Andrew Rice

Hillary Clinton got a temporary boost out of Pennsylvania last night, and today, her surrogates are likely to be arguing to superdelegates that her comfortable victory in a swing state is yet more proof that she is the superior general election candidate.  read more »

[This article originally appeared in the 8/2/2004 edition of The New York Observer.]

Uhuru Kenyatta and Barack Obama have a lot in common. They both have Kenyan fathers. They are a year apart in age. (Mr. Kenyatta is 43, Mr. Obama, 42.) They are both in politics.  read more »

At night, when Mark Penn sleeps and dreams of Hillary Clinton’s electorate, his head dances with visions of voters like this. Born June 13, 1944. White, female. College-educated. An elementary school teacher. Pays a mortgage and worries about her retirement. A lifelong Democrat. Born in the North, but lives in the South. Has four kids, three of them girls. Divorced. Definitely convinced that a woman could run this country.

Mr. Penn, meet my mother, Diane Rice.  read more »

The John Edwards “surge” has been the Loch Ness Monster of this primary campaign. There have been unconfirmed sightings of this elusive creature in the closing days of Iowa, New Hampshire and even (to a small degree) in Nevada, where he actually ended up getting just four percent of the vote. Now, based on a couple of polls that show Edwards within striking distance of second place in South Carolina, some people are saying they see the surge for real. Today, the lead sentence of a story in The State, the daily newspaper in Columbia (regrettably the article is nowhere to be found online): “Watch John Edwards.”

This morning, Edwards cited the surge rumors at a rally held in a crammed convention center conference room in Columbia. He told his audience, mostly college students, that he saw an “opportunity for a surprise” tomorrow. Edwards was energetic and impressive, emphasizing issues that were of interest to his young audience—many of whom wore t-shirts emblazoned with slogans like “I Vote For Darfur”—while taking care to strike notes that were also palatable to social conservatives, whom he’s clearly hoping to court in this devoutly religious state. When one young woman asked about threats to Roe v. Wade, Edwards only fleetingly reiterated his support for a woman’s right to choose, before going into a long and eloquent speech about the “need to be very inclusive and respectful” of those who oppose abortion. “There are very good people who have a different view about this,” he said. “Nobody made me God.”

More after the jump.  read more »

Walterboro, S.C.—“This is huge,” Bill Clinton was saying. His speaking voice, the most famously fragile in politics, was at full-tilt croakiness, yet another reminder of campaigns past.

“You can make biofuels in every county in this state…” The former president was standing alone on an auditorium stage in this Spanish moss-festooned town of 5,000 in the South Carolina lowcountry. It was mid-afternoon, and the chilly, darkened hall was maybe two-thirds full.

“You can make it from grass, you can make it from wood chips, you can make it from the leavings of all your agricultural operations. You can make it from all the organic materials in all the landfills. We can get rid of landfills forever and make biofeuls.”  read more »

WALTERBORO, S.C.—At a panel and Q&A session this afternoon, one attendee asked Bill Clinton about how accessible Hillary would be as President. After speaking to the topic, he digressed, and challenged the Bush administration’s rationale for warrantless wiretaps.

“After 9/11, I think most people thought we may need a stronger President to deal with the terrorist threat, but a stronger presidency does not mean an unaccountable presidency,” Clinton said.  read more »

WEST COLUMBIA, S.C.—We were at a community center attached to a megachurch-ish place called the Brookland Baptist Church. No one seemed to know we were coming. Charlie Rangel ambled in, looking Ranglian. He took three questions. The first, from a Greenville news reporter, was basically, what are you doing here.

"I have no idea,” Rangel responded. “I'm campaigning for Hillary Cllnton and this is my first stop...I'm here to do what campaigning is all about."

The second question was about why people should vote for her versus Obama.  read more »

Warming up a crowd for John Edwards yesterday in Lancaster, S.C., the bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley, a slight man with a shock of white hair, stood alone at a microphone on a flag-bedecked auditorium stage. “I’m death I come to take the soul,” he sang, in a husky a capella warble. “Leave the body and leave it cold … O, Death / O, Death / Won’t you spare me over ‘til another year.”

As campaign anthems go, Stanley’s Appalachian dirge—made famous by the “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” soundtrack—wasn’t exactly “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow.” But in these last-gasp days, Edwards is striving to convey an authentic cultural connection to his audiences in South Carolina, and sometimes southerners can get pretty gloomy. Especially these days, as the candidate is telling audiences in a bus tour across the upstate that he’s dubbed his “Back Home, Back Roads Barnstorm.”  read more »

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- I'm going to be spending the rest of the week in my home state, South Carolina, writing about the upcoming Democratic primary for the Politicker.

