Picking a vice president is obviously Barack Obama's decision to make. He must be comfortable with who he picks. Comfort level between a president and vice president may be the most important factor of all.

So I can only offer my argument, based on some facts and subjective impressions, as to why I believe it would be in Sen. Obama's personal and political interest to select Hillary Rodham Clinton as his vice presidential running mate. Not just to enhance his chances of winning -- but, more important, to help him be a more effective president.

Let's start with one undisputable fact: Sen. Clinton is the only Democrat who gives Sen. Obama a statistically significant boost in any national poll results.

This is not a criticism of other candidates. This is simply a fact -- a product of Sen. Clinton's nearly 18-month national campaign in all 50 states and the 18 million votes she won. The result was a dramatic increase in her favorable ratings across the spectrum, even among some of her most conservative critics.

In late June, polls conducted by The Wall Street Journal/NBC and Fox/Opinion Dynamics -- using entirely different samples -- both showed Sen. Clinton giving Sen. Obama a +3% bump, pushing him over 51% for the first time, when the two of them were paired against Sen. McCain and Gov. Romney.

Most recently, in nationwide polling on July 22-23, a Fox/Opinion Dynamics poll showed a more dramatic bump of +8% with Sen. Clinton as Sen. Obama's vice presidential running mate. In a head-on match, it was Sen. Obama 41% to Sen. McCain's 40% (this was before the intense media coverage of his European trip). But with exactly the same sample, when all voters were presented with the choice of an Obama-Clinton ticket vs. McCain-Romney, the results were Obama-Clinton, 48% (+7%), and McCain-Romney 39% (-1%).

Can Sen. Obama win without Sen. Clinton on the ticket? Yes he can. Majorities favor his views on most of the economic issues. And his European trip was virtually flawless, demonstrating that he can walk, talk and act like a president in foreign affairs and with foreign leaders.

However, with Sen. Clinton on the ticket, I do not believe Sen. Obama can lose. She adds important strength to Sen. Obama's in the key constituencies of women, blue-collar workers and senior citizens. And, thus, she could tip the balance in such key border states as West Virginia, Kentucky and Arkansas (not apparently in play for Sen. Obama as of now), as well as in the key battleground states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Florida.

So, considering this data, why not pick Sen. Clinton? Here are the three most repeated negatives that seem to concern sincere supporters of Sen. Obama the most:

- Sen. Clinton is polarizing and will rev up the Republican base.

In fact, the data proves the reverse is true: Sen. Clinton has little or no effect on Republican preferences in a race against Sen. McCain -- and she helps Sen. Obama significantly among Democrats.

According to the July 22-23 Fox/Opinion Dynamics poll, in an Obama-McCain head-on match-up, Sen. Obama gets just 74% of the Democrats and 6% of the Republicans. With Sen. Clinton as his running mate vs. a McCain-Romney ticket, Sen. Obama's Democratic vote goes up to 86% -- a significant 12% increase. As for Republican voters, rather than getting "revved up" because of Hillary's presence on the ticket, there was no effect at all: The Obama-Clinton ticket gains 3% (from 6% to 9% among Republicans), whereas McCain-Romney gains the same 3% (from 82% to 85%).

So what about independents? An Obama-Clinton ticket appears to gain some strength in this critical swing-voter group. With an Obama-McCain head-on contest, independents are evenly divided, 32%-30%, with Sen. Obama over Sen. McCain. But with an Obama-Clinton ticket vs. a McCain-Romney ticket, the independents favor Obama-Clinton 38%-30% -- a statistically significant 6% increase in a crucial voter group.

- Choosing Sen. Clinton would be counter to the Obama message of "new politics" and change.

The simple answer: How can choosing the first woman vice president in the history of the United States be a choice for the status quo? How can choosing someone who can help the future President Obama bring to America its first affordable and effective national health insurance system reinforce the status quo rather than change? The answer is: Older doesn't mean status quo. Hillary Clinton is a change agent and always has been throughout her public career. Barack Obama selecting her as the first female vice president would reinforce his change message, not detract from it.

- She would not be a team player, and her husband would be a distraction or worse in an Obama White House.

The answer here comes down to knowing Hillary and Bill Clinton as real people, not as cartoon characters. No one who knows either one of them believes there is a shred of truth to this widely held misperception.

Hillary Clinton is the ultimate team player and I have no doubt she would be an invaluable vice president. She knows from firsthand experience the importance of a supportive and involved vice president.

I am certain of this -- not just because of my personal friendship with her over 39-plus years, in the best of times and in the worst of times. But also I know -- and I believe even her critics would agree -- that she is first and foremost a dedicated public servant. And she would do everything, everything, to help her president succeed because by doing so the nation and the American people would benefit. As long as I've known her, that has always been her life's driving goal: public service to help people.

So what about Bill Clinton? Well, what about him? He loves his wife, he loves his country, and he would be 100% dedicated to helping a President Obama in any way the president wished. If that means being quiet and not distracting from the messages or issues the Obama White House is focusing on, Bill Clinton will do whatever it takes to be helpful.

Of course having a former president as the spouse of the vice president in the White House, much less someone with the intellectual power and star quality of Bill Clinton, will be a challenge to a President Obama and his White House. Few can deny that. But the last time I looked, Sen. Obama does pretty well dealing with challenges, even those his closest friends and confidantes are worried about.

In the final analysis, to repeat, this is Sen. Obama's personal and political decision and he must be comfortable with the choice. I respect that. I honor that. These are my best arguments that it is in his political interest and his future administration's interest to have Hillary Clinton by his side on the ticket as vice president -- as a cheerleader and articulate supporter, as a candid adviser, and as a friend inside the White House with eight years of frontline experience of what it's like.

Now it's up to Sen. Obama. Whatever his decision, I will support it.

By LANNY J. DAVIS, The Wall Street Journal, July 31, 2008

WASHINGTON - After spending much of the summer searching for an effective line of attack against Senator Barack Obama, Senator John McCain is beginning a newly aggressive campaign to define Mr. Obama as arrogant, out of touch and unprepared for the presidency.

On Wednesday alone, the McCain campaign released a new advertisement suggesting - and not in a good way - that Mr. Obama was a celebrity along the lines of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. Republicans tried to portray Mr. Obama as a candidate who believed the race was all about him, relying on what Democrats said was a completely inaccurate quotation.

The Republican National Committee began an anti-Obama Web site called "Audacity Watch," a play on the title of Mr. Obama's book "The Audacity of Hope." And, in a concerted volley of television interviews, news releases and e-mail, campaign representatives attacked him on a wide range of issues, including tax policies and energy proposals.

The moves are the McCain campaign's most full-throttled effort to define Mr. Obama negatively, on its own terms, by creating a narrative intended to turn the public off to an opponent.

Although Mr. Obama has been under an intense public spotlight for the last year, he is still relatively new on the national scene, and polls indicate that for all the enthusiasm he has generated among his supporters, many voters still have questions about him, providing Republicans an opening to shape his image in critical groups like white working-class voters between now and Election Day.

Mr. McCain's campaign is now under the leadership of members of President Bush's re-election campaign, including Steve Schmidt, the czar of the Bush war room that relentlessly painted his opponent, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, as effete, elite, and equivocal through a daily blitz of sound bites and Web videos that were carefully coordinated with Mr. Bush's television advertisements.

The run of attacks against Mr. Obama over the last couple of weeks have been strikingly reminiscent of that drive, including the Bush team's tactics of seeking to make campaigns referendums on its opponents - not a choice between two candidates - and attacking the opponent's perceived strengths head-on. Central to the latest McCain drive is an attempt to use against Mr. Obama the huge crowds and excitement he has drawn, including on his foreign trip last week, by promoting a view of him as more interested in attention and adulation than in solving the problems facing American families.

"I would say that it is beyond dispute that he has become the biggest celebrity in the world," Mr. Schmidt said in a conference call with reporters on Wednesday. "The question that we are posing to the American people is this: 'Is he ready to lead yet?' And the answer to the question that we will offer to the American people is: 'No he is not.' "

Mr. McCain's more focused assault comes after one of his worst weeks of the general election campaign, when he seemed to fumble for a consistent, overarching critique of Mr. Obama, who winged around the Middle East and Europe. Mr. McCain's advisers continue to look for ways to bring more discipline to his message, and are being urged by some supporters to cut back the frequency of his question-and-answer sessions with reporters, a staple of his campaign but one that occasionally yields unscripted moments, misstatements and off-the-cuff pronouncements that divert attention from the themes he is trying to promote.

The intensity of the recent drive - which has included some assertions from the McCain campaign that have been widely dismissed as misleading - has surprised even some allies of Mr. McCain, who has frequently spoken about the need for civility in politics. The sentiment seeped onto television on Wednesday with Andrea Tantaros, a Republican strategist, saying on MSNBC that the use of Ms. Hilton in Mr. McCain's commercial was "absurd and juvenile," and that he should spend more time promoting his own agenda.

Mr. Obama's campaign seized on those concerns, trying to turn the tables by portraying Mr. McCain as cranky and negative. The Democratic National Committee called Mr. McCain "McNasty." Late Wednesday Mr. Obama released a counter advertisement citing editorials critical of Mr. McCain's latest volley of attacks and featuring an announcer who says, "John McCain, Same old politics, same failed policies."

Asked by reporters about Mr. McCain's new advertisement, Mr. Obama said, "I do notice that he doesn't seem to have anything to say very positive about himself."

