Saturnalia Evening Addition

The Obama rally in Providence, Rhode Island today sounds like it was a big success. Hillary got a crowd of 3,000 last week at the same venue. Obama had 3,000 in the overflow. The venue was filled with from 5,000 to 8,000 people, very enthusiastic. Senator Lincoln Chafee, who as a Republican lost his seat because he voted against authorizing the Iraq war, was present in the hall as an Obama supporter, and when Obama mentioned his vote, he got the ovation he so richly deserved. The Washington Post also suggests R.I. may not be safe for Clinton.

This was after Obama had a meeting with Latino religious leaders in Texas and visited the border.

Al G. reports that Obama is headed for a couple of events in Ohio, one tonight in the Cleveland area and one tomorrow noon. The New York Times reports that Clinton and Obama will be in the same Ohio town at the same time Sunday. Their article describes the battle for both states as fierce, as Clinton tries to survive and Obama tries to end this thing.

Clinton apparently is not sticking to her previously announced schedule of staying in Texas until Tuesday. She is expected to concentrate on questioning Obama's national security credentials. With Obama buying perhaps twice as much ad time, Hillary is going for free media, with her appearance on Saturday Night Live Saturday, and upcoming on the Daily Show on Monday. Obama's Town Hall Meeting in Parma, Ohio (Cleveland area) Saturday appears to have been very well attended.

Meanwhile the Obama campaign said that its volunteers made 300,000 phone calls to the March 4 states on Saturday, passing its goal of 1 million by March 4. The new goal is another half million calls by the time the polls close Tuesday.

The Week Before Ends

So the day--and the week-- slog to an end. The battle of San Antonio score was an estimated 8,000 for Obama in the suburbs, and 1500 tops for Hillary in the city. It looks like Al G. got burned on Richardson, which happened to me right after Wisconsin. Richardson' s been saying he might endorse "in a few days" for a few weeks.

A lot can still happen over the weekend, the polls are very close in Ohio now and show a bit of a stall in Texas. It still seems likely that Clinton will not gain an appreciable number of delegates, but that Obama might. The Texas caucus alone suggests he'll win more delegates than she in Texas. Since Super Tuesday, as some point out, Obama has done much better than the final polls in each contest.

The ground game, the get out of the vote effort, has been a big factor, and observers suggest the same is going to be true in Texas and Ohio. And according to a story in the New York Times Saturday, it might even be true in Rhode Island, which is no longer a gimme for Hillary. Obama speaks in Providence Saturday. (It's currently the only event on his public schedule.)

What the pundits are likely to be talking about all weekend is: what will Hillary do if...If she loses Texas and Ohio. If she wins one, loses the other. If she wins small popular vote margins in both, but Obama ends the night winning more delegates. I suppose there's even a question of what she would do if Obama wins big in all four states. And nobody knows.

What Hillary has done this week is keep the Obama campaign playing defense, which the Obama campaign has done successfully--Hillary hasn't scored, at least so anyone would know. If she had, there would be some consistency in her campaign, which there isn't. (Shame on you seems years ago.) But it is possible that the visible growth of enthusiasm for Obama has been slowed. Something may happen to reignite it this weekend, or I may be entirely wrong about this--but there are ups and downs in any wave. All that would mean is a slower momentum, with Hillary not losing a lot more of her base.

But after the back and forth of this week, the expectations game playing today (Clintonians actually saying that if Obama doesn't win four blow-outs it signals he's in trouble; Obama's campaign manager saying Hillary can't possibly achieve her goal of getting within 25 delegates total of Obama, and Obama himself saying he'll be happy to hold his delegate lead), I've had one thought: so far nothing the Obama campaign has said or done has made me cringe. It's a whole new feeling.

No Rest for Friday

Maybe it's because it's a grey, cold, windy and generally weary Friday afternoon here on the North Coast of CA where I am, but this campaign is exhausting. One of the reasons I decided to blog on it here at least once a day was to have a personal record, possibly to compare to my less frequent entries in 2006, 2004 and earlier elections. But I wonder whether even I will go back and read these. Because of the role of super-delegates and the TV ad that Hillary unveiled today, there's been a lot of talk about the 1984 primaries between Gary Hart and Walter Mondale. I'm sure I followed them closely (which at the time meant reading the newspapers and watching the evening news and PBS) but I don't remember anything about it. It's exhausting to go through, let alone return to.

