Hillary Clinton has begun to ask her influential backers to be in Washington on May 14 for a meeting at her home, according to a major fund-raiser. Separately, the fund-raiser said, Bill Clinton will be speaking with top donors this afternoon on a conference call.

GREENSBORO, N.C. – Bill Clinton, making a late plea for votes on his wife's behalf here yesterday, asserted that "academic study after academic study" had shown the former first lady to be the victim of "the most slanted press coverage in American history" during this campaign.

Though it was not clear exactly what studies he was referring to, Clinton appeared especially irked by criticism of the senator's proposal to offer consumers a summer 'holiday' from gasoline taxes.  read more »

In her embrace of a temporary suspension of the federal gas tax – an idea that virtually every credible economist agrees is a gimmick – Hillary Clinton is making the same bet that delivered her husband to the Democratic nomination 16 years ago: that voters prefer promises of free candy to the truth.

In 1992, with the country mired in an economic slump, Bill Clinton made a middle-class tax cut the centerpiece of his presidential campaign.  read more »

Stop it! Stop asking me about Hillary’s pantsuits, or any other aspect of her personal style! If you persist, I swear to God I will stuff Mrs. Clinton into a Balenciaga bubble dress with matching gladiator spike-heeled boots, and then you’ll be sorry.

Every 20 minutes I get a jangling call from an earnest hack looking for quips about the fashion choices of the presidential candidates. These content generators are hell-bent on viewing the current political jousting match through the lens of la mode: What do I think of Hillary’s pink blouses?  read more »

The Massachusetts Democratic primary, along with nearly two dozen other primaries and caucuses, was held on Feb. 5. Hillary Clinton won it by 15 points, one of her best showings anywhere this year, and Michael Dukakis voted in it—but he won’t say for whom.

“I voted for a candidate, yeah,” is about all Mr. Dukakis, the state’s former governor and a lifelong resident of Brookline, will say.

Mr. Dukakis has maintained an adamantly neutral public stance throughout the campaign, hoping instead to sell both candidates and their campaigns on the need for assembling a massive grassroots organizing effort—a captain and six block leaders in all 200,000 precincts in the country—for the fall. But he also said that Barack Obama will probably be the nominee and the race decided by early June, and possibly much sooner, with primaries in Indiana and North Carolina on tap next week.  read more »

Tomorrow night marks the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner in Washington, D.C. Members of the press corps (including some Media Mob contributors who are already on their way—note low posting rate today!) will have a chance to clink glasses with the president and his cabinet and remind themselves that despite five years of war, an economy some are already calling a Depression, and a painful slog of an election season, it's all in good fun. L'chaim! To us!

This year's event will be emceed by CBS Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson, whom the W.H.C.A.'s president (and ABC News correspondent), Ann Compton, is really excited about: "Craig Ferguson is a fresh take on late night TV. As a new citizen, a first-time uncommitted voter and someone who has looked at American politics from the outside, I am looking forward to his unique take on our system."

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Ms. Silk, 27, was talking about former fat kids, of which she is one. Have you ever noticed how New York is simply swimming with these psychologically fragile souls? You can see it in the careful attention to what’s on their plates ... their slavish devotion to daily exercise routines ... and the slightly nervous look that creeps into their eyes now, as bikini season looms.  read more »

This weekend brought two reminders that what happens in politics is often, more than anything, about the past.

On Friday, Robert Reich formally endorsed Barack Obama, a decision that was greeted as noteworthy since Reich was an old Oxford chum of Bill Clinton’s and served as the 42nd president’s first labor secretary. He also scored a date with a young Hillary Rodham back in 1966, when, as the freshman class president at Dartmouth, he asked Hillary, his counterpart at Wellesley, to meet him for “a presidential summit” in Hanover. (There was no second date.)  read more »

The Obama campaign just announced that Robert Reich, who served as Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton, is endorsing Barack Obama.

Here's part of what Reich wrote (where else?) on his blog:

I believe that Barack Obama should be elected President of the United States.

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]]> http://origin.observer.com/2008/robert-reich-obama#comments Politics Barack Obama Bill Clinton Hillary Clinton Robert Reich Fri, 18 Apr 2008 14:53:49 -0400 Katharine Jose 68056 at http://origin.observer.com http://origin.observer.com/2008/obama-campaign-clintons-are-whiners-too

It looks like all the “whining” taunts have finally gotten to the Obama campaign.

It’s not so much that they’re denying that Obama has attempted to profit from a sense that he was victimized during Wednesday night's debate as much as it is an attempt to note that the tactic has been standard operating procedure for both Bill and Hillary Clinton since the beginning of this year’s contest.  read more »

]]> http://origin.observer.com/2008/obama-campaign-clintons-are-whiners-too#comments Politics Barack Obama Bill Burton Bill Clinton Hillary Clinton Fri, 18 Apr 2008 12:12:12 -0400 Jason Horowitz 68043 at http://origin.observer.com