John McCain keeps insisting he's Mr. Straight Talk. But like all politicians, he ducks inconvenient truths when he can. A good example of this came during Wednesday night's CNN debate. About halfway through, Janet Hook of The Los Angeles Times put this query to McCain.

You're talking about making the [George W. Bush] tax cuts permanent. And as Governor Romney pointed out before, you opposed the Bush tax cuts the first time around. Now, more recently you've been saying that the reason why you opposed the tax cuts at first was because they weren't offset by spending cuts. But back when you actually voted against the tax cuts in Congress, you said you opposed them because they favored the wealthy too much. So which is it? And if they were too skewed to the wealthy at first, are they still too skewed to the wealthy?

If ever a question called for straight talk, this was it. The debate was taking place at the Ronald Reagan presidential library. McCain was surrounded by rivals and Reagan-lovers who would go crazy on him if he dared to suggest that a tax cut was unfair because it disproportionately benefited the rich. He was in the middle of Trickle-Down Country.

The senator replied:

I was part of the Reagan revolution. I was there with Jack Kemp and Phil Gramm and Warren Rudman and all these other fighters that wanted to change a terrible economic situation in America with 10 percent unemployment and 20 percent interest rates. I was proud to be a foot soldier, support those tax cuts, and they had spending restraints associated with it. I made it very clear when I ran in 2000 that I had a package of tax cuts which were very important and very impactful, but I also had restraints in spending. And I disagreed when spending got out of control. And I disagreed when we had tax cuts without spending restraint.

And guess what? Spending got out of control. Republicans lost the 2006 election not over the war in Iraq, over spending. Our base became disenchanted.

If we had done what I wanted to do, we would not only have had the spending restraint, but we'd be talking about additional tax cuts today. I'm proud of my record. I'm proud of my record as a foot soldier in the Reagan revolution, and now I'm prepared to lead in restraining spending.

Did McCain answer the question? No, he threw up chaff about his love of Reagan and refused to repeat his initial criticism to the Bush tax cuts. Why? Because he would be crucified if he acknowledged that he had opposed the tax cuts because they were skewed toward the rich. McCain is fond of saying that he speaks his mind on Iraq because he would rather lose an election than a war. When it comes to unfair tax cuts beloved by Republicans, he's a bit more circumspect.

Nothing.

During his victory speech on Tuesday night, John McCain, who beat Mitt Romney in the Florida by 5 points, thanked his supporters and spoke graciously of his rivals. He presented himself as a traditional Republican. He noted that he first was attracted to the "principles and policies" of the Republican Party when he heard of the conservatism of Ronald Reagan "in whispered conversations and tap codes" while he was a prisoner of war in Vietnam. He called for lower taxes. He denounced activist judges. He said not a word about Iraq. Nothing about ending the war. Nothing about winning the war.

Make of this what you will.

George W. Bush should be damn mad at his speechwriters. His final State of the Union speech was pedestrian. And it was irrelevant. After all, at this point, his deeds drown out any words he could issue. As he faces the last year of the presidency, he really has nothing new to say: win, win, win in Iraq; tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts; freedom, freedom, freedom. He certainly is not in any position to propose major new policy initiatives. He cannot move anything significant through the Democratic-controlled Congress in the next eleven months--except the continuation of his unpopular war. So the speech barely warrants analysis. That said, here are portions that stood out and the obvious commentary.

"As Americans, we believe in the power of individuals to determine their destiny and shape the course of history. We believe that the most reliable guide for our country is the collective wisdom of ordinary citizens. So in all we do, we must trust in the ability of free people to make wise decisions, and empower them to improve their lives and their futures."

Then why won't the Bush allow the U.S. Senate--which represents the people--to authorize or not authorize the agreement the Bush administration is now negotiating with Iraq concerning the U.S. military presence there? Democrats maintain this accord should be treated as a treaty and put to the Senate for a vote. Bush says he can do it on his own. How's that for empowerment?

"Most Americans think their taxes are high enough. With all the other pressures on their finances, American families should not have to worry about the federal government taking a bigger bite out of their paychecks. There is only one way to eliminate this uncertainty: make the tax relief permanent."

He keeps calling tax breaks for millionaires "relief." Why do people making over $250,000 need "relief"?

"Next week, I will send you a budget....And this budget will keep America on track for a surplus in 2012. American families have to balance their budgets, and so should their government."

Just not during Bush's entire time in office and not for the four years after he departs the White House. He will be leaving his successor $9.2 trillion in national debt.

"I ask you to pass legislation to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, modernize the Federal Housing Administration, and allow state housing agencies to issue tax-free bonds to help homeowners refinance their mortgages. These are difficult times for many American families, and by taking these steps, we can help more of them keep their homes."

What about the predatory lending industry that created the subprime mess? Nothing.

"We share a common goal: making health care more affordable and accessible for all Americans. The best way to achieve that goal is by expanding consumer choice, not government control. So I have proposed ending the bias in the tax code against those who do not get their health insurance through their employer. This one reform would put private coverage within reach for millions."

But not for all of those millions of Americans who are uninsured. Bush's plan would give a modest tax credit to people who can afford to buy their own plans. If you can't, well....

"Our security, our prosperity, and our environment all require reducing our dependence on oil."

After seven years of the Bush II administration, is the nation significantly closer to energy independence?

"And let us complete an international agreement that has the potential to slow, stop, and eventually reverse the growth of greenhouse gases."

Complete an agreement? How about getting one going? The Bush administration has demonstrated no urgency on this front, repeatedly blocking international steps toward redressing global warming.

"Let us create a new international clean technology fund, which will help developing nations like India and China make greater use of clean energy sources."

This was Bush's only mention of China in the speech. China presents perhaps a fundamental challenge of this century. And what about freedom in China? Apparently, that issue didn't make the final cut for this address.

"To keep America competitive into the future, we must trust in the skill of our scientists and engineers and empower them to pursue the breakthroughs of tomorrow."

But it's okay to censor the work of government scientists when it involves climate change.

"Tonight the armies of compassion continue the march to a new day in the Gulf Coast. America honors the strength and resilience of the people of this region. We reaffirm our pledge to help them build stronger and better than before. And tonight I am pleased to announce that in April we will host this year’s North American Summit of Canada, Mexico, and the United States in the great city of New Orleans."

If it's a march, it's a rather slow one. Much of New Orleans is still a wasteland. At least Bush is sending the city diplomats.

"Every Member in this chamber knows that spending on entitlement programs like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid is growing faster than we can afford. And we all know the painful choices ahead if America stays on this path: massive tax increases, sudden and drastic cuts in benefits, or crippling deficits. I have laid out proposals to reform these programs. Now I ask members of Congress to offer your proposals and come up with a bipartisan solution to save these vital programs for our children and grandchildren."

Translation: I give up.

"Illegal immigration is complicated, but it can be resolved. And it must be resolved in a way that upholds both our laws and our highest ideals."

Translation: I have no idea what to do next.

"Our foreign policy is based on a clear premise: We trust that people, when given the chance, will choose a future of freedom and peace."

See Hamas.

"We will stay on the offense, we will keep up the pressure, and we will deliver justice to the enemies of America."

Haven't we heard this before? Paging Osama bin Laden.

"And we gave our troops [in Iraq] a new mission: Work with Iraqi forces to protect the Iraqi people, pursue the enemy in its strongholds, and deny the terrorists sanctuary anywhere in the country."

That mission, Bush said a year ago, was to create breathing space for the Iraq government. In this speech, Bush did not mention breathing space for the Iraq government. Nor did he note that 2007 was the deadliest year overall for U.S. soldiers in Iraq. He did say that "American troops are shifting from leading operations, to partnering with Iraqi forces, and, eventually, to a protective overwatch mission." A "protective overwatch mission"? Bush did not define what that meant? But it sure sounds like mission creep.

"Al Qaeda is on the run in Iraq, and this enemy will be defeated."

Bush always talks about the war in Iraq as if the primary battle is against al Qaeda, though numerous military and terrorism experts have repeatedly said that al Qaeda is a rather small slice of the insurgency in Iraq.

"Reconciliation [in Iraq] is taking place."

That remains debatable.

"A free Iraq will deny Al Qaeda a safe haven."

In Saddam Hussein's unfree Iraq, al Qaeda had no safe haven. And there is little chance that should the U.S. withdraw troops from Iraq, the Shia, Sunni, and Kurds would hand over the country to the small and unpopular al Qaeda outfit in Iraq.