Well, we are picking a President at a critical moment for the future of human civilization, so here we go again...

The pace itself is dizzying, as evidenced by today's back and forth, beginning with the release of the Hillary ad (three in the morning, the phone rings, who do you trust to answer it in the White House?), Obama's spoken rejoinder at his next event in Texas, and then by midafternoon, a new Obama ad that directly responds to Hillary's, making the point that the person you want answering that phone is the one with the best judgment. Amazing--and I agree with georgia10 , one of the frontpagers at Kos: "Attacks will be flying fast and furious in the general, and swift responses like this will be required. Should he become the nominee, the Obama campaign's extraordinarily rapid response time is a great sign. "

And then there's this account of the media conference call with the Clinton wolves:

Responding to the release of HRC's new TX TV ad, which asserts in no subtle terms that only she has the experience to deal with a major world crisis, and, relatedly, to keep your children safe, Slate's John Dickerson asked the obvious question: "What foreign policy moment would you point to in Hillary's career where she's been tested by crisis?" he said.

Silence on the call. You could've knit a sweater in the time it took the usually verbose team of Mark Penn, Howard Wolfson and Lee Feinstein, Clinton's national security director, to find a cogent answer. And what they came up with was weak -- that she's been endorsed by many high ranking members of the uniformed military.

But the most significant event of the day so far may be the quiet endorsement of Obama by Senator Jay Rockerfeller of West Virginia, chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee. He is considered a moderate Democrat, with great national security credentials, and parts of West Virginia are the same as parts of Ohio and Pennsylvania. Put this together with Obama's other two major endorsements of the week--Senator Chris Dodd and Rep. John Lewis--and you have endorsers with exceptional credentials in three distinct parts of the party.
Impressive, powerful.

Obama Momentum Continues?

In a Reuters/Houston Chronicle/C-SPAN poll released Friday, Barack Obama has taken a 6 point lead in Texas, and is 2 points-- within the 3.8 margin of error-- behind Hillary Clinton in Ohio. The poll shows the momentum is with Obama.

The poll was conducted by Zogby, which has gotten some key races wrong earlier in the primary season. However, a tracking poll by a Texas company and TV station shows Obama ahead for the first time, leading by a large margin in early voting, and leading in the most populated areas with the most delegates.

Update: Other polls released today confirm these general trends. Rasmussen shows Obama gaining on Clinton in Ohio. Rasmussen and other polls show Obama slightly ahead in Texas; other polls show him slightly to moderately behind in Ohio.


Today and tonight could be quite dramatic in San Antonio. Obama and Hillary are holding events within miles of each other. And Al G. of The Field , who is reporting in San Antonio, has been hinting about a big endorsement there--Bill Richardson, more or less explicitly--but it's not clear if he's riffing or if he knows something he can't say. If Richardson really, finally is going to endorse, then Texas would be the place, where he could make some Latinos more comfortable about moving away from Hillary (or staying with her, if he endorses her.)

Toledo Blade Endorses Obama

After a clean sweep of major Texas newspapers, Obama gets the endorsement of the Toledo Blade on Friday:

THE Blade has a long-established principle of seldom endorsing a candidate in any primary election. It's easy to see, however, that this isn't a typical year. For the first time in history, the outcome of the Ohio primary may well determine the Democratic nominee for president of the United States.

We are not yet ready to say who we will endorse in November. But we wholeheartedly agree with something our editorial board heard on Sunday: 'We have to have a government that works for ordinary people. We've got to be able to bring the country together so we have a working majority for change. We have to break down some of the ideologically driven polarization that prevents us from taking practical steps to make the country more competitive and to get opportunity to people.'

We urge Ohio Democrats to vote on Tuesday for the man who spoke those words, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.

It's Only Thursday

The Clinton campaign is fighting furiously, but there are two questions: is this smoke and mirrors? And is it too late--has the train left the station?

On the first question, the Clinton campaign announced today that it raised $35 million in February, their highest one month total, and enough to be competitive in upcoming contests. But there is no breakdown on how much of this is pledged to the primary and how much to the general, and can't be used for upcoming primaries. [UPDATE: according to the Friday NY Times, the campaign says that $34 million is for the primaries. ]It was believed that the Clinton contributors had maxed out on the primaries, though her campaign says these were contributions that averaged at $100. It's impossible to know what that means. 90% of Obama's contributions are $50 or less, but the average is still slightly above $100, because that other 10% made large contributions.

