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First Read is an analysis of the day's political news, from the NBC News political unit. First Read is updated throughout the day, so check back often.

Chuck Todd, NBC Political Director

Mark Murray, NBC Deputy Political Director

Domenico Montanaro, NBC Political Researcher



May 6: The 527 wars

Posted: Thursday, May 01, 2008 9:16 AM by Mark Murray
Filed Under: ,

INDIANA: The Los Angeles Times examines the Clinton-supporting 527. “With $220,000 in ad buys Wednesday alone, the California-based American Leadership Project has spent more on advertisements in Indiana than in the other, more populous states where it has been active: Texas, Pennsylvania and Ohio… The effort is funded mainly by unions backing Clinton. The American Federation of Teachers donated $300,000 on Wednesday. In recent days, the effort has received a combined $600,000 from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees and unions representing painters and sheet metal workers."

SEIU, though, is now chipping in more money for its own pro-Obama campaign. "The SEIU has spent the most on independent campaigns during the primaries -- at least $8.7 million boosting Obama's candidacy, according to Federal Election Commission records. The AFSCME has spent $4.1 million to help Clinton.”

The New York Times looks at the sense of urgency Clinton is feeling regarding Indiana. "While Clinton advisers say that Mrs. Clinton needs to carry the state to start trying to catch up with Mr. Obama’s lead in delegates, some political analysts said that even a virtual tie would be a setback because it would show she could not beat Mr. Obama when he was struggling."

Here’s a dispatch from NBC’s Kevin Corke from the Mean Green Machine… In our travels from Anderson, IN to Indianapolis, we rode in-cab with Joe Pyles, a professional truck driver. Joe -- a white male in his mid-50s -- has been driving big rigs for 30 years. He told me he could remember when gas cost 65 cents a gallon. Now with prices for diesel over $4.40 in some places it costs him $800 every time he fills up. "I don't care who you are, the cost of fuel is making it tough just to live. Forget about eatin' at a restaurant, I've gotta make sure I can put the basics in the cupboard. And you can point to one reason, the cost of fuel- period!"

Pyles said jobs, the economy, and gas prices are the main issues he wants the next president to address -- adding that he's leaning toward voting for Obama.

We also spoke with Jennifer Preston (a black female, mom of four who just took a buyout from Chrysler after 15 years on the job). She said jobs and health care are her main issues. She said she liked Hillary until South Carolina and the "Bill thing." Now she's backing Obama. "I think he can help lift up black people so they can get a chance to do better, cause we've been struggling."

Preston said she thought Obama waited too long to more forcefully distance himself from Rev. Jeremiah Wright. "I'm not mad at Obama, I'm mad at Wright because he doesn't speak for black people, Obama or for Indianans. No preacher I know ever talked like that. He knows he's hurting Obama and I think he's doing it on purpose... He (Wright) should be ashamed."

Today, we'll meet students at Indiana University (supporters of Clinton and Obama), and we'll interview them from the Mean Green Machine. We'll also talk gas prices as we take the MGM to various stations on our way to Bloomington.

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She said she liked Hillary until South Carolina and the "Bill thing." Now she's backing Obama.
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Oooh, that has to hurt.  And Ol' Bill keeps saying that everyone played the race card on HIM.  Give me a break.

http://thepajamapundit.com/
http://twocanpete.blogspot.com/
Three months ago when they were telling Bubba to shut up they should have been turning him loose. If Mike Tyson offers to cover your back in a bar fight would you tell him to get lost?
We joke that Obama supporters are drinking kool aid, but one has to wonder what are they drinking at the DNC and what is Joe Andrew drinking? Are these radical liberals just losing their minds? Obama did not denounce his racist pastor until Wright stood up at the National Press Club and called Obama a LYING POLITICIAN! Well, that was just it for Obama! Never mind G-d D- -m America, or the government is giving blacks AIDS, but Wright called him a lying politician! We have to believe that Wright was not off his message on Monday. But Obama has changed his story - again! It's disgusting that a United States Senator sat in a church that supported and endorsed the views of Hamas, and with his silence and presence in the church gave legitimitacy to Hamas and Wright's preachings. But for the DNC and superdelegates to go to these lengths to support a candidate who obviously harbors racist anti-american views of our country, just shows how out of touch the radical left wing of the democratic party is with Americans. The DNC is doing a reenactment of the end of Thelma and Louise for the women, they must be really bitter with us....
I can only at this point laugh at this stuff. Sense of urgency in Indiana? You've got to be kidding.

Clinton knows she could win Indiana by 20 points and not dent Obama's delegate lead. She seemingly knows the superdelegates aren't breaking her way. Wasn't it just yesterday we heard superdelegates telling us the lobbying has stopped? This implies everyone from both campaigns pretty much knows where each superdelegate is sitting. She knows she lost. The only question is why stay in the race, and the best answer I've heard is to run up Obama's negatives so he'll lose in November.

And given all that, how could anyone have a sense of urgency about Indiana?
Another Super who was a Clinton buddy BOLTS form Hill

Anyone wonder why???