"This month in Ramallah and Jerusalem, I assured leaders from both sides that America will do, and I will do, everything we can to help them achieve a peace agreement that defines a Palestinian state by the end of this year."

It just took Bush a little while to get around to working on the Middle East.

"America is using its influence to build a freer, more hopeful, and more compassionate world."

That must be why the United States' standing in the world is so low.

"America is leading the fight against global poverty."

Other Western nations devote a higher percentage of their gross national product to foreign assistance. By the way, there was no mention of American poverty in the hour-long speech.

"So long as we continue to trust the people, our nation will prosper, our liberty will be secure, and the State of our Union will remain strong."

We just cannot trust the people when it comes to war. Two-thirds of the American public now say the Iraq war was a mistake. Bush refuses to acknowledge that. This profound gap between the people and the president was not part of his assessment of the state of the union. Then again, how could it be?

I attended the American University event on Monday, where Ted Kennedy endorsed Barack Obama, with Caroline and Patrick Kennedy joining in. After hearing Kennedy's remarks, I read them. the second time around, they seemed much more a warning to the Clintons than they had in person. Maybe that's because the volume was too low on the microphones used by the Kennedys and Obama. Kennedy's speech does seem to set up a clash between the two main families of the Democratic Party. (Drop in your own Sopranos allusion here.) And within the Kennedy clan, there is a split, with several Kennedys siding against the Godfather (sorry, couldn't resist) and backing Hillary Clinton. Will this all blow over after a nominee is chosen. I dunno. But I don't see Chelsea Clinton taking on a Michael Corleone-like role. But enough of that. Below is a report I filed for MotherJones.com on the Kennedy event. And check out my colleague John Stein's assessment of the EMK endorsement.:

Democrats don't come much more traditional than Teddy Kennedy, the grand man of the Democratic Party. So his endorsement of Barack Obama--implicitly an anti-endorsement of Hillary Clinton--has punch. Endorsements routinely don't matter much in presidential campaigns--with a few exceptions. A politician who controls a machine--say, a governor--can come in quite handy on Election Day. In this case, Kennedy brings two piping hot dishes to the Obama potluck.

By awarding him the Kennedy Seal of Approval--with Caroline Kennedy (daughter of John) and Representative Patrick Kennedy (son of Ted) chiming in--Kennedy makes it official: Obama is the Next Generation leader of the Democratic Party and, in that role, has a lock on the vision thing. And by pledging to campaign arduously for Obama in the coming days, Kennedy will be assisting Obama's efforts to reach out to traditional Democratic voters: working-class Dems. Clinton has been faring better among that core demographic chunk of the Democratic electorate. Kennedy is no white knight who will rescue Obama on this front. But if Kennedy pulls a few votes here and there, it could be significant--only if Obama on his own can close the gap between him and Clinton on blue-collar Democrats and Latinos. It is too late for any candidate--or any set of endorsements--to change the fundamentals of the presidential race in time for Supersaturated Tuesday on February 5. And Ted Kennedy on the campaign trail is no match for Hillary Clinton's hit man: her husband. Yet any bit of Kennedy magic dust the Massachusetts senator sprinkles for Obama can only help.

Kennedy's endorsement speech--held before an enthusiastic crowd at an auditorium at American University--was a roar. He noted that Clinton and John Edwards were fine people and his friends. "But I believe," he said, "there is one candidate who has extraordinary gifts of leadership and character, matched to the extraordinary demands of this moment in history." He completely adopted Obama's own arguments: "He is a leader who sees the world clearly without being cynical. He is a fighter who cares passionately about the causes he believes in, without demonizing those who hold a different view." That last line, an echo of a remark Obama made on Saturday night after winning the South Carolina primary, was a dig at the Clinton camp.

Other digs followed: "We know the true record of Barack Obama. There is the courage he showed when so many others were silent or simply went along. From the beginning, he opposed the war in Iraq. And let no one deny that truth." The Clinton crew has been trying to undermine Obama's natural advantage on the war. (He opposed voting for it: she did not.) Kennedy was calling them out on this matter and essentially telling them to shut up.

And then Kennedy passed the torch:

With Barack Obama, there is a new national leader who has given America a different kind of campaign--a campaign not just about himself, but about all of us. A campaign about the country we will become, if we can rise above the old politics that parses us into separate groups and puts us at odds with one another.

I remember another such time, in the 1960s, when I came to the Senate at the age of 30. We had a new president who inspired the nation, especially the young, to seek a new frontier. Those inspired young people marched, sat in at lunch counters, protested the war in Vietnam and served honorably in that war even when they opposed it.

Obama can be the new Kennedy--John or Robert, take your pick. Who says so? Their brother. Such rhetoric might be easily dismissed by the cynical, but it is heady stuff. And Kennedy probably did not make the decision to anoint Obama in this manner lightly. He compared Obama to Clinton and found one inspiring, the other merely commendable. "What counts in our leadership," Kennedy thundered, "is not the length of years in Washington, but the reach of our vision, the strength of our beliefs, and that rare quality of mind and spirit that can call forth the best in our country and our people. With Barack Obama, we will turn the page on the old politics of misrepresentation and distortion."

Kennedy's red-hot endorsement can be read as something of a pushback to the Clinton gang's assault on the junior senator from Illinois. "Let us reject the counsels of doubt and calculation," Kennedy said loudly before the American University crowd. Whose doubt and calculation? The Clintons', of course. And he was not indirect.....

You can read the rest here.

UPDATE: After Barack Obama's trouncing of Hillary Clinton in South Carolina, will the Clinton Attack Machine--starring Bill Clinton!--continue to fire away? I ponder this point here.

During a conference call on Friday with Clinton aides--who were again blasting Barack Obama for having noted that the Republican Party developed a reputation as "the party of ideas" in the 1990s--I asked whether the Clinton camp was stepping over the line (you know, that line of respectability and accuracy) in its attacks on Hillary Clinton's chief rival. As one example, I cited a remark Representative Barney Frank, a Clinton backer, had made at the start of the call.

Referring to Obama's "party of ideas" comments, Frank said that Obama had been "wrong to say Ronald Reagan was right about government getting too big." But did Obama really endorse Reagan's signature gripe? I'll post and you can decide. Here's the relevant passage:

I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it.

I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn't much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

Do these words add up to an endorsement of Reagan's antigovernment rhetoric?...Since you asked, they don't for me. I read the remark to be a stab at historical analysis, with Obama characterizing (rightly or wrongly) popular opinion during the 1980s. But in response to my question, Frank argued that Obama's reference implied approval.

I'm sure not looking to pick a fight with Frank, the sharpest wit on Capitol Hill. But let me point out that on January 27, 1996, then-President Bill Clinton gave a radio address and said:

These are the seven challenges I set forth Tuesday night -- to strengthen our families, to renew our schools and expand educational opportunity, to help every American who's willing to work for it achieve economic security, to take our streets back from crime, to protect our environment, to reinvent our government so that it serves better and costs less, and to keep America the leading force for peace and freedom throughout the world. We will meet these challenges, not through big government. The era of big government is over, but we can't go back to a time when our citizens were just left to fend for themselves. [My bold.]

The era of big government is over. How's that for a grand Reaganesque declaration? It's certainly a much clearer endorsement of Reagan's view of the world than anything Obama said. Will Frank now ask Hillary to disavow Bill?

I'm waiting to get on a conference call with Clinton campaign officials, who, no doubt, will again defend their attacks on Barack Obama by claiming they have no choice but to respond to his criticisms of Hillary and Bill Clinton. But many of their attacks have been disingenuous. On a similar call yesterday, Mark Penn, her chief strategist, blasted Obama for saying as a candidate for the Senate in 2003 that he would not vote for Iraq war funding and then doing so after he entered the Senate. But there's a problem with that shot: as a candidate, Obama never said he would never vote for Iraq war funding; he said he opposed the war spending bill then pending for several reasons. The Clinton camp has legitimate criticism it could toss at Obama. The experience issue is a real one. But the Clinton crowd continues to mix real and phony attacks, pissing off some Democrats but succeeding strategically by keeping Obama bogged down in an acrimonious mudwrestle. I wonder what they'll come up with next. Meanwhile, allow me to cross-post my take on the recent GOP debate, which first appeared on MotherJones.com. Bottom line: they were nice to each other but, boy, did they mug the truth.

