The three leading contenders all have ties to Wal-Mart, a decidedly controversial company among Democratic primary voters.

Between 1986 and 1992, she served on the Arkansas-based company's board of directors, a position that let her rake in about $12,500 per year. During the 1992 campaign, she still owned about $80,000 in company stock.

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Last January, the senator scolded Wal-Mart for not doing enough about healthcare--but withered when asked if she ever suggested a change when she served on the board. "Well, you know, I, that was a long time ago, I have to remember." Not a good answer.

Clarke notes that John Edwards "used to own company stock--stock he conveniently managed to sell in 2004."

In an impressive demonstration of historical repetition, the senator's wife, Michelle, earns about $45,000 per year (plus stock options) serving on the board of a major Chicago food company whose biggest customer is--one guess--Wal-Mart. If that connection seems pretty distant (and, really, the connection is pretty distant) just think about all the tenuously relevant personal details that can railroad a perfectly respectable presidential campaign. Campaign critics can make a four-course meal out of pretty thin gruel.

Republican governor Mike Huckabee of Arkansas says Hillary Clinton will be tough for Republicans to defeat in 2008. He says Hillary has "rock-star quality that she brings just by walking into a room and sucking the oxygen out of it."

The Times new-ish political blog on national politics has Colin Powell's letter to John McCain where Powell writes, "The world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism."

Jeanine Pirro and Andrew Cuomo have begun to debate about debates already.

Senator Serph Maltese's 101-year-old uncle passed away.

One-time gubernatorial candidate Pat Manning, who is running for re-election to the Assembly, lost his Independence Republican Party primary.

Hillary.org has the victory speech KT McFarland never delivered.

• Russia's capital faces a battle for its landmark sites too. Except, unlike New York, Moscow's mayor is knocking down the avant garde to build the "fairy-tale version of Russia." (The New York Times)
• Bloomberg this week said that immigrants are essential to the US economy because they take on the jobs that Americans won't, many associated with construction and building or property maintenance. But if those jobs came with salaries and benefits, mightn't there might be more takers? (The New York Times)
• New York 's guide to the rest of the world, all six cities.
• The new residential trend: living in cars. (The New York Times)
• Who doesn't want a Batmobile? What if your home could do that? (We Make Money Not Art)
• An anonymous donor pledged $4 million to Judson College so that the school could finish building an "environmentally friendly architecture designed to allow the building to heat and cool itself without mechanical intervention six months out of the year." Who is this donor ... Brad Pitt? (Daily Herald)
• Every week New York magazine offers a designers an outlet in the back of the book's "High Priority" illustration. (Design Observer)
• The most expensive states to insure a home suffer from mold. (Forbes)
• Nick Lachey licked MTV VJ, and Derek Jeter's girlfriend, Vanessa Minnillo at the W Union Square, a Starwood hotel. Joke overload... (Hotel Chatter)
• Grassroots street reimagination comes by way of George S., a graffiti scenester who drops homemade clay figurines around town and Mark Gorton, who rallies officials for wider sidewalks. (Metropolis)
• Exit, the mega nightclub of choice for many high schoolers, was closed down by police for the illegal sale of alcohol, possession of marijuana and allowing minors to enter. (Page Six)
• Rogers Marvel Architects and Ken Smith Workshop will receive a MASterwork award from The Municipal Arts Society of New York this week for their design of the park at 55 Water Street. (Tropolism)
• Someone is building Noah's Ark. That is all. (BBC)
• The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts will open in downtown Brooklyn by mid-May at 80 Hansen Place and S. Portland Avenue in the same eight-story building as Creative Outlet Dance Theatre, Cool Culture and Fulton Area Business Association. (Crain's)

Less laughable stuff came from Anthony's old boss, Chuck, who quoted some judicial nominees he helped block.

"Another - for the woman in the room - said the purpose of a woman is to be subjugated to her man."

"Another one said - this is for the D.C. Court of Appeals, that has jurisdiction over all labor law, said there should be no labor laws. No Child Labor Laws, no Minimum Wage Laws, no Worker Protection Laws. All those were unconstitutional, unconstitutional takings from employers. These are not just, you know, crackpots giving out literature or speaking on the soapbox. These are people nominated to the highest courts of our land."