call Obama an “elusive starlet” and—no kidding—“a tease” when it comes to spending quality time with the press.

Meanwhile, reporter Patrick Healy warns readers/voters that the Clinton campaign has got the blues. Some staffers have even taken to turning off their Blackberrys after 9 p.m. and hitting the bottle (Why, oh why, weren’t they getting sauced before? $1,200 on donuts, but no booze? Talk about campaign strategy problems.)

Despite it all, Healy reassures, Hillary’s hanging in there:

Mrs. Clinton has, though, increasingly sought to keep her fate in perspective. In her debate in Texas on Thursday with Mr. Obama, she delivered what some viewers saw as a valedictory—but what she said was a simple expression from the heart—when she spoke warmly about the race and her rival.

“I am honored to be here with Barack Obama. I am absolutely honored,” she said. “And you know, whatever happens, we’re going to be fine.”

Though the campaign has since changed its tune, the piece signs off with some loving lines from Clinton’s recently fired campaign manager, Patti Solis Doyle:

“Hillary is incredibly tough—she grew up with two brothers and a strong father in the Midwest, so she knows a challenge... She has gone through so much, where someone like me would hide under the covers. But she gets up. She works. She tries.”

She attacks.

—Hannah Lobel

UPDATE: Though I’d say Healy’s story read like a rallying warning to Hillary supporters, her people disagree. And, according to the Huffington Post, they’re peeved that the paper won’t print a letter of objection from supporters—what editorial page editor Andy Rosenthal rightly calls a “press release.”

Beware the passion of the hometown newspaper. It can seep from an editorial-page endorsement into news coverage, transforming campaign reporting into spin-infested idolatry. Such is the case with the New York Times, whose news pages of late have been stamped with Hillary-approved storylines and sources.

The most egregious case in point was a front-page feature on February 9 that, in essence, whined that Barack Obama had trumped up his drug use:

Mr. Obama’s account of his younger self and drugs, though, significantly differs from the recollections of others who do not recall his drug use. That could suggest he was so private about his usage that few people were aware of it, that the memories of those who knew him decades ago are fuzzy or rosier out of a desire to protect him, or that he added some writerly touches in his memoir to make the challenges he overcame seem more dramatic.

Reporter Serge F. Kovaleski chooses door number three, smoking out old college and high school acquaintances who didn’t remember Obama as much of a party animal. Then he dissects Obama’s drug use (which Kovaleski acknowledges takes up 1½ pages of a 442-page book):   

Mr. Obama wrote that he would get high to help numb the confusion he felt about himself. “Junkie. Pothead. That’s where I’d been headed: the final, fatal role of the young would-be black man,” he penned in the memoir.

But, Kovaleski implies, there was really no such risk. Just listen to Obama’s old prep-school pal, Keith Kakugawa, who recollects: “As far as pot, booze, or coke being a prevalent part of his life, I doubt it.” (See, no chance of slipping down an ill-fated path. And what has Kakugawa been up to since those days? Well, Kovaleski reports, he “spent seven years in and out of prison for drug offenses beginning in 1996.”)

One can only imagine what the media line would have been had Obama not fessed up early in his ambitious career. Doesn’t he know he’s supposed to leave that stuff hidden, so enterprising reporters in dire need of scoops can uncover it?

The New York Times’ tack here is reminiscent of its efforts to jump on the memoir-debunking bandwagon in 2006. Inspired by the James Frey pile-on that followed revelations about the fictive liberties the author took in his one-time memoir, A Million Little Pieces, the paper’s arts section aired idiotic concerns about the importance of factual errors that were corrected in the new translation of Elie Wiesel’s Holocaust memoir Night:

In the previous translation, published in 1960, the narrator tells a fellow prisoner that he is "not quite 15." But the scene takes place in 1944. Mr. Wiesel, born on Sept. 30, 1928, would have already been 15, going on 16. In the new edition, when asked his age, he replies, "15."

Gotcha!

The anti-Obama bias has seeped into other coverage as well. (Though there have been some valiant and nasty efforts among the paper’s columnists to counterbalance.) Take the lead story in the February 17 “Week in Review.” Veteran campaign-trail reporter Kate Zernike examines the perks and pitfalls of the “charismatic leader,” recruiting various historians to parse the Obama phenomenon. Eventually, she elicits this zinger:

“What is troubling about the [Obama] campaign is that it’s gone beyond hope and change to redemption . . . It’s posing as a figure who is the one person who will redeem our politics. And what I fear is, that ends up promising more from politics than politics can deliver.”

And who did Zernike tap for this scholarly assessment? Princeton historian Sean Wilentz, who, she parenthetically notes, is “a longtime friend of the Clintons.” Certainly there is a scholar somewhere in this nation’s Ivory Towers who—despite not having Bill and Hillary in their Rolodex—is nevertheless capable of throwing a few swings at Obama. There’s a substantive difference between the biased view of a supporter and the biased view of a friend. Transparency does not good sourcing make.

Now, the list of errant reporting can go on. (And would start with the breathlessly pro-Clinton blogging from reporter Katharine Q. Seelye during the CNN/Univision debate in Texas). But I’ll sign off with a roundup of news outlets’ poll positions that the Columbia Journalism Review’s Campaign Desk blog assembled in the run-up to the Potomac Primaries (to illustrate a different point about the media’s wrong-headed insistence on fortune-telling):

McClatchy: McCain, Obama favored to win Virginia

Agence France-Presse: Ragged Clinton campaign braces for more vote woe

UPI: Poll: Obama, McCain favored in Va., Md.

LA Times: Obama favored in Potomac primaries

Miami Herald: McCain, Obama look strong for ‘Potomac Primary’

Pittsburgh Tribune: Obama favored to sweep next 3 primaries

Wall Street Journal: Today, Sen. Obama is favored to win the “Potomac Primary” in neighboring Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia.