At Thursday night's Republican presidential debate, the GOP contenders did their best not to make any news. No one attacked anyone; no one disagreed on any major policy matter--except regarding a proposal to establish a national catastrophic insurance fund that would back up private insurance firms. (Rudy Giuliani, playing to Florida homeowners, voiced his support for it; Mitt Romney supported the general notion; John McCain attacked legislation that would set up such a fund as a $200 billion boondoggle.) Generally, the candidates made up a chorus for tax cuts and fighting--make that, winning--the Iraq war. (Then there was Ron Paul.) At times, the candidates hailed their rivals. It was so.... un-Democratic. No nastiness--even though McCain and Romney, essentially tied for first place in the Florida polls, have been hurling negative ads at each other. (A Romney ad assails McCain for flip-flopping on tax cuts; a McCain spot blasts Romney for...flip-flopping on tax cuts. McCain is actually comparing Romney to John Kerry.)

If you were forced to pick a winner--and in the absence of policy disputes, the debate was all about the horse race--you'd probably have to choose Romney, who seemed quasi-commanding and who this night, for some reason, looked more like Hollywood's idea of a president than usual. But no candidate hurt his own prospects. That doesn't mean, though, they didn't come out with some whoppers. Here's a sampling:

* Moderator Tim Russert asked McCain about a comment McCain had supposedly made--"I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues; I still need to be educated"--and McCain shot back, "I don't know where you got that quote from; I'm very well-versed in economics." Well, McCain did tell the Baltimore Sun, "The issue of economics is something that I've really never understood as well as I should." So much for being "well-versed."

* Asked whether it was un-American for U.S. banks to seek infusions of billions of dollars in capital from foreign sources, Giuliani said there was nothing wrong with that as long as "they're transparent." Giuliani, though, still refuses to be transparent about his own multi-million-dollar business dealings, declining to release information about the clients and foreign officials he has worked with as a consultant.

* McCain said that the invasion of Iraq was justified because Saddam Hussein was "hell-bent on acquiring" weapons of mass destruction. Actually, he wasn't. Saddam might have desired WMDs. But for years prior to the invasion, the Iraqi dictator had suspended his WMD program and done nothing to pursue WMDs, according to the final report of Charles Duelfer and his Iraq Survey Group.

* Mike Huckabee, voicing his support for Bush's invasion of Iraq, said that just because the United States didn't find WMDs in Iraq that "doesn't mean it wasn't there." The aforementioned Duelfer report--and Duelfer took over the Iraq Survey Group as a hawk who had believed Saddam possessed WMDs--made it clear that Saddam not only had no weapons in the years leading up to the war, he had no WMD program. In other words, there were no WMDs to be found in Iraq--period.

* Romney praised Bush for mounting the Iraq war and making sure al Qaeda could not gain "a safe haven" in Iraq "for launching attacks against us." That was certainly not an issue prior to the invasion. Saddam had no operational ties with al Qaeda. And now there's little, if any chance, that the small and unpopular al Qaeda outfit in Iraq could take over Iraq, pushing aside the Shiites, the Sunnis, and the Kurds.

* Romney claimed that under Hillary Clinton's universal health care proposal, everybody will get their coverage "from the government." Here's how Clinton describes it: "If you have a plan you like, you keep it. If you want to change plans or aren't currently covered, you can choose from dozens of the same plans available to members of Congress, or you can opt into a public plan option like Medicare." That's not a government-only plan.

* Huckabee said that Americans "ought to be able to respect people who don't have any [faith]." Yet in a book he co-wrote in 1998, Huckabee huffed, "Men who have rejected God and do not walk in faith are more often than not immoral, impure, and improvident (Gal. 5:19-21). They are prone to extreme and destructive behavior, indulging in perverse vices and dissipating sensuality (1 Cor. 6:9-10)." That just doesn't come across as a respectful attitude regarding people who don't have faith.

But the candidates sure did behave nicely.

Is there a mini-neo-quasi-backlash setting in against the Clintons for their attacks on Barack Obama?

The Washington Post reported on Thursday that some Democratic leaders were getting mighty peeved at the Clintons--especially him for unfairly assailing Barack Obama. (I've reported several times on how the Clinton camp has made false accusations against Obama regarding his position on the Iraq war. See here.)

And there's a rather compelling video in which the former president of Chicago NOW says she has switched from supporting Hillary Clinton to backing Barack Obama because the Clinton campaign has disingenuously assailed Obama's record on abortion rights. It's powerful evidence for those who claim the Clintons are going beyond acceptable politics into the realm of slime and smears. Here it is:

Will this nascent backlash matter? Well, there's not that much time between now and Supersaturated Tuesday on February 5. It's hard to see a full-scale Democratic rebellion against the Clintons emerging. Meanwhile, all this sniping is keeping Obama pinned down. That is, it's working for the Clintons. Their calculation is obvious: the heat is worth the gain.

John Edwards is moaning that Hillary Clinton isn't spending much time in South Carolina. Why should she? Clinton showed in New Hampshire that she can take a punch (Iowa) and keep on going. She may not win South Carolina on Saturday, but she doesn't need the Palmetto State as much as Barack Obama and John Edwards do. So she's already on to Supersaturated Tuesday, campaigning this week in California, New Mexico, and New Jersey.

This is giving her a leg up on Obama. He's pinned down in South Carolina, hoping to round up the votes many folks already presume he has (African American votes). If he cannot clobber Clinton there, he will certainly have a tough time going into the February 5 states.

His campaign announced on Wednesday that it will begin airing ads in various 2/5 states. The ads are...fine: positive spots that highlight his personal tale, his policies (end the war, end tax breaks for outsourcing corporations, begin universal health care), and his call for change. They do not redefine political advertising the way Obama is trying to redefine politics. And it's fair to wonder if they will be enough to best Clinton, who in Nevada and New Hampshire demonstrated an ability to win over traditional Democrats. Most of the big-state Democratic primaries on February 5 are closed to independent voters--but not California--and that means the traditional Dems will count the most.

Thus, while Clinton skips South Carolina, leaving the Big Dawg (a.k.a. Mr. Clinton) to stump the Palmetto State for her (and continue the mudwrestle with Obama), and while she starts her February 5 campaigning, Obama is working for a win in South Carolina that the Clintonites are already dismissing. (After all, shouldn't he triumph in a state where half the voters are African Americans?) At the same time, he is depending on short spots to convey his large message to millions of voters elsewhere. It's not the best position to be in.

Obama needs a definitional moment. That doesn't mean he should cry on the campaign trail. (And the politerati will debate for years whether that did the trick for Clinton in New Hampshire.) But he has to cut through the clutter--the sniping, the jockeying, the sideshow stories--in a bold manner that brings it all home for those 2/5 voters who might only now be thinking seriously about whom to choose. Now if I knew how to engineer such a move, I'd be rich. This ain't easy. But reaching so many people at once, as I've said before, is a mighty challenge. Winning South Carolina won't be enough.

The conventional take is that neither Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton came out well during Monday night's joint-slam of a debate. And on Tuesday, the cat-fight continued, with HRC belittling Obama and claiming he "was looking for a fight" because of his recent primary losses. As he did on Monday night, John Edwards called on the leading contenders to knock it off.

Bicker, bicker, bicker. It does make the face-off between Obama and Clinton look petty. And that is to Clinton's advantage.

She's once again in the lead. In New Hampshire and Nevada, she beat back Obama's politics of hope. Trench warfare has served her well. As I noted recently, Obama's challenge is to bond with voters in the upcoming primaries and to connect them to his unconventional and transformative brand of politics. It's one helluva tough assignment--especially given the size of the playing field for Supersaturated Tuesday on February 5. Clinton merely has to succeed in her conventional task: selling herself as the better-qualified candidate. If Obama gets tied up in schoolyard-style back-and-forth with Clinton, he will become bogged down. He will not soar. He needs to. She does not.

On Sunday, Obama delivered a triumphant speech at Martin Luther King Jr.'s church in Atlanta. (Watch it here; read it here.) Forget the budget deficit or the trade deficit, he said, the nation has a "a moral deficit...an empathy deficit." He explained; "I'm talking about an inability to recognize ourselves in one another; to understand that we are our brothers keeper; we are our sister's keep; that, in the words of Dr. King, we are all tied together in a single garment of destiny."

He defended the importance of inspiring rhetoric:

That is how Dr. King led this country through the wilderness. He did it with words--words that he spoke not just to the children of slaves, but the children of slave owners. Words that inspired not just black but also white; not just the Christian but the Jew; not just the Southerner but also the Northerner.

