Obama has Electoral Vote Advantage Come November

I plotted the general election electoral for November at the Washington Post website (you can do your own). My estimate shows Obama barely winning; but winning. The issue being Barack has to win either Ohio or Pennsylvania.

<p><strong>><a href='http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/interactives/campaign08/electoral-college/'>Electoral College Prediction Map</a></strong> - Predict the winner of the general election. Use the map to experiment with winning combinations of states. Save your prediction and send it to friends.</p>

Our Troops Endangered by Faulty Rifles?

If it weren't bad enough that our troops in Iraq are dying at the hands of insurgents. Now they face having to fight with guns that don't shoot:

No weapon is more important to tens of thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan than the carbine rifle. And for well over a decade, the military has relied on one company, Colt Defense of Hartford, to make the M4s they trust with their lives.

Now, as Congress considers spending millions more on the guns, this exclusive arrangement is being criticized as a bad deal for American forces as well as taxpayers, according to interviews and research conducted by the Associated Press.

"What we have is a fat contractor in Colt who's gotten very rich off our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.).

The M4, which can shoot hundreds of bullets a minute, is a shorter and lighter version of the company's M16 rifle, first used 40 years ago during the Vietnam War. At about $1,500 apiece, the M4 is overpriced, according to Coburn. It jams too often in sandy environments such as Iraq, he adds, and requires far more maintenance than more durable carbines.

"And if you tend to have the problem at the wrong time, you're putting your life on the line," said Coburn, who began examining the M4's performance last year after receiving complaints from soldiers. "The fact is, the American GI today doesn't have the best weapon. And they ought to."

[...]In 2006, a nonprofit research group surveyed 2,600 soldiers who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan and found 89 percent were satisfied with the M4. Colt and the Army have trumpeted that finding, but detractors point out that the survey also revealed that 19 percent of these soldiers had their weapon jam during a firefight.

Chicago Killings Raise Parents' Fears

What the hell is going on here? Are we seeing the disintegration our society? Then you have a worthless dynasty politician blaming the victims--the mothers:

All day, Chicago was a city on edge, with police gearing up to combat the waves of violence that have hit the city hard over the past few weeks.

Police SWAT teams are saturating the city's South Side, the area where most of the 331 shootings in the city this year have occurred. The teams are out in street patrols, backed up by helicopter surveillance.

It's their response to last weekend's shooting spree, which alone counted for an estimated 36 of those shootings, seven of them deadly.

Jitters Weatherspoon, a South Side native, said the violence in his neighborhood is forcing him and other parents to hold their children hostage in their own homes, for fear of seeing them get shot.

"That's a parent's worst dream is to have to bury their own kid and yes, it's happening. People are burying their kids," he said.

[...]A fired up Mayor Richard Daley held an emergency community meeting on Friday in which he blamed parents for letting the problem spiral out of control.

Kim Jong-il builds ‘Thunderbirds’ Runway for war in N. Korea

From The Sunday Times (UK):

North Korean military engineers are completing an underground runway beneath a mountain that can protect fighter aircraft from attack until they take off at high speed through the mouth of a tunnel.

The 6,000ft runway is a few minutes’ flying time from the tense front line where the Korean People’s Army faces soldiers from the United States and South Korea.

The project was identified by an air force defector from North Korea and captured on a satellite image by Google Earth, according to reports in the South Korean press last week.

It is one of three underground fighter bases among an elaborate subterranean military infrastructure built to withstand a “shock and awe” assault in the first moments of a war, the defector said.

The runway, reminiscent of the Thunderbirds television series, highlights the strange and secretive nature of the regime that provided the expertise for a partially built nuclear reactor in Syria, film of which was released by the CIA last week.

The reactor was destroyed by Israeli aircraft last September in an operation that may have killed or injured North Koreans at the site in the remote deserts of eastern Syria.

The airstrike appears to have convinced North Korea to harden its own defences and to spend more on its military, even as it struggles to cope with a new food shortage that could see millions of its citizens go hungry. In recent days North Korea has ordered its people to be vigilant against “warmongers”.

“The prevailing situation requires the whole party and army and all the people to get fully prepared to go into action,” North Korea’s state media said on Friday.

Although the media unleashed a volley of abuse against the United States and Lee Myungbak, South Korea’s conservative new president, it also said “sincere and constructive” negotiations on nuclear disarmament were in progress, an apparent effort to play off hawks against doves in Washington.

Olympic Torch Relay Protests In Japan

The Olympic torch can be extinguished but not the desire for human freedom:

Huge security along the route of the Olympic torch relay in Japan failed to prevent scuffles breaking out and demonstrators from attacking the flame.

More than 3,000 police were deployed in Nagano, the site of the 1998 Winter Olympics, following major disruption during the relay legs in London and Paris.

Demonstrators are keen to use the publicity surrounding the Beijing Games to highlight human rights issues in China and the occupation of Tibet.

Police guards in track suits surrounded the first runner, the manager of Japan's national baseball team, and another 100 uniformed riot police trotted alongside six patrol cars and two police lead motorcycles.

Two men tried to charge at the torch in separate incidents during the first half of the relay, but were arrested.

Another was held after throwing eggs at the flame.

Demonstrators also threw rubbish and flares towards the torch at different points, briefly holding up the relay.

Pro-Chinese supporters and protesters kicked and punched one another, leaving at least four Chinese injured, officials said.

[...]The 1,400-year-old temple, which was the showcase of the 1998 Olympics, last week declined to host the start of the relay, citing security concerns and sympathy among monks and worshippers for their religious brethren in Tibet.

After Nagano, the Olympic torch heads to South Korea, North Korea, Vietnam and Hong Kong.

If the grievances of the Tibetan people are not addressed violence could worsen and harm innocent people, including athletes attending the Olympics in China:

Interpol has warned of a "real possibility" that the Beijing Olympics will be targeted by terrorists - or that anti-China groups could attack athletes.

The warning came in the wake of the Olympic torch relay being dogged by pro-Tibet protests.

Ronald Noble, secretary general of the International Criminal Police Organisation, said: "An attempted act of terrorism is a real possibility and a real concern that all Olympic host countries have shared in recent years.

"In light of recent events, all countries whose athletes will participate and whose citizens will attend the Beijing Olympics must be prepared for the possibility that the groups and individuals responsible for the violence during the global torch relay could carry out their protests at the actual games."

He said the actions could range from disruptive behaviour, like blocking major transport routes or interfering with competitions, to more violent acts like assaulting officials or athletes or destroying property.

"Worse yet, we must be prepared for the possibility that al Qaeda or some other terrorist group will attempt to launch a deadly terrorist attack at these Olympics," he said.

The warning comes as air passengers in China will be restricted from taking more than one piece of carry-on baggage on flights from May 1.

Earlier this month, China added matches and lighters to a list of banned items on board domestic flights after what it said was plot to bring down a flight from the western region of Xinjiang.

