Obama Wins Global Primary – TIME 

More than 20,000 U.S. citizens living abroad voted in the primary, which ran from Feb. 5 to Feb. 12. Obama won about 65 percent of the vote, according to results released by the Democrats Abroad, an organization sanctioned by the national party.

Voters living in 164 countries cast votes online, while expatriates voted in person in more than 30 countries, at hotels in Australia and Costa Rica, at a pub in Ireland and at a Starbucks in Thailand. The results took about a week to tabulate as local committees around the globe gathered ballots.

Obama Wins Global Primary – TIME

Much more at this link on Obama’s substance.

Obsidian Wings: Obama: Actually, I Think We Can

I’ll say something about the peculiar idea that Barack Obama is all style and no substance.

I came to Obama by an unusual route: as I explained here,
I follow some issues pretty closely, and over and over again, Barack
Obama kept popping up, doing really good substantive things. There he
was, working for nuclear non-proliferation and securing loose stockpiles of conventional weapons, like shoulder-fired missiles. There he was again, passing what the Washington Post called
“the strongest ethics legislation to emerge from Congress yet” —
though not as strong as Obama would have liked. Look — he’s over
there, passing a bill that created a searchable database of recipients of federal contracts and grants, proposing legislation on avian flu back when most people hadn’t even heard of it, working
to make sure that soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan were
screened for traumatic brain injury and to prevent homelessness among
veterans, successfully fighting a proposal by the VA to reexamine all PTSD cases in which full benefits had been awarded, working to ban no-bid contracts in Katrina reconstruction, and introducing legislation to criminalize deceptive political tactics and voter intimidation. And there he was again, introducing a tech plan of which Lawrence Lessig wrote:

“Obama has committed himself to a technology policy for
government that could radically change how government works. The small
part of that is simple efficiency — the appointment with broad power
of a CTO for the government, making the insanely backwards technology
systems of government actually work. …”

Barack’s Rock | Print Article | Newsweek.com
By Richard Wolffe NEWSWEEK

Now a very public figure, Michelle has accepted the role of aspiring First Lady and the sometimes uncomfortable scrutiny that comes with it. On the campaign trail, she is sometimes slated as the opening act, introducing Barack to the audience. Direct and plain-spoken, with an edgy sense of humor uncommon in a political spouse, she complements her husband’s more grandiose style. She can be tough, and even a little steely, an attitude that stems, at least in part, from wanting to live up to the high expectations her father set for her. She wants to change the world, but she also wants to win this thing now that they’re so deeply invested. If his loftiness can set him apart from the crowd, her bluntness draws them in. …

Part of Michelle Obama’s appeal—she routinely draws audiences of 1,000-plus supporters even when she’s campaigning on her own—is that she comes across as so normal despite the withering glare of a national campaign. As a political spouse, she is somewhat unusual. She isn’t the traditional Stepford booster, smiling vacantly at her husband and sticking to a script of carefully vetted blandishments. Nor is she a surrogate campaign manager, ordering the staff around and micromanaging the candidate’s every move. She travels the country giving speeches and attending events (her mother watches the kids when she’s on the road), but resists staying away for more than one night at a stretch. When the couple catch up several times a day on the phone, the talk is more likely to be about their daughters than the latest poll projections. Michelle has made it her job to ensure that Barack, who now lives full time inside the surreal campaign bubble of adoring crowds and constant attention, doesn’t himself lose sight of what’s normal.

Onstage, Obama has introduced Michelle as “my rock”—the person who keeps him focused and grounded. In her words, she is just making sure he is “keeping it real.” She does this in part by tethering him to the more mundane responsibilities of a husband and father. She insists that Barack fly home from wherever he is to attend ballet recitals and parent-teacher conferences. When the couple host political gatherings at their home in Chicago’s Hyde Park, Michelle asks everyone to bring along their children. To help bridge the physical distance between father and daughters, Michelle recently bought two MacBook laptops, one for Barack and one for the kids, so they could have video chats over the Internet. Last Thursday, she cleared his schedule so he could return home to Chicago and spend Valentine’s Day with her and the girls. …

Barack’s Rock | Print Article | Newsweek.com

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The Page – by Mark Halperin – TIME

“[I]f you sample talk radio and the conservative blogs, you will get a neat preview of what will happen if Barack Obama is the Democrats’ presidential nominee and his wife makes similar statements as a potential first lady.”

