• The first decidedly unseemly story attached to the candidacy and campaign of Obama is hitting hard and making big news on the political wire this week and again today. With some reports of African American supporters and superdelegates of Hillary being threatened in attempts to intimidate them and back Obama breaking earlier in the week, more stories from black Hillary backers are popping up. Such influential African American Clinton supporters like Diane Watson and Emmanuel Cleaver have either reported or experienced themselves pressure from constituents or black Obama supporters to switch Dem candidates, calling those who continue to support HRC “Uncle Tom’s” who have “betrayed their race.” This come after the initial knock against Obama came from black political` leaders and others who said he wasn’t “black enough.” It’s a story full of bizarre reverse racism angles and a fresh sympathy line for Hillary. Blacks verbally abusing HRC supporters after all Bill did for African Americans in the ’90’s? The media will love this story and will begin to hammer Obama for the first time over this. Reports are that the major networks are planning evening broadcast “investigations” into these allegations - and that they will be tough on Obama’s posse.
  • It’s an absolute pander-fest in Ohio on free trade and NAFTA. While the two remaining Dems were once talking about the benefits of free trade, merely calling for retooling a few deals and adding more “fair trade” stipulations, they are now out-and-out isolationists in the Buckeye State. And why not? Ohio has been hit super-hard by the various trade agreements of both Bill Clinton and G.W. Bush, losing jobs and quality of life. The moderate stances of Hillary (trying to defend her husband initially) and Obama can’t cut it in a hostile environment like OH. So both have turned the tables and are calling for serious re-negotiations on NAFTA or the complete destruction of the agreement - just to help Ohio. Obama once embraced globalization and decried “rampant protectionism” in his best selling “Audacity of Hope. Hillary was a staunch defender of Bill’s trade record and a supporter of NAFTA. Both are now taking a populist tack and throwing out the most anti-free trade rhetoric they can cook up.
  • Some cold water on the Hillary campaign’s strategy to simply win Ohio and Texas to get back in front of the Dem race: It’s mathematically imperative that any HRC win in Ohio (and Texas) must be big - well into double-digits. With 92 delegates to awarded through a proportional system, there;’s not much room to maneuver if Hillary manages to squeak out a close win over Obama. And with Texas trending heavily to Obama, her win would have to be simply enormous to have any positive effect on her faltering campaign. Campaign advisers aren’t publicly discussing the troubling math  - they’re just promising a victory.
  • Great news for Obama from a set of two new Reuters/C-SPAN/Houston Chronicle polls released this morning. They show him taking a somewhat commanding six-point lead over Hillary in the Texas race and nearly pulling into a dead heat with HRC in Clinton-friendly Ohio. Both continue to show pro-Obama trends in both states and have dashed any hope from the Clinton camp for two easy wins to get the storyline back to the HRC juggernaut. This data is by no means assurance of Obama wins: Time and again we’ve seen major swings against both candidate - especially Obama - on primary day.
  • Pot and kettle?: At a Texas town hall yesterday, McCain pops off on Obama and blisters him with attacks. Most notable was when JMac accused Obama and his candidacy of representing “the past.” OK; is that just silly, or is it an abhorrent failure to realize the tormented history of African American in the U.S.?
Sphere: Related Content