The government has now restricted luggage allowances and also banned passengers carrying liquids on board domestic flights.

Is Bush Preparing for War with Iran?

The Bush presidency has been a total disaster. He needs something to distract the American people's attention from his failure. What is the solution? Wag the dog: start a war. Bill Clinton bombed Iraq during his Monica Lewinsky troubles. In addition, it was the neocon plan all along to overthrow the regime in Iran. They've been thwarted up to this point by the press, especially the blogs, from carrying out that dream. We'll need to stop them again:

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff accused Iran yesterday of "ratcheting up" its arms and training support to insurgents in Iraq, and warned that the United States has the combat power to strike Tehran if needed.

Adm. Mike Mullen told a Pentagon news conference the military has evidence - such as date stamps on newly found weapons caches - that shows that recently made Iranian weapons are flowing into Iraq at a steadily increasing rate.

Some of that firepower was used to support insurgents during the recent fighting in Basra in southern Iraq.

Mullen said he has seen evidence "that some of the weapons are recently not just found, but recently manufactured."

Both Mullen and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have made it clear that while all military options are on the table, they prefer to use other pressures on Iran.

"The solution right now still lies in using other levers of national power, including diplomatic, financial and international pressure," Mullen said.

Mullen also said that launching a third conflict in that region would be extremely stressing for US forces,

But "it would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability."

"Unusual public accusations":

U.S. military leaders have issued a series of unusual public accusations and warnings about Iran, saying they have new evidence of Iranian-backed attacks on U.S. troops as part of a broader effort to destabilize Iraq.

On Friday, the top uniformed officer in the U.S., Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, accused Iran in a televised news briefing of increasing its shipments of weapons to militants in Iraq, in violation of its promises to stem the flow of arms.

The comments by Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came days after angry complaints by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates.

In addition, military officers in Iraq are planning to publicize evidence of what Mullen called Iran's "malign influence" there.

Military officials said there was no concerted U.S. campaign to intensify pressure on Iran. But taken together, the remarks represent a shift in the military's thinking. Hopes expressed last year that Iran might be tempering its involvement in Iraq seem to have evaporated, and military officials have renewed warnings about the potential for military action.

[...]Underscoring the latest tensions, a cargo vessel under contract to the Defense Department fired on a group of small boats in the Persian Gulf on Friday, briefly touching off alarm in the world energy markets. U.S. military officials said they believed the boats involved in the confrontation were Iranian, but military officials in Tehran denied the incident took place.

President Bush and officials in his administration have been accused by political opponents of using criticism of Iran to shift public attention away from the protracted war in Iraq.

U.S. intelligence experts reversed earlier assessments in December and concluded that Iran was not actively pursuing a nuclear weapons program. But in releasing classified information this week on an alleged nuclear reactor being built in Syria with the help of North Korea, the White House also warned Iran against pursuing such technology.

Here's another view from another blog:

As previously noted, Admiral Mike Mullen told a gathering at the Atlantic Council that he fears the United States and its allies “will have to deal with Iran in the very near future.” That statement left a lot of room for strategic ambiguity. He removed a bit in a press briefing yesterday, Ann Scott Tyson reports.

The nation’s top military officer said today that the Pentagon is planning for “potential military courses of action” against Iran, criticizing what he called the Tehran government’s “increasingly lethal and malign influence” in Iraq. Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said a conflict with Iran would be “extremely stressing” but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing specifically to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force. “It would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability,” he said at a Pentagon news conference.

Related Links:

• Clinton warns Iran of U.S. nuclear response
• UN nuke watchdog to revisit Iran: report
• Naval Incident Raises US-Iran Tensions
• Iran says no confrontation with US in Gulf - reports
• Oil prices up on word US ship fired on boats in Persian Gulf
• Questions Linger on Scope of Iran’s Threat in Iraq
• Iran's involvement in Iraq may not have increased: report

The Coming Civil War Among Democrats

Her victory in Pennsylvania guarantees Hillary Clinton will continue her destructive campaign until the convention. This assures a battle royal that could rival the chaos of the 1968 Democratic convention. Such a bloodbath would hand the election to John McCain. This might explain why some in the Democratic party are blasting the Clinton distraction:

If Democratic leaders strip Barack Obama of the nomination when he holds the lead in pledged delegates, they might as well call it "Driving Miss Hillary" - and watch as the party is torn asunder, long past the November election.

For decades, black voters have been the very core of the Democratic Party.

Without their near-total allegiance, Bill Clinton would not have served a single term, nor would Jimmy Carter have occupied the Oval Office.

Early on in this race, black voters viewed Obama as almost too good to be true, and they supported Hillary Rodham Clinton, as well.

They suspected Obama must be like all the other "black candidates" - a vent for them, but hopeless at the polls.

In the wake of Clinton's win in Pennsylvania, a new round of speculation has begun about whether to cut throats and whose to cut.

Clinton's blue-collar supporters are far more likely than Obama's black supporters to back John McCain if their candidate doesn't get the nomination, the theory goes.

Therefore, according to speculation, Democratic Party elders should dismiss Obama's advantage among "pledged" delegates - those won at the ballot box and the only true currency in this campaign - and give the nomination to Clinton.

But to be tricked now and sent once again to the back of the bus by the party they have loyally supported for decades would be a cruel, twisted insult for black Democrats.

Dem bigwigs are terrified of a convention fight and want a conclusion before then:

Democratic Party bigwigs are preparing to push superdelegates to get off the fence once state primary elections end in June, officials said yesterday.

The leaders, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, might pen a joint letter to the party insiders.

The letter would send a clear message to about 300 insiders who have stayed on the sidelines while Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama have mounted increasingly harsh attacks on each other.

"The three of us, we may write a joint letter," Reid said yesterday. "We might do individual letters."

"We need to solve this before the convention," said Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly. "The way to do that is to have the superdelegates make their choices known."

And if you think the solution is a Obama-Clinton, Clinton-Obama ticket, Speaker Pelosi poured cold water on that idea:

KING: If you had your power, would you want them to run together?

PELOSI: No.

KING: No?

PELOSI: I don't think it's a good idea.

KING: Not a good idea?

PELOSI: No, I don't think so.

KING: Because?

PELOSI: I think that, first of all, the candidates -- whoever he or she may be -- should choose his or her own vice presidential candidate. I think that's appropriate. That's where you would see the comfort level on not only how to run, but how to govern the country. And there's plenty of talent to go around to draw upon for a good strong ticket. I'm not one of those who thinks that that's a good ticket.

KING: Really?

PELOSI: Really. KING: There's too much animosity?

PELOSI: No, I just think that -- well, let's put it this way, if they think that it's a good ticket, maybe it is. But I don't think that we should thrust the vice presidential choice onto the presidential nominee. That's her or his decision to make.