Journalists seem to agree that Clinton is still being outspent for media in Ohio and Texas, however. The Obama campaign has just made a major ad buy for two minute slots on the Monday before the election.

Similarly, the Clinton campaign continues to release new TV commercials, as they did for Wisconsin, but this obscures just how much they're actually going to be on the air, which in Wisconsin was, not much. Plus, the support (on the ground and on the air) for Obama from the likes of unions and moveon.org is just starting to kick in. And the Obama campaign has yet to announce its February take, except to say it is "considerably more" than Clinton's.

The larger question is whether it is too late anyway. Obama himself has tried to limit expectations for Ohio and Texas, telling reporters that if he came out of March 4 with the same delegate lead he has now, he'd be satisfied. The polls in both big states continue to be close.

On the other hand...If Clinton has regained momentum, it hasn't translated into anything visible. All but one recent poll shows movement to Obama in Texas, and all do in Ohio. If Hillary changed anything with the debate and her recent campaigning it wouldn't show up yet.

What is visible is that super-delegates continue to abandon Hillary and move to Obama. Obama has netted 34 since Super Tuesday and Clinton has lost six. (Her lead is down to 254 to 203.) Obama continues to speak to huge audiences--by one estimate, a crowd of 25,000 in San Marcos, Texas. Early voting in Texas and Ohio are breaking records: Time Magazine joins local observers in suggesting it favors Obama in Texas, and CNN suggested in a report today it is favoring Obama in Ohio.

National surveys continue to see an Obama wave, most recently the respected Pew Research poll which shows Obama ahead of Clinton among Democrats, 49% to 40%, and ahead of McCain for the general election 50% to 43%.

Clinton has been mostly in Ohio this week, but tomorrow she goes to Texas and stays there until Tuesday. Does this indicate confidence about Ohio, worry about Texas? Obama campaigns in Texas Friday but leaves the big states for a bit to speak in Rhode Island Saturday, suggesting that Clinton's one "sure" March 4 state is up for grabs, or just that he intends to contest everywhere.

The truth at this point is that nobody knows anything, especially because of early voting, open primaries, etc. Will the overwhelming enthusiasm for Obama again translate into votes? Are Latinos in Texas and/or women and working class voters moving back to Clinton? Will voters endorse the conventional wisdom that Obama is going to be the nominee, or will they revolt? I'm seeing smoke and mirrors in the Clinton campaign, but I'm not yet ready to say the train has left the station. It's only Thursday, after all.

Update: both candidates will hold rallies in San Antonio Friday.

Judgment

Part of good judgment is knowing what words mean, when they apply and when they don't. If you know this, you can be precise in your agreement and disagreement. It's an essential skill in working with people over time, and in getting things right from the start.

In Tuesday's debate we saw how Barack Obama respects words, and how he uses good judgment. He was asked a question about accepting or rejecting Louis Farrakhan's "endorsement." In fact, Farrakhan did not say he endorsed Obama for President in the Democratic primaries or the general election. He observed, "This young man is the hope of the entire world that America will change and be better." But Obama let the word "endorse" go by, and explained that he had often denounced Farrakhan's positions and statements. He said that he can't stop anyone from saying anything, and that Farrakhan had offered no help to his campaign.

Then Hillary made a big to-do about rejecting an endorsement by a hate group, which sounds like it really might have been an endorsement, and insisted that Obama would send the wrong message by merely "denouncing" and not "rejecting."

Several commentators later said or wrote that Obama had been vague, or gotten himself in trouble at this point. Then he made his point and the distinction even clearer: "There's no formal offer of help from Minister Farrakhan that would involve me rejecting it." I don't see how he could have been clearer: he can't reject what hadn't been offered. And that all those commentators didn't understand this bothers me.

But then Obama made an immensely skillful move. Seeing that people might not get the distinction, and that this might require even further explanation, and that it wasn't worth it, he added, "But if the word 'reject' Senator Clinton feels is stronger than the word 'denounce,' then I'm happy to concede the point, and I would reject and denounce."

This made the whole things seem silly, Clinton look petty in trying to find something to get him on, and it pulled the rug from under the commentators who couldn't figure out that very simple distinction.