Mr. Obama's chief strategist, David Axelrod, said that Mr. McCain's strategy to define Mr. Obama negatively in voters' minds, while similar to one that successfully worked against Mr. Kerry, would not work this year.

"When people are struggling, when they're trying to pay their bills, when they're concerned about their fundamental security, I don't think they have much tolerance for Britney Spears and Paris Hilton," Mr. Axelrod said. "I think they understand times are more serious than that, and they thought John McCain was, too."

Mr. Schmidt, whom Mr. McCain placed in charge of day-to-day operations this month, specialized during the 2004 campaign in seizing on opportunities - think windsurfing; seemingly contradictory votes on Iraq policy - to paint Mr. Kerry negatively.

Seeking similar openings, the campaign seized on Mr. Obama's decision to skip a visit with wounded United States troops in Germany. (The McCain campaign said Mr. Obama canceled because he could not take the news media with him to the hospital, an assertion denied by the Obama campaign and undercut by the accounts of reporters.)

The new focus has been welcomed by some Republicans. "They're now in a position of driving news as opposed to reacting to it," said Brian Jones, a former aide to Mr. McCain.

But some fear a backlash. And Mr. McCain does not like to follow a script. People who know him said that it may be a challenge to apply the Bush model - strict adherence to the message of the day by the candidate combined with a relentless drive to define the opponent negatively - to a campaign not known so far for discipline or consistency.

"It could be the Coca-Cola strategy of marketing that they're trying to apply to Dr Pepper," said John Weaver, a former chief strategist for Mr. McCain.

By Jim Rutenberg, The New York Times, July 31, 2008

Chuck Lasker, a political blogger and Internet consultant in Indiana, hosted a gathering last week of 20 people he calls "whispering Republicans" - party members like him who support Senator Barack Obama, a Democrat, for president. Over iced tea and brownies, the renegades took turns explaining why they liked Mr. Obama and recalling the strange stares from other Republicans.

"It was sort of like a group therapy session," said Mr. Lasker, who said he had never voted for a Democrat, for any office, until the Indiana primary in May. "We all wanted to make sure we weren't a little crazy."

Republican anger over the Iraq war and the economy has left some advisers to Mr. Obama hopeful that they can capture pockets of Republican votes on Election Day in states like Alaska, Indiana, Montana, North Dakota and Virginia. Advisers also said they had recently begun emphasizing Mr. Obama's ties to Republicans as a way to make undecided independent voters more comfortable with him.

In recent weeks, Obama aides have met with Republican leaders in crucial states to strategize about wooing undecided voters. The campaign is considering inviting Republicans to speak at the Democratic convention. Obama aides pointed to a defense by Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, a critic of the war, after Senator John McCain's campaign ran an advertisement attacking Mr. Obama. And they have tapped sympathetic Republican brand names like Susan Eisenhower, the granddaughter of the former president, to reach out to party members.

Obama advisers say support from Republican voters could be critical if Mr. McCain makes gains in Michigan and Pennsylvania, two states recent Democratic presidential nominees have carried but where Mr. Obama is struggling among working-class white voters.

Based on recent polls, as well as interviews with Obama advisers, Republican voters are not moving to Mr. Obama at a greater pace than they moved to Senator John Kerry, the Democratic nominee in 2004. In the most recent New York Times/CBS News poll, conducted this month, 9 percent of Republicans said they would vote for Mr. Obama if the election were held today; at the same point in 2004, 6 percent said they would have supported Mr. Kerry, a statistically insignificant difference.

But analysts also note that sizable numbers of voters who typically support Republicans - or were solidly behind President Bush at this point in 2000 and 2004 - remain undecided about Mr. McCain.

"There aren't a lot of people on the Republican side who are saying yes to Obama - though there are more of them," said Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Research Center. "But uncertainty about McCain raises the possibility of Republican defections down the road."

The Obama campaign is not overstating its expectations about Republican support. Aides are concentrating organizing and polling on independents and Democrats, and are working to leverage two potential advantages this year: increased Democratic voter registration and black voters energized by the prospect of the first African-American nominee.

Yet advisers say that Mr. Obama's emphatic message that he is not a partisan politician - combined with the unpopularity of President Bush and some qualms about Mr. McCain's positions, temperament and age - may attract disaffected Republicans.

"Obama seems like a leader who can deal with challenges that are highly complex, nuanced and interconnected," Ms. Eisenhower said, "and he has the language and communication skills and temperament to engage a set of world leaders who are his generation."

Brian Rogers, a McCain spokesman, said the Obama campaign's outreach to Republicans was nothing more than bluster. "The real battleground is middle-of-the-road swing voters, and John McCain has enormous appeal for them based on his history as a maverick, his independence and his experience," Mr. Rogers said.

Mr. Obama is hardly a perfect candidate for Republicans. Some say they loathe his support for abortion rights but have decided, after the failed 35-year campaign to overturn Roe v. Wade, that they could accept a Democratic president who pledges to work to decrease abortions, as Mr. Obama has.

His multilateral approach to foreign policy disturbs some Republican supporters, who worry that he will indulge European interests, cozy up to the United Nations and engage Iran and North Korea. And some Democrats may end up breaking with Mr. Obama over Israel, given his concern with Palestinian issues (though he strongly supports Israel).

And the idea of a Barack Obama-Nancy Pelosi-Harry Reid triumvirate, should Democrats still control Congress after the election, is anathema to many Republicans, as well as to independents who believe in the virtue of two-party government. No Republican member of Congress has endorsed Mr. Obama.

Yet concerns about Mr. Obama, several Republicans said, are less immediate and visceral than the anger at the Bush administration over the invasion and occupation of Iraq, and to a lesser degree over foreign policy decisions like support for Pakistan despite its failings at capturing terrorists.

"Some Republicans are so distressed with the state of their party that they might be for Obama if they don't see him as a threat to their interests," said David A. Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union. "Going after Republicans and getting some will only make him more acceptable to people who vote Republican."

Mike Murphy, a Republican media consultant who advised Mr. McCain in his presidential bid in 2000, said he believed that Mr. Obama would probably win more Republican votes this fall than Mr. Kerry did in 2004. But he said that most Republicans would ultimately stand behind Mr. McCain and that the Obama campaign's pitch, instead, could end up proving far more helpful with white independent swing voters.

"The Obama campaign is dripping with money, so they can afford to fool around with Republicans, especially since the McCain campaign is challenged," Mr. Murphy said, referring to Republican concern that the McCain bid has been unfocused at times. "Whether Obama pulls in a big number of swing voters this fall depends on whether McCain comes to life."

An invigorated McCain campaign, though, is not what some Republicans want. Even some who once supported President Bush say that they have tired of the party's hawkishness, unstinting support for the war and attacks on privacy, and that they believe Mr. Obama offers fresher thinking than Mr. McCain or others in both parties.

"I really worry McCain would just continue most of these wrongheaded policies," said Rita E. Hauser, a prominent philanthropist and former Bush fund-raiser who supports Mr. Obama. "I don't want to become a Democrat; I just want a new direction and then a chance for the Republican Party to get back to its roots."

By Patrick Healy, The New York Times, July 31, 2008

Will Bill's intake affect Hillary's debt relief?

Bill Clinton collected $10,085,000 in speeches alone in 2007, a figure that underscores his continued rock-star credentials on the international lecture circuit, according Sen. Hillary Clinton's financial disclosure forms for 2007, which were released Wednesday morning by the Secretary of the Senate.

The Clintons also earned between $11 million and $26 million last year by selling stocks from their personal portfolio, according to the newly released figures. The stock sales appear to be the proceeds from a blind trust that Senator Clinton announced she planned to liquidate during her presidential campaign to avoid potential conflicts of interest.

The new disclosures could have political consequences for the Clintons. By calling more attention to the couple's personal wealth, as well as the former president's enormous earning power, the figures could make it more difficult to persuade Democratic Party donors to help pay off Hillary Clinton's $22.5 million in campaign debts - nearly half of which is owed to the Clintons personally.

A Clinton spokesperson today said that the senator is not seeking relief for the $13 million she poured into her campaign. The spokesperson pointed to a June conference call, in which the New York Democrat said she considered the loan an "investment" and is not expecting anybody to help pay it back.

According to the new financial disclosure, former president Clinton gave 54 speeches worldwide last year. Many of them were given to corporate giants such as Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, General Electric and Lehman Brothers. He averaged more than $186,000 an appearance. Clinton's most lucrative payday was in the United Kingdom on Aug. 14, 2007; a group called AEG London (which operates sports stadiums and franchises) paid him $425,000 for his services.

The disclosure shows that, even while actively campaigning on behalf of his wife's 2008 presidential bid, the former president kept a hectic international schedule. Among his speaking stops: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, London, South Korea and Canada. The international talks have been the most lucrative for the former president, commanding upward of $250,000 an appearance. Over a three-day period in Norway, Denmark and Sweden in May, Clinton earned $1,485,000. The Power Within, a Canada-based motivational speaking agency, shelled out $955,000 in 2007 to have Clinton appear in Minneapolis, Toronto, Montreal and Niagara on the Lake, Canada.

After leaving the White House, Clinton turned to speaking to help settle about $12 million in legal bills accrued during his time as president. In 2006, he gave 352 speeches (nearly one a day) and earned $10.2 million (much of which the former president has donated to charity.) The number of speeches in 2007 was much lower, but appears to have been on average much more lucrative for the former president.