The first thing I noticed when I walked into my mother's house, where I'm staying, was a flashing red light on the answering machine. I pushed the button, thinking my mom might have left an update on the status of the supply of cold cuts in the fridge, but instead, there was a drawling recorded voice:

Hello. FBI agent Gary Aldrich says that Hillary on Inauguration Day, 1993 was in an uncontrolled and unbridled fury, yelling and screaming profanities, because she was not allowed to have Vice President Al Gore’s office in the White House. Hillary treats people like they are invisible; can you trust her?

And this:

Hillary knew about and helped cover up Bill’s rape of Juanita Broaddrick. Hillary treats women like they are invisible; can you trust her?

It went on in this vein for a minute or so. (In one particularly ludicrous bit of slander, the robo-caller accused the Clintons of stealing or killing Kathleen Willey's cat, concluding with the following punchline: “Hillary thinks cats are expendable; can you trust her?”

It would have been funny if it weren't so sad.TPM Muckraker was on these calls (apparently the work of a unaffiliated Black Helicopter-type) yesterday, so they're not exactly news, but somehow this kind of mud seems dirtier when it's being flung in your (or your mom’s) direction.

Should be an interesting few days.

Andrew Cuomo makes dating safe and cheap.

Shrinking violet Bo Dietl criticizes Spitzer, wants his phone calls returned.

Binding arbitration gets the veto treatment in Albany.

Steve thinks that letting Scooter off did nothing for Bush with the base.

Michelle Obama says her husband has plenty of experience.

The Politico breaks down the GOP candidates’ “burn rates.”

Greg Sargent is hopping mad about that Edwards hairdresser story in the Washington Post.

Ben asks whether someone is manipulating the political futures market.

It sounds like Rudy’s trying to run up the score with his fundraising.

Ron Paul’s partisans respond surprisingly rapidly to mild ridicule.

Rupert Murdoch does not own the Wall Street Journal. Yet.

Well, dear readers, that’s it for my stint as guest editor. It’s been a long, hectic and often quite rewarding week and a half. You regular editor, Josh Benson, will be home from the Dalmatian Coast and back at the helm on Monday, and the Observer will resume weekly publication with a new issue on Wednesday. It’s been a very great pleasure to waste a few precious moments of your workdays.

How poorly is fundraising going for the Republican presidential contenders? Libertarian fringe candidate Ron Paul is in third place among the candidates in terms of cash-on-hand, with $2.4 million. George Stephanopoulos, who might want to have a frank conversation with his booker, will have an "exclusive interview" with Paul on Sunday's edition of "This Week."

The only question I have is, how much did Rudy pay him to stay in the race?

Steve Kornacki has a long column today on the reemergence of Mark Warner, the former Virginia governor who dropped out of the presidential race last year, ostensibly because he didn't want to put the strain on his family. With rumors abounding that Senator John Warner might step aside, the other, younger, Democratic Warner is sending unambiguous signals that he's ready to get back in the game. Which will only serve to stoke the suspicions--never substaintiated in any way--that his decision to leave the presidential race before it even got started was somewhat more complicated than its been publicly portrayed.

Live From Congress: Rep. Ingersoll's Murder of a Hobo

From the Onion, via Wonkette, positive proof that any sentence becomes funny if you add the word "hobo" to it.

President Bush’s spokesman takes a shot at Bill Clinton, saying it took “chutzpah” for him to offer criticism on the subject of presidential pardons.

Governor Spitzer’s spokesman called today’s Post story about alleged monitoring of Joe Bruno’s travel arrangements “grossly inaccurate and false.”

Bruno threw another temper tantrum, accusing Spitzer of “political espionage.”

The state GOP chairman called the alleged monitoring “Nixonesque.”

Newsday’s John Riley says, “This is war.”

Dick Gephardt endorses Hillary Clinton. Maybe the Post was just four years ahead of everyone?

John McCain pushed aside his state director in South Carolina. His controversial longtime South Carolina strategist, Richard Quinn, will stay on without pay.

Bruce Reed condenses that enormous Mitt Romney profile from the Boston Globe.

The guy with the knife outside Obama’s hotel seems less menacing than it first appeared.

Bush and Putin didn’t accomplish much at their Kennebunkport summit.