As I say, that they couldn't figure it out bothers me. But it gives me great confidence that Obama understood it. Someday that kind of precision is going to be important for President Obama.

Wednesday Evening News

What do we make of this? Last night's debate got more viewers than anything else on cable, was MSNBC's highest rated hour ever, and beat out all but a few entertainment shows on television as a whole. Why? It could be the play that Hillary's weekend dramatics got, suggesting there would be lots of fireworks. It could be the growing awareness of Barack Obama, reflected in his big jump in the national polls. In any case, I stick with my analysis. Beyond the issues that have been discussed thoroughly in this campaign, it was about the impression of which person you'd want to see and experience and follow as President for the next four years. A clear winner for Obama, seems to me. (And Tom Shales in the Washington Post seems to agree with me, while Keith used my ju jitsu analogy today.)

Speaking of Obama winning, he got two more super-delegate endorsements: Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, and Rep. John Lewis, the famed Civil Rights leader, who had previously backed Hillary. Some suggest this is the first of many endorsements/switches to Obama to come from the black political community. These two endorsements mean than Obama now has 200 super-delegate announced votes.

The Obama campaign announced that it has recorded its one millionth campaign contributor. News out of Ohio is that Obama has four times the TV ads as Clinton, and reporting plus anecdotes continue to suggest that the Obama ground game is far superior in both Texas and Ohio. More than a half million Texans have already voted; though both campaigns have been stressing early voting, the higher percentage increases in early voting are coming from areas believed to be Obama territory.

Via Kos, there's the information (as delegates continue to be awarded from contests long over, due to complex state rules) that since voting began with Iowa, Obama has not lost to Clinton in delegates once, including Super Tuesday, which so far has Obama gaining 842 delegates to 828 for Clinton.

While the news covers Clinton's latest new rationale or talking point for her primary election, today the news about Obama was an exchange on Iraq between Obama and John McCain. But I don't see overconfidence in the Obama campaign, which has taken on a life of its own with thousands of volunteers plus the union support that's being deployed on his behalf. They seem to be concentrating on the ground game. (They have a goal of one million phone calls to voters in March 4 states.) Clinton's latest series of content-related appearances in Ohio is actually pretty smart. But the Obama air campaign and the ground game may be too much.

If the Hillaryites are looking to Pennsylvania for yet another firewall, they'd better look again. Hillary was up by 16 points two weeks ago, but according to the Quinnipiac poll numbers today, that lead is down to 6: 49% to 43%.

Clinton and the Media

The apparently intense resentment the Clinton campaign is expressing for how the media is covering the campaign spilled into Tuesday's debate in a fairly bizarre way, with Hillary attacking the questioners for--of all things--always asking her questions first. That this is a disadvantage is by no means obvious.

But on the larger point, it's true that the Clinton campaign is getting a bad press. Why? Because they're losing. For much of this year, the media narrative was Clinton the Inevitable, the virtual incumbent, with unbeatable credentials, political machine, message discipline, etc.

Well, as I've pointed out many times before, the media knows only one story line, the rise, the fall, the resurrection. It's their version of boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl (with the appropriate 21st century gender variations.) So they gave her months of the rise to dominance, and then the story was alone at the top. But happily ever after is boring, and once that clearly was no longer the way things were going, then the Clinton story became "the fall," while the Obama story took over the "rise" storyline.

Sure, the fall of the Clintons liberated some bias, both conscious and unconscious, against women, but also liberated resentment against the Clintons, and specifically against how Hillary's campaign hectors the press, responds to questions by belittling the question itself, and so on. People will take that as long as they have to. Now they don't have to.

The media is covering dissension within the Clinton campaign and among her supporters. Nobody cares much about dissension in a winning campaign, though reporters store up those stories for later use. At the debate, the Tim "The Ferret" Russert turned his beady eyes and gleaming teeth on Hillary first, partly because she's been making the most provocative statements and exhibiting the most provocative behavior. What she's been saying and doing is new. I don't discount a certain amount of payback, and I don't like Russert in the first place (if you couldn't tell.) But if she's such a fighter and a survivor, she can't also be the victim.

Insofar as the pushback by the Clinton campaign is tactical, trying to force the press into different behavior, good luck. Clinton can get better press by changing the storyline. And she can only do that by winning Texas and Ohio by Obama-sized margins next Tuesday. Then they're happily off to the Resurrection. The story continues.