Bill Clinton's speaking schedule attracted media scrutiny last year because of the large overlap between the corporate groups paying him to speak and those donating to his wife's presidential campaign. But now the political impact could be different. After Hillary Clinton dropped out of the presidential race, Barack Obama agreed to ask his top donors to help his defeated rival pay off her campaign debts. But the plea thus far has not yielded nearly the amounts the Clintons and their supporters had hoped for.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. Hillary Clinton has agreed to speak on the second night of next month's Democratic convention, sources say.

Two sources close to Clinton said the former presidential candidate will headline on August 26 -- the 88th anniversary of the day women earned the right to vote.

"Tuesday night is Hillary night," said one supporter.

Clinton will be joined on stage with the female Democratic U.S. senators, the sources said.

Those close to Clinton say that she believes there is little chance that she will be Obama's running mate.

While there could be a change of schedule, the vice presidential pick is expected to speak on Wednesday night.

"From what we can gather, she's not really on the short list," said Gloria Borger, a CNN senior political analyst. "The reason Hillary Clinton is out is because she's not on message for Barack Obama, her campaign is not about change, she represents Washington."

Meanwhile, the group Vote Both, which had been pushing for a joint Obama-Clinton ticket, said in a e-mail to supporters Wednesday night that Clinton's chances of being Obama's running mate were slim.

"This is a sign that she is not being considered seriously by the campaign. Along with you, we would have loved to have seen a dream ticket with both Obama and Clinton, but because Sen. Obama has made his decision to offer the slot on the ticket to another candidate, we believe that continuing to ask him to pick Hillary is no longer helpful to our party's chances of winning in November," the e-mail said.

A message on the group's Web site urged Clinton supporters to back Obama. Some have said they would rather vote for John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, than throw their support to Obama.

"While we all were working toward a different result, ultimately we and Barack Obama are working for the same eventual outcome -- getting ready to take back the White House and bring our country the change Americans deserve and so desperately need," the message said.

Sources close to Clinton said the Obama campaign has asked her to hit the trail for Obama, and she will soon do so in the next couple of weeks -- focusing on Nevada, Ohio and Florida.

She's been told, according to the sources, to expect to travel a lot this fall. Those close to her say she's completely comfortable with that, and not angry with Obama.

Clinton's 18 million primary voters were once painted as the 18 million reasons Obama would want to pick her for the No. 2 spot.

Clinton made it clear that it was a job she'd take, if asked. Her closest friends did her bidding.

Mindful not to disrespect Clinton or alienate her supporters, Obama insists she hasn't been ruled out.

"I've said consistently that I think Hillary Clinton would be on anybody's short list," Obama said on NBC's "Meet The Press" on Sunday.

But as the short list gets shorter, the political calculations seem a little more clear.

"Hillary Clinton would be in the ticket if the Barack Obama campaign felt that they were in some trouble with the voters that she brings -- the older women, those voters in rural America, battleground states. They don't think they are in trouble there, so they probably don't think they need her," Borger said.

At the same time Clinton is now fully engaged in talks with the Obama team, the buzz is intensifying over who could be a running mate capable of bringing in Clinton voters.

"There is no one running mate that could deliver her supporters in one swoop the way she could, but I do think, for example, that Evan Bayh of Indiana could go to Indiana, which is turning into a battleground state, and help Obama there," Borger added. Sen. Bayh was also originally a big Clinton supporter and was by her side during much of the primary season.




By Suzanne Malveaux, CNN, July 31, 2008

Governor Bill Richardson is doing his part to unite the Democratic party today, announcing he will hold two August fundraisers for Senator Hillary Clinton in his home state of New Mexico.

A press release sent out by the Governor's office Wednesday states Richardson, a former candidate for the Democratic nomination himself, will hold two invitation-only events on August 17th. One event in Santa Fe will be hosted by Dave Contarino, Governor Richardson's former campaign manager and long time strategist. The second event will take place in Albuquerque and will be hosted by a well-known New Mexico businessman. Clinton will be in attendance for both fundraisers.

The Governor, who is "an ardent supporter of Senator Obama," according to the press release, will preside over both events with his Lt. Governor, Diane Denish.

"Senator Clinton is grateful for Governor Richardson's and Senator Obama's efforts to assist with retiring her campaign debt and she is looking forward to continuing to campaign for Senator Obama and help ensure victory for Democrats throughout the country this fall," said Clinton spokeswoman Kathleen Strand in the release.

And of course, to prove just how unified they all are, Obama spokesman Bill Burton was also quoted in the press release stating, "Governor Richardson's efforts reinforce Senator Obama's commitment to unifying the Democratic Party and assisting Senator Clinton's effort to retire her campaign debt."

Richardson has often been one of the strongest voices to call for party unity among Democrats. In fact, while addressing the Democratic Leadership Council in Chicago last month, Richardson promised he would be involved in helping to reitre Clinton's debt. A promise he is now making good on.

And while this show of support is something all Democrats welcome, the hard feelings between Richardson and the Clintons still lingers in many political minds.

A cloud of endorsement speculation surrounded Richardson after he ended his own presidential bid. Richardson was heavily wooed by both sides, with former President Bill Clinton even flying to New Mexico to watch the Super Bowl with the Governor.

In the end Richardon chose to endorse Obama. The decision not only ruptured his relationship with the Clintons, but lead to James Carville calling him "judas" in interviews. Perhaps these fundraisers will be the first step towards a reconciliation.




By Sarah Amos, ABC News, July 30, 2008

Maybe I've been looking at the media's treatment of Barack Obama -- the relentless, often favorable and sometimes gushing coverage -- through the wrong end of the telescope.

Maybe -- though I'm not convinced -- what we write and report doesn't matter. Maybe Obama manages to float above it all, protected by a Teflon coating.

That, at any rate, is the theory being floated by Slate media critic Jack Shafer. And since I'm invoked, I feel the need to respond.

My cameo role involved a piece I wrote in March, cataloguing the negative subjects that had been chewed over in the media: Tony Rezko, William Ayers, 130 "present" votes in the Illinois legislature, a Senate compromise that favored a nuclear energy contributor and, of course, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

But I don't believe those stories had little or no impact on Obama; after that, you may recall, Hillary Clinton won most of the remaining primaries. Most likely, we haven't heard the end of the Wright issue. And the coverage of Obama has gotten much friendlier since he clinched the nomination, especially during last week's world tour.

Obama is a skilled counterpuncher; he can defuse an issue without losing his cool, either by calmly brushing it off or smothering it in nice-sounding words. It is an underrated skill in politics. Nothing seems to rattle the guy.

In fact, that supreme self-confidence is itself becoming an issue, which says to me the media is largely firing blanks these days. How dare he meet Merkel, Sarkozy and Brown before he's even been nominated? How dare he tell House Democrats that he's likely to win? (Have you seen many candidates who go around proclaiming they'll probably lose?) It makes for good sport, but if this is the worst thing the media can pin on Obama, he's in for an easy ride.

In the end, though, here's why the coverage matters: Obama is--or was--the least-known nominee since Jimmy Carter. Our impressions of him aren't fully formed. That's why he keeps trotting out his family for People, Us Weekly and "Access Hollywood." He knows the coverage is crucial in sharpening the gauzy image many Americans have of him, and he's right.

Here's the Shafer argument:

"What's unique about Obama and his candidacy is that almost none of the stuff the press throws at him sticks. Nor is the press alone in its inability to stick him. Hillary Clinton hurled rocks, knives, and acid at her rival even before the primaries and later upped the ante in desperation. She claimed that he was unprepared to serve as commander in chief and accused him of insulting gun owners and the religiously faithful. The eleventh-hour tactics may have won Clinton votes, but they failed to undermine Obama.

"You could call Obama the Teflon-coated candidate, but this would miss the fact that his slickness goes all the way to the core. What has gone unexplored until now is this: How did Barack Obama achieve superslipperiness without becoming greasy?

"In a 2006 profile in Men's Vogue by Jacob Weisberg, Obama acknowledges that every politician, himself included, has 'some of that reptilian side to him.' To win public office, a politician must power his scales, trim his nails, and tame his swinging tail . . .

"Obama's poise and discipline allow him to resist whatever bait the press and politicians dangle in front of him. When he does address scandalous material, he generally does so to his advantage. In June, when the Web and cable news advanced false rumors that Michelle Obama had called white people 'whitey' on a videotape, Obama squelched the gossip with a denial and, as Ben Smith of Politico reported, put the press on notice by questioning the appropriateness of the question. Smears undermine a politician only when they appeal to voters' pre-existing idea of what sort of person a politician is. Seeing as the pre-existing idea of Obama is so positive, the Obama-haters have had trouble portraying him either as a literal bomb thrower, like William Ayers, or a figurative one, like the Rev. Wright. When the smear artists dress him up as a radical or as 'madrassa'-educated, the ploys only backfire."

The latest John McCain assault is to play the Britney card:

"After spending much of the summer searching for an effective line of attack against Senator Barack Obama," says the New York Times, "Senator John McCain is beginning a newly aggressive campaign to define Mr. Obama as arrogant, out of touch and unprepared for the presidency.

"On Wednesday alone, the McCain campaign released a new advertisement suggesting -- and not in a good way -- that Mr. Obama was a celebrity along the lines of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. Republicans tried to portray Mr. Obama as a candidate who believed the race was all about him, relying on what Democrats said was a completely inaccurate quotation." (The quote was reported by The Washington Post from a closed-door session with Hill Dems.)

