Charles Krauthammer continues the conservative line on Obama's policy shifts and says:

By the time he's finished, Obama will have made the Clintons look scrupulous.

So, is creating a negative Obama/Clinton association the new way for conservatives to attack Obama, or is it more a media creation? Salon's Joan Walsh says the media may have fairly criticized Bill Clinton during the primaries, but should back off:

Clinton has finally listened to his critics, left the spotlight to his wife, and nursed his grievances in private -- and he's still getting criticized!

I'll be on MSNBC this morning at around 11:30 to discuss Bill Clinton's reported "beef" with the Obama campaign.

In short, I'll argue that while Clinton may be upset at how his reputation was dinged during the Democratic primary, the best remedy is for him to campaign as enthusiastically for Obama as possible. Politics does not tend to be kind to those who feel sorry for themselves.

For potentially millions of Democratic voters in Pennsylvania today, it's Hillary Clinton vs. Barack Obama in a primary battle that just may end the protracted battle for their party's nomination.

But in the political blogosphere today, the top story is Bill Clinton's accusation to WHYY radio yesterday that the Obama campaign "played the race card" against him:

“I think that they played the race card on me. We now know, from memos from the campaign that they planned to do it along.” - President Bill Clinton.

Clinton has since denied making the accusation, directly conflicting his statement to WHYY.


Blogger reactions after the jump...

From South Carolina to Texas, the Democratic presidential primary has been rich with examples of Bill Clinton losing his temper or acting in a way that seems to run counter to Hillary Clinton's best interests. So, today's San Francisco Chronicle report on the former president's "tirade" against a California superdelegate, comes less as a surprise, than as another negative example of his role in this campaign:

The former president then went on a tirade that ran from the media's unfair treatment of Hillary to questions about the fairness of the votes in state caucuses that voted for Obama. It ended with him asking delegates to imagine what the reaction would be if Obama was trailing by just 1 percent and people were telling him to drop out.

Did Bill Clinton mean what he said when speaking to a Denver audience yesterday about the economy and the environment? ABC News highlights the following text:

"We just have to slow down our economy and cut back our greenhouse gas emissions 'cause we have to save the planet for our grandchildren."

But in full context, no, Clinton does not appear to be calling for an economic slowdown. Later in the speech, the former president seems to indicate that he was more specifically saying that environmental agreements will hurt the U.S. and other first-world economies unless they are also agreed to upon by other emerging nations like India and China. Nonetheless, that hasn’t stopped the blogs from speculating.

Over at the liberal Washington Monthly, Steve Benen points out that even conservative blogs like The Corner and Hot Air are coming to Clinton’s defense. From the Corner’s Iain Murray:

[The ABC] video is actually (and again, I can't believe I'm saying this) really unfair to Bill Clinton. The biter bit, you may say, but I don't believe this sort of manipulation by the media is in any way helpful. The clip is out of context.... That's not good journalism in any sense.

But some other righty blogs, like Townhall.com, are running with the out-of-context reporting, even though a number of readers on the Townhall.com comments board have pointed out the differences in context.

Bloggers are having fun with this Onion story today, "Bill Clinton: 'Screw It, I'm Running For President'"

"My fellow Americans, I am sick and tired of not being president," said Clinton, introducing his wife at a "Hillary '08" rally. "For seven agonizing years, I have sat idly by as others experienced the joys of campaigning, debating, and interacting with the people of this great nation, and I simply cannot take it anymore. I have to be president again. I have to."

As the Carpetbagger Report notes:

Now, this item is just poking fun, so it can brush past that pesky 22nd Amendment, but it obviously touches on a genuine phenomenon. At this week’s debate, Barack Obama mentioned, “I can’t tell who I’m running against sometimes.” The audience applauded because they knew exactly what he meant.