Debate and Other News

I've just read through a bunch of the online commentary on the debate, after catching much of the MSNBC and CNN commentary. Want my review? Oddly, I thought some of the TV talkers had good points, while the online commentators and live bloggers missed or misunderstood a great deal--maybe you really can't watch and blog at the same time.

But I'm now confident that my impressions have no less validity, because I can drive a truck through some of their assertions, and some of the impressions of body language, etc., made me wonder whether we watched the same debate.

I started watching when the candidates were already seated, and Hillary looked pretty awful--there was a dull sadness in her eyes I hadn't seen before, and she seemed to be slumping. She's exhausted. Obama looked fine (apparently over his cold from the last debate), sat erect, clear-eyed. On Sunday Hillary more or less promised she would be on the attack, although she backed off yesterday, so nobody knew what she would be like tonight.

If you want the obligatory sports metaphor, Obama was playing jujitsu--he waited for her attack, parried smoothly and when the opportunity presented itself, knocked her back. Though Hillary rallied and acquitted herself well at various points, she also faltered (and with that get Barack a pillow comment, and the charge that he advocated bombing Pakistan, hurt herself.) She just didn't have the energy to sustain.

But beyond the sports metaphor which is of limited usefulness, I thought the biggest impression from the debate is giving us an idea of what Obama would be like as President. He was incisive, cool and had a sense of humor. He had a command of issues, didn't let Hillary get away with an inaccuracy, but gave her credit when he thought she was right. He not only looked and sounded presidential, he showed how he can work with others and bring them to his view, or allow them to modify his, by zeroing in on areas of agreement and difference (without being offended by difference, or getting inflated by agreement) and by coming back to principle. We saw an even temperament and an incisive intellect able to make fine distinctions while always guided by his core principles.

On debating points, he won on Iraq, won on Pakistan and terrorism, won on "denounce and reject," defended his health care plan from her attack than it isn't universal, and showed that she had a double standard on attacks of their plans: if she attacks his plan for not being universal, while he maintains it is universal, then she's right; if he attacks her plans for mandates, then he's attacking universal health care. He won on NAFTA mostly because she's running from her past support, which is on the record.

Yes, the commentators are all correct in that there was no "knockout" blow. I would have preferred that Obama mention the difference in the process he wants to fashion a universal health care bill openly. I would have liked more on economic issues and certainly the Climate Crisis (though they both touted the green economy.)

But even though there was nothing that obviously might change minds in Ohio, I do feel how voters might have experienced this debate: as a preview of what they might see on their televisions for the next four years. Do they want to watch and listen to Hillary, with her harsh, hectoring tone and mixed messages within statements, or Obama--a slower paced speaking style in this format, yet crisp and precise in his statements, whose arguments are clear and convincing, and short?

Hillary went specifically after women with her closing statement about the big difference a woman in the White House, and that might have worked with that constituency to some degree, but did it overcome other impressions? She positioned herself as a fighter, without giving a convincing argument why fighting Clinton-style is better or more effective than getting people to agree. The "I'll fight for you," may be her latest knockoff from John Edwards, but it was also Al Gore's refrain in 2000. Maybe times are different, but it didn't win Ohio then, and it may not win Ohio now. It depends on whether people want that, or feel they're heard it all before and they'd like to try something--and someone new.

The "other news" is that the Survey USA poll on Ohio shows that Hillary still has a lead, but it's diminished, though not by the huge percentage as in Texas (but Obama has just started campaigning in Ohio.) Hillary had a 17 point lead almost a week ago, now 9. But her internals are holding up pretty well, and early voting favors her pretty substantially. Still, it's by no means a lock--Obama could still win the state, is on track to gain as many or more delegates (according to Al G.'s analysis), and almost certainly will deny the dimensions of victory Hillary needs.

Also Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd became the first of the ex-candidates to endorse: he endorsed, not his next-door neighbor from New York, but Barack Obama. It immediately struck me that he ought to be on the short list for an Obama vice president, and that's the first name (besides John Edwards) that makes sense to me.

The Political Wire saw fit to headline Bill Richardson's statement that he might endorse "in a few days," but he said that before Wisconsin, so I'm not holding my breath. He did say that he's not sure his endorsement means that much, and he's right there, especially if he waits until after the Texas primary. He also offered the opinion that this race is not over "by a long shot," which might signal he's going for Hillary, or just that since he's been forever making up his mind, that he wants his endorsement to be at least a little relevant.