The Barack Blowout – TIME

By JOE KLEIN

If nothing else, a presidential campaign tests a candidate’s ability
to think strategically and tactically and to manage a very complex
organization. We have three plausible candidates remaining–Obama,
Clinton and John McCain–and Obama has proved himself the best
executive by far. Both the Clinton and the McCain campaigns have gone
broke at crucial moments. So much for fiscal responsibility. McCain has
been effective only when he runs as a guerrilla; in both 2000 and ’08,
he was hapless at building a coherent campaign apparatus. Clinton’s
sins are different: arrogance and the inability to see past loyalty to
hire the best people for the job and to fire those who prove
inadequate. “If nothing else, we’ve learned that Obama probably has the
ability to put together a smooth-running Administration,” said a
Clinton super-delegate. “That’s pretty important.”

Obama still
has a tricky path to the nomination. “We know he can walk on water,”
Democratic stalwart Donna Brazile told me, presciently, a year ago.
“Now he’s got to produce the loaves and fishes.”

Obama’s New Vulnerability – WSJ.com 

Unlike Bill Clinton in 1992, Mr. Obama is completely unwilling to confront the left wing of the Democratic Party, no matter how outrageous its demands, no matter how out of touch it might be with the American people. And Tuesday night, in a key moment in this race, he dropped the pretense that his was a centrist agenda. His agenda is the agenda of the Democratic left.

In recent days, courtesy of Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, Mr. Obama has invoked the Declaration of Independence, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Franklin Roosevelt to show the power of words. But there is a critical difference between Mr. Obama’s rhetoric and that of Jefferson, King and FDR. In each instance, their words were used to advance large, specific purposes — establishing a new nation based on inalienable rights; achieving equal rights and a color-blind society; giving people confidence to endure a Great Depression. For Mr. Obama, words are merely a means to hide a left-leaning agenda behind the cloak of centrist rhetoric. That garment has now been torn. As voters see what his agenda is, his opponents can now far more effectively question his authenticity, credibility, record and fitness to be leader of the free world.

The road to the presidency just got steeper for Barack Obama, and all because he pivoted on Tuesday night.

Mr. Rove is a former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to President George W. Bush.

Obama’s New Vulnerability – WSJ.com

LCV Releases 2007 National Environmental Scorecard 

Presidential Candidates’ Scores

* The presidential candidates’ scores all suffered from the occupational hazard of absenteeism. Sens. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.) missed four votes each in 2007, although both made a point of being on hand for the key vote that would have allowed a version of the energy bill to move forward that included a provision to repeal billions of dollars in tax breaks for big oil and put that money toward clean energy programs. Clinton’s score in 2007 was 73 percent (87 percent lifetime); Obama’s was 67 percent (86 percent lifetime).
* Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) scored 0 percent in 2007 (24 percent lifetime) due to missing all 15 votes scored, including the key vote on repealing tax giveaways to big oil – a measure that failed by only one vote.

LCV Releases 2007 National Environmental Scorecard

McCain Disputed On 1999 Meeting – washingtonpost.com 

By James V. Grimaldi and Jeffrey H. Birnbaum

Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, February 23, 2008; Page A01

Broadcaster Lowell “Bud” Paxson yesterday contradicted statements from Sen. John McCain‘s presidential campaign that the senator did not meet with Paxson or his lobbyist before sending two controversial letters to the Federal Communications Commission on Paxson’s behalf.

Paxson said he talked with McCain in his Washington office several weeks before the Arizona Republican wrote the letters in 1999 to the FCC urging a rapid decision on Paxson’s quest to acquire a Pittsburgh television station.

Paxson also recalled that his lobbyist, Vicki Iseman, likely attended the meeting in McCain’s office and that Iseman helped arrange the meeting. “Was Vicki there? Probably,” Paxson said in an interview with The Washington Post yesterday. “The woman was a professional. She was good. She could get us meetings.”

The recollection of the now-retired Paxson conflicted with the account provided by the McCain campaign about the two letters at the center of a controversy about the senator’s ties to Iseman, a partner at the lobbying firm of Alcalde & Fay.

McCain Disputed On 1999 Meeting – washingtonpost.com