And, in honor of a miserably slow news day, Azi passes along the above bit of found political commentary, a snapshot taken at a park somewhere near Bush and Clinton Streets in Red Hook, Brooklyn.

It’s often been said that political careers, like love affairs, go in cycles. They begin with flirtation, progress to infatuation, and—if the politician is lucky—lead to consummation. But, as in a relationship, there comes a point in every politician’s time in public life when he (or she) starts to become a little grating, when affection dims, when the act of congress with the populace starts to feel awkward and perfunctory. The qualities that made him (or her) so attractive in the first place become gradually less endearing. Confidence starts to look like cockiness. Charming words start to sound glib. The affair begins to sour.

(I get to the point after the jump.)  read more »

While it's true that politics never ends, it does--ever so occasionally--rest, and so does the Politicker. Barring any huge, unforeseen developments (hang in there, John McCain!) the site will be quiet for the rest of the day, as we commemorate the founding of our great nation just as our founding fathers did: with gunplay in Brooklyn. Rest assured, however, that we will be back tomorrow.

God bless you and God bless these United States of America.

Now eat some hot dogs!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s the text of Scooter Libby’s commutation.

Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani announce their second-quarter takes: Worse than the top Dems, but way better than John McCain.

Chris Cillizza thinks John McCain’s money problems have been a long time in coming, and are not necessarily terminal.

John Dickerson on McCain’s woes: “If McCain is a panderer, he may be the most ineffective one in the history of American politics.”

Joe Bruno cancels his subscription to the Albany Times-Union, which broke the story about his chopper use. He says an ad salesman for the paper called him to suggest buying space in the paper if he wanted to appear positively in its pages.

Daniel Pearl’s mother has a problem with A Mighty Heart.

There’s more speculation that Virginia’s John Warner might be the next Republican senator to retire. Think Jim Gilmore might be keeping a detached eye on his seat?

Inside the Clintons’ Des Moines rally.

Ron Paul, on the cutting edge.

Ed Koch, always relevant.

This Viola Plummer story will never end, apparently.

Marty Peretz attacks one of TNR’s own staffers’ posts as “malicious and malevolent nonsense.” Good thing he doesn’t own the place anymore!

This is hilarious. Meet the ferret-owning baggage handler to who helped to save the day in Glasgow.

And finally, in the picture above, some Iowans learn there’s one more reason to vote for Obama—he can dunk flatfooted (via Marc Ambinder).

Details to come, but it looks like Rudy Giuliani's going to be the second-quarter fundraising champ on the Republican side. This should cement his position as the frontrunner, for now.

One interesting reversal of fortune: The biggest Republican numbers are roughly half what Obama raised.

UPDATE: The AP reports Rudy raised $17 million. That's $3 million more than Mitt Romney, although Romney more than made up the difference by loaning himself $6.5 million

Yes, we've sunken to posting funny-sign pictures.

Jason Horowitz just saw this one as he was driving around Vienna, Virginia.

Steve just posted a pair of columns. In the first of them, he looks back on the Samuel Alito confirmation hearings and wonders whether Democrats would be have been better off if they'd tried to Bork him. He notes that after the defeat of Bork, Reagan nominated Anthony Kennedy, obviously a more moderate choice. "What if Democrats had stuck together – as they did with Bork – and held out for a second, or third nominee from President Bush? Would there be another Kennedy on the court right now?" he asks.

It's an interesting counterfactual, though I must note one big difference: the Democrats had taken back the Senate in 1986, the year before Bork's nomination, and Reagan was in the midst of Iran-Contra and other late-term scandals. The real analogy would be if Stevens or another justice died or stepped down unexpectedly this year--and does anyone doubt that the Democrats of 2007 would put up a fight in that case?

On a lighter note, Steve also debuts the Observer's inaugural edition of the Also-Ran Dead Pool, a tongue-in-cheek assessment of which presidential "contenders" are likely to drop out of the race first, and why. Your wisecracks are welcome, as always, in the comments section.

By the way, the Polticker is still trying to put together a list of July 4 events, and I'm sure we'd all like to knock off as early as possible today, so please email anything you've got to nyopoliticker@gmail.com.

 

George Bush pardoned Scooter Libby, surprising his staff and outraging his critics.

The latest round of U.K. bombings look to be a “doctor’s plot.” Wait—that name’s already taken.

Mayor Bloomberg tells everyone to relax and enjoy the holiday.

John McCain huffily dismissed speculation that yesterday’s staff layoffs were a prelude to dropping out of the race for president.