Late Numbers

The blogs are buzzing with the new Survey USA poll numbers. SUSA is considered to be the most reliable polling outfit. Their Texas poll shows Obama ahead 49-45, just out of the margin of error. It's a nine point swing in six days.

But it's inside the poll that is most fascinating. For example, Hillary's lead among Latino voters has gone from 33 points to 13. In a week! She led among women by 27, now by 11. Obama has increased his lead among young voters from 6 points to 22. Among those most concerned with the economy as an issue, Clinton had led by 2, but now Obama leads by 11. Where Obama has spent the most time campaigning, his numbers have soared.

Al G. quotes from a story in tomorrow morning's NY Times, in which a pharmacist in San Antonio talks about switching from Hillary to Obama because of the lines to get into Obama's speech there: “The lines to get into the plaza went more than a mile,” said Mr. Davila, showing photographs his assistant had taken at the Obama rally held less than half a block from his pharmacy. “The crowd was one-third white, one-third black and one-third Latino. I had never seen anything like it in San Antonio. And I knew right then he was the best candidate to defeat the Republicans in November.”

There's your operative number: one-third white, one-third black, one-third Latino. In 1964, the long-time Republican leader of the House, Everett Dirkson, ended his opposition to civil rights legislation by quoting (or mis-quoting as the case may be, because I've seen at least three variations) Victor Hugo: "Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come."

Hillary-kiri

There was a disturbing diary at Kos yesterday that despite remaining on the Rec list until today, hasn't seemed to inspire political discussion beyond the site. I'd like to hear some other discussion of what the facts that it reveals (assuming they are facts.)might mean, especially in view of the Hillary campaign over the past few days.

Here's the gist: Mark Penn, Hillary's chief strategist who has billed millions, is the CEO of the global PR firm Burston-Marsteller. The company has a Washington based subsidiary for lobbying, called BKSH. Its chairman is Charlie Black, a Republican who is John McCain's chief advisor. He travels with McCain and has gotten some recent press from admitting that he carries on his lobbying activities from McCain's Straight Talk Express.

Like other DC-involved PR firms, BKSH also has Democrats in its employ--its highest ranking one is Scott Pastrick, a Hillary supporter. So in one sense, nothing unusual. Except for the theory more or less offered in this diary, which I'll give in my own interpretation: since Hillary is shortly to become an ex-candidate, Mark Penn will lose big income he'd been counting on. But his firm is still working for McCain--so why not test some negative themes against Obama with Clinton? If she hits on one that works, great. If she doesn't, no harm done--except to her reputation and the Democratic Party--because she's on the way to tanking anyway. And when it's over for her, Penn can take anything that looked like it could work to McCain. Which also explains why Hillary sounds so much like a Republican, and her campaign so much like desperate bottom feeders, in their attacks.

That diary is a bit more conspiratorial than this, but after the last couple of days--the "shame on you" thing, the show Obama looking like somebody's idea of a Muslim photo, the sarcasm about inspiration and the less than subtle comparison to an untested G.W. Bush--this idea has some grim resonance.

Penn may be selling this to Hillary as her only chance to force Obama into making a big mistake at the debate Tuesday, which in turn is her only chance to turn back his amazing momentum. And if it turns out that all Clinton is doing is committing Hillary-kiri, what does he care? He's got her millions. McCain needs all the help he can get.

More Monday Numbers

Attention Super-delegates: The CBS/New York Times poll has Barack Obama ahead of Hillary nationally by 16 points among Democratic primary voters, and he's above the magic 50%: it's 54% to 38%. Hillary has lost her base of women--it's even between them.

The new Gallup poll shows a similar spread: 51% to 39%.

The Obama rally in Cincinatti drew 11,000. At that rally he got the endorsement of the city's mayor, which brings his mayoral endorsements in major Ohio cities to three, including Cleveland and Columbus. In Dayton, another 11,000. Clinton drew about 1500 in or near these cities recently. Ohio also has early voting, and these Obama rallies provide buses to the polls to vote immediately afterwards.

Al G. at the Field provides a preliminary analysis of how the Ohio delegate allocation breaks out. His general conclusions: Hillary needs to win the state with 60% to get even 20 more delegates than Obama. And "the weighting of delegates per district helps Obama more than Clinton."