He led with words, but he also led with deeds. He also led by example. He led by marching and going to jail and suffering threats and being away from his family. He led by taking a stand against a war, knowing full well that it would diminish his popularity. He led by challenging our economic structures, understanding that it would cause discomfort. Dr. King understood that unity cannot be won on the cheap; that we would have to earn it through great effort and determination.

It was Obama at his best. And it was the sort of material upon which he should be judged as a presidential candidate--far more important than the nanny-nah-nah exchanges between him and Clinton.

So if Clinton can keep Obama engaged in spitball-slinging, she will be doing herself a favor. He is the candidate who needs the space to make an unconventional case. Clutter is her friend. A mudwrestle helps her, not him. Don't be surprised if the Clinton camp keeps squabbling alive.

LEAVING ALREADY? I weigh in on Fred Thompson's departure from the Republican race here.

Barack Obama has a big problem.

If the Democratic presidential race is between him and Hillary Clinton--sorry, Senator Edwards--it boils down, in a way to this: Clinton says, believe in my resume; Obama says, believe in me.

Clinton is pitching herself as a woman of experience who can start working for you and our children on Day One. Look, 35 years of policy wonkery and advocacy. Look, a record of accomplishment. (Fill in the number of children in fill in the state have health insurance because of her.) Look, years of traveling overseas as First Lady, years of hard toil--including working with (gasp!) Republicans--in the Senate, and years of doing political battle in the trenches. All of this is measurable and confirmable. A voter can easily evaluate her case and judge whether she's right for the job.

Obama is selling himself as...himself. That is, Obama is insisting that he has the ability to create a new politics--a transformative, overcoming-the-divide politics--because of who he is, because of his character and considerable personal attributes. Sure, he points to his past as a community organizer and civil rights lawyers and to his work in the Illinois state senator and the U.S. Senate to bolster his argument that he possesses the right stuff. But his is not a campaign of resume-waving. He's running on his soul. And Obama goes further than asking voters to hire him as their advocate. He issues an invitation: join me in this grand cause to change politics, change government, and change the nation. He speaks of his campaign as a movement and compares it to the great social movements of America's past.

With Obama, it's not about his career highlights, it's about him. To buy his case, a voter must believe in him, have faith in him, place hope in him--must have (or feel) a connection with him. And this is where the problem kicks in.

In the small and early states, a presidential candidates can forge a connection with voters. There are direct interactions: meet-and-greets, town hall gatherings, rallies. Word of mouth can spread. And the media in the early states devote extensive coverage; even couch potatoes come into regular contact with the contenders. In both Iowa and New Hampshire, Obama was able to create a bond with a great number of voters--many of whom had been able to interact closely with him or his campaign. They could hear him speak. They could look him in the eye. They could experience Obama--in real time, in real life.

After Nevada and South Carolina, that's going to change. The election will be shaped by Supersaturated Tuesday, February 5, when two dozen states, including some of the largest in the union, will hold primaries or caucuses. No candidate will be able to reach large number of voters in an up-close-and-personal manner. There will be big rallies in California and elsewhere. But the people who show up will be a minuscule fraction of the electorate, and these events may not receive extensive local media coverage--absent Oprah or a newsworthy mishap. (California television news is notorious for shortchanging political coverage. There are, after all, so many car chases to chase after.)

At this stage, the candidates will be reaching voters mainly through commercials. A television spot is a fine medium for a candidate to share his or her resume, to list his or her accomplishments. It is much tougher to convey the intangibles of hope, faith, and transcendence in a 30- or 60-second spot. The bottom line: advantage to Clinton.

In the mad scramble that will ensue after the South Carolina Democratic primary on January 26--with the candidates flying back and forth across the country in an intense nine-day dash--Obama may find it difficult to connect directly with voters in the fashion he needs to. He proclaims, let me lead you in a noble cause, and many Democrats are already sold. They have been inspired. They are part of his crusade. But others might need to feel the buzz viscerally before jumping on the Obama Express. Can Obama jazz them up from a distance--when he's hopscotching from one state to the other, responding to Clinton's criticisms (or attacks), and keeping it all together?

Prior to the primaries, Obama did move thousands of Democrats, who flocked to his website and donated generously. He did not shake the hand of each one. He did not have to. And the enthusiasm he generated set him up well for Iowa and New Hampshire. But as New Hampshire demonstrated, he needs to expand beyond that base. And that means reaching voters who have not yet felt the Obama magic. How to convince them from afar is a profound challenge. (To be clear: I'm not predicting he will fail. I'm not predicting anything at all about this election. Not anymore. I'm merely noting Obama has much unique heavy-lifting to do in the next three weeks.)

When Supersized Tuesday first materialized, political observers made the obvious observation that it would favor any candidate with big bucks, extensive organization, and/or establishment backing. But it also gives an advantage to any candidate with a conventional (and, thus, easy-to-convey) message. And that isn't Barack Obama.

I'll be out of town for a few days. See you next week--after Nevada.

John McCain, the war ain't helping you. That is, all the war advocates who have recently been mouthing happy talk about the Iraq war are not doing McCain any favors. And he can include himself in that group.

Look at the Michigan primary. Mitt Romney finally won a gold medal last night and whooped McCain by 9 points. Half the voters in Michigan said that the economy was the No. 1 issue. Only one-fifth pointed to Iraq. Among those who cited the economy, Romney bested McCain 41 to 29 percent. Of course, Michigan is in a near-depression, and it comes as no surprise that GOP voters there are looking more for an economic savior than a military commander who can keep Iraqi insurgents from coming over here to attack our malls. And during the campaign Romney did his best to pander to Michiganders, promising to bring back the golden age of automobile manufacturing. McCain, though, told 'em to suck it up and get with Plan B (retraining and education for non-automaking jobs). Thus, the candidate of national security was trounced by the candidate of economic miracles.

McCain and his strategists can dismiss the Michigan loss as inevitably due to the specific circumstances of the Michigan economy. But that might be whistling past the shutdown factory. The meta-narrative these days is this: the war is going well, the U.S. economy is rushing toward a recession. It doesn't matter whether this is an accurate depiction of reality. After all, the war in Iraq has hardly turned the corner, and even the recent passage of a de-Baathification law in the Iraqi parliament was not much of a true success. (Almost a half of the body didn't turn up for the vote, and its passage pissed off Sunnis and Shias alike, with many of the former remaining unconvinced this legislation will change much for them.) But if GOP voters believe--or hear repeatedly--that the surge is working, they have less reason to fret about the war, and less reason to feel a need for McCain.

What other issue is McCain known for these days? Maybe pork-busting. But he's never had much of a profile on grand economic matters. Conservatives still hold a grudge against him for not being a passionate tax-cutter. So if the pending--or already-arrived--recession is now the worry of the moment for GOP voters, McCain doesn't meet the demand. Enter Romney, Mr. CEO. The guy who gave us Staples and cheap paper clips. In Michigan, his economy-first message triumphed. Could he do the same elsewhere?

For months, McCain has been proclaiming that the surge is succeeding. And with such pronouncements filling the media, Iraq has become a less salient issue for voters in both parties. McCain might end up a victim of his own success.

DEMS DO NEVADA. It was a rather low-key debate in Las Vegas on Tuesday night for the Democratic presidential contenders. They all played nice. They all looked exhausted. Here's my report from MotherJones.com:

What did the umpteenth Democratic presidential debate, held in Nevada on Tuesday night, demonstrate? That Barack Obama, John Edwards, and Hillary Clinton each need a nap. The trio looked worn out. Perhaps that was why few punches were thrown. The Iraq war, the politics of race, tears (or near tears)--the Democratic contest had become rather heated in recent days. Clinton, using misleading information, had accused Obama of being a disingenuous hypocrite regarding the war. Obama's camp had seized on a comment Clinton had made to Fox News and assailed her for supposedly dissing Martin Luther King Jr. And Edwards had snidely insinuated Clinton might not be strong enough to be president (after she became emotional at a campaign stop in New Hampshire). It was getting nasty.

But in Las Vegas, there was relative calm. And no one hit the jackpot. Sure, there were a few pokes. Clinton declined to state that Obama and Edwards are prepared to be president. Edwards noted that Clinton and Obama had pocketed campaign contributions from corporate executives. Obama suggested that Clinton was using the specter of a future terrorist attack to scare people into voting for her. Overall, though, the three stuck to their positive scripts. Obama: I can inspire, mobilize, and bring together a divided nation. Clinton: I have the experience to be ready on Day One to solve problems for you and your children. Edwards: I will fight to my last breath for middle-class and low-income Americans. (Clinton did have a Clintonian moment when she acknowledged that she had voted for the anti-consumer bankruptcy bill of 2001 but "was happy that it never became law." In other words, I voted for it but didn't inhale.)