Black Congressman Denounces Bill Clinton’s Remarks

This from the NY Times blog:

The third-ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives and one of the country’s most influential African-America leaders sharply criticized former President Bill Clinton this afternoon for what he called the former president’s “bizarre” conduct during the Democratic primary campaign.

Representative James E. Clyburn, an undeclared superdelegate from South Carolina who is the Democratic whip in the House, said that “black people are incensed over all of this,” referring to a series of statements that Mr. Clinton has made in the course of the heated race between his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, and Senator Barack Obama.

Mr. Clinton was widely criticized by black leaders after he equated the eventual victory of Mr. Obama in South Carolina in January to that of the Rev. Jesse Jackson in 1988 – a parallel that many took as an attempt to diminish Mr. Obama’s success in the campaign. In a radio interview in Philadelphia Monday, Mr. Clinton defended his remarks and said the Obama campaign had “played the race card on me” by making an issue of those comments.

In an interview with The Times late Thursday, Mr. Clyburn said that Mr. Clinton’s conduct in this campaign has caused what might be an irreparable breach between Mr. Clinton and an African-American constituency that once revered him. “When he was going through his impeachment problems, it was the black community that bellied up to the bar,” Mr. Clyburn said. “I think black folks feel strongly that that this is a strange way for President Clinton to show his appreciation.”

Mr. Clyburn added that there appears to be an almost “unanimous” view among African-Americans that Mr. and Mrs. Clinton “are committed to doing everything they possibly can to damage Obama to a point that he could never win.”

The Clintons have more problems:

Hillary Clinton's campaign debt at the end of March was bigger than it appeared because she didn't list the $5 million she loaned herself, a campaign finance watchdog group reported this afternoon.

Clinton, in her filing with the Federal Election Commission, reported that her campaign had $9 million in cash on hand as of March 30, and $10 million in debts.

"The Clinton campaign itemizes its debts to vendors, totaling $10.3 million by the end of last month, but since January, when Clinton infused her campaign with $5 million, the campaign hasn't been adding in that loan when reporting its overall debt to the Federal Election Commission," the Center for Responsive Politics said.

The press is piling on Barack Obama right now. It makes for more drama. But if they were fair we would hear more about Hillary's duplicity. Obama misspeaks. Hillary lies:

Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., hit Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., for having served on the board of a Chicago nonprofit with Bill Ayers, a former member of the 1960s-era left-wing radical group the Weather Underground. "What they did was set bombs, and in some cases people died. I know Sen Obama is a good man and I respect him greatly but this is certainly something the Republicans will be raising."

Obama hit back, pointing out -- as I did in February -- that Clinton had her own ties to the group.

"President Clinton pardoned two members of the Weather Underground," Obama said, "which is a bigger deal than serving on a board with someone."

As I reported in February when the Clinton camp first raised the issue, in 2001 then-president Bill Clinton pardoned Susan Rosenberg, a Weather Underground member arrested in 1984 while unloading 740 pounds of dynamite from the back of her car.

But Clinton indeed pardoned a second -- Linda Evans, who had been convicted of several charges stemming from a series of bombings in the 1980s.

Hillary Clinton on Larry King Show 4-21-08: Transcript

An arrogant Hillary at her very best:

KING: How do you respond, Senator, to the complaints that the campaign -- both campaigns, in a sense -- have gotten so negative?

Robert Reich, the former Labor secretary in your husband's administration, a longtime friend of yours, is one of the people who says that he's now backing Obama.

Here's what he told CNN. I'd be interested in your comment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERT REICH, FORMER SECRETARY OF LABOR: But this crescendo of negative mudslinging from the Clinton camp, diverting attention from the big issues this country faces.

I just thought, I can't be silent any longer. I've got to take a stand and I've got to follow my conscience.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Did that hurt you?

CLINTON: Well, I don't think that he's followed the campaign very closely, because, clearly, there has been a relentless series of attacks coming from the other side.

I've spent the vast majority of this campaign giving very specific speeches about the solutions that I offer on all of the important issues facing our country. And, in fact, the press that covers me on a regular basis, I think, is kind of bored, because I just talk about solutions and what we're going to do to get more jobs and get health care for everyone and make sure we have a clean, renewable energy future and all of the other concerns that voters talk to me about.

But in the last, you know, couple of weeks, Senator Obama's campaign has become increasingly negative. He says one thing on the stump and his campaign does something else.

I'd like nothing better than to stay focused on the differences between our health care plans. I have a plan that will get to universal health care and cover everyone and he doesn't.

I have a plan to end the home foreclosure crisis and I don't think his measures up.

So I would be really pleased to talk about a lot of the hard questions that are going to face the next president. But, you know, in a campaign, it does get sometimes back-and-forth. Actually, I think this has been, on balance, a pretty civil and positive campaign, compared to many that we've seen in the last years. And it is fair to compare and contrast the differences between us. And voters get to make up their own minds about, you know, who they can count on to make the very difficult decisions and bring about the positive results we need.

Hillary doesn't care what the people think. She is going to do whatever it takes to win, regardless of what the people think:

We have an e-mail from Collins in Riverview, Florida, who says: "I've noticed you started with the negative ads once you fell behind in the nomination race. So my question is, do you think you'd be in contention at this point if you had not gone negative?"

Now, you don't think you've gone negative.

Would you agree that a lot of the public thinks you have?

CLINTON: Well, I don't know what the public thinks. But I certainly believe that any fair reading of this campaign, the kinds of things that my opponent's campaign has said, the kind of ads that they and their allies have run, the sort of phone calls and mailings -- remember in Ohio, I had to call them out on the misleading, negative mailings that they were sending out about my health care plan and about my position to change and fix NAFTA.

And I think the people of Ohio took a hard look at who was being misleading and who wasn't, and that's why I won such an overwhelming vote in Ohio.

So I can imagine the people who only, you know, follow it from, you know, some of the snippets on TV might, you know, not be sure exactly who's saying what and what the campaigns are doing.

But the people in the states where we're competing who follow it very, very closely, I think, are well aware of, you know, who is running what kind of ads and the fact that Senator Obama is outspending me three or four to one and, you know, literally just running ads around the clock. You know, that's all part of the campaign. And at the end of the day, voters get to decide who they think would be best suited to do the tough job that the next president will face.

Economy in Crisis: Food Shortage in America?

We need to start being concerned about food shortages/hunger inside America eventhough the press and the presidential candidates are not showing concern. The Costco story is another sign of things to come:

THE panic over global food shortages and rising prices gripping developing nations has spread to the world's wealthiest countries, with giant US-based retailer Wal-Mart rationing rice sales.

Wal-Mart's warehouse chain Sam's Club became the second retailer in the US to limit bulk purchases of rice this week, citing "recent supply and demand trends". Earlier in the week, Seattle-based Costco Wholesale Corporation imposed limits in some stores on bulk rice purchases.