Rhode Island is still considered Hillary's best shot for a win on March 4, but the support of Providence Mayor David Cicilline, previously announced for Hillary, is wavering.

And back to the numbers: a couple of sites have suggested that because of Obama's huge lead in Vermont polls, he could actually pick up more delegates from that state than from Texas or Ohio. So theoretically, and given today's polls numbers, Obama could simply stay close in the other states, and win the night in delegates by winning Vermont. But with the momentum in Texas and now Ohio, and more than a week to go, things are moving his way. Hillary's last chance to alter the perception is in tomorrow's debate, and it's only a slight chance.

8 Days Away

Four new polls (so far) today show Obama cutting Clinton's lead in Ohio in half, or more. The American Research Group shows her with a ten point lead, Institute of Policy Research Ohio poll gives her an 8 pt. lead, Quinnipac 9 pts. (down from 21 pts. last week), and the Public Policy Polling survey gives her just a 4 pt. lead. All the polls show Obama gaining. There are 8 days until the Ohio primary.

The ARG poll shows Obama leading in Texas by 8 points.

There are two other contests on March 4, in Rhode Island (where Hillary was ahead) and Vermont (which Hillary is virtually conceding to Obama.) So if the primary were held tomorrow, it might be a split. But it's not. And Hillary is going negative to try to stop Obama's momentum.

The Utility Workers of America union, with 10,000 members in Ohio and 8,000 in PA, endorsed Obama today.

10,000 people attended the Obama rally in Toledo, with another 5,000 in the overflow. Obama's crowd in Akron was estimated at 8,000.

If a Hillary Screams in the Forest...

Al G. at the Field has some amazing numbers on the relative sizes of crowds that Obama and Hillary are getting in Texas and Ohio. Yesterday Obama spoke to 6,000 people in Cleveland. Clinton spoke the day before to 2,500. Obama spoke to another 6,000 in Akron, where he got the endorsement of a former mayor and state rep. Clinton in the larger city of Cinncinatti drew 1500. She drew the same number in Dayton, and 3000 in Toledo, where Obama is holding another huge rally today.

But the real extremes are in Texas. Obama spoke to 19,000 in Houston, Hillary to 600. (To be fair, this was apparently an event scheduled at the last minute. But even that tells you something.)

Al thinks this might be why Hillary shouted, "Enough with the speeches and big rallies!" in her "shame on you" speech Saturday. Today she's out and out mocking Obama's speeches. But how many people are listening?

The crowds Obama is getting in Texas aren't the only indication of how he's doing there. Early voting in districts where he is expected to do well is up by astounding percentages--in some places, 8 or 9 times what it was in 2004. This alone has caused a Houston Chronicle columnist to predict that Obama will win the state.

A couple of interesting polls revealed today which are likely to be noted by super-delegates: A Des Moines Register poll shows Obama carrying the state of Iowa in the general election against McCain by a huge margin: 53% to 36%. But Hillary would lose to McCain by nine points. And a Rasmussen poll that shows Hillary losing New Mexico by 12 points, but Obama tied with McCain. This is a state Hillary won by a few hundred votes in the Super Tuesday primary.

I saw a story somewhere about the Clinton campaign that had them really worried about carrying Texas. They can start worrying about Pennsylvania, too, if they get that far. Word is that the Philadelphia Building Trades Council is set to endorse Obama tomorrow. The Boston Globe report adds that: On Friday, Obama campaign announced that it had received the support of Leon Lynch, a Pittsburgh-area superdelegate and former vice president of the United Steelworkers of America, which had previously supported John Edwards.

The Globe reporter concludes that "In many cases, labor’s leadership is trying to catch up with a membership that is marching into the Obama camp," led by younger members. The significance is what the Globe calls "growing support for Obama among the building trades -- key operators in the upcoming Ohio and Pennsylvania primaries -- has begun to create a labor coalition that offsets Hillary Clinton’s strength among public-employees unions. "

Oh, and Ralph Nader announced today he's running for President. Obama, who as a young man once worked for a Nader-affliated organization in Harlem, had this to say:

"I think anybody has the right to vote [run?] for president if they file sufficient papers. And I think the job of the Democratic Party is to be so compelling that a few percentage of the vote going to another candidate's not going to make any difference."