The major clash of the night came over...energy policy....

You can read the rest here.

Over the past few months, Jim Pinkerton, my regular sparring partner on Bloggingheads.tv, has regularly rushed to the defense of Mike Huckabee. When I wondered aloud whether Huckabee really does believe that angels intervened when he was in a hunting contest (to help him kill an elk), Pinkerton pooh-poohed my secularistic skepticism. When I uncovered a little-known 1998 book in which Huckabee lumped together environmentalism and pornography, seemingly compared homosexuality with necrophila, and insisted that people who "do not walk in faith" tend to be "immoral, impure and improvident," Pinkerton claimed I was taking the former Arkansas governor's comments out of context. (I begged to differ.)

So it did not come as a shock when I heard that Pinkerton, who was a domestic policy adviser for the first President Bush, had suspended his career as pundit to go to work for Huckabee's presidential campaign.

Pinkerton is a quirky, independent-minded, and affable conservative, which is why I have enjoyed working with him on bhTV. He proudly wears the paleocon badge, and he has been against the Iraq war from the start, blasting away at the neocons and their imperial ambitions. He's a fierce hawk on immigration. No fence is too big or too large for him. He has railed repeatedly on bhTV that elites (I guess that includes me) just don't get it--the "it" being the supposed widespread and deep popular anger about illegal immigrants. He's also a utopian advocate of space exploration. He wants off Planet Earth. Matt Yglesias recently poked at Pinkerton's way-out notions.

I wonder whether Huckabee and his campaign realize what they're getting with Pinkerton. Perhaps they're comfortable with his blistering attacks on George W. Bush and the neocons--even though Huckabee stands with Bush and the hawks on the Iraq war. I doubt Huckabee would take personal offense at Pinkerton's argument that the defense of "Christendom" (against creeping Muslimization) ought to be the organizing principle of U.S. policy. But does Huckabee need more attention drawn toward his fundamentalism?

In vetting Pinkerton, did the Huckabee-ites consider one of his proposals for domestic security: put a cop in front of every mosque in America. Yes, that's what he said during a recent Bloggingheads.tv match-up. He was serious. Quite serious. You can see for yourself right here:

If you watched the clip, you saw that when I questioned his idea, Pinkerton said that "we can have some elections on this issue." So is Pinkerton now advising Huckabee to call for police surveillance of every mosque in the nation? I'd sure like to be the fly on the wall for that meeting. Or when Pinkerton says to Huckabee that he ought to unfurl the flag of "Christendom." Or when he tells Huckabee that space is the place.

As I said, I do like Pinkerton. He is engaging and possesses (as you can tell) an unorthodox mind. I wish him well, though not success, for a Pinkertonian Huckabee is a rather daunting (if not frightening) prospect to consider.

I've been tough on Hillary Clinton lately for speaking falsely about Barack Obama and his record on the Iraq war. (See here and here.) But I have to say this: Clinton and her allies are right about Nevada. They have been blasting the process that will be used in the January 19 caucus. Clinton has groused about caucuses in general, complaining that because caucus meetings occur at a specific time, many voters (say, those who have to be at work) miss out and are disenfranchised. All that is true--though I doubt Clinton would have adopted the role of Ms. Empowerment if Iowa and Nevada were good states for her. In Nevada, though, one step implemented in response to that criticism may end up hurting her. But whether or not it's bad for Clinton, this reform still warrants second thoughts.

In Nevada, Clinton is at a disadvantage because the major Democratic political player with street muscle--the Culinary Workers Union--endorsed Obama last week. This union has tens of thousands of members it can bus, shove, or escort to the caucuses. And the union won't have to push or guide them too far, for the state Democratic Party has arranged to hold caucuses in nine of Las Vegas's biggest unionized casinos.

On one level, you can say, isn't this great? It will be so much easier for blackjack dealers, cocktail waitresses, bellhops, cabbies and others to participate. But there is something a little creepy about a setup in which a union drives its members to a room at the workplace and then these members have to vote in public. (Remember, in a caucus, you don't go into a voting booth; you stand in a corner of a room.) Presumably union leaders will be there watching whom stands where. Certainly, the same dynamic might have been at play in some caucus sites in Iowa, but not in as an intense manner.

You can't blame the Obama campaign for accepting the support of the dominant union and deriving the benefits of a system set up by the state party. (One amusing note: many casino execs are Clinton supporters, and the pro-Obama union is using their casinos to help Obama.) And the caucusing-in-the-casino arrangement was cooked up long before CWU's endorsement of Obama in order to boost participation--not to benefit any specific candidate. Yet it's not a good deal for democracy. Not that I expect there will be union goons present enforcing the Obama endorsement. But people ought to be able to vote free of any concern--real or imagined.

This makes me sympathetic to the argument that caucuses ought to be abolished in favor of elections--but not sympathetic to the lawsuit filed by the Nevada State Education Association, which has gone to court to shut down the casino caucuses. (The group has not endorsed Clinton but several of its leaders support her.) It's hard not to suspect that politics, rather than principle, propelled that union to try to thwart what could be a big day for Obama.

It's no surprise that politics in Las Vegas has become a whirl of wheeling and dealing. The Clintonites are entitled to be pissed off about the casino caucuses, but that does not place them on the moral high ground. Such real estate is quite difficult to find in Sin City.

The Fred shall rise again?

Well, he tried. At the GOP presidential debate in South Carolina, Fred Thompson, the lackadaisical former senator, finally got off the couch. His past debate performances-- like much of his campaign--have been a series of nothing burgers. He's acted the curmudgeon, grumbling about this or that and making a not very good fifth (sixth, seventh, eighth....) impression. But last night, when the opportunity arrived, he pounced--and lit into Mike Huckabee. Reading from notes--or a script--Thompson called the former Arkansas governor a "Christian leader" but (gasp!) a liberal when it comes to economic policies, foreign policy, and immigration policy. In one of the few instances of Thompson displaying any passion, he was bashing Huckabee, who deflected the blast with an aw-shucks response. It was as if some campaign aide had finally attached electrodes to his backside so Thompson, for at least 90 seconds, could show some pep. (I could imagine the cheers at Thompson HQ: "He's alive, he's alive!")

South Carolina is truly Thompson's last stand. But he's up against his old Senate pal John McCain, who's resurgent, and Huckabee, who plays well to the social conservatives of the Palmetto State. South Carolina was McCain's Waterloo in 2000, but as a national-security-first Republican maybe this time around he can win over the Republicans who did not fancy him as a maverick eight years ago. And Huckabee can grab those religious rightwingers who still recall that McCain dissed Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and the religious right during the 2000 campaign. That does not leave much space for Thompson, a son of the South.

Thompson's flopping performance (so far) has been one of the surprises of the 2008 campaign. Remember the conventional wisdom that he got into the race too late? Well, maybe he entered the contest too early. He was much better as an almost-candidate than as an actual candidate. The consensus explanation for his lack of success (so far) is that he's been a lazy and lousy candidate who has not shown any flash or zeal. That's certainly true. But I have another theory.

Thompson has spent more of his years as a Hollywood actor than as a politician. And as an actor, he's been quite lucky. People keep developing roles that suit him, but each one is essentially the same role. We need a gruff White House chief of staff. Let's get Thompson. We need a gruff district attorney. Let's get Thompson. We need a gruff president. Let's get Thompson. We need a gruff admiral. Let's get Thompson. We need a gruff CIA director. Let's get Thompson. We need a gruff senator. Let's get Thompson. Or in the case of his first movie, Marie, we need Thompson. Let's get Thompson.

Fred Thompson has not had to stretch his acting chops much. He has basically had to hit his mark, read his lines, and be himself. He's done that well, and he's made millions of dollars. But he never developed range or flexibility as an actor. He could do gruff--and perhaps laconic--but not a lot more.

So there he was early last year, pursuing his acting career, when people started telling him they had another part for him: presidential candidate. He jumped into the race believing that, once more, he could play himself and wow the crowds. But this script demanded more of Thompson. He might have (for some) looked the part--though it does seem he's aged six years in six months--but he did not possess the skills needed to connect with the audience, I mean voters, who were expecting more than a gruff former prosecutor/admiral/CIA director/chief of staff. He's been mailing in his performance and receiving the predictable reviews. The debate last night was not quite a career-reviving moment, even if it did show Thompson had a dollop of spunk left in him.

