Of course he has to attack, but he hasn't attacked her with sleaze. I wouldn't even call the "Washington insider" comment "negative" in the "old politics" sense.

Old politics, negative politics would be Obama pushing bullshit issues, like misinterpreting and repeating some gaffe Hillary has made, or bringing up shit like Vince Foster and all that other bullshit Repugs have been raving about for ages.

No, Obama has attacked Hillary on the issues, like NAFTA, on her connections with lobbyists, and on her Washington insider/establishment connections and mentality. That's legit. And if you are a serious person, you should have known that. You should be able to tell the difference with pushing Farakon, Wright, or flag lapel pins...

on purpose.

"Low information voter," as you well know, refers to the exit polls that show Hillary voters are, on average, less educated and poorer than Obama voters.

You, on the other hand, know better, but choose to misunderstand and misinterpret regardless.

more like bullshit questions, and Hillary piled on.

and imo Obama answered them fine, although I was listening to it on the radio, so perhaps he did worse on tv.

Carter, who was accompanied by his wife Rosalynn, did not profess a direct support for Obama but rather choose to make a veiled statement.
"We are very interested in the primaries. Don't forget that Obama won in my state of Georgia. My town which is home to 625 people is for Obama, my children and their spouses are pro- Obama.
My grandchildren are also pro- Obama. As a Super Delegate, I would not disclose who I am rooting for but I leave you to make that guess," he said.

link: http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?i d=107611

Under a winner-take-all primary system Obama would still be winning, and the Salon writer would have written an article about how that system is unfair and how Hillary would be far ahead under a proportional representation, or some other system...

The analysis in this diary does not properly incorporate the significance and magnitude of the 'negative' comments identified. The key is that they were not divisive in effect; Democratic voters by and far still held both candidates in high regard.

The real (divisive) negativity started with the run-up to Texas and Ohio. First, there were the Xerox accusations and the 3AM ad, which were fair game certainly, but the tone changed. The 'Shame on you Barack Obama' was evidence of this change.

Then Hillary went even further by basically saying that she and McCain had the experience to be president, but Obama did not. And later she tried to push the Wright thing.

Those accusations are on a different level than anything identified by the diarist because they were divisive, and the polls showed it. I remember that was when I first went from thinking that while I supported Obama, Hillary was a great candidate too, to questioning whether I could support her in the general.

Of course, there has been the whole undercurrent of racial tactics throughout the campaign, but that's harder to pin down and more debatable, so I won't comment on it further.

Obama is not fit to be president because he has never even broken a law and ended up in jail for a cause he believed in. Hillary for Prez!

I've heard Kos on the Sam Seder show - and if Sam was under fire, I'm sure Kos would comment. And I'm not suggesting he doesn't know who Randi Rhodes is, or that she said something inflammatory recently. I AM saying that he would not bother to investigate it because Randi sin't significant on dailyKos, and there's no personal relationship between her and Kos.

Other controversies? RR show ran a joke intro one time about someone shooting Bush. That made it to the MSM, MSMBC at least. Did Kos comment? Not that I recall.

For this diary to have any validity, the diarist should have established that Kos' behavior now is an exception to the history/pattern on dKos regarding Randi - of course s/he couldn't because there's nothing there.

Hillary will become the joke candidate if she stays in much longer.

I just heard on the Young Turks that Obama has now caught up in declared superdelegates. He's outspending Hillary 5-1 in PA advertising. Soon it'll be clear to everyone, except Hillary, that she cannot win, and that's just embarrassing...

Has Kos ever commented on anything Randi Rhodes did? There have been other controversies involving her, and I don't recall that they've generated much attention on daily Kos, let alone from Kos himself. He probably hasn't even heard the quote in full context because Rhodes just isn't significant enough to warrant that type of attention.

As for Hitler/MyDD thing, that was about blogs, and there has been tension recently between his blog and this one, plus he wrote a book together with Jerome, and so forth, so of course what happens here is a lot closer to home for Kos.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/200 8/03/29/clinton-obama-camps-still-fighti ng-in-texas/#more-6138

(meant to include that in the previous post)

cnn is stilling running it under their "Latest News" banner with the heading: "Ticker: Clinton, Obama still battling in Texas"

First two paragraphs give the impression Hillary is winning:

"AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama scrambled to secure Texas' last remaining Democratic National Convention delegates Saturday as the state pushed to settle the outcome of the March 4 caucus.

Early results tallied by The Associated Press showed that Clinton had 301 delegates, or 60 percent, compared to Obama's 202 delegates, or 40 percent. That's out of about 7,300 delegates expected to be selected at about 280 county and senate district meetings across the state Saturday."

Most people who read beyond the title only read the first few paragraphs so they'll get the imprssion Hillary is winning. It's kind of weird for CNN to keep something like that up after the results are in, but there it is:

"Why do I do this? I get zero pleasure out of it. But I am trying to figure out how to get through to people that Obama is not qualified to be president, and has serious problems in his background that GENERAL ELECTION VOTERS will be extremely wary about. <snip>"

There have been plenty of presidents (some good, some bad) with little experience - and Clinton has her own problems that I won't regurgitate now - let's just say my issues with her are a bigger problem than Obama's thin resume.

As for general election, there's no objective evidence to your claim, so we have to go with our own instinct. Mine tells me that Obama has the potential to be a real rock star candidate, the type people like to vote for, and McCain is incredibly weak anyway - he just hasn't been exposed to the wider public yet.

"FURTHER: I believe that Hillary Clinton has a far more sophisticated, and deep, grasp of the issues facing this country. I posted information about her statement on the economy today at No Quarter. <snip>"

This is not about policy, both candidates agree on major issues and anyway, their plans are just starting points - you cannot seriously expect them to get anything through as stated now. So this question should be about who is better at getting things through Congress, forget the policy nuances already.

"Numerous Republican senators have mentioned that, despite his rhetoric about "reaching across the aisle," they saw little or no evidence of such in his short time in the Senate.

I am also fearful about his real commitment to progressive views. <snip> He hasn't the backbone or resolve that Hillary Clinton has."

So Repug Senators aren't happy with Obama? Is that good or bad? Yet, he may not be truly progressive either? Sounds to me like you are assuming the worst about him. For me his progressive record in both state and national senate is the best evidence of where his values lie. And as far as Clinton's backbone is concerned, I simply have to disagree.

"These are my opinions. But they are based on rather in-depth study of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. You may disagree. But, since MOST people are mostly besotted with Obama's rhetoric -- and haven't taken the time to study his background and his positions -- we have to do something to wake people up."

-I don't care about his rhetoric, other than I love how he's able to excite people. In 2004 I didn't know anyone who was excited about Kerry as a candidate. With Obama it's the opposite, which is why I believe he'd do great in the general.

-As for positions, I've studied both candidates, and they are close enough; the question is who can get more progressive legislation through? My answer: Obama because he'll be better for downticket candidates, and thus will have a stronger position from which to negotiate. Last time a Clinton was president, we lost both houses of congress.

And as for the pastor, Rezko, ... these are about "guilt by association" and that only goes so far. My belief is they won't even matter in a month or two.

Supers 'should' vote along with their district or state for the good of the party, not that it's unfair for them to vote another way.

If they don't, Obama voters will feel robbed and disenfranchised by party insiders, blacks would think the party leadership got together and said 'hey, we can't give it to the black guy,' ... it would be a complete mess.

Something drastic would need to happen to make a Hillary nomination politically viable at this point - don't hold your breath.

damn, should have hit the preview button first... I hate it when that happens...