The L.A. Times says Hillary Clinton is “aiming at voters who are dubious about her but are not partisan enemies,” with some success.

She got the endorsement of Philadelphia’s mayor, John Street, yesterday. Street used to be a hot dog vendor.

Bill Clinton plunges back into the fray in Iowa, saying he’d be behind her “even if we weren’t married.”

The Times has a good piece on the Clintons’ efforts to revive Hillary’s “struggling” campaign in Iowa.

Jim Gilmore is suspending his campaign for president after seeing “bright flashes” in his eyes. It’s Gilmore, so we know they weren’t flashbulbs.

Cory Booker is still having trouble overcoming the “not black enough” label, according to a big Times feature, which is a terrific read.

Charles Barron stands by his embattled staff member.

The Post reports that Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum circumvented the city’s competitive bidding rules to buy furniture, computer equipment and the like.

The Sun says Bloomberg gathered the flacks for all city agencies earlier this year to emphasize his “independence.”

Beverley Sills, opera diva and former chairwoman of Lincoln Center, is dead.

The state inspector general released a voluminous report on the bidders for Aqueduct and other race tracks.

Two attorney generals are looking into Joe Bruno’s travel arrangements now.

Bruno once again called New York’s governor a “rich, spoiled brat.”

Bruno also said Spitzer once threatened him, saying: "I'm going to knock you out.”

Which, on this pleasant July morning, diverts your aging blogger’s mind to a mean little ditty from the summer of 1990. (See above.)

The Observer’s Jason Horowitz broke the news of Scooter Libby’s commuted sentence.

Andrew Sullivan’s response to Bush: “I retained some minimal respect. No longer.”

John McCain takes some steps to create an, ahem, “more nimble campaign.”

Josh Marshall wonders if it’s “Phil Gramm ’96 redux.”

As for the other flagging frontrunner, Noam Scheiber says Hillary Clinton is “vulnerable in ways that weren’t apparent six months ago” and says she has to reevaluate her strategy before it’s too late.

Obama’s fundraising aside, Chris Cillizza thinks Hillary remains the frontrunner.

Jonathan Martin reports that McCain and Mitt Romney addressed a secretive conservative Christian group late last week.

A First Lady seeks the presidency—in Argentina.

More completely uninformed speculation about Bill Clinton’s hypothetical romantic adventures.

The war between Eliot Spitzer and Joe Bruno heightened. Bruno claimed that the story about his helicopter trips “came out of the governor’s office.”

Curbed takes a look the Times’ Sunday story about “possible risk” in the Atlantic Yards project and concludes that the projected sale prices (of $900 to $1000 a square foot) for condos at that location “[don’t] really sound that shocking.”

After masterminding a disastrous war and getting drummed out of his job running the World Bank, Paul Wolfowitz has decided to lend a hand to Africa. Can Scooter be far behind?

One sure sign that a president has reached his sell-by date--in addition to the collapse of his domestic agenda, the recruitment of friendly intellectuals for brainstorming sessions, and a steady trickle of subpoenas and jail sentences for his trusted henchmen--is the beginning of a "place in history" debate on newspaper op-ed columns. The Washington Post's Sunday "Outlook" section got it all started some time back by asking several prominent historians to make a preliminary assessment of George W. Bush (the consensus seemed to be "at least he's not Nixon.") and yesterday, it continued its efforts to come to grips, printing a column by Lynne Olson, the author of a recent history focusing on Winston Churchill and the run-up to World War II. Bush himself is reportedly reading Olson's book, so it may dismay him a bit to hear the author's conclusion:

I think Bush's hero would be bemused, to say the least, by the president's wrapping himself in the Churchillian cloak. Indeed, the more you understand the historical record, the more the parallels leap out -- but they're between Bush and [Neville] Chamberlain, not Bush and Churchill.

Like Bush and unlike Churchill, Chamberlain came to office with almost no understanding of foreign affairs or experience in dealing with international leaders. Nonetheless, he was convinced that he alone could bring Hitler and Benito Mussolini to heel. He surrounded himself with like-minded advisers and refused to heed anyone who told him otherwise.

Olson goes on to make a very interesting case for the historical parallels between the styles of Bush and the prime minister whose very name has become synonymous with disastrous miscalculation. It just goes to underscore how far he--and we--have traveled since the fall of 2001.