In recent weeks, my one-liner take on Thompson has been this: if you want your cranky uncle to be president, Thompson is your candidate. Last night didn't change that review. Thompson still has to prove to Republican voters there's more to Fred Thompson than just Fred Thompson.

Like everyone else in New Hampshire--reporters, campaign workers for Hillary Clinton and for Barack Obama, and ski lift operators--I thought Obama was schussing toward victory (perhaps even a double-digit--victory) in the Live Free or Die state. Howard Kurtz slaps the media silly today for calling the race so wrong. (Sometimes, Kurtz really has it easy.) But to explain--not excuse--let me note that on Election Day, all the Clinton folks in New Hampshire had the look of death on their faces. They were telling reporters that the campaign was not working. They were saying that it would have to be retooled. We were all fooled by the data that was available: the polls, the obvious passion and attendance gap between Obama's events and Clinton's. The media's big error was not misreading this information, though that was a mistake; it was overhyping the collective conventional wisdom. But that's what the media tend to do in order to win attention. Will a cable talk show host who plays it calm and cool ("we don't really know what's going to happen; the front-runner could win again; then again, another candidate might triumph") bag a bigger audience than one who bangs a drum loudly, playing up the drama and sharing sharp opinions? The same goes for bloggers and the tabloids.

In any event, I wonder how much--if at all--the media coverage of the race affected the results. Did Iowa voters decide who to vote for on the basis of what was said on Fox News or MSNBC? Did those legendary independent-minded voters of New Hampshire take their cues from the political coverage of The New York Times, Washington Post, or the New York Post? In both states, voters can obtain their information and impressions directly from the candidates. I doubt media coverage was a significant factor--though some analysts now wonder if anti-Clinton coverage motivated female voters to come to the rescue of this damsel in distress. (That is, blame Chris Matthews.)

Now for my own mea culpa. I was carried away by hope. I try not to make political predictions and mostly resisted the urge this week. But when asked, I did say a double-digit victory was possible, if not likely, for Obama. Whoops. I should have stuck to my previous, pre-Iowa skepticism. Months ago, I did the math. Women, I noted, tend to vote in greater numbers than men. If Hillary could lock up a decent-sized majority (or plurality) of the women vote, she could be unstoppable. The math was simply overwhelming--particularly in a race involving her and multiple male candidates. Obama was facing a double gender-gap: more Democratic women voting in general, and more of those women supporting Clinton. I repeated this back-of-the-envelope analysis to Obama fans. No, I was told, hope will win out.

It did in Iowa. Obama did play well there among women. But then the women came home. Why? Partly because the Clinton campaign mounted an efficient get-out-the-gals organizing campaign in New Hampshire and made sure their appeal was just right for Democratic women. And perhaps because Democratic women did not want to see Hillary Clinton, the first woman with a shot of becoming president, so easily dispatched. (I'm not going to try to factor in--or out--the near-crying episode.)

To understand Clinton's appeal to Democratic women, several male reporters I know have turned to a very particular focus group: their mothers. Several colleagues have told me that they have heard from their moms on the subject of Clinton, usually with the mother sharing a positive view of the candidate. (In other words, treat her fairly!) After the results came in on Tuesday night, my mother weighed in. She emailed me, "I sort of wanted Obama to win, but was happy that she won." But Ma was also pleased that Clinton had not won "by a landslide." See the conflict? Democratic women do have a tough choice: between that reliable warhorse (of whom they may have mixed feelings) and that inspirational new guy. In South Carolina, African-American woman will be confronted by the same--and maybe more so.

Earlier in the race, it did seem rather noteworthy that the Democratic contest could produce either the first female nominee or the first black nominee of a major party. While that remains true, the contest appears to have hit the shoals of identity politics. And, boy, there's not much more than race and gender matters that commentators and pundits like to chew on (except, of course, sex). So in the next few weeks, as gender and racial politics overtly shape and perhaps define the presidential race on the Democratic side, there ought to be plenty of opportunity for us journalists (particularly us white-guy journalists) to get something wrong again.

In politics, nothing beats hope like a good ground game and negative campaigning. Is that the lesson of New Hampshire? The dust is still settling. One longtime New Hampshire Democrat--at 2:00 am--was telling me that she believes the explanation is simple: race. Perhaps. But the Clinton camp sure turned out the dames, according to the exit polls. And the indie guys seemed to have gone with John McCain. In any event, those damn polls sure were damn wrong. They had Obama up by 4 to 13 points--"I'm just praying the spread is 9.9 percent," one top Clinton adviser said to me on Election Day afternoon--and he lost by two. The funny thing is, the same polls were right about McCain's victory over Mitt Romney. Which brings some of us back to race. Black candidates tend to do less well in voting booths than in polls. Is that what happened in New Hampshire, which, I'm told, was the last state to recognize Martin Luther King's birthday as a holiday? I dunno. And I wonder if Clinton's unfair slams on Obama made a difference. In any event, here's the piece I posted for MotherJones.com from Obama's "victory" celebration in Nashua.

HILLARY RISING: EXPERIENCE AND CONVENTIONAL POLITICS TRIUMPH IN NH

The empire strikes back.

Throughout the morning, afternoon, and early evening of Election Day in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton aides looked grim and gloomily moaned about a campaign that appeared to have been derailed, if not defeated. Expecting to lose by perhaps over 10 points, they wondered aloud what could be done to stop Barack Obama, the self-proclaimed "hope-monger," who only days earlier had seemingly rewritten modern American politics. Then the actual results started coming in, and Clinton was reborn. After being trounced in Iowa, the wife of the "comeback kid" of 1992 had managed a resurrection far more impressive than her spouse had achieved sixteen years earlier. He had merely overcome news of an extramarital affair; she had beaten back a new brand of politics.

Her surprising win--based partly on a strong performance among women and working-class voters--came after she had spent days decrying Obama's lack of experience (a legitimate point) and denouncing him as a hypocrite (not a legitimate point). With Clinton's victory, the main question of the Democratic race returns to what it had been prior to Iowa: can he beat her? But the small 3-percent margin in her favor suggested that the battle between her conventional politics and his unconventional politics has not been definitively resolved.

Throughout the campaign, Obama and Clinton have been operating on two different levels. Her playbook has been by-the-numbers: bash the Bush administration, offer red-meat policy proposals, sell her experience, talents, and strength--and, of course, raise tons of money and assemble a powerhouse organization. Obama has done all of that but within a different context. At the start, he and his advisers took one big step back and tried to envision what the electorate would be yearning for in 2008--not just the Democrats but also independents and those Republicans who did not fancy the taste of the Bush-Cheney Kool-Aid.

Clinton was practicing standard supply-side politics: push the candidate. Obama was looking at the demand side. He and his aides believed there was a desire for a break from politics-as-usual. After all, there had been a decade-and-a-half of bitter politics, as well as several years of governmental incompetence (and worse), care of the Bush administration. Opinion polls suggested deep popular dissatisfaction with the state and future of the country. The Iraq war--and its unending fallout--had soured many independents and some Republicans. And the current regime was not doing much for anyone worried about economic security, health care, or global warming. So for many Americans, the government wasn't working, and the political system was broken. They wanted change. For a potential national candidate, what was the answer? A candidacy that offered solutions and leadership that would transcend the same-old/same-old. That was Obama's theory: give 'em both a platform and, yes, hope.

In Iowa, it worked. Obama attracted newcomers to politics. He persuaded people that he had character, root principles, and the desire (if not the ability) to rise above the bickering of Washington to accomplish grand goals--that by electing him the voters themselves could be implementers of profound change. (A President Obama certainly would represent more change than a second President Clinton.) He offered them not merely a choice but the chance to be part of a cause.

In New Hampshire, his crusade crashed into prosaic political reality. Though the state--with its high percentage of upscale and well-educated voters--seemed ready-made for another Obama triumph, the Clintons had deep roots there (which was not the case in Iowa). And after being upset in Iowa, the Clinton campaign focused on its core supporters. "At Clinton headquarters, It was all women all the time," said one Democratic official. And exit polls showed that women made up 57 percent of the Democratic vote and broke dramatically for Clinton.