But the Boston Globe cautions: "The taunting commercials also risk backlash if they are seen at odds with McCain's repeated pledges to run a civil campaign on the issues.

"Independent analysts have said that several assertions in the ads are based on questionable claims or outright falsehoods. In the TV spots, McCain suggests that Obama is responsible for rising gas prices and that Obama canceled a trip to visit wounded troops because he couldn't bring the media along - assertions strongly disputed by the Obama campaign."

The New York Post's fair-and-balanced headline: " 'Barack the Bimbo.' "

Josh Marshall faults The WP, CNN, AP and others for adopting the cockiness narrative:

"Here we have a candidate, John McCain, who is running on a record of straight talk and honorable campaigning running a campaign made up mainly of charges reporters are now more or less acknowledging are lies. But there's precious little drawing together of the contradiction. What's more, as everyone will acknowledge after the campaign, the McCain campaign is now pushing the caricature of Obama as a uppity young black man whose presumptuousness is displayed not only in taking on airs above his station but also in a taste for young white women.

"So please keep an eye out for references to Obama's presumptuousness, arrogance, etc."

But isn't the McCain camp mockingly comparing Obama to the likes of Britney Spears, rather than implying that he likes to hang with starlets?

Michelle Malkin hits the celebrity angle against the candidate the GOP is now casting as Paris Hilton:

"You couldn't pass a grocery store line this weekend without seeing the picture-perfect smiles of the Obama family. There were Barack Obama's young daughters (whose privacy their parents so sanctimoniously claim to want to protect) flashing their pearly whites on the cover of People. Malia and Sasha competed for attention right next to Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's toddler daughter, Shiloh, whose cherubic face was splashed on the cover of another celebrity tabloid. Next to them beamed basket-case starlet Lindsay Lohan and her new lesbian lover -- oh, and that formerly pregnant 'man' who just gave birth to a baby girl. The Obamas blended seamlessly into this Hollyweird pop-culture galaxy.

"The spread in People, which earlier this year fawned over a photo of the bare-chested Obama in his swimsuit, was supposed to be an 'exclusive' first and last look at life at home with the Obamas. Knowing what we know about the Obama we know now, it probably won't be the last. They've hawked the kids to TV gossip show Access Hollywood, blabbed about their romance to Us Weekly, and plopped Michelle O -- the purported 'civilian' whom the Obamessiah declares immune from public criticism -- in front of the cameras to schmooze effortlessly for The Colbert Report and The View demographics. They believe their two-faced tabloid strategy (show their true elitist colors behind closed doors, but play the Every Family for the Obamedia sycophants) is working. Given our dumbed-down, celebrity-obsessed culture, they are probably right.

"Who cares about Barack's perilous lack of foreign-policy experience, his longtime associations with left-wing radicals and domestic terrorists, and his business dealings with Chicago corruptocrats? People brings you the scoop on what really matters in this critical presidential campaign: Michelle hula-hoops with her daughters. They're just like you and me! The kids have slumber parties. They're just like you and me! Barack does laundry, but he doesn't fold it. They're just like you and me! The kids get small allowances. They're just like you and me! The Obamas wear normal clothes while doing normal things."

It's an old right-wing playbook to mock and denigrate the Democrat, says the New Republic's Jonathan Chait:

"Do you remember when conservatives used to speak warmly, and sometimes rapturously, about Barack Obama? That was back when they were certain that the Clinton voodoo magic would make Hillary the nominee, and Obama her sympathetic roadkill. Since then, the right has made the horrifying discoveries that Obama is, successively, a left-wing ideologue, a coddler of anti- Americanism, a wine-sipping elitist, and, now, a shameless flip-flopper. The man will say anything, discard any position, in order to win the election.

"If such a tragic tarnishing of the reputation could happen to a fresh-faced reformer like Obama, it could happen to anybody. And, in fact, it has--at least to anybody who has happened to attain the Democratic presidential nomination at any point over the last five election cycles. John Kerry, as everybody remembers, came to be defined almost exclusively as a flip-flopper. (A 2004 Wall Street Journal news article described him as 'a politician with a troublesome reputation for trying to have it both ways.')

"Al Gore was relentlessly attacked by Republicans for his alleged waffling. ('Mr. Gore has a bit of a reputation for flip-flopping and corner-cutting,' reported The New York Times in 2000.) Bill Clinton was attacked by George H.W. Bush for 'turn[ing] the White House into a Waffle House' and the subject of a famous Time cover story titled, 'Why Voters Don't Trust Bill Clinton.'

"It was true: Voters didn't trust Clinton--or Gore, or Kerry. In all of those elections, polls showed the Democratic nominee scoring higher on most of the issues, but the Republican nominee scoring higher on honesty and other personal qualities. Either this is because the Democratic Party keeps nominating weasels for president, time and time again, or else there's something systemic that makes Republicans (and the press) portray them as such. I'm going with explanation number two . . .

"Flip-flopping is a simple accusation that campaign reporters can sink their teeth into. Moreover, there's always grist for the accusation, because getting to the position of running for president without changing your stance on a few issues is essentially impossible."

The libs, of course, have jumped on McCain's "nothing is off the table" tax comment with George Stephanopoulos--the subject of much subsequent backtracking--but conservatives are really steamed. Check out this Wall Street Journal editorial:

"One of the miracles of this presidential election campaign is that John McCain still has a chance to win, notwithstanding his best attempts to kick it away. In his latest random policy improvisation, the Arizona Senator tried to give up the tax issue . . .

"Economics has never been Mr. McCain's strong suit, but with Iraq receding as a crisis the economy is the ground where the Senator will have to fight and win. And the tax issue provides him with a potent opening, given Mr. Obama's pledge to raise taxes on incomes, dividends and capital gains. In proposing to raise the payroll tax cap, the Democrat is to the left even of Hillary Clinton. Mr. McCain's Sunday blunder will make that issue that much harder to exploit.

"Such mistakes also help explain the continued lack of enthusiasm for Mr. McCain among many conservatives. Meeting with us last December, before the primaries, he declared that 'I will not agree to any tax increase,' repeating the phrase for emphasis. He did not say any tax increase with the exception of Social Security. If Mr. McCain can't convince voters that he's better on taxes than is a Democrat who says matter-of-factly that he wants to raise taxes, the Republican is going to lose in a rout."

The Ted Stevens indictment--which comes as the Alaskan is up for reelection--inspires no sympathy from National Review:

"One of Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens's most memorable moments of the last few years came during the Senate fight over the infamous 'Bridge to Nowhere.' In 2005, when Sen. Tom Coburn introduced a measure that would have redirected the money Stevens had earmarked for the bridge to hurricane-ravaged New Orleans, Stevens gave an apoplectic speech on the Senate floor in which he threatened to resign if the Senate passed the measure. It was the nation's loss that the Senate voted the measure down, simultaneously missing two opportunities.

"Now that a grand jury has indicted Stevens on seven counts of making false statements, it is time for him to make good on his threat. Stevens is of course innocent until proven guilty of the crimes with which he is charged. But even if he committed no crime, the facts that have emerged over the course of the federal investigation into his personal finances are damning enough on their own. The indictment was just the last straw."

By Howard Kurtz, The Washington Post, July 31, 2008

Obama's camp recognizes there is both promise and peril in accusing McCain and the GOP of racially-tinged attacks. Yes, it energizes the Democratic base (black and white) while also raising the antennae of suburban swing voters.

But Obama himself doesn't want to be seen as playing the race card, portraying himself as a victim. A large part of his post-racial appeal is that he's not run a grievance-oriented campaign. As Doug Wilder, the former governor of Virginia and nation's first elected black governor, told Ben Smith and I a few weeks ago, Obama must make plain that "he's not another Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson."

Which brings us to Obama yesterday in Missouri, testing out a new line that seems unambiguously aimed at accusing the GOP of using race (something which McCain and his campaign have not done):

"Nobody thinks that Bush and McCain have a real answer to the challenges we face. So what they're going to try to do is make you scared of me," Obama said yesterday. "You know, he's not patriotic enough, he's got a funny name, you know, he doesn't look like all those other presidents on the dollar bills."

Asked Thursday if Obama was referring to race, Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said, "No."

"What Barack Obama was talking about was that he didn't get here after spending decades in Washington," Gibbs said.

Right, neither did Lincoln, but his face, along with those of many other white men, adorns a dollar bill.

Obama is covering himself here just a bit by making his accusation predictive -- "going to" -- but this seems to be a pretty clear effort at having it both ways.

By Jonathan Martin, The Politico, July 31, 2008

TRENTON, N.J., July 30 (UPI) -- Sen. Hillary Clinton still should be considered as a running mate for Barack Obama in his U.S presidential run, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine said Wednesday.

"I certainly think she should still be in the hunt," Corzine said of his next-state neighbor during an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "I think she has the qualifications to be president, and I think she would be very strong as a campaigner. So you're doing the two things that need to be done to be qualified."

Aides for both Obama, D-Ill., and Clinton, D-N.Y., were reported as saying the likelihood of the two Democratic primary rivals on the same ticket were fading. Among the signs of waning interests -- Clinton hasn't been asked to submit documentation for vetting.