Poring over the latest FEC reports, Ben predicts: “It's going to be a good year to be in ad sales in Des Moines.” This morning, the Nielsen Company put out a report that breaks down exactly who’s advertised so far, where they’ve done it, and—perhaps most interestingly, in this day and age—what medium they’ve chosen to get the message out.

According to the report (pdf here) Mitt Romney has advertised far more than all the other candidates, running 4,549 ads, through June 10, “mostly on local broadcast television” in seven markets, including Iowa and New Hampshire. He’s placed “more local TV advertisements than all other candidates combined,” the report says.

(Read the rest of my breakdown after the jump...)

UPDATE: The Nielsen people send along the following correction to the report that I linked above:

There was an labeling error in the chart "2008 Presidential Campaign Television & Radio Spots" on page 2 of the news release. The first column should read TV Total and not TV & Radio Total. The data for that chart is correct.

 read more »

The latest bombing plot in the U.K. was not homegrown, authorities say.

Barack Obama had a record-breaking fundraising quarter.

Read his chest-thumping announcement memo here.

Get all your FEC filing details here.

A “well-publicized billionaire investor in the metropolitan New York area” has bet $350,000 that Hillary will win, the Sun reports.

On This Week, Joe Lieberman praised Rudy Giuliani and John McCain.

Steve Kornacki says it’s just another indication of how irrelevant Lieberman has become.

A Rudy Giuliani aide says firefighter criticism is coming from “a few disgruntled union members.”

Fred Thompson is looking ever more certain to run.

The Times takes a close look at his sons’ lobbying activities.

Hillary attacks Thompson, meanwhile, for warning of Castro agents with suitcase nukes. In league with Chinese financiers, perhaps?

Chuck Schumer calls for greater regulation of Chinese trade goods.

It’s “extremely likely” Governor Spitzer will request an investigation into Joe Bruno’s apparent use of a state helicopter for fundraising activities.

The Times Union broke the chopper story on Sunday. Among the contributors Bruno flew to meet with: Maurice “Hank” Greenberg, the insurance magnate who was brought down by a Spitzer investigation.

Liz Benjamin reports that “Spitzer aides are researching whether Bruno violated the Public Officers Law, which could bring suspension or removal from office or a civil penalty,” as well as possible criminal violations.

A Bruno aide says the state inspector general has “no jurisdiction to investigate the legislative branch.”

Fred Dicker says Spitzer’s attacks on Bruno last week were “filled with distortions, half-truths and, in one case, an outright falsehood.”

Two Republican state senators generously say Spitzer is just on a “learning curve” and will soon be wise to the ways of Albany.

In case you missed it on Saturday, here’s the Times’ profile of Kevin Sheekey.

Despite the new city noise code, New York is still noisy, the Times reports.

Charles Barron is planning a “day of outrage.”

New York state is no closer to enacting a no-fault divorce law.

The New Jersey legislature is wary of bloggers.

Al Gore got a very special favor from Paramount chief Brad Grey.

The Rodriguez family is classy all around.

It was a pretty scary day in London.

You may want to avoid the Meatpacking District this weekend. Actually, that’s good advice for every weekend.

Andrew Sullivan says Londoners are pretty blasé about it all.

Josh Marshall wonders why it took David Broder six years to decide that Dick Cheney was a malevolent force.

Mike Bloomberg says he is in “great health.”

Eliot Spitzer is naming names.

More HOT AMATEUR CLIPS from REAL COUPLES in IOWA!!!

John McCain, under fire from the right again.

Michael Kinsley had me rolling on the floor (ok, not really, but laughing) with this one.

Kobayashi, destroyer of hot dogs, has been making some news ahead of this year’s Nathan’s event.

Seth Lipsky is not into dressing down on Fridays.

TNR’s Ryan Lizza takes a big step up. (via Gawker.)

And finally, I’m not sure what you’re doing this evening … ohhh … right around 10 p.m., but the Observer received the following press release from the office of Michael Benjamin, state assemblyman from the Bronx. (That’s him above, third from the left, standing next to the fuzzy yellow creature.) Celebrity is fleeting, but it is so, so sweet.

*** MEDIA ADVISORY ***

This week, Assemblyman Michael Benjamin and his wife, the author, D. Kennedy Williams-Benjamin will utter [the] Channel 5 Ten O'clock News' signature intro: "Do You Where Your Children Are?" The segments will air prior to the news at 9:59 pm on Monday night, June 25 and Friday night, June 29, respectively.