At campaign stops, Obama audaciously compared his campaign to great periods in U.S. history: the fight for independence, the abolition of slavery, the defeat of fascism in World War II, the suffragette movement, the civil rights movement. "There's a moment in the life of every generation," Obama told the New Hampshire voters who flooded his events, "if it is to make a mark on history, when that spirit of hopefulness must come through....This is our moment."

Clinton aides and supporters dismissed and derided all his talk of hope and change as hokey. The day before the election, Bill Clinton called Obama's pitch "the biggest fairy tale I've ever seen." Again and again--in New Hampshire bars, restaurants and hotel lobbies, at campaign events--the Clintonistas voiced the mantra: Obama's a fine young man, but she has the experience, she has been vetted. Their frustration was palpable: why don't those damn voters get it. In the backroom of an Irish pub in Manchester, retired General Wesley Clark said to me that he wished Democratic voters "would show some guts," that he believed they were scared to vote for Clinton because they feared Republicans would mount a vicious anti-Hillary campaign should she be nominated. Democratic voters, he said, needed to suck it up and get behind Hillary Clinton, because she was the only candidate with deep experience. "Democrats," he complained, "fall in love. Republicans fall in line."

Working to get those Democrats into line behind her, Clinton asked voters to hire her as their champion, noting that due to her work in the White House, 7000 kids in New Hampshire had health insurance and that New Hampshire National Guard members had health care thanks to her toils in the Senate. She held campaign events--not always so well attended--where she answered long series of questions to show her command of policy details She cried--or nearly cried--at one campaign stop when discussing why she was driven to run for president. (Tons of analysis--before and after her win--focused on whether this had helped her.) And as Election Day neared, Clinton and her campaign ops went further than questioning Obama's readiness; they denigrated him as a talker, not a doer, and, worse, as a disingenuous hypocrite. Their evidence for the second half of this argument was weak--more spin than substance. (For one example, see here.)

Reporters laughed off the Clinton oppo attacks, some telling me that the campaign had been peddling (unsuccessfully) the same thin stuff to reporters for months. There's no telling--at this time--whether those cheap shots helped her. But they certainly didn't hurt. And the hypocrisy of Clinton's blasts never backfired against her. The Clinton campaign hammered Obama for slamming lobbyists but naming a (state) lobbyist for a drug company as co-chair his New Hampshire campaign. A fair point--but her campaign's chief strategist is Mark Penn, a corporate consultant who has worked for drug companies and other favorite Democratic targets. The Clintonites did not allow themselves to be inconvenienced by such contradictions. And virtually no one called them on it.

In the meantime, the Clinton campaign's get-out-the-gals ground game plodded ahead--even though on Election Day, Clinton people did not appear to have much faith in it. "This is not working," Elizabeth Bagley, a Clinton adviser and fundraiser, said at mid-day. "There obviously has to be a retooling of the campaign." And talk swirled that the Clinton campaign was about to undergo a dramatic shakeup. ("We're always adding new people to the team," a not-so-cheerful-looking Terry McAuliffe, the campaign chairman, told me.) The politerati pondered whether or not Clinton would pull out of Nevada, which holds a first-time caucus on January 19, and South Carolina, which has a primary election on January 26, and make her final stand on Super-Duper Tuesday, February 5, when 24 states will hold primaries or caucuses. "We need a time-out," said a Clinton adviser, "something to stop the momentum, so we can have a reality check." Clinton got much more than a stop-in-play.

With his lofty calls for change and his invitation to voters to join him in a grand political experiment, Obama, in Iowa, flipped the script. "We shook up every political assumption," he said while campaigning in New Hampshire. But now Clinton--even though she won by only a few thousand votes--has flipped it back. And the new narrative is again the old narrative. Their Election Night speeches reflected the fundamental divide of the race. Obama declared, "The reason our campaign has always been different...is because it's not just about what I will do as president....It's about what you can do to change" the nation. Clinton proclaimed, "It's time we had a president who stands up for all of you." He was still selling a movement; she was still selling herself. The primaries ahead will show who has a better sense of the market--and, just as important (as New Hampshire reminded all), who has a better delivery system.

Like you, I'm waiting to see what those so-important New Hampshire voters are going to do. After chasing the candidates--all of them!--around the state for nearly a week, today is a day of calm. The candidates tend to do little, other than visit polling places and shake hands. There won't be any speeches, there will be few press releases blasting an opponent. No one wants to make any last-minute mistake. There's often an eerie calm on Election Day. So below are some reflections first posted on MotherJones.com on what a loss might mean for Hillary Clinton's presidential ambitions.

ELECTION DAY IN NH: HILLARY'S LAST HURRAH?

Last night, at a rally near the Manchester airport, Hillary Clinton packed 'em in. A thousand or so people listened to her deliver a long speech outlining virtually every policy position she has ever mentioned during the campaign. On one level, it was an impressive performance. She demonstrated a command of policy and facts. She spoke passionately about her intellectual passions. On another level, it was, perhaps, too much too late. As at least two reporters in the room --including Mickey Kaus--quipped, it seemed she was delivering a State of the Union speech, particularly the sort that her husband use to give. Remember how he would go over a long laundry list of policy proposals? One of the biggest cheers of the night came when she said that if elected president she would make sure the federal student aide form wouldn't be too long.

This was as good as she gets. The crowd was pumped--though it did lose some energy as she went on and on. (And on Election Day eve, you don't want to tire out supporters who have to get up early the next morning and start working for you.) She pointed out that she was the candidate who was strong enough and experienced enough to deliver the change that the American electorate yearns for. But she took no pot shots at her opponents. "Time to tell her story," a Clinton aide said to me.

It's not such a bad story. And did the size of the crowd indicate she might just be able to pull out a win in New Hampshire? Once upon a time--that would be sixteen years ago--another Clinton became the self-proclaimed "comeback kid" of New Hampshire. (That was after placing second in New Hampshire. Talk about chutzpah!) There's no reporter in New Hampshire I've spoken to who thinks that HRC can pull it out. Instead, we discuss how big Barack Obama's win will be--and what the point spread will mean. Some political commentators claim that if Clinton can hold him to a 6-point or less win, she can claim a moral victory. I dunno. Seems to me that whatever the win is, as long as it's more than a close call, the important statistic will be this: 2 for 2.

At their morning and afternoon events yesterday, Obama continued to soar, preaching his politics of hope, and Clinton continued to blast away at him, using weak ammo. His events were jammed. Hers (until the evening rally) were not. At a gym in Dover, there was an embarrassingly small crowd, and a Politico reporter spent an hour trying to find young pro-Clinton voters in the room. She failed. At the opera house in Rochester, hundreds of people waited in the cold for Obama, and then many did not get in.

I'm not making any prediction. But I would be stunned if Obama does not end this day with a commanding lead. And the key question of the Democratic race will only become sharper: what is she to do? I keep saying this: he's selling vision, she's selling vegetables. You can't beat vision by saying my vegetables are better yours--especially if the consumers are in the mood for vision.

And where can she stop him? In Nevada, which will hold a caucus on January 19? That caucus--a first-time event in the state--will likely be quite small. And the one political powerhouse in the state--the culinary workers union--seems poised to endorse Obama. (That endorsement could come on Wednesday.) Nevada might easily become Obama's third in a row. So South Carolina? It's hard to envision the dominant African-American vote in that state not flowing to a sweeping Obama. Some pundits floating about New Hampshire are saying Clinton ought to pull out of South Carolina. If she did, she would appear weak. But if she looses there, she would appear weak. She has no good choices in South Carolina.

That leaves Super Duper Tuesday on February 5 as the place for Clinton to make her final stand, if the Obama wave doesn't crash on its own. That's a long way off. Then again, it's in less than a month. In a way, she's being forced into a Rudy Giuliani strategy: loose all the initial bouts and then shoot the moon in the near-national primary. It's a tough model for success. Will she be able to beat back Obama in California, the key prize of February 5?

Politics is a fluid business. But things, at the moment, do seem grim for the Clinton gang. So maybe Kaus was right, and last night Clinton delivered her fantasy State of the Union speech because she realizes she might never get to do it for real.

I've been dashing around New Hampshire, chasing candidates (large and small). Is anything happening in the world south of Nashua? So while I'm on the run, allow me to repurpose--as they say--a report I filed for MotherJones.com. Here it is:

The morning after, it got nasty.

At Saturday night's Democratic debate in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton served notice she was looking to tear down Barack Obama with two charges: he's a flip-flopper and he's all talk and no action. And moments after the debate ended, her aides trotted out to the so-called spin room to hammer home these points.