"Well, I think that Senator Clinton has been vetted pretty carefully by 16, 17 months of campaigning and whatever else you want to look at in history," Corzine, who endorsed Clinton during the primary season. "So I think most of those things you would know. I don't think there are a lot of surprises."

United Press International, July 30, 2008

Former Senator and presidential candidate Bob Dole chatted with Prime Buzz Wednesday on a variety of topics:

On John McCain's vice presidential pick: "I know he's looking at it because...I talked with somebody who's sort of in the loop on that. They haven't got much time...I don't know who's being vetted, but you need to vet them very carefully."

On campaign coverage and negativity: "I listened to the news the other night...they were saying he (McCain) wasn't being aggressive enough, you know, Barack Obama is getting away with all this stuff because the press has given him $325,000 and McCain $20,000. Barack can get away with the low blows and they never mention McCain -- if (McCain) sneezes it's a low blow.

"People though I should've lightened up more, but you don't know because it's pretty serious business. You're running for president of the United States. I think it's got to be aggressive, it's got to be -- I remember in '96 they wanted me to go after Clinton's character, I wouldn't do it. I think you have to satisfy yourself that there's a limit on how far you're going to go."

On whether McCain or Obama have crossed that limit: "I haven't tried to parse everything they've said. Somebody thought McCain was questioning his (Obama's) patriotism, I don't think -- nobody's questioning anybody's patriotism. Let's face it, politics is what it is. And if it's a political advantage to be opposed to the surge, or to support the surge as McCain is, that's fair game."

On surrogates: "What you really have to watch are your friends. The people out there, your surrogates, who say things, they get you off message, you waste a whole day, you don't make the news cycle."

Does McCain have a message? "They said that about me (that I didn't have a message). If you're winning, you're a hell of a candidate, but if you lose, you're a bum...I think he needs to get the campaign a little more focused. Obama's got all this money and a big organization...what are they spending, $20 million on the Latino vote?

"They ran against a pro. They ran against Hillary Clinton. And the Clintons know how to run a campaign.

"I think McCain's got a shot. This big trip overseas was a wash.. if I'm living out in Russell, Kansas, and a candidate is over in Germany with a couple hundred thousand Germans, and I can't get gas because I've got four bucks in my pocket, I'm not sure I get too excited about someone being all the way to Germany."

By Dave Helling, Kansas City Star, July 31, 2008

He may have lost a step, judging from his erratic performance in his wife's presidential quest, but Bubba's still the king of the show-for-dough lecture circuit.

Sen. Hillary Clinton's financial disclosure form released Wednesday showed that her husband raked in nearly $10.1million in fees last year for 54 speeches, averaging an eye-popping $187,000 per talk.

Bill Clinton's biggest single payday was May 23, 2007, when he netted $615,000 for two speeches, in Stockholm and Oslo. His fattest fee was $425,000 for a speech in London to AEG, a Los Angeles-based sports and entertainment conglomerate.

Half his lecturing haul was earned abroad, including a staggering $1.5 million in a four-day Scandinavia tour.

By Thomas M. DeFrank, New York DAILY NEWS, July 30th 2008

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. Barack Obama's two unannounced and very secretive meetings with his vice presidential team have Washington insiders buzzing about a potential announcement.

Predicting whom a presidential candidate will pick as a running mate, though, is a dangerous game.

A headline in the New York Post on July 7, 2004, announced "Kerry's choice," showing a picture of Sen. John Kerry and former House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt.

However, Kerry had picked former Sen. John Edwards as his 2004 presidential running mate.

With the Democratic convention less than a month away, Obama remains mum.

"The next time I talk about my vice presidential selection, it will be to introduce the selection," Obama told CNN's Candy Crowley in Berlin, Germany, last week.

But Washington being Washington, political junkies just can't help themselves.

Before the 1980s, presidential candidates typically did not unveil their running mates until the convention, often on its very last day.

Democrats broke this trend in 1984, when Walter Mondale announced his pick of Geraldine Ferraro four days before the start of the San Francisco convention.

The Democrats continued this practice through 2004, when Kerry announced Edwards as his running mate 20 days before the convention. Republican candidates did not start announcing their vice presidential picks ahead of their convention until 1996.

There are odds-on favorites for Obama's pick, as of now, including Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.

The most buzz, however, is around Kaine, who's been campaigning for Obama for the last year and a half. He is also the Obama campaign's national chairman.

Asked directly whether he's being courted, Kaine remained coy Tuesday.

"It's flattering to be mentioned; my mom loves it; she calls when she sees it. But, you know, it is just -- that is for the campaign to decide," he told WTOP radio.

CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider said there are several advantages: "He's young; he's fresh; he's new; he's an outsider."

And the downside?

Both Obama and Kaine are young and very new to the national stage, with little or no national security experience.

The two Democrats, however, are comfortable with each other. Kaine was the first governor to endorse Obama outside Illinois, when most of the Democratic establishment was still supporting Sen. Hillary Clinton.

Demographically and geographically, Kaine is the full package.

Kaine, a Roman Catholic, once worked as a missionary in Central America. He can speak about religious values, something Obama wants more Democrats to do. Kaine also speaks fluent Spanish, another target group for Democrats.

Kaine was also born in Minnesota and went to college in Missouri, two swing states in the Midwest.

Stu Rothenberg of the Rothenberg Political Report said Kaine "makes a lot of sense" for Obama.

"Virginia is going to be one of the two or three key states for Obama," he said.

Just as Al Gore did for President Clinton, Kaine helps re-enforce the central theme: The Democratic Party is new and different.

Biden, who is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is a good pick in terms of experience, Rothenberg said.

"He's a grown-up; foreign policy, national security, been around a long time," Rothenberg added.

The Democrat's political experience will help counter GOP arguments that Obama is inexperienced on foreign policy.

Biden is also a scrappy campaigner and would almost certainly revel in the traditional attack-dog role of the running mate.

On the downside, Biden is more apt to wander off script more than once during a general election campaign. In addition, Delaware's three electoral votes are safely in the Democratic column.

Picking Bayh -- originally a big Clinton supporter during the Democratic primaries -- would help unite Democrats during a lengthy, heated primary campaign.

"Evan Bayh is not the kind of person to make mistakes. He is loyal; he's trustworthy; he's smart; he looks terrific in a photo op," Rothenberg said.

On the plus side, Bayh's service on the Senate Intelligence and Armed Services Committees would help shore up Obama's weak spots.

Running with this centrist Democrat would counter GOP critics that Obama is a typical liberal. Indiana's 11 electoral votes wouldn't hurt, either.

However, Bayh's support of the war in Iraq could put him at odds with his running mate, who has repeatedly brought up his opposition to the war during campaign rallies.

And then there's Sebelius, who could either help or hurt the women's vote.

"Kathlee Sebelius ... might evoke such a scream of anger from Hillary Clinton supporters that a Sebelius pick wouldn't be worth it if you're just going for a woman," Rothenberg said.

The popular two-term governor of Kansas could help Obama carry the state for the first time since 1964.

Sebelius, who chose a former state GOP chairman as her running mate in 2006, would reinforce Obama's image as someone who transcends the normal partisan divide.

The veepstakes spotlight on Clinton, however, has diminished.

"Normally, the presidential nominee doesn't want to be overshadowed by the veep or the veep's husband, and Sen. Clinton brings some considerable baggage and controversy," Rothenberg said.

That controversy includes the perception that she is one of the most divisive politicians. Obama may not want to put a polarizing figure such as Clinton on a ticket aimed at bridging the partisan divide.

On the plus side, there's no better way to unite the Democratic Party than by putting her on the ticket.

Clinton also has the ability to win older voters, Roman Catholics and women, three groups that have remained noticeably cool to Obama.





By Suzanne Malveaux, Bill Schneider, Robert Yoon, Alan Silverleib and Ed Hornick, CNN, July 30, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) - "Vote Both," a group dedicated to persuading Barack Obama to pick former foe Hillary Clinton as his vice presidential running mate, is folding, as hopes of a "dream ticket" fade.

Organizers Adam Parkhomenko and Sam Arora said they were halting their campaign, based on indications that the presumptive Democratic nominee was looking elsewhere for a right-hand man, or woman.

"Because it seems that Senator Obama has made his decision to offer the slot on the ticket to another candidate, we believe that continuing to ask him to pick Hillary is no longer helpful to our party's chances of winning in November," they wrote in a website message to supporters.

The two former Clinton staffers concluded that reports that Obama had offered Clinton a prime-time speaking role on the second night of the party's convention in Denver next month meant she would not be his pick for number two.

Vice presidential nominees traditionally speak on the penultimate night of the four-day convention.

"We worked for Hillary for a combined 10 years, so we know how many of you may be feeling," they wrote.

"And to those who are hesitant to support Obama right now, we urge you to keep giving him the chance to earn your vote. We are confident he will."

When she wrapped up her historic bid to become America's first woman president in June, Clinton pleaded with supporters to transfer their affections to Obama, to break the Republican stranglehold on the White House.

But some fervent supporters said they would find it hard to back Obama after such a drawn-out and bitter fight.

The former first lady, who piled up votes among women and working-class voters especially, has already campaigned with Obama, and has said she plans to throw herself into the fight to elect him in battleground states.

Vice presidential speculation surrounding Obama, and his Republican rival John McCain, is peaking in the month-long run-up to the party conventions.

The Democratic spotlight has recently fallen on Virginia Governor Tim Kaine.