In his latest column, about Jeanne Shaheen and the demise of the northeastern Republican, Steve Kornacki reports:

It looks like the DCCC is looking to stir up some trouble this weekend in three potential targeted districts in the Northeast, taking aim at Republican incumbents Randy Kuhl and James Walsh from New York and Mike Ferguson in New Jersey.

According to Chris Cillizza at The Fix, the national Republican Party is plenty worried about those seats. He managed to get his hands on the RNCC’s so-called “ROMP list.” Basically, this list—the acronym stands for “Regain Our Majority Program,” a slight change from past election cycles, when the “R” stood for “Retain”—is a roster of those House members the party feels are most endangered. Being on the list is both a blessing and an embarrassment, in that it assures you’ll get a lot of money from your House colleagues, but it also proclaims your vulnerability to the world.

Of the 20 incumbents who have been ROMP’ed so far, six are from the northeast, including Kuhl, of New York’s 29th (the old Amo Houghton district, which includes Corning and Elmira), Walsh, of New York’s 25th (Syracuse and its environs), Ferguson (parts of Union, Middlesex, Somerset and Hunterdon counties), and Rep. Chris Shays, the perennially endangered member from Connecticut. It’s easy to see why they made the team: In 2006, all four of them won their races by less than 7,000 votes.

Notably absent from the list: Tom Reynolds.

Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion was recently named president of the National Association of Latino Elected Officials, and takes control at the organization’s annual convention in Orlando this weekend. This year’s convention will feature—in addition to Carrion’s ascension to his vaunted office—a Saturday debate of the major Democratic candidates for president, including Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards. The Latino organization invited all the Republican candidates to come as well, but none of them accepted the invitation, despite the fact that the outgoing president of the organization is a Republican. All of which prompted Carrion to make the first of what is sure to be many, many official statements on behalf of Latino officeholders everywhere:

"It's outrageous that Republican candidates would ignore such a large and growing voting population. Not two years ago Republicans were banging at our doors and now for reasons unknown, they have decided to skip an extremely important event. These candidates have made a major miscalculation. Discounting this population will not go unnoticed."

Greg Sargent picks up on a story I'm afraid I'd completely missed. Apparently, Mitt Romney is not so nice to animals. Here's Greg's synopsis:

Just in case you haven't been following this, the gist here is that Romney -- according to The Boston Globe -- strapped the family dog to his car's roof in 1983. Though Romney did build a windscreen for the pooch, the story gained momentum, and before long it was picked up by Time magazine.

Yesterday things got so bad that Romney was forced to address it while speaking to reporters in Pittsburgh. His rather creative defense was that "my dog likes fresh air."

Talk about a man-bites-dog tale.

Greg may laugh, but I think this could really be trouble for Romney. I know many voters--in fact, I date one of them--who base their entire political ideology on what's good for the pooches.

We were anticipating an easy morning over here at the Politicker, a veritable Katyusha barrage of posts out of last night’s Democratic debate at Howard University. Would the crowd be with Obama? Would Edwards go after Hillary again? Would Mike Gravel hurl a boulder at Tavis Smiley?

Well… we went, we saw, we yawned.

Rebecca Sinderbrand, who was at the hall, reports that the consensus was that “this debate was somewhat of a bust, as these things go.” Apparently, in the spin room afterward, people ignored Edwards and ogled Kucinich’s fembot wife. No news there.

Jason Horowitz, writing last night, gave the nod to Hillary as the night’s winner, though without much enthusiasm: “In the end, the campaigns of the frontrunners will all claim victory and will have valid points to make in the spin room. But on television, at least, Mrs. Clinton came across as the most assertive and fluent with legislation and policy.”

Steve Kornacki wished the main candidates had taken the opportunity to beat up on poor Gravel, the way Rudy knocked around Ron Paul to such great effect at the South Carolina GOP debate. Unfortunately, he writes, “perhaps because the rules technically forbade direct exchanges between the candidates or maybe just because they are used to tuning out when Mr. Gravel speaks,” the oddball Alaskan’s latest musings about drug legalization passed without so much as a raised eyebrow, much less a right cross.

Anyway, it was that kind of night. We shall not speak of it again. But if, perchance, you haven’t gotten your fill of bromides and comity, here’s a roundup of other folks’ takes.

Slate’s John Dickerson calls the debate an “orgy of agreement.”

Ben senses that Obama missed an opportunity.

Michael Crowley thinks that Hillary’s answer on the Darfur question “underscored my sense that she's doing a great job with the can-a-woman-lead-the-military question.” But he thinks everyone will forget this one real quick.