The extraordinary move constitutes the first time food rationing has been introduced in the US. While Americans suffered some rationing during World War II for items such as petrol, light bulbs and stockings, they have never had to limit consumption of a key food item.

World rice prices have more than doubled in the past year as demand has outstripped supply, with the drought-ravaged Australian crop blamed for contributing to the problem.

Australia's rice production has collapsed, with many farmers given a zero water allocation from the Murray River. This year's crop will be the smallest since 1960, with exports barely a 10th of recent years.

Until 2002-03, Australia exported on average 620,000 tonnes of rice a year - or 80 per cent of what it produced. But figures compiled by the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics show the 2007-08 export crop will be 70,000 tonnes, with no improvement the following year.

Around the world, countries are restricting exports of rice and other grains as food prices rocket and nations move to ensure their own food security. The international price of rice has risen 118per cent in the past year despite world rice exports rising from 22.7 million tonnes in 2000 to a forecast 29.6 million tonnes this year.

Gary Helou, chief executive of Australian rice exporter Sunrice, said the accusation that the drought in Australia was causing food rationing in the US was "terribly ill-informed", saying Australia was a small player in the global rice market.

Ricegrowers' Association president Les Gordon agreed, saying prices were high due to "a straight-up case of supply and demand". "Supply has been slowly dwindling all around the world for the last 10 years, and it became apparent to our grain marketers 12 months, two years ago that it really was heading for a very low level," he said.

He is bemused by US supermarkets blaming Australia for shortages. "I can understand them having a run on rice in the supermarkets, but how they could tag that to drought in Australia is ... nonsense. None of our rice goes to America."

In Britain, rice is being rationed by shopkeepers in Asian districts to prevent hoarding.

More signs of an economy headed towards crisis:

Sales of new homes plunged in March to the lowest level in 16½ years as housing slumped further at the start of the spring sales season. The median price of a new home in March compared to a year ago fell by the largest amount in nearly four decades.

The Commerce Department reported Thursday that sales of new homes dropped by 8.5 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 526,000 units, the slowest sales pace since October 1991.

The median price of a home sold in March dropped by 13.3 percent compared to March 2007, the biggest year-over-year price decline since a 14.6 percent plunge in July 1970.

The dismal news on new home sales followed earlier reports showing that sales of existing homes fell by 2 percent in March. Housing, which boomed for five years, has been in a prolonged slump for the past two years with sales and home prices falling at especially sharp rates in formerly boom areas of the country.

For March, sales were down in all regions of the country, dropping the most in the Northeast, a decline of 19.4 percent. Sales fell by 12.9 percent in the Midwest, 12.5 percent in the Midwest and 4.6 percent in the South.

In other economic news, orders to factories for big-ticket manufactured goods fell for a third straight month in March, the longest string of declines since the 2001 recession, while applications for unemployment benefits fell by 33,000 to 342,000.

The Commerce Department said that demand for durable goods dropped by 0.3 percent last month, a worse-than-expected performance that underscored the problems manufacturers are facing from a severe economic slowdown. The last time orders fell for three consecutive months was from February to April of 2001, when the country was sliding into the last recession.

The weakness in manufacturing orders was led by a 4.6 percent drop in orders for autos, a sector that has been hard hit by soaring gasoline prices and the weakening economy, which have cut sharply into car sales. Orders in the category that includes home appliances fell by 6.6 percent. This industry has been hurt by the two-year slump in home sales.

President Bush on Tuesday said the economy was not in a recession but a period of slower growth. However, economists who believe the country has fallen into a recession pointed to the string of declines in manufacturing orders to support their view.

Israelis Claim Secret Agreement With U.S.

This story proves that Bush is an obsequious tool of the neocons and the Israeli lobby. It also proves that this President has no interest in supporting negotiations for peace between the Palestianians and the Israelis. The White House got caught and are now lying about it:

A letter that President Bush personally delivered to then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon four years ago has emerged as a significant obstacle to the president's efforts to forge a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians during his last year in office.

Ehud Olmert, the current Israeli prime minister, said this week that Bush's letter gave the Jewish state permission to expand the West Bank settlements that it hopes to retain in a final peace deal, even though Bush's peace plan officially calls for a freeze of Israeli settlements across Palestinian territories on the West Bank. In an interview this week, Sharon's chief of staff, Dov Weissglas, said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice reaffirmed this understanding in a secret agreement reached between Israel and the United States in the spring of 2005, just before Israel withdrew from Gaza.

U.S. officials say no such agreement exists, and in recent months Rice has publicly criticized even settlement expansion on the outskirts of Jerusalem, which Israel does not officially count as settlements. But as peace negotiations have stepped up in recent months, so has the pace of settlement construction, infuriating Palestinian officials, and Washington has taken no punitive action against Israel for its settlement efforts.

Israeli officials say they have clear guidance from Bush administration officials to continue building settlements, as long as it meets carefully negotiated criteria, even though those understandings appear to contradict U.S. policy.

Many experts say new settlement construction undermines the political standing of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas -- who is to meet with Bush today at the White House -- and adds to Palestinian cynicism about the peace process. Palestinians view the settlements as an Israeli effort to claim Palestinian lands, and in a meeting yesterday with Rice, Abbas said settlement construction was "one of the greatest obstacles" to a peace deal.

U.S. and Israeli officials privately argue that Israel has greatly restricted settlement growth outside the settlements it hopes to retain in a peace deal with the Palestinians, and Olmert has said Israel has stopped building new settlements and confiscating Palestinian lands.

Housing starts -- not counting the Jerusalem settlements -- have declined 33 percent since 2003, according to the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics. But officials say it is politically damaging for Olmert to admit that, so instead he publicly emphasizes that he is adding to the settlements, which now house about 450,000 Israelis.

"It was clear from day one to Abbas, Rice and Bush that construction would continue in population concentrations -- the areas mentioned in Bush's 2004 letter," Olmert declared in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, published Sunday. "I say this again today: Beitar Illit will be built, Gush Etzion will be built; there will be construction in Pisgat Ze'ev and in the Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem," referring to new settlement expansion plans. "It's clear that these areas will remain under Israeli control in any future settlement."

In a key sentence in Bush's 2004 letter, the president stated, "In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli populations centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949."

Related Posts:

• Is Israel a Friend to the U.S.?
• Bush Predicts Completion of Mideast Treaty
• Report: FBI Translator says Israel Planted Nuclear 'Moles' in U.S.
• Egypt: Israeli Lobby 'Harms' US
• Israel: We are at War with Hamas

Is Israel a Friend to the U.S.?

It is rarely debated in America, the relationship between the U.S. and Israel. Anyone, especially politicians, are immediately denounced the moment they breathe a word of criticism of the Jewish state. This spying case will be no different. It will get little press coverage, and even less public debate over our support for a "friendly" country that spies on us:

Israel was tightlipped on Wednesday over the arrest in the United States of an 84-year-old American suspected of providing it with U.S. military secrets in the 1980s, a new case that has opened old wounds.