OBAMA is the man
"'We' joke that Obama supporters (and thus the Democratic party) drink Kool-aid..." as we sip on another Limbaugh cocktail and take comfort from "Dear Leader's" promises that there is NO WAY a "dimocrat" will ever, ever be elected president again, especially since everybody is so happy with the economy, and our victories in Afganistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Iraq.  Besides, after the borders was closed, there's nobody left to vote dimocrat anyway! Maybe Hannity will finally run for President!!!!
People, wake up! Hillary Clinton isn't running for 2008; she's running for 2012, and she and her loser of a husband are doing everything they can to undermine Obama's '08 run.

Too bad for Hillary that Kathleen Sebelius would be the nominee four years from now if Obama doesn't win in November. Kinda steals her thunder about being the first woman president, eh?
527's?  How about these people?
Read it on the huffington post. The article is from the institute for Southern Studies "facing South".

Who's behind the mysterious "robo-calls" that have spread misleading voter information and sown confusion and frustration among North Carolina residents over the last week?

Facing South has confirmed the source of the calls, and the mastermind is Women's Voices Women Vote, a D.C.-based nonprofit which aims to boost voting among "unmarried women voters."

What's more, Facing South has learned that the firestorm Women's Voices has ignited in North Carolina isn't the group's first brush with controversy. Women's Voices' questionable tactics have spawned thousands of voter complaints in at least 11 states and brought harsh condemnation from some election officials for their secrecy, misleading nature and likely violations of election law.

First, a quick recap: As we covered yesterday, N.C. residents have reported receiving peculiar automated calls from someone claiming to be "Lamont Williams." The caller says that a "voter registration packet" is coming in the mail, and the recipient can sign it and mail it back to be registered to vote. No other information is provided.

The call is deceptive because the deadline has already passed for mail-in registrations for North Carolina's May 6 primary. Also, many who have received the calls -- like Kevin Farmer in Durham, who made a tape of the call that is available here -- are already registered. The call's suggestion that they're not registered has caused widespread confusion and drawn hundreds of complaints, including many from African-American voters who received the calls.

The calls are also probably illegal. Farmer and others have told Facing South the calls use a blocked phone number and provided no contact information -- a violation of North Carolina rules regulating "robo-calls" (N.C. General Statute 163-104(b)(1)c). N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper further stated in a recent memo that the identifying information must be clear enough to allow the recipient to "complain or seek redress" -- something not included in the calls.

It is also a Class I felony in North Carolina "to misrepresent the law to the public through mass mailing or any other means of communication where the intent and the effect is to intimidate or discourage potential voters from exercising their lawful right to vote."
For such a sophisticated and well-funded operation, which counts among its ranks some of the country's most seasoned political operatives, such missteps are peculiar, as is the surprise expressed by Women's Voices staff after each controversy.

In at least two states, the timing of Women's Voices' activities have raised alarm that they are attempting to influence the outcome of a primary. As we reported earlier, in Virginia, news reports surfaced the first week in February that prospective voters were receiving anonymous robo-calls telling voters that they were about to receive a voter registration packet in the mail.
Now Women's Voices is plunging North Carolina into the same confusion. State officials tell Facing South they are still receiving calls from frustrated and confused voters, wondering why "Lamont Williams" is offering to send them a "voter registration packet" after the deadline for mail-in registration for the primaries has passed.

In correspondence with North Carolina election officials, Women's Voices founder and President Page Gardner merely said that the disruptive timing was an "unfortunate coincidence" -- a strange alibi for a group with their level of resources and sophistication.

There are other questions about Women's Voices' outreach efforts. Although the group purports to be targeting "unmarried women," their calls and mailings don't fit the profile. Kevin Farmer in Durham, who first recorded the call, is a white male. Many of the recipients are African-American; Rev. Nelson Johnson, who is a married, male and African-American, reported that his house was called four times by the mysterious "Lamont Williams."
Some have also questioned the ties between Women's Voices operatives and Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton. Gardner, for example, contributed $2,500 to Clinton's HILLPAC on May 4, 2006, and in March 2005 she donated a total of $4,200 to Clinton, according to The Center for Responsive Politics' OpenSecrets.org. She has not contributed to the Obama campaign, according to the database.

Women's Voices Executive Director Joe Goode worked for Bill Clinton's election campaign in 1992 as a pollster; the group's website says he was intimately involved in "development and implementation of all polling and focus groups done for the presidential primary and general election campaigns" for Clinton.

Women's Voices board member John Podesta, former Chief of Staff for President Bill Clinton, donated $2,300 to Hillary Clinton on April 19, 2007, according to OpenSecrets.org. Podesta also donated $1,000 to Barack Obama in July 2004, but that was well before Obama announced his candidacy for president.

"The reports from other states are very disturbing, especially the pattern of mass confusion among targeted voters on the eve of a state's primary," Democracy North Carolina's Bob Hall tells Facing South. "These are highly skilled political operatives -- something doesn't add up.

Could you look into this interesting political story? Where voters across the country have been deliberately misinformed by a DC Women's non-profit, that distorts election dates, and causes confusion for voters, and a deluge of local election offices? And as stated it seems to be African Americans that are the targets?

I thought that when push came to shove, McCain voted for the "CIA enhanced interrogation" techniques.  I would have voted for the 2000 version of McCain.  I now have a tough time differentiating between Bush and McCain.
Paul v. Clinton, where is it?

HRC’s ties to black revolutionaries while at Yale, where is it?

HCR criticizes Indiana plant closings which Bill approved while in office, where is it?

This probably will not be posted.  I have posted this many time but First Read will not show it.


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