pretty outrageous that "journalists" invoke their own misleading character associations into the mouths of other candidates.

http://thephoenix.com/MediaLog/PermaLink .aspx?guid=7bc50b07-ec45-44c2-8816-edf18 144313c

HALPERIN [discussing John Edwards' potential endorsement of Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama]: I can tell you, he's really skeptical of her ability to be the kind of president he wants. But, he kinda thinks Obama is...he thinks Obama is kind of a pussy...He has real questions about Obama's toughness, his readiness for the office.

There you have it!

Here are my questions:

1. Suppose Edwards told Halperin he questions Obama's toughness, but didn't actually use the word "pussy." Should Halperin  really introduce it to describe Edwards' point of view?

2. Suppose instead that Edwards actually used that phrase himself--that he told Halperin or someone he knows that Obama is "kind of a pussy." In repeating the phrase for a broader audience, might Halperin be doing Edwards' pre-Clinton-endorsement dirty work for him?

3. I know satellite radio is freewheeling and everything, but does Time really want its staffers using the word "pussy" in their guest appearances?

4. Coming on the heels of the pimped-out-Chelsea debacle, is this some sort of Machiavellian effort by Halperin/Sirius/Walters to increase their visibility?

Here's Halperin's response

http://thepage.time.com/2008/02/13/my-ap ologies/

I'm sorry. In a live radio interview this week, I used a word I shouldn't have. The fact that I was conveying other people's words is no excuse for my lapse in judgment. It won't happen again. -- Mark Halperin

this isn't really conveying anything that's appropriate for a journalist and I doubt Edwards would use that word in public.

There's more...

While I have a lot of quibbles with individual parts of the recent Mark Halperin and John Harris book The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008 (not the least of which is their awkward and mistaken attempt to exonerate their respective news organizations from the accusation of Freak Show influence {pp. 41-42}), on the whole it has fascinated me and I feel I have learned a lot from it.  It has given me a fresh perspective on the presidential race to come, and its lessons, I feel, can be applied to potential candidates not even mentioned in its pages.

I wish to address, however, one the main subjects in their book, the viability of the candidacy of Senator Hillary Clinton.  Many times, Halperin and Harris assert that Mrs. Clinton has been diligently learning from the political successes and failures of the past sixteen years; lessons learned not only from her husband, but from the two failed Democratic candidates and the successful George W. Bush.  The book goes on to give a laundry list of choices and tactics Mrs. Clinton may choose in her upcoming campaign, and which traits of hers she will likely play up or gloss over.  I have decided to use this framework and take it one important step further.

My theory is that Senator Clinton will essentially run a tweaked version of the George W. Bush 2000 campaign, though I suspect with fewer push-polls, and less involvement from the Supreme Court.  Senator Clinton will no doubt wield her Democratic Clinton Credentials like a broadsword, but I believe her playbook will be an adaptation of the one written by Karl Rove.  It will, that is, if she's smart.  And she's smart. Read on...

There's more...