Meanwhile Republican Mitt Romney, rumored to be on McCain's shortlist, was quoted in the Washington Post as saying "I don't plan on being part of the ticket" -- hardly a cast-iron refusal to serve if selected.

AFP, July 31, 2008

A longtime friend of Sen. Hillary Clinton said it's "incomprehensible" that Sen. Barack Obama would choose another woman to be his vice-presidential candidate over Sen. Hillary Clinton.

"The selection of either one of those instead of Sen. Clinton I would find completely incomprehensible," said Lanny Davis of rumored Obama vice-presidential contenders Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill.

Davis is a former special counsel to President Bill Clinton and a longtime friend of Sen. Hillary Clinton's dating back to their time at Yale Law School.

"If anyone thinks that picking a woman will simply placate Hillary Clinton's female supporters, I think that's very patronizing to women and i don't think that that either Gov. Sebelius or Gov. McCaskill would disagree," said Davis, who penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal Thursday titled "Why Obama Should Pick Hillary."

Davis said he hasn't met either Sebelius or McCaskill and said he admires them, but Clinton is more qualified.

"She helps him more and she's more qualified," Davis said of Clinton, "Therefore, why would he pick two females, both who are very admirable public servants, why would you pick them over her?"

Davis, a longtime friend of Clinton, said he isn't speaking for Clinton and doesn't know if she truly wants to be vice-president. Though Davis said she recently called him when he was ill.

Davis said he hasn't given up on the "dream" of an Obama-Clinton ticket, though he said he has abandoned his early effort after Obama won the primary to get Clinton supporters to sign a petition urging Obama to pick Clinton as his running-mate.

However other Clinton supporters seem less confident in an Obama-Clinton ticket.

Two former Clinton campaign staffers who started the website VoteBoth.com to urge Obama to choose Clinton as his running-mate is shutting down under the assumption she's not on his short-list of vice-presidential candidates.

Obama's vice-presidential shortlist is being closely help by the campaign.

"We're not commenting about the nominee selection process," Obama spokesperson Bill Burton told ABC News.com.

Obama spent hours this week meeting with the co-chairs of his vice presidential committee search team Eric Holder and Caroline Kennedy.

Likely Democratic vice-presidential contenders include Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, Indiana Sen. Even Bayh, Sen. Joe Biden, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, and Sebelius, a two-term governor of a red state, and McCaskill, a first-time senator from a battleground state who is close to Obama.

McCaskill campaigned with Obama in Missouri Wednesday, but she has said she's not being vetted and sources close to her describe her role as a close personal advisor rather than a possible veep candidate. Meanwhile, Sebelius sidestepped questions Wednesday about whether she is being considered.

Obama may try to solidify his support among women voters thought key in November by picking a woman as his running-mate.

Clinton, who lost her bid to be the Democratic Party's first woman presidential candidate, won 52 percent of Democratic women voters during the primaries. However Obama is leading McCain 54-39 percent in support from likely women voters, according to the latest ABC News poll.

But Davis argued Obama's poll numbers increase with Clinton as his running-mate, citing two June polls from Wall Street Journal/NBC and Fox/Opinion Dynamics.

"Even they wouldn't contend, I believe, that they would be more helpful to Sen. Obama on the ticket than Hillary Clinton," Davis said of Sebelius and McCaskill.

By Jennifer Parker, ABC News, July 31, 2008

Sen. Hillary Clinton is expected to appear and speak in person Thursday in San Francisco, California before 6,000 labor activists at the annual convention of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME).

"We were the strongest supporters of Sen. Clinton during the Democratic primary," AFSCME spokesperson Gregory King told ABC News.com, "and now Clinton is coming to thank us for our support and ask us to support Sen. Barack Obama."

Obama will speak to the group via satellite from Cedar Rapids, Iowa following Clinton's remarks.

"She's coming to basically set the table for him to speak to us," King said.

AFSCME endorsed Obama for President on June 19, 2008. The union group has 1.4 million members.

By Jennifer Parker, ABC News, July 31, 2008

Barack Obama's vice presidential vetting process has moved into a new stage in which a larger than previously reported group of candidates is being exposed to a "deeper dig" into their backgrounds -- in the words of a source familiar with the process.

The hard vetting involves follow-ups to lingering questions about candidates' backgrounds and clarifications of their stands on issues. While the process is intensifying, the fact that the number of potential candidates still being considered is larger than generally believed, suggests that no decision is imminent, just 26 days before the opening of the Democratic National Convention.

It also runs counter to much-publicized comments by Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine Tuesday that "there has been a long list. It seems to be getting shorter."

The spate of meetings between Obama and his vetting team this week in Washington were designed to brief Obama on the loose ends that the group is chasing down concerning various candidates rather than some sort of conclusive gathering in which a choice is settled upon.

No one The Fix spoke to for this story would confirm the names being subjected to the "deeper dig." Speculation over the past 48 hours has zeroed in on three names -- Kaine, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and Delaware Sen. Joe Biden -- but the idea of a wider list of potential veeps suggests that names like Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, former Sen. Sam Nunn and Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (among others) are still in the mix.

With the exception of Kaine, who seems to be on something of a media blitz of late, all of the candidates above -- and their key political people -- are saying almost nothing about where they stand in the process. The idea guiding that approach is that the more publicly a candidate declares his (or her) interest in the job, the less chance there is that person will be the pick.

That radio silence makes reporting on the veepstakes one of the most difficult challenges in political journalism. A group numbering perhaps no more than four or five insiders has the whole picture of Obama's vice presidential search while everyone else -- including many of the candidates mentioned -- is left to interpret (and re-interpret) small comments and hints dropped by those in the know.

In other words, take it all cum grano salis. And, don't worry: this will all be over soon.

By Chris Cillizza, The Washington Post, July 31, 2008

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- On a Tuesday night when John McCain was raising $3.2 million at a lavish estate outside Denver, Barack Obama was in a nondescript, windowless room in the University Plaza Hotel (to call it a ballroom would be generous), taking what he could from 40 to 50 Missourians.

The group stood on line to take pictures with the candidate, milled around and chatted with Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.). Participants say they paid $5,000 to the Obama Victory Fund to get in, although some confessed they were invitees, not donors.

Organizer Nadia Cavner said the event raised $250,000, hailing that as a record for Springfield.

Obama stood on a small riser and spoke proudly of his trip abroad last week, saying, "What struck me was how hungry people were for American leadership." Of the 200,000 who came out to hear him in Berlin, he said, "They know that if America stands up and is leading with its values and ideals, then the whole world benefits."

A shortened stump speech lamented the 468,000 jobs lost since the beginning of this year, the highest rate of foreclosure since the Great Depression, spiraling gas and education prices and an average family income that has "flat-lined."

"We may be the first generation to pass on an America that is a little poorer than the one we inherited from our parents and grandparents," he said.

Speaking to "a lot of doctors in this room," he promised universal health care access by the end of his first term, a line that drew loud applause. He promised to spend $15 billion a year over the next decade on renewable energy sources, and he spoke of common-sense Midwestern values, singling out a woman who said she was his fourth cousin twice removed on his maternal side.

By Jonathan Weisman, The Washington Post, July 29, 2008

CHERRY HILLS, Colo. -- Setting what multimillionaire investor Charles Gallagher called a "Colorado record," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) raised $3.2 million Tuesday night in the Denver suburbs.

Standing on the patio of Gallagher's home, McCain made his usual fundraiser jokes about being welcomed "into this modest, middle-income tract home." After Gallagher murmured about the possibility of a tax break, the senator continued, "These public housing projects are quite remarkable."

McCain paid homage to former Rep. Bob Schaffer, who is running for the Senate this year to replace retiring Republican Wayne Allard, and to former Sen. Hank Brown (R-Colo.), a longtime supporter and fellow Vietnam War veteran.

"I will not let you down. I will always put my country first," McCain said. "This incredible fundraiser makes me even more committed to doing what's right for this country."

Gallagher's home abuts a country club golf course and is located just a couple of houses away from that of Denver Broncos owner Pat Bowlen. It featured the usual trappings of a fancy estate: gurgling fountains, manicured topiaries and elaborate fencing.

Tuesday's guests nibbled on appetizers that included Colorado lamb, a morel mushroom bruschetta, lobster salad and ahi tuna on sticky rice, followed by a salad course and Dover sole with caramelized onions. Attendees also received on their way out gift-wrapped copies of "Faith of Our Fathers," the book McCain wrote with his longtime aide Mark Salter.

On the same day that McCain's Senate colleague Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) was indicted on federal corruption charges, McCain said Republicans deserved plenty of blame for Americans hating Washington.

By Juliet Eilperin, The Washington Post, July 29, 2008

UNION, Mo., July 30 -- Sen. Barack Obama campaigned through the conservative heart of rural Missouri on Wednesday, determined to prove that a Democrat can capture this bellwether state by winning over voters in its far-flung small towns as well as in its urban centers.

With a town hall meeting and rally in Springfield, another in Rolla, a stop in Lebanon, and a rainy barbecue here, Obama is trying to mimic Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill's winning game plan from 2006 and get beyond more traditional strategies that left Vice President Al Gore and Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) narrow losers in the Show-Me State. Democrats have traditionally counted on huge margins in St. Louis and Kansas City to counter GOP strength in the rest of the state, and it hasn't worked.

"We are going to be fighting for every vote here in Missouri," Obama told an audience in Rolla. "Don't let the other side scare you from what you know in your gut. You know in your gut we have to bring about change."