"We received an official update from the Americans. We are following the developments," Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Arye Mekel said, a day after suspect Ben-Ami Kadish made an initial appearance in a federal court in New York.

The case, linked to the Jonathan Pollard spy scandal that has been an irritant in the U.S.-Israel alliance, raised fears in Israel it would cast a pall over President George W. Bush's visit next month to celebrate the Jewish state's 60th birthday.

But Environment Minister Gideon Ezra, a former senior security official, predicted that Israel's relations with the United States would not suffer.

"Our strategic relationship with the United States is stronger than this," Ezra told Israel Radio.

Officials with inside knowledge in Israel of the country's intelligence services were not denying it may have had a second spy operating in the United States in parallel with Pollard -- but they were insisting such espionage ceased long ago.

"The Americans know ... that since Pollard was exposed in 1985, Israel doesn't recruit agents or receive classified material (in) the United States," said Yuval Steinitz, a former chairman of the Israeli parliament's Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee.

But Danny Yatom, a legislator and a former head of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency, said the current affair had touched a nerve with Washington.

"I think what primarily bothers the Americans is the feeling that Israel didn't tell them the whole truth two decades ago, in 1985, when the Pollard affair exploded," Yatom told Israeli Army Radio.

"The Americans asked if there are additional people that Israel ran or are running in the United States. The answer, to the best of my knowledge, was always no," Yatom said.

Kadish, who was released on $300,000 bail, is a Connecticut-born U.S. citizen who worked as a mechanical engineer at the Army's Picatinny Arsenal in Dover, New Jersey.

He was accused of giving Israel secrets, from 1979 to 1985, about nuclear weapons, fighter jets and missiles.

According to a federal complaint, Kadish reported to the same Israeli handler who was a main contact for Pollard, a U.S. naval intelligence analyst arrested in 1985 and sentenced in 1987 to life imprisonment for spying for Israel.

Israel has said Pollard was recruited in a rogue operation by the since-disbanded Bureau of Scientific Relations, then headed by Rafi Eitan, now pensioners minister.

U.S. authorities did not disclose what led to their discovery of Kadish's suspected espionage.

But they said he had remained in contact with his alleged handler, who left the United States when Pollard was detained and has not returned.

Clinton "Victory Enough to Keep Destructive Campaign Going"

This columnist gets what most in the press keep missing, Hillary is still in this race regardless of what's good for the Democrats. And more importantly, Ms.Clinton wants to make sure that if she doesn't win that Obama loses so she can run in 4 years:

Here's the simple reality of this corrosive slugfest: Hillary Clinton can't win, but she's convinced Barack Obama just might lose.

So unless her cash-starved campaign can't raise or borrow enough to compete, her Pennsylvania victory keeps her in, and she will ratchet up her slash-and-burn tactics that have driven her negatives up but thrown Obama off his game.

[...]Her Keystone State margin was sufficient to keep her alive, but not nearly enough to change the trajectory of the campaign.

Barring an utter collapse by Obama, or a double-barreled win by him in Indiana and North Carolina in two weeks, this war of attrition will end June 3 with the Illinois senator ahead in contests won, popular vote and pledged convention delegates.

Against that headwind, even some of her closest confidants recognize her prospects of pulling off the upset remain minuscule.

[...]Obama's dominant position is all the more significant because he's just stumbled through the worst two months of his campaign.

[...]Meanwhile, John McCain and his handlers smile beatifically from the sideline, savoring the spectacle of Clinton writing their November attack ads for them.

"She's going to lose the nomination, and he's going to lose the election," a dispirited Hillary loyalist despaired.

Here's another column that has it right:

Hillary Clinton's final ad in Pennsylvania was the opening round of a desperate end game that won't be pretty to watch.

The ad - perhaps the source of her respectable if not overwhelming victory - was an attempt to scare voters into supporting her, complete with an image of Osama Bin Laden and an ominous question about who could be trusted to handle another terrorist attack.

The point of Clinton's ad, and her oft-stated position - that she alone is tough enough to handle the Bin Ladens of the world - would mean a lot more if she could handle the skinny kid from Illinois, who remains on track to win the nomination.

But the extraordinary ad signaled that Clinton's most plausible path to the nomination is a knockout blow that has nothing to do with winning over actual voters. She's relying on some scandal, gaffe or act of self-destruction to disqualify Barack Obama as a candidate.

And with the Bin Laden ad, Clinton made clear that she'll throw as much mud as possible to score that knockout.

"A win is a win," is what Hillary Clinton said early Tuesday, hours before the polls closed. True enough.

But as always when dealing with the Clintons, even a simple statement requires an asterisk, a footnote and careful parsing.

Despite Clinton's victory, the fact remains that Obama has won twice as many states as Clinton and racked up an all-but-insurmountable lead in delegates and popular votes. If Clinton wins every remaining state by the same margin as Pennsylvania, she loses.

[...]You would also have to ignore the fact that Obama has nearly matched her in the count of uncommitted superdelegates and currently holds more than four times as much campaign cash.

This unconvincing "my wins good, your wins bad" argument is what Team Clinton has been reduced to, barely 90 days after Hillary predicted she would lock up the nomination by early March.

The 200 or so remaining superdelegates who haven't pledged to either candidate probably won't buy it.

According to exit polls, two-thirds of Pennsylvania voters believe Clinton waged unfair attacks during the primary campaign, far more than said Obama had taken the low road.

Our Failure: U.S. 5% World Population, 25% of Prisoners

We have failed as a society when so many of our citizens are locked-up in prisons. Something is very wrong. We are throwaway society that puts commercial gain above social and spiritual advancement:

The United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population. But it has almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners.

Indeed, the United States leads the world in producing prisoners, a reflection of a relatively recent and now entirely distinctive American approach to crime and punishment. Americans are locked up for crimes — from writing bad checks to using drugs — that would rarely produce prison sentences in other countries. And in particular they are kept incarcerated far longer than prisoners in other nations.

Criminologists and legal scholars in other industrialized nations say they are mystified and appalled by the number and length of American prison sentences.

The United States has, for instance, 2.3 million criminals behind bars, more than any other nation, according to data maintained by the International Center for Prison Studies at King’s College London.

China, which is four times more populous than the United States, is a distant second, with 1.6 million people in prison. (That number excludes hundreds of thousands of people held in administrative detention, most of them in China’s extrajudicial system of re-education through labor, which often singles out political activists who have not committed crimes.)

San Marino, with a population of about 30,000, is at the end of the long list of 218 countries compiled by the center. It has a single prisoner.

The United States comes in first, too, on a more meaningful list from the prison studies center, the one ranked in order of the incarceration rates. It has 751 people in prison or jail for every 100,000 in population. (If you count only adults, one in 100 Americans is locked up.)