The Hill: Potomac primary losses could spark pressure on Huckabee to withdraw

ABC News’s The Note: Clinton’s gone cold at the wrong time, and she could wake up Wednesday staring at Obama from the other side of the standings.

New York Times: With primaries on Tuesday in Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia, Clinton advisers were pessimistic about her chances, though some held out hope for a surprise performance in Virginia.

That “some” holding out for victory? Clinton’s campaign denizens, donors, and the New York Times.

—Hannah Lobel 

The formula for political scandal is ludicrously simple. Take Individual A, insert in Institution B, add Power C and, sooner or later, out pops a shiny, new, media-ready scandal (simply append the suffix “-gate”). Hillary and Bill Clinton are no strangers to this process; they might well be seen as two of its greatest products. Their latest scandal? They played editor at GQ magazine.

As Politico reported back in September, Bill Clinton threatened not to appear as GQ’s “Man of the Year” if the gentleman’s magazine published a story on internal strife in Hillary Clinton’s campaign. The Times’ Frank Rich referred in passing to this turn of events last fall, but the kicker is that the Atlantic has now published the piece, with updated reporting and even un-timelier timing for the Clintons, who are currently trying to cope with Barack Obama’s winning streak. All in all, it’s a victory for investigative journalism—but let’s not make a “-gate” out of it.   

(Thanks, Columbia Journalism Review.)

—Michael Rowe

Utne Blogs the Iowa Caucuses: Day 2

Barack Obama pulled a few of his key Iowa field organizers up on stage yesterday during a rally in Des Moines, Iowa. He hugged them and thanked them for their hard work. While he was speaking, at least two of the organizers got choked up and started to cry. The tears were likely due to a lack of sleep as much as anything else, but it was a touching moment.

The most notable part of Obama’s speech was how long it was. He spoke for over an hour, without notes. He began by introducing his wife and two children. He moved on to introducing his organizers saying, "They're a good looking bunch, aren't they. They look like a Benetton ad." Then he spoke alone, addressing the challenges facing the country today, and his hope for the future. (You can hear an excerpt from the speech at the bottom of this post.)

And even though he spoke extemporaneously, I had heard most of the speech before. By now, all of the candidates must be nearly out of new material, heading into these final days of the caucus. Much of the crowd, though, was still inspired by his message. I found myself trying to join the crowd in applause at multiple points in the speech, but restrained myself due to the stoic atmosphere of the press gallery.

Throughout the speech, Obama never once mentioned any of his Democratic opponents by name. He did, however, reference Hillary Clinton throughout. In a not-so-subtle swipe at the former first lady, Obama said, “We can’t poll test every opinion.” And, “We need principles, not polls: not calculations, but commitment.” When speaking about his decision not to run negative advertising, he said he resisted the temptation to “pull a Tonya Harding on the frontrunner.” He came close, but not a single Clinton, Edwards, Biden, or Dodd was mentioned by name throughout the speech. Instead, he took shots at the Bush administration, for which he garnered his biggest applause of the day.

—Bennett Gordon

Historical Side Note: The event took place at Roosevelt High School, in Des Moines. The school was the site of the conflict that led to one of the most famous cases in the history of the US Supreme Court: Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District. In the case, the Supreme Court decided that students and teachers don’t “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” It was also the place where my father went to high school.

To hear an excerpt from the speech, click on the arrow below:

 Excerpt from Barack Obama’s speech in Des Moines, Iowa: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

For all the posts from the Iowa Caucuses, read the Utne Politics blog.

Utne Blogs the Iowa Caucuses: Day 1-2

New Years Eve was a night of improvisation for me in Iowa. I arrived in downtown Des Moines at 10 p.m., just in time to see Hillary and Bill Clinton walk out of a party. (I would have posted a photo of Hillary, but they were all blurry.) The two waved and smiled to the loyal supporters who braved the bitter Iowa cold to catch a glimpse of the former president and first lady. I assumed that the action wouldn’t end there, but after the Clintons left, everyone just stood around dumfounded.

I caught up with a journalist from a German radio station and asked her if she knew of any other political events taking place that night. She looked confused and disheartened as she told me that she didn’t. She asked me if I had seen anything interesting today, and I told her that I saw Mike Huckabee get a hair cut. Suddenly her face changed into one of child-like envy. “Oh no,” she said, further disheartened. “I’ve checked the schedule, and no one’s doing anything that interesting anymore.”

Out on the street, camera crews from around the world were searching for people to interview. People exchanged expectant looks, as media correspondents and Iowans tried to figure out who was asking the questions, and who was giving the opinions. By the time I entered the Clinton Party, the room was quickly being deserted. Few people were left beyond a couple of bloggers, and some Clinton loyalists searching for someone to talk to.

After the Clinton party was over, I wandered into a party for the John Edwards campaign. Unfortunatly, John Edwards was not at the party, but it did have an open bar. The actress Madeline Stowe was there, eating appetizers and taking questions. Every few minutes, someone would walk by and ask to have his or her picture taken with her. Stowe was working for Edwards in Iowa, she told me, because she felt “inspired” by both his message and his policies.

Meanwhile, the Edwards Staffers were busy blowing off steam, having a few drinks, searching for someone to kiss at midnight, and singing karaoke. There was a general hesitancy to talk about politics at the party. No one wanted to get quoted saying something stupid, minutes before New Years Eve and days before the caucus. One highlight of the night came around 1 am, a few of the staffers sang a full-throated version of “Total Eclipse of the Heart.” By the time I left the party at 2 a.m., many of the revelers were still going strong.          

—Bennett Gordon

For all the posts from the Iowa Caucuses, read the Utne Politics blog.