Consequently, it was no surprise that on Sunday morning, she began a day of campaign events in which she declared that New Hampshire voters should elect "a doer, not a talker" and that it was time to distinguish "rhetoric from reality." Her campaign released a statement emphasizing this line of attack that was headlined, "Rhetoric vs. Results, Talk vs. Action." It was not subtle:

At the debate last night it was clear when opponents were asked what change they had made:

Instead of telling New Hamphsire voters what he had done for them, Barack Obama defended rhetoric and talk and cited legislation that bans sit-down meals with lobbyists but allows them to stand up and eat together.

Obama talked about government reform, but denied that the co-chair of his New Hampshire campaign is a lobbyist. He talked about energy reform but couldn't defend his vote in favor of Dick Cheney's energy plan that gave the big oil companies billions in tax breaks. He talked about his speech against the war, but didn't explain why he voted for $300 billion in funding for the war and why he said as late as 2004 that he didn't know how he would have voted on the war.

The Clinton campaign was doing its best to stretch the little oppo research it has been able to dig up on Obama. When Obama voted for the energy bill--which passed the Senate on an 85 to 12 vote--he said that the measure had fallen short of what was necessary to achieve U.S. energy independence. Environmentalists did not fancy the bill, but over half of the Democrats in the Senate supported the legislation. Most of them came from states that would benefit from the subsidies in the bill--as did Obama. This vote was not a shining moment for Obama, but it represented a conventional political decision (help your state), not hypocrisy. As for the Iraq war funding issue, Obama, like other Democratic senators opposing the war (including Clinton), has voted for bills financing the war. Regarding Obama's New Hampshire co-chair, Jim Demers, the Clinton gang did have a point. He is a lobbyist for drug interests and other groups--but in New Hampshire, not Washington, the Obama campaign say. Still, he is an influence-peddler of the sort Obama has decried.

All told, though, the Clinton campaign did not present a strong case. Then came the robo-call charge.

On Sunday afternoon, the Clinton campaign zapped out an email to reporters accusing Obama of conducting illegal campaign activities. The press release said that the Clinton campaign had received reports from New Hampshire voters who were on the do-not-call list but who had received prerecorded calls from the Obama campaign. Under New Hampshire law, it is illegal to robo-call people on the do-not-call registry, and state law requires a prerecorded call to identify its sponsor within 30 seconds. This particular call did not do so for 38 seconds. (The call contained a message from a Planned Parenthood official who said that Obama has a "100 percent pro-choice record." The Clinton campaign has slammed Obama for voting present--neither yea or nay--on seven abortion-related bills during his years as an Illinois state senator.) The Obama campaign, the Clinton crew asserted, "appears" to have violated the law.

The Clinton campaign arranged a conference call for reporters to discuss this pressing matter. During the call, Kathy Sullivan, a co-chair of the Clinton effort in New Hampshire, denounced Obama for the robo-calls. But when a reporter asked how many instances she could cite of a person on the do-not-call list being bothered by one of these messages, she replied, two. That's not a lot.

The Clinton campaign is clearly in the throw-whatever-we-have mode and is hoping that something--anything!---sticks. During this conference call, I questioned Howard Wolfson, the campaign's communications director, about the charge that Obama had been inconsistent on the Iraq war. Hillary Clinton, I noted, now opposes the war, but she, too, has voted to fund it. Isn't it a bit unfair, I asked, for her to slap Obama for doing the same? But Obama, Wolfson countered, "said one thing when he was running for the Senate and then changed his mind."

Obama's campaign says that when he was campaigning for the Senate he opposed the $87 billion funding bill under consideration at the time because it included unnecessary spending. (He then voted for other war funding legislation when he became a senator.) So I asked Wolfson if Clinton was attacking Obama the same way that George W. Bush's campaign had assailed Senator John Kerry, who first supported the $87 billion package but then opposed it after Bush and the Republicans refused to suspend tax cuts for the wealthy to pay for it. Wolfson acknowledged that "there certainly could be...a change of policy, a change of circumstance" that caused Obama to shift his view regarding war funding legislation. But he went on to claim that Obama had changed his approach toward health care, gun control, and mandatory minimum sentences for criminal convictions. "In the case of Senator Obama," he said, "you see a pattern....This is important information for people to know." And, he implied, we're damn sure going to get it to them.

The Obama campaign was preparing itself for the last-minute onslaught. And on Sunday afternoon, David Axelrod, Obama's chief strategist, was punching back. Concerning Clinton's charge that Obama is all poetry and no production, he told me, "I don't know where she was when he passed the single biggest ethics reform since Watergate as well as significant arms control legislation. Maybe she wasn't there when he passed the Google bill, which would put the federal budget on line. I know she's not familiar with what he did in Illinois, where he passed legislation on health care reform and death penalty reform. She must be unfamiliar, or there's another possibility: she is willfully distorting the truth." Axelrod said he is expecting more of the same: "She has failed to convince the people of New Hampshire that she should be president. She will spend her time now trying to convince them Barack Obama shouldn't be."

At a Sunday rally in Derry, New Hampshire, Barack Obama, speaking to a large crowd, indirectly replied to Clinton's get-Obama strategy. "Being against something--that's easy," he said, adding, "the reason why people came out in Iowa is because they want to be for something." With new polls showing Obama leading Clinton by up to 13 points, there's not much time for the Clinton campaign's nicks to draw signficant blood. But each day, the attacks (well-founded or not) get sharper. The question is whether they are relevant to the dynamics of the Democratic race--which have been defined so far by Obama's message not Clinton's. As I noted earlier, he's selling vision, she's selling vegetables. Those voters yearning for the former may not be persuadable by the conventional (and occasionally petty) attacks mounted in conventional style by the conventional campaign of Hillary Clinton. Tuesday will show whether Obama's soaring politics of hope can be brought to Earth by Clinton's ground fire. If it cannot be, what else will--or can--she try?

The Republican primary contest in New Hampshire has turned into a festival of recrimination, with the candidates arguing over which campaign is violating the supposed 11th Commandment of the GOP: thou shall not attack a fellow Republican. (Yeah, right.) And at the GOP debate on Saturday night, amid this bitter bickering, Mitt Romney got caught (oh so easily) in a lie.

During a heated exchange about illegal immigration--the hot topic of the night--John McCain accused Romney of falsely calling the immigration plan McCain tried to pass in Congress "amnesty" for illegal immigrants. McCain was mad:

It's not amnesty. And for you to describe it as you do in the attack ads, my friend, you can spend your whole fortune on these attack ads, but it still won't be true.

In defense, Romney shot back:

I don't describe your plan as amnesty in my ad. I don't call it amnesty.

Immediately after the debate, in the so-called spin room, Senator Lindsey Graham was spinning for McCain and blasting Romney for running negative ads against candidates and not owning up to doing so. As Graham fumed, a McCain aide shoved into his hand a flyer that Romney had mailed out to potential voters. The piece was an attack on McCain, and one of its key charges was that McCain supports amnesty. "Look at this," Graham said. Gotcha!

This one scene was representative of the larger narrative: the other candidates do seem to detest Romney at the moment, believing he's running a dirtier-than-permitted campaign. The good news for Democrats: there's plenty of time for the GOP contest to get even nastier. Then again, the same can be said of the Democratic race.

I'm in New Hampshire, reporting for my home base, Mother Jones. Here's a list of my recent dispatches:

* How HRC previewed her get-Obama strategy at the Democratic debate. Click here.

* How Romney became an Obama copycat, how McCain became a self-proclaimed "agent of change," and how Mike Huckabee became a Chuck Norris sidekick. Click here.

* How Clinton has had a tough time trying to dash Obama's hope. Click here.

If you're not overwhelmed by New Hampshire coverage, check out these dispatches.

At Milly's Tavern in Manchester, New Hampshire--where Barack Obama campaign workers had assembled to watch the Iowa caucus results on Thursday night--there was only one question on the mind of the few reporters in the room: what is Hillary Clinton to do now?

By trouncing Clinton by 8 points, Obama shifted the political landscape. If he had won by merely a few points and Clinton and John Edwards had finished close, the race in New Hampshire probably would have been just a continuation of the Iowa contest, with the candidates sticking to their basic gameplans and messages. Finishing (as of this writing) in third place and losing by a significant amount, Clinton and her strategists cannot look at New Hampshire and say, "We just have to do what we've been doing better and hope it will play better before a different audience of Democrats and independents." No, you lose by 8 points, you have to make some changes.