The only other major industrialized nation that even comes close is Russia, with 627 prisoners for every 100,000 people. The others have much lower rates. England’s rate is 151; Germany’s is 88; and Japan’s is 63.

The median among all nations is about 125, roughly a sixth of the American rate.

There is little question that the high incarceration rate here has helped drive down crime, though there is debate about how much.

[...]The spike in American incarceration rates is quite recent. From 1925 to 1975, the rate remained stable, around 110 people in prison per 100,000 people. It shot up with the movement to get tough on crime in the late 1970s. (These numbers exclude people held in jails, as comprehensive information on prisoners held in state and local jails was not collected until relatively recently.)

The nation’s relatively high violent crime rate, partly driven by the much easier availability of guns here, helps explain the number of people in American prisons.

“The assault rate in New York and London is not that much different,” said Marc Mauer, the executive director of the Sentencing Project, a research and advocacy group. “But if you look at the murder rate, particularly with firearms, it’s much higher.”

Despite the recent decline in the murder rate in the United States, it is still about four times that of many nations in Western Europe.

But that is only a partial explanation. The United States, in fact, has relatively low rates of nonviolent crime. It has lower burglary and robbery rates than Australia, Canada and England.

People who commit nonviolent crimes in the rest of the world are less likely to receive prison time and certainly less likely to receive long sentences. The United States is, for instance, the only advanced country that incarcerates people for minor property crimes like passing bad checks, Mr. Whitman wrote.

Efforts to combat illegal drugs play a major role in explaining long prison sentences in the United States as well. In 1980, there were about 40,000 people in American jails and prisons for drug crimes. These days, there are almost 500,000.

Transcript: Clinton Interview with Keith Olbermann 4-21-08

Hillary Clinton had the nerve to appear on Countdown and get interviewed by Keith Olbermann, who has eviscerated her over the last few weeks. Here's the complete transcript:

OLBERMANN: Let’s start with something that got remarkably short shrift in last week’s debate.

Is the election in the fall, in your estimation, going to be decided on the price of a gallon of gas and is it not true that a president can’t really do anything about the price of a gallon of gas?

CLINTON: Well, I think it’s going to be very much influenced by the economy. I don’t know what else might happen between now and then but it appears to me that the economy is not going to recover and in fact the price of gas is going to be a big issue. I think oil hit $117 a barrel today which is just unbelievable. When George Bush became president it was $20 a barrel.

I do think there are things that we can do in the short run. I would, if I were president, launch an investigation to make sure that there’s not market manipulation going on. I am still haunted by what we learned during the Enron scandal about those electricity traders manipulating the market and causing the people in California, Oregon and Washington to pay such high prices that were not at all related to supply and demand.

Hillary threatens Iran:

OLBERMANN: You mentioned the oil suppliers and that obviously leads us into something else that really flew by during the debate that seemed awfully important. In that debate you were asked about a hypothetical Iranian attack on Israel and your hypothetical response as commander in chief and you said, let me read the quote exactly, “I think that we should be looking to create an umbrella of deterrence that goes much further than Israel. Of course I would make it clear to the Iranians that an attack on Israel would include massive retaliation from the United States but I would do the same with other countries in the region.”

Can you clarify since there was no follow-up to that which hypothetical Middle East conflicts would incur massive retaliation by this country and what constitutes massive retaliation?

CLINTON: Well, what we were talking about was the potential for a nuclear attack by Iran. If Iran does achieve what appears to be its continuing goal of obtaining nuclear weapons — and I think deterrence has not been effectively used in recent times. We used it very well during the Cold War when we had a bipolar world — and what I think the president should do and what our policy should be is to make it very clear to the Iranians that they would be risking massive retaliation were they to launch a nuclear attack on Israel.

What about the Swiftboat tactics you are employing against Obama, Hillary:

OLBERMANN: Not to equate nuclear conflict or its use as a deterrent to the Pennsylvania primary but that is the other headline, I suppose, of the day. Let me ask you about the campaign and something you said in Pittsburgh today and again, let me read the quote about being president: “It’s the toughest job in the world and you have to be ready for anything. Two wars, skyrocketing oil prices, an economy in crisis. Well, if you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen.”

That is almost word for word the narration of this new ad that your campaign put out today, and that ad flashes a very brief image of Osama bin Laden. For nearly six years now since Sen. Max Cleland was cut down by a commercial that featured a picture of bin Laden, that tactic has been kind of a bloody shirt for many Democrats. Is it not just, in your opinion, as much of a scare tactic for a Democrat to use it against another Democrat, as it is for a Republican to use it in a race against the Democrat?

CLINTON: Well, first of all, that ad is about leadership, and I obviously believe I do have the leadership experience and qualities to become the president and the commander in chief. And as you said in the beginning, lots of times important issues get short shrift in the back-and-forth in a campaign.

Pentagon Increasing Recruitment of Ex-Cons as Soldiers

In order to fight his wars George Bush's needs more bodies. You have to get from somewhere since so many have been slaughtered in Iraq. Doesn't matter to King George who they are and whether those same felons will turn around and shoot up their neighborhoods as gang members:

The Army and Marines last year doubled the number of convicted felons they enlisted, raising new concerns about the strain on the military from fighting two wars.

About 861 enlistees convicted of felony assault, burglary, possession of hard drugs and even rape and other sex crimes went into uniform for the first time last year, a House panel reported Monday.

The Army and Marines recruited 115,000 men and women in 2007, two years after reports first surfaced about enlistment standards being watered down to meet quotas.

"Concerns have been raised that the significant increase in the recruitment of persons with criminal records is a result of the strain put on the military by the Iraq war and may be undermining military readiness," said House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.).

In 2006, the regular Army granted 249 waivers to felons so they could join up. But the number jumped to 511 last year, Waxman said, citing statistics provided by the Pentagon's top personnel official, David Chu.

The Marines went from 208 waivers to 350 during the same period, Waxman said.

Those numbers are even higher if active-duty and Army Reserve waivers for those charged with felonies who were never convicted are factored in.

Army Recruiting Command spokesman Douglas Smith said the Army uses a 16-step review process to "look at the whole person" seeking to enlist - and the waivers are signed by generals.

As to why waivers have increased, Smith said, "There are more and more young people getting caught up in the criminal justice system than in the past."

"I won't say the military is desperate" to meet Pentagon recruiting goals, said defense analyst John Pike of GlobalSecurity.org, "but they're eager to explore any available avenue."

Some in the Army say the consequence of recruiting more felons is lack of trust and cohesion in the ranks. Other officers argue that soldiers with criminal records often succeed in combat because they're risktakers.

And if Bush starts a war with Iran he will need those extra soldiers:

DEFENCE Secretary Robert Gates said he believes Iran is 'hell-bent' on acquiring nuclear weapons, but he warned in strong terms of the consequences of going to war over that.