The odds may be against him. Public polling has given Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) a consistent but narrow lead statewide. But the Obama campaign is making a run at it, with 24 offices in rural Missouri and 150 paid staff members, an unprecedented total that is triple the number Kerry deployed.

"It's the difference between winning and losing," said McCaskill, who squeaked past Republican Jim Talent with 49.6 percent of the vote in 2006. "People all over the state need to have a sense that a candidate cares about them, and if you don't bother to show up in rural Missouri, if you don't bother to ask for people's votes all over the state, then you're not going to win statewide in Missouri."

Republicans are skeptical, not just of the strategy but also of the depths of the on-the-ground campaigning that Obama supporters say is already underway.

"Southwest Missourians are much more focused on substance at the end of the day than style," said House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), whose district hosted Obama all day Wednesday. "No question he has style. He gives a great speech. But there's a reason Missouri has been called for years the Show-Me State."

To hand out tickets for events Wednesday, Obama volunteers in Nixa had to set up a table outside what is supposed to be a campaign office, because no lease has been signed. Chad Jackson of Heartland Realty in Nixa said he thinks the Obama campaign intends to open the office eventually, but it isn't there yet, despite the billing. "We just need the signature," he said. "Call back Thursday or Friday, and I should give you a more definitive answer."

Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.) hinted at the problems Obama still might face here when she suggested that he "has some making up to do" with small-town America after his comments about "bitter" Americans clinging to guns and religion. "What rural Missourians don't like is a candidate who dismisses whole communities out of hand," she said.

But Obama supporters say the effort here is real and the enthusiasm is already there. About 2,000 Missourians stood in 90-degree heat to claim the 1,400 tickets available for the candidate's appearance at Missouri University of Science and Technology in Rolla, a town where McCaskill told a sweaty crowd "a lot of people in this state would think nobody would show up . . . for Barack Obama."

To Obama and McCaskill, victory in November is a numbers game. Kerry took 46 percent of the vote in Missouri in 2004, but in the three counties Obama campaigned in, Greene, Franklin and Phelps, he won 37 percent, 41 percent and 36 percent, respectively. McCaskill didn't win them, either, but her 43 percent average was enough.

"North of 40 would do it" for Obama, McCaskill predicted.

Blunt said McCaskill virtually lived in and around Springfield, showing she learned her lesson from her losing gubernatorial campaign two years earlier. Obama could never put in that kind of personal effort, he said, and McCaskill barely won in a year when congressional Republicans were beaten soundly across the country.

But Obama's organization may outdo McCaskill's. By design, a significant number of his Missouri staffers have local roots. Peachy Myers, who commands the field operation, comes from Rolla, and two deputies are from Joplin and Kansas City.

Nearly 100 volunteers, most from Missouri, just finished a six-week commitment to work 30 hours a week. Many worked more. Volunteers and staffers have canvassed in rural areas where no presidential candidate has operated before. On Thursday, the campaign will open two larger offices in St. Louis and one in Kansas City.

The campaign sees potential advantages in Missouri as Obama tries to do what Kerry and Gore could not. One is the existence of a large black population amid polls that suggest Obama is likely to get more than 90 percent of the African American vote nationwide. Another is geography: Missouri's long border with Illinois has given voters more than average familiarity with the senator from next door.

Obama strategists see an opening, too, in the results of the Feb. 5 Republican primary, in which McCain received just 33 percent of the vote, narrowly beating Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney on a day when 200,000 more Missourians cast ballots for a Democrat than for a Republican.

It was no accident that Obama's first campaign stop designed for the general election was in Cape Girardeau, a conservative Mississippi River community that is Rush Limbaugh's home town.

"The key in Missouri, for a Democrat especially, is you have to show up in rural Missouri," said Rep. Riss Carnahan (D-Mo.), whose family has run eight statewide campaigns since 1980. "They want to see you in their town. They want to know that you're talking to them and listening to them."

By Jonathan Weisman and Peter Slevin, The Washington Post, July 31, 2008

McCain tells workers in Denver that his rival is a typical politician and an incessant tax-raiser. 'Don't let them scare you,' Obama assures crowds in southwest Missouri.

SPRINGFIELD, MO. -- Barack Obama campaigned deep in Republican strongholds in southwest Missouri on Wednesday, stressing economic themes to woo fence-sitters and scoffing at rival John McCain for "tired old answers."

Obama's forays into conservative-dominated districts were designed to highlight his economic offensive against McCain, but the Missouri thrust was also carefully aimed at easing swing-state voters' qualms about the Illinois senator's background and political resume.

"We can't afford to have eight more years of what we've been having," Obama told a crowd of 1,500 people crowded into the gym of Glendale High School in downtown Springfield.

Departing from prepared speeches that referred to McCain only as "my opponent," Obama lit into the Arizona Republican senator by name several times, responding to McCain's recent toughened broadsides against him on the stump and in campaign ads.

Obama repeatedly linked McCain with President Bush, who handily won southwest Missouri counties in the 2000 and 2004 elections but whose popularity has eroded, Democratic Party operatives here say, because of the tanking national economy and the drawn-out war in Iraq.

"John McCain believes we're on the right track. He's said our economy has made great progress these past eight years," Obama said, drawing a wave of laughter. "He's embraced the Bush economic policies and promises to continue them."

Even as he castigated McCain, Obama also took care to urge Missouri voters to spurn Internet rumors and intensifying GOP assaults that have taken a toll on his poll ratings.

"The only way they figure they're going to win this election is if they make you scared of me," Obama later told a crowd of 1,200 in a college recreation center in the small central Missouri town of Rolla. " 'He's new. He doesn't look like the other presidents on the dollar bills. He's got a funny name. . . .' The argument is that I'm too risky."

The real risk, Obama insisted, is "doing the same things we've done the last eight years." He implored the Rolla crowd: "Don't let them scare you."

Obama aides said his appeals were part of the campaign's calibrated effort to take on misinformation and GOP broadsides even in conservative enclaves that might otherwise be written off.

"He's here to talk about the economy, but he's also here to address people's concerns about him," said Jen Psaki, a campaign spokeswoman. "These are districts where the vote was 65% to 35% for Bush in the last two elections. It shows we intend to be competitive in places where Democrats have tended to shy away from in the past."

In 2004, Sen. John F. Kerry's presidential campaign made a strong display of committing campaign cash and staffers to Missouri but in the end did not make a concerted final push, Obama advisors said -- a mistake they insisted Obama would not repeat.

McCain also stopped in Missouri on Wednesday, briefly, for an evening fundraiser in Kansas City. Earlier, before workers at a machine maintenance company in suburban Denver, McCain accused Obama of being an incessant tax-raiser.

"He's proposed tax increases on income taxes, capital gains, dividend taxes -- pretty much anything you can tax, he wants to tax more," McCain said. "Raising taxes in a bad economy is about the worst thing you can do, because it could kill more jobs."

McCain also attacked Obama as a typical politician who speaks eloquently but doesn't follow through on his promises.

"What he says and what he does are often two different things," McCain told a crowd of several hundred employees at Wagner Equipment Co. He added later: "We don't need another politician in Washington that puts self-interest and political expedience ahead of problem-solving."




By Stephen Braun and Nicholas Riccardi, Los Angeles Times, July 31, 2008

KANSAS CITY, Mo., July 30 -- Sen. John McCain last week delivered one of his sharpest critiques yet of Sen. Barack Obama's Iraq policies, carefully reading a prepared speech that accused his Democratic rival of failing the commander-in-chief test and promoting ideas that would force American troops to "retreat under fire."

But just hours after his crisp performance, the Republican presidential candidate blurred his own message with an offhand comment to a television interviewer that Obama's proposal for a 16-month time frame for removing combat troops from Iraq might be a "pretty good timetable." That seemed to run counter to his attempts to cast Obama as naive on foreign policy, and it sent his aides scrambling.

As Election Day nears, McCain's campaign is adopting the aggressive, take-no-prisoners style of Karl Rove, the GOP operative who engineered victories for President Bush. The campaign continued the attack Wednesday with a sarcastic television ad deriding Obama as a "celebrity," part of an intensifying effort to cast him as an elitist.

But the sharp-edged approach is being orchestrated for an unpredictable candidate who often chafes at delivering the campaign's message of the day. It is that freewheeling style that has made him popular with voters and cemented his reputation for candor and straight talk.

McCain, who was most comfortable as an underdog in the unscripted environment of the New Hampshire primary, makes his advisers cringe as he delivers the attack line -- and then keeps talking. In that respect, he is no Bush, his handlers say.

The result is a presidential campaign that sometimes rolls between serious policy discussions about the nation's future and gotcha politics aimed at undermining his opponent's character. McCain himself is often caught in the middle, proclaiming his commitment to the former while participating in the latter.

For weeks, McCain's staff has been criticized for running a campaign that has no clear message. The decision by the senator from Arizona to have former Bush strategist Steve Schmidt run daily operations was described as a way to get control of the message. But some Republicans outside the campaign believe that not much has changed since then.

"It's the candidate," said one GOP strategist with close ties to the campaign, who added that efforts to identify a theme for each week quickly unravel as McCain veers off message in his public comments.

At a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania last week, McCain stood before a banner that proclaimed "Energy Solutions" and "The Lexington Project" -- the moniker his campaign coined for an energy proposal featuring a combination of conservation efforts, expanded offshore drilling and nuclear power.