MSNBC’s first read calculates that—this will come as a shock—Bill Richardson spoke the longest.

Jim Geraghty at NRO calls it “an egregious can-you top-this panderfest.”

And Jonathan Martin was struck by Mike Gravel’s pants. 

Yes, it was a very khaki evening.

The Democrats debated at Howard University.

In the Post’s African American focus groups, Hillary Clinton won, 27-2.

John McCain dismissed as “ridiculous” the notion that he might be considering whether to drop out of the presidential race.

Charlie Bagli declares the Vito Lopez-tweaked affordable housing tax break bill a “flop.”

Meanwhile, the Sun discovers that affordable housing developers are exempt from the City Council’s new campaign finance regulations.

Someone’s been making mysterious polling calls about a Michael Bloomberg presidential campaign.

Bloomberg is losing his closely guarded privacy.

The Post thinks he leaked the news about his heart surgery himself.

An attempted terror attack in London last night could have caused “carnage.”

Governor Spitzer called for new, cleaner power plants.

He met with some jeers at a public event on Long Island.

Malcolm Smith wants PBA chief Patrick Lynch to run for Republican Frank Padavan’s state senate seat, the Post reports.

It was a lightning strike that caused that blackout on Wednesday.

Polls give the Democratic Congress low marks for its performance so far.

The key opinion in yesterday’s Supreme Court desegregation case is the one written by Anthony Kennedy, says Linda Greenhouse.

Al Baker writes a fine requiem for the police sawhorse.

Greg Oden goes #1, Kevin Durant goes #2, Jeff Green goes #5. Sigh—bye Jeff.

The Supreme Court gutted school desegregation plans.

Immigration bill dies (yet again.)

Ben reports that Bloomberg says Obama’s not presidential material (yet).

Council Speaker Quinn suspends staff member who called for an opponent’s assassination.

Greg Sargent swears he is neither gay, bisexual nor transgendered. He did grow up in the West Village, though.

Mitt Romney has his own odd confession.

Meanwhile, Romney’s minions are making more mischief.

Scooter Libby gets a prison number. Prison bitch to come.

White House counsel to Congress: Drop Fred.

Rahm Emmanuel proposes cutting off Dick Cheney’s funding. (See video above, via TPM Muckraker.)

And finally, the answer to our highly hypothetical constitutional question about the presidential selection process, courtesy of a friendly law student who wishes to remain anonymous: It’s the Congress elected in 2008 that would break a deadlock, not the lame-duck Congress of 2006. Sleep tight, Rahm!

(For those few incorrigible nerds who are still paying attention to this debate, the full explanation, complete with handy citation, is after the jump.)  read more »

As Ben Smith reports, Howard Wolfson announced, via blog, the Clinton campaign's anticipating fundraising number for this quarter, which is "in the range of $27 million." As Ben points out, simple math would suggest that Obama, who boasts of 138,000 "open wallets" this quarter, will probably do better. A close observer of the race, after reading Wolfson's dispatch, emailed the following impression: "The point, I think, is that they got creamed in fund-raising and are trying hard to obscure it with this laundry list." I guess the question, presuming this interpretation is true, is whether the fundraising numbers in this case are a leading or lagging indicator. Clinton's had a good few weeks--like a Third World dictator fighting rebels in the bush, every day she stays on top represents a victory for her--and it seems as if her support is not defecting from her at the first sign of trouble, as many predicted. Of course, a bad fundraising quarter might seriously damage that already dinged-up aura of inevitability.

Anyway, the full text of Wolfson's announcement is after the jump.  read more »

Ok, now I am really confused.

Yesterday, I wrote a post referring to a Steve Kornacki column about the possibility (granted: extremely remote) that an independent campaign by Michael Bloomberg could throw the 2008 presidential election into the House of Representatives. I raised the possibility that this could become a strategic issue for the DCCC and RNCC, especially in states like North Carolina, where the (very conceivable) shift of a single seat into the Republican column could alter the balance of the state delegation, thus upsetting the Democrats' current one-vote advantage in terms of state delegation control. (For why this matters, consult Kornacki's column.) After I posted the item, Kornacki wrote to say that he was under the impression that it was the present House that would meet to settle the electoral college deadlock--that is, the Representatives elected in 2006, not in November 2008. I checked the text of the 12th Amendment, which said that the House was to consider the matter "immediately" after the electors met in December, which seemed to suggest that it was indeed the lame-duck Congress that held sway. I wrote a correction.