'Another war in the Middle East is the last thing we need and, in fact, I believe it would be disastrous on a number of levels,' he said in a speech he was delivering on Monday evening at the US Military Academy at West Point, New York.

[...] He said he favours keeping the military option against Iran on the table, 'given the destabilising policies of the regime and the risks inherent in a future Iranian nuclear threat, either directly or through proliferation.'

Mr Gates also said that if the war in Iraq is not finished on favorable terms, the consequences could be dire.

'It is a hard sell to say we must sustain the fight in Iraq right now, and continue to absorb the high financial and human costs of this struggle, in order to avoid an even uglier fight or even greater danger to our country in the future,' he said.

He added, however, that the US experience with Afghanistan - helping the Afghans oust Russian invaders in the 1980s only to abandon the country and see it become a haven for Osama bin Laden's terrorist network - makes it clear to him that a similar approach in Iraq would have similar results.

Mr Gates said the US military was not organised or equipped for the kind of wars it finds itself in today.

'The current campaign has gone on longer, and has been more difficult, than anyone expected or prepared for at the start,' he said. 'And so we've had to scramble to position ourselves for success over the long haul, which I believe we are doing.'

Michael Moore Endorses Obama Calls Hillary "Disgusting"

The famous leftwing activist and documentarian is the latest celebrity who finds Clinton's lies and deceit tiresome:

So, if you live in Pennsylvania, can you do me a favor? Will you please cast my vote -- and yours -- on Tuesday for Senator Barack Obama?

I haven't spoken publicly 'til now as to who I would vote for, primarily for two reasons: 1) Who cares?; and 2) I (and most people I know) don't give a rat's ass whose name is on the ballot in November, as long as there's a picture of JFK and FDR riding a donkey at the top of the ballot, and the word "Democratic" next to the candidate's name.

Seriously, I know so many people who don't care if the name under the Big "D" is Dancer, Prancer, Clinton or Blitzen. It can be Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Barry Obama or the Dalai Lama.

Well, that sounded good last year, but over the past two months, the actions and words of Hillary Clinton have gone from being merely disappointing to downright disgusting. I guess the debate last week was the final straw. I've watched Senator Clinton and her husband play this game of appealing to the worst side of white people, but last Wednesday, when she hurled the name "Farrakhan" out of nowhere, well that's when the silly season came to an early end for me. She said the "F" word to scare white people, pure and simple. Of course, Obama has no connection to Farrakhan. But, according to Senator Clinton, Obama's pastor does -- AND the "church bulletin" once included a Los Angeles Times op-ed from some guy with Hamas! No, not the church bulletin!

This sleazy attempt to smear Obama was brilliantly explained the following night by Stephen Colbert. He pointed out that if Obama is supported by Ted Kennedy, who is Catholic, and the Catholic Church is led by a Pope who was in the Hitler Youth, that can mean only one thing: OBAMA LOVES HITLER!

Yes, Senator Clinton, that's how you sounded. Like you were nuts. Like you were a bigot stoking the fires of stupidity. How sad that I would ever have to write those words about you. You have devoted your life to good causes and good deeds. And now to throw it all away for an office you can't win unless you smear the black man so much that the superdelegates cry "Uncle (Tom)" and give it all to you.

But that can't happen. You cast your die when you voted to start this bloody war. When you did that you were like Moses who lost it for a moment and, because of that, was prohibited from entering the Promised Land.

How sad for a country that wanted to see the first woman elected to the White House. That day will come -- but it won't be you. We'll have to wait for the current Democratic governor of Kansas to run in 2016 (you read it here first!).

There are those who say Obama isn't ready, or he's voted wrong on this or that. But that's looking at the trees and not the forest. What we are witnessing is not just a candidate but a profound, massive public movement for change. My endorsement is more for Obama The Movement than it is for Obama the candidate.

That is not to take anything away from this exceptional man. But what's going on is bigger than him at this point, and that's a good thing for the country. Because, when he wins in November, that Obama Movement is going to have to stay alert and active. Corporate America is not going to give up their hold on our government just because we say so. President Obama is going to need a nation of millions to stand behind him.

- Read the entire statement by Moore

Donna Brazile Slams the Clinton Campaign

Donna Brazil was Al Gore's campaign manager in 2000. She is also a prominent activist in the Democratic Party. Someone like Brazile is dedicated to her party and is sick and tired of the Clinton antics:

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton unveiled new negative television ads and attacked each other personally from the stump this weekend ahead of Tuesday's Pennsylvania primary, stoking more worries among Democrats that the party's eventual nominee will head into the general election badly damaged.

The rising vitriol is prompting more Democrats to demand that party leaders do something to end the battle. But no single leader or clique exists within the fractious party to end the fight, and those with influence insist voters must have their say.

Nevertheless, some party leaders are quietly planning to try to end the clash, said people familiar with the matter. After the primaries end in June, these influential Democrats -- led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- plan to push the last uncommitted party leaders to endorse a candidate, in hopes of preventing a fight at the August presidential convention, party insiders say.

These "superdelegates" -- governors, members of Congress and others who can vote for any candidate at the convention -- would likely tip the balance to Sen. Obama, who holds a sizable and likely insurmountable delegate lead. Sen. Clinton is hoping that a win in Pennsylvania, where she is favored, would lift her campaign and give party officials pause about Sen. Obama as the nominee.

[...]Despite widespread expectations that he won't win in Pennsylvania, Sen. Obama has continued to draw a steady stream of endorsements. Friday, former Sens. Sam Nunn and David Boren, both national-security experts, signed on as advisers. They aren't superdelegates, but both men remain influential with fellow southern conservatives who are. Mr. Boren's son, Oklahoma Rep. Dan Boren, is an uncommitted superdelegate.
[Hillary Clinton]

Sen. Clinton's enlistment of two Ohio superdelegates late last week was an exception to a two-month trend of the local and state party leaders falling in behind Sen. Obama. Other party leaders will likely come off the fence before May primaries in Indiana, North Carolina, West Virginia, Kentucky and Oregon.

[...]The party leaders' aim: To thwart the Clinton campaign's vow to fight all summer long to a final, nationally televised round at the Denver convention, so the party can get on with the battle against the likely Republican candidate, Arizona Sen. John McCain. Convention fights in past decades -- notably in 1968, 1972 and 1980 -- left deep divisions that contributed to the nominees' losses and hurt lesser candidates on the ballots.

[...]With Democrats protective of the House and Senate majorities just won in 2006, "Do you think for one minute that Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid will allow this fight to go on and on and on?" says Donna Brazile, an uncommitted superdelegate as an official of the Democratic National Committee, and manager of the 2000 Gore campaign. "There's a group around [Sen. Clinton] that really wants to take the fight to the convention. They don't care about the party. It scares me, and that's what scares a lot of superdelegates."

Clinton supporters vehemently defend their right to fight to the convention if necessary, and deny it would hurt the party.