McCain rambled quickly through the details and showed little appreciation for the art of "branding."

"I call it the Lexington Project, my friends, but you can call it anything you want," he said.

Several weeks ago senior aide Mark Salter said McCain would stop kicking off town hall meetings with news "ripped from the day's headlines" and would instead deliver a formal introduction on a single theme. That effort lasted just a few weeks: In his opening remarks at Tuesday's town hall, McCain hopscotched from the war to pork-barrel spending.

The campaign's focus on expanding its war chest sometimes compromises its ability to deliver a coherent message, since McCain's schedule is often dictated by the sites of fundraising events rather than an overarching theme. This week, for example, the presumptive GOP nominee has traveled from central California to San Francisco to Reno to Denver to Kansas City, holding as many fundraisers as public events.

The assault on Obama's capacity to lead continued Wednesday with the release of McCain's latest commercial, "Celeb," which compares Obama's ability to attract adoring fans to that of Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.

In a news conference with reporters, campaign manager Rick Davis said the ad draws a distinction between Obama's popularity and McCain's appeal, which Davis said stems not from "celebrity" but from "actually having a political movement based on ideas and solutions for the American public."

Schmidt joined the conference call midway through to hammer the point. "There's no dispute that he's become the biggest celebrity in the world," Schmidt said of Obama. "The question that we are posing to the American people is this: Is he ready to lead yet?"

The new ad relies mainly on atmospherics, but it also delivers a harsh assessment of Obama's record, declaring that the Democrat "says he'll raise taxes on electricity." In fact, Obama opposes a "carbon tax," though he does favor a "cap and trade" plan to curb greenhouse gas emissions, which McCain also supports. The assertion is based on a comment that Obama made to a San Antonio paper in February: "What we ought to tax is dirty energy, like coal and, to a lesser extent, natural gas."

Obama's campaign responded to McCain's attacks Wednesday with an ad describing them as "the politics of the past."

On the stump in Missouri, Obama also said: "You know, I don't pay attention to John McCain's ads. Although I do notice that he doesn't seem to have anything to say very positive about himself. He seems to only be talking about me. You need to ask John McCain what he's for, not just what he's against."

But sometimes McCain is not his best spokesman.

At a town hall meeting Tuesday, a GOP voter posed a question McCain has heard everywhere from Sparks, Nev., to Dayton, Ohio: Why should Republicans support him?

"I think I speak for a lot of conservatives when I say I'm not very excited about this election," the questioner said, noting that he differs with McCain on issues including "amnesty" for illegal immigrants and the senator's support for "the global warming crowd's agenda."

But rather than rattle off his most conservative positions -- his opposition to abortion and support for the war -- he launched into a long explanation of his role in a compromise on judges, something that conservatives often criticize him for.

He sparked applause from the Republican audience by mentioning his support for conservative Supreme Court Justices John G. Roberts Jr. and Samuel A. Alito Jr., but he then noted that he had backed liberal Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer as well.

McCain finished off what was supposed to be an explanation of why conservatives should back him with a pledge to push for a cleaner planet.

"I've stood up against my party many times," he said, "because I've done what I thought was right."

By Juliet Eilperin and Robert Barnes, The Washington Post, July 31, 2008

Barack Obama has long been his party's presumptive nominee. Now he's becoming its presumptuous nominee.

Fresh from his presidential-style world tour, during which foreign leaders and American generals lined up to show him affection, Obama settled down to some presidential-style business in Washington yesterday. He ordered up a teleconference with the (current president's) Treasury secretary, granted an audience to the Pakistani prime minister and had his staff arrange for the chairman of the Federal Reserve to give him a briefing. Then, he went up to Capitol Hill to be adored by House Democrats in a presidential-style pep rally.

Along the way, he traveled in a bubble more insulating than the actual president's. Traffic was shut down for him as he zoomed about town in a long, presidential-style motorcade, while the public and most of the press were kept in the dark about his activities, which included a fundraiser at the Mayflower where donors paid $10,000 or more to have photos taken with him. His schedule for the day, announced Monday night, would have made Dick Cheney envious:

11:00 a.m.: En route TBA.

12:05 p.m.: En route TBA.

1:45 p.m.: En route TBA.

2:55 p.m.: En route TBA.

5:20 p.m.: En route TBA.

The 5:20 TBA turned out to be his adoration session with lawmakers in the Cannon Caucus Room, where even committee chairmen arrived early, as if for the State of the Union. Capitol Police cleared the halls -- just as they do for the actual president. The Secret Service hustled him in through a side door -- just as they do for the actual president.

Inside, according to a witness, he told the House members, "This is the moment . . . that the world is waiting for," adding: "I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions."

As he marches toward Inauguration Day (Election Day is but a milestone on that path), Obama's biggest challenger may not be Republican John McCain but rather his own hubris.

Some say the supremely confident Obama -- nearly 100 days from the election, he pronounces that "the odds of us winning are very good" -- has become a president-in-waiting. But in truth, he doesn't need to wait: He has already amassed the trappings of the office, without those pesky decisions.

The Atlantic's Marc Ambinder reported last week that Obama has directed his staff to begin planning for his transition to the White House, causing Republicans to howl about premature drape measuring. Obama was even feeling confident enough to give British Prime Minister Gordon Brown some management advice over the weekend. "If what you're trying to do is micromanage and solve everything, then you end up being a dilettante," he advised the prime minister, portraying his relative inexperience much as President Bush did in 2000.

On his presidential-style visit to the Western Wall in Jerusalem last week, Obama left a written prayer, intercepted by an Israeli newspaper, asking God to "help me guard against pride and despair." He seems to have the despair part under control, but the pride could be a problem.

One source of the confidence is the polling, which shows him with a big lead over McCain. But polls are fickle allies: A USA Today-Gallup poll released Monday found McCain leading Obama by four percentage points among likely voters. Another reason for Obama's confidence -- the press -- is also an unfaithful partner. The Project for Excellence in Journalism reported yesterday that Obama dominated the news media's attention for a seventh straight week. But there are signs that the Obama campaign's arrogance has begun to anger reporters.

In the latest issue of the New Republic, Gabriel Sherman found reporters complaining that Obama's campaign was "acting like the Prom Queen" and being more secretive than Bush. The magazine quoted the New York Times Adam Nagourney's reaction to the Obama campaign's memo attacking one of his stories: "I've never had an experience like this, with this campaign or others." Then came Obama's overseas trip and the campaign's selection of which news organizations could come aboard. Among those excluded: the New Yorker magazine, which had just published a satirical cover about Obama that offended the campaign.

Even Bush hasn't tried that. But then again, Obama has been outdoing the president in ruffles and flourishes lately. As Bush held quiet signing ceremonies in the White House yesterday morning, Obama was involved in a more visible display of executive authority a block away, when he met with Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani at the Willard. A full block of F Street was shut down for the prime minister and the would-be president, and some 40 security and motorcade vehicles filled the street.

Later, Obama's aides issued an official-sounding statement, borrowing the language of White House communiques: "I had a productive and wide-ranging discussion. . . . I look forward to working with the democratically elected government of Pakistan."

It had been a long day of acting presidential, but Obama wasn't done. After a few hours huddling with advisers over his vice presidential choice, Obama made his way to the pep rally on the Hill. Moments after he entered the meeting with lawmakers, there was an extended cheer, followed by another, and another.

"I think this can be an incredible election," Obama said later. "I look forward to collaborating with everybody here to win the election."

Win the election? Didn't he do that already?

By Dana Millbank, The Washington Post, July 30, 2008

After a Spectacular Political Failure, the Former Top Aide To Clinton Makes Herself at Home in Obama's Camp

CHICAGO

Patti Solis Doyle has come home to get her house in order and her reputation back. It has not been a good year.

After a dramatic failure at the helm of Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign, and five months after Clinton sacked her via e-mail, she moved back to the comfort of her home town to work for Barack Obama.

Here, she is in the protective cocoon of her close Mexican American family, and enveloped by the familiar faces of the tight Democratic machine that helped shape her.

And here, in a small glass office on the 11th floor, at Obama's campaign headquarters on Michigan Avenue, she keeps her head down and tries to unravel the mysteries of 2008: why Clinton lost, why so many of her old friends have turned on her, why she is largely blamed for the campaign's dysfunction, and, most unsettling to her, why Clinton has distanced herself from her onetime closest confidant.

In Washington, proximity to power is power, and on the February day Solis Doyle was replaced, she experienced one of the more rapid -- and extraordinary -- free falls in American politics. She was immediately shut out of the inner circle and cut loose. She was accused of squandering millions of campaign dollars, of being holed up in her corner office watching soap operas as the campaign collapsed, of being an imperious leader who perpetuated a tense and joyless atmosphere -- all of which she denies.

"It's really sad and discouraging and revolting at times," Solis Doyle, 42, says over lunch one recent day. "I have to tell you, I was surprised by the vitriol towards me. I think I'm a good person."

It is generally an unremarkable event when staffers for a defeated presidential candidate join the rival's campaign. At a certain moment, there is a clarion call for all hands on deck. But Clinton loyalists were enraged when Solis Doyle was named chief of staff for Obama's future vice presidential pick.

She had worked for Clinton for 17 years, through Whitewater and Monica, two Senate races and the relentless GOP attack machine. It was Solis Doyle who coined the phrase "Hillaryland" to describe the coterie of women who have been with Clinton since her years as first lady.