When reporters reminded Obamathat Nader had said some not-so nice things about him, Obama replied:"He had called me and I think reached out to my campaign. My sense is that Mr. Nader is somebody who if you're -- don't listen and adopt all of his policies, thinks you're not substantive. He seems to have a pretty high opinion of his own work. Now, and by the way, I have to say that historically, he is a singular figure in American politics and has done as much as just about anybody on behalf of consumers. So in many ways, he is a heroic figure and I don't mean to diminish him, but I do think there's a sense now that um, you know if somebody's not hewn to the Ralph Nader agenda then you, you must be lacking in some way."

In the department of better late than ever comes these Words from Bloomberg.com: Hillary Clinton has criticized Barack Obama for ``lifting whole passages'' in his speeches, an act her campaign has called plagiarism. The Illinois senator says the charges are ``silly,'' and intellectual-property experts agree.

Saturday's Surprises

So she proved me wrong, more or less. Hillary picked a fight (over Obama direct mail pieces that are weeks old) and challenged Obama to debate his tactics in Ohio on Tuesday.

Taking offense at what you suddenly define as dirty negative campaigning is not a completely stupid move, at least not in another campaign. Obama quickly called her on the timing and the content of her charges. Hillary's play was largely seen as desperate, especially in its tone, but also due to the ease of seeing through it. She attacked Obama for criticizing her health care plan, although she's been criticizing his for months. Ditto on NAFTA--what she says are lies may technically be corrections to a specific quote that should indeed have been made by now, but substantively, the evidence that the charges are true are on the public record. The whole thing is on Youtube already.

In her criticism of Obama, she asked, "Since when do Democrats attack one another on universal health care?"Obama had a ready reply to that. "Well, when she started to say I was against universal health care ... which she does every single day," he said. If Hillary actually believes what she said, it's a textbook example of projection, fueled perhaps by denial.

Hillary's "Shame on you, Barack Obama" got her today's headlines. It also lost her every male vote in Texas and probably Ohio, and possibly every female one under age 50. Except those regressive types who want to be bullied by mom on a tirade.

Hillary was into shaming alot on Saturday, it seems. She said America didn't know enough about the charming G.W. Bush and look what happened. Now they were making the same mistake with Obama. "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me." She actually said that. Made it up herself, too.

At least she got the whole schoolyard cliche out correctly, more than G.W. himself was able to do. But maybe the more pertinent comparison--and certainly the funnier--is in the Sunday column by Frank Rich, when he compares the Clinton campaign to Iraq--you know, shock & awe, mission accomplished, blindsided by the insurgency, denial, no exit strategy, etc. I guess now it's the Surge. Rich also catalogues some of the many missteps and absurdities, such as the machinist union leader who introduced Hillary's speech last Tuesday talking about Obama's supporters as "latte-drinking, Prius-driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust-fund babies.” "Less than 24 hours later," Rich notes, " Mr. Obama received the endorsement of the latte-drinking Teamsters."

Literally standing behind Hillary as she made these charges was Ohio Governor Ted Strickland, feeling a little striken perhaps as he watches his chances at being vice-president drain away. He'd already been reported as telling political colleagues that he wasn't sure he could hold his state for Clinton.

Meanwhile, supporters like Kathleen Kennedy Townsend and former Bill Clinton press secretary Dede Myers were publicly offering their obituaries for the Clinton campaign and scornfully describing its mistakes.

So now Hillary has called Obama out for the Tuesday debate. By then, he'll have been in Ohio a few days, building enthusiasm there. It's likely to be Hillary's last stand.

And while this was going on, all the fun was in Texas. Obama had a huge, huge rally in Austin. The Tom DeLay redistricting and state Republicans trying to suppress Democratic turnout placed the early voting site for the Prairie View A&M university 7 miles from campus. Students responded by marching those 7 miles to vote in such large numbers that they shut down traffic on the highway. The Obama ground operation is blowing away the Clinton efforts in Texas and Ohio, and elsewhere. (They're even in North Carolina and Wyoming, and of course, Pennsylvania.) Now it's true that in this last string of victories the Obama campaign hasn't been up against the full Clinton effort and (in Ohio) state machinery backing her. If the Obama tide can overcome it and turn all this enthusiasm into victories in those states, Hillary is truly done. And if she doesn't admit it and stand down, shame on her.