Uppity Wisconsin

First, it helps to understand the Cadillac healthcare coverage members of Congress receive. They pay no deductibles, no co-pays, and only a $35 monthly fee is taken from an annual salary of $158k. Oh, and they're covered until they die, no matter when their congressional tenure came to an end.

Second, their premiums have remained stable while their coverage has expanded.

Now, consider this recent quote from Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, and how it stands in contrast to the messages coming from the presidential contenders:

“Healthcare I feel strongly about, but I am not sure that we’re ready for a major national healthcare plan,” Schumer said.

Ah, yes, taxpayers fund your benefits and get nothing in return. If you want to let your Wisconsin reps in Congress know what you think about this, here's how to get in touch with them.

The Hill has more.

Update: A reader left this comment worth posting: "Hillary is a political succubus. She will suck the energy and will from this party until we are broken and defeated. ... Even if one does not consider the supposedly inflammatory nature of the Wright sermons, she took an opportunity to promote healing or at least thought provoking discussion, and instead parroted a line that even the conservative nominee and the man he defeated has abandoned. ... I have no doubt Hillary would have left her church and the place that introduced her to Jesus because it is abundantly clear that there is no belief, no ethic, no moral, or important relationship she would not gladly sacrifice in order to further her own naked ambition."

Hillary Clinton has gone blind.

Hillary is the big, yucky snowbank outside that is melting fast.

Hillary's divide-and-conquer brand of politics is becoming untenable in the Democratic presidential primary.

Melissa Schroeder, Wisconsin’s 7th District Democratic Party Secretary and superdelegate, goes to Obama. From the Obama campaign:

Today Wisconsin superdelegate Melissa Schroeder endorsed Barack Obama for president, citing his unique ability to stand up to the special interests and unite all Americans to bring about real, meaningful change. 

Melissa Schroeder said: “After much consideration, I have decided to endorse Senator Barack Obama. My decision came down to electability and who I felt would do a better job of unifying this country for a common purpose. Obama's message of hope and change has touched millions of voters in a way that I haven't seen since the late 1960's.  People from every walk of life, young and the not so young, Democrats, Independents and some Republicans, are all rallying around a belief that change can happen if we want it bad enough.  With Obama as our nominee, I am confident that this November we will increase our majority in the House and Senate and elect a Democrat to the White House.”

Update: BREAKING NEWS: NBC News confirms