Today, a Politcker legal eagle sent the following email, taking issue with the corrected item:

The electors meet in their respective state capitals in mid-December and the ballots are opened and counted in the beginning of January--AFTER the new congress is sworn in. If after the ballots are counted no one has 270, the election for president is thrown into the House.

(More constitutional hair-splitting, plus a priceless Kornacki family memory, after the jump.)  read more »

Yesterday, Azi departed this fair city for a few of rest. "Rest," in Azi's case, is a relative term. During his daylong bus ride to Maine, he sent me roughly 237 emails from his Blackberry. This morning, he was back at it, apparently tracking down a wireless connection in order to listen to New York schools Chancellor Joel Klein's interview on the Brian Lehrer show. He sent along the following observations:

During the interview, Klein was asked about the major restructuring that public schools will undergo next school year. Namely, the 10 regional school districts Klein created when Bloomberg came into office will be replaced with another set of local school regions which'll provide principals with institutional support.

Klein denied it was a sign that his earlier reforms didn't work, and said, in fact, it was all part of the plan. He pointed to a speech he gave at NYU in which he called his first set of reforms "temporary."

He then said all the changes really are more akin to a parent giving kids more freedom as they get older.

Does anybody else remember the public school reform discussion being framed like this at the time?

Well, does anybody? Commenters?

A little more than a week into Michael Bloomberg’s pseudo-campaign for president, the inevitable backlash has begun. In accordance with the conventions of counterintuition, the on-second-thought analysis focuses not on the Mayor’s obvious disadvantages—the history of third-party candidates, his lack of national party organization, his height, his religion, his martial status—but on the qualities that were initially perceived to be his great strengths. In essence, the story on Day 1 was: “He’s a billionaire, and he’s not Ross Perot.” The emerging case against Bloomberg goes: “He’s a billionaire, but he’s no Ross Perot.”

(More after the jump.)  read more »

The City Council voted to limit campaign contributions by those who do business with the city.

But the new campaign finance rules do not apply to unions, the NYT reports.

The Post says “the Fred Thompson express continues to roll" toward Rudy Giuliani.

But a poll found that 60 percent of Republicans would vote for a pro-choice candidate.

The same poll found that they favor universal health care. (Are these people sure they’re Republicans?)

Mike Bloomberg had heart surgery seven years ago.

Eliot Spitzer’s “Unfinished Business” tour comes to Long Island today. Yesterday, in Syracuse, the governor called out Republican State Sen. John DeFrancisco.

Spitzer ran into DeFrancisco at a coffee shop, and offered to buy him a cup, but the senator turned him down.

New York’s Democrats are looking to the national party for help as they try to retake the State Senate, Roll Call reports.

New York has added 206,000 people since 2000, making it the only city outside the Sunbelt to significantly gain population, according to the Census Bureau.

Today may be D-Day for the Senate immigration bill.

Business is booming for Washington process servers. Today’s subpoenas involve warrantless wiretapping.

Nino Scalia is a sore winner.

Paris Hilton told Larry King she has never taken drugs, is on a “journey” of self-discovery, wants to raise money for breast cancer and multiple sclerosis.

 

 

Dear readers,

So, a final accounting for Day 1 of my stint behind the wheel of the new, post-redesign Politicker.

Posts: 9

Corrections: 2

Computer crashes: 2

Panicked calls for technical assistance: 2

Screams of agony: 4

Inanimate objects flung against wall: 1

Inanimate objects glared at with malice aforethought: They know who they are...

Blackouts: 1

Meals: 1

Showers: 0

In other words, it's been a learning experience. Rest assured, tomorrow will be a better day. Maybe I'll even manage to get to an "Elsewhere" post.

By the way, I'm Andrew Rice and I'll be your guest editor for the next week or so.

UPDATE: And of course, I welcome your questions, comments, tips, gossip, critiques, corrections, hurtful invective, and comic-strip exegeses at andrewrice75@yahoo.com.

This morning, in the course of writing the morning read, I strugged to summon up a pithy way to describe Gordon Brown's ascension to the office of Prime Minister. Brown, as Tony Blair's number 2, has waited for this moment for so long, in such transparent suffering, that the whole saga has taken on the qualities of a long-running television comedy, with the dour chancellor playing the Endora/Major Burns/Rosco P. Coltrane role. Anyway, what I came up with was:

"The meek inherit the earth. Linus bags Sally. Gordon Brown is finally Prime Minister."