Ms. Brazile says that starting the morning of June 4, "we'll all talk to each other. I know I'll reach out to some key people, including my ex-boss" -- former Vice President Al Gore, another superdelegate who remains uncommitted.

What Ever Happened to the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy?

This time around the VRWC is supporting Hillary--at least until the general election. Ms.Clinton is the ideal candidate for the Republicans. This explains why there has been more attacks on Obama. They also want to prolong the Democratic nomination scuffle. She is nothing but a pawn:

Could it be the "vast right wing conspiracy" is having second thoughts? Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton was endorsed Sunday by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, whose owner and publisher, billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife, personally funded many of the investigations that led to President Clinton's impeachment in 1998.

It was one of a handful of endorsements the New York senator has received from Pennsylvania newspapers before the state's primary Tuesday. Most of the state's major papers have endorsed Barack Obama.

In its endorsement, Tribune-Review editors said Obama is too inexperienced to be president and that his recent comments about bitter voters living in small towns showed a lack of respect for middle-class values.

"In sharp contrast, Clinton is far more experienced in government - as an engaged first lady to a governor and a president, as a second-term senator in her own right," the paper said. "She has a real voting record on key issues. Agree with her or not, you at least know where she stands instead of being forced to wonder."

Clinton met with the Tribune-Review's editorial board, including Scaife, last month. Afterward, Scaife wrote an editorial titled "Hillary, Reassessed," declaring how impressed he had been by the former first lady.

"Her meeting and her remarks during it changed my mind about her," Scaife wrote.

In the 1990s, Scaife helped support conservative groups and publications investigating Bill Clinton's financial dealings and sex life.

Scaife spent $2.3 million to fund a series of articles by The American Spectator magazine that dug into Bill Clinton's behavior as governor of Arkansas.

Why isn't the press pointing out that Obama's ability to raise funds is another argument for his nomination. Instead they are allowing the Clinton mob to spin it into a virtue for Hillary:

Barack Obama began the month of April with a 5-1 cash advantage over a debt-saddled Hillary Rodham Clinton, setting the stage for his lopsided spending in the crucial primary state of Pennsylvania.

Financial reports filed Sunday by the Democratic presidential candidates with the Federal Election Commission show Clinton had $10.3 million in debts at the start of the month and only about $9 million cash on hand for the primaries. Obama reported having $42 million for the primary.

Clinton's red ink poses yet another obstacle to her campaign as she seeks to end the primary season with a string of victories. She trails Obama in delegates, states won and popular votes. And she can't dent Obama's superior fundraising.

The March money positioned Obama to undertake an expensive April campaign in Pennsylvania, where he has spent at least twice as much as Clinton and cut into her lead. Pennsylvania votes on Tuesday.

Clinton, who had kept pace with Obama financially throughout last year, had even less cash on hand than Republican John McCain. McCain raised $15.2 million in March and had $11.6 million in the bank at the start of April. It was his best fundraising performance of the campaign, coming after he had essentially secured his party's presidential nomination.

With the Democratic contest still in full boil, McCain has been on the sidelines, saving his money and completing payments on a loan.

Nearly half of Clinton's debt in March is money owed to the firm of her demoted former chief strategist, Mark Penn. The report shows that the campaign owes $4.6 million to Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates. The campaign has already paid the firm $14 million, including $3 million in March for polling and direct mail.

Clinton took away Penn's role as chief adviser earlier this month after he met with Colombian officials to discuss his private work on behalf of a Colombian free trade agreement, a trade deal Clinton opposes.

Obama's fundraising in March led all candidates, but was still lower than the mark he set in February, when he raised more than $55 million. The Illinois senator has raised $235 million in his campaign.

Economy in Crisis: Bank of America’s Profit Drops Sharply

This means less funds to lend to consumers and invest in the economy. It only makes things worse, lengthens the recession:

Bank of America said Monday that it saw a 77 percent drop in its profits for its first quarter this year from last year, as the banking giant announced nearly $2 billion in write-downs tied to its debt underwriting and trading activities.

Monday’s announcement represented the third consecutive drop in earnings for the firm, as its outsized ambitions to rival Wall Street’s traditional financial giants instead hurt the bank again. Bank of America said it lost $1.3 billion in its trading activities, a reversal from the $1.6 billion it earned at the same time last year.

The bank earned $1.21 billion, or 23 cents a share, atop revenues of $17 billion. Analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News had expected on average 41 cents a share.

[...]Though Bank of America’s most immediate pain stemmed from the collapsed mortgage market, its earnings report showed that the credit crisis had seeped into other areas as well. It reported $2.72 billion in net charge-offs, or loans that it thinks are uncollectable, a 90 percent jump from last year. It also raised its credit loss provisions to $6.01 billion from $1.24 billion.

The firm said that its nonperforming assets rose to $7.83 billion, or .9 percent of its total loans, leases and foreclosed properties. That is up from $2.06 billion, or .29 percent, at the same time last year.

In his statement, Mr. Lewis said that the firm still believes that its broad base of operations will allow it to “withstand the jolts” to the economy.

But the sustained shock provided by weak housing markets may not augur well for Bank of America’s acquisition of Countrywide Financial, the troubled mortgage lender that the firm is paying $4 billion for.

The global economies are desperately working to try and avert further drying up of credit worldwide:

The Bank of England announced a near-100-billion-dollar plan Monday to free up Britain's home loan market in one of the biggest moves by a major central bank to combat the global credit crunch.

The BoE said it would allow high street banks to swap mortgage-backed securities for government bonds in a bid to boost their liquidity at a time when banks are reluctant to lend to each other.

Britain's main home loan providers are rapidly tightening their lending criteria as fears persist over the sector's exposure to the collapsed subprime or high-risk housing market in the United States.

"The Bank of England is today launching a scheme to allow banks to swap temporarily their high quality mortgage-backed and other securities for UK Treasury Bills," the central bank said in a statement.

It added: "Discussions with banks suggest that use of the scheme is initially likely to be around 50 billion pounds (63 billion euros, 99 billion dollars)."

[...] A growing number of commercial lenders have recently increased the interest rates they charge to their customers for home loans, contributing to a sharp slowdown in house prices.

The Bank's move to inject such a considerable sum of money into the markets could be seen as a major u-turn as it is traditionally more conservative in its support for banks than the European Central Bank and the US Federal Reserve.

[...] "The credit crunch is of course a global problem and central banks are trying to address it locally, but this particular gesture is mainly aimed at giving the UK lending market, which has clearly started to seize up, a break."

Other analysts were more sceptical.

Martin Slaney, head of spread betting at GFT Global Markets, said: "This rescue plan has been touted as a jump-start to the lending markets but it is more likely to serve as a one-off bail-out which plugs a hole for now.

"We are a long way off from returning to a more liquid lending market where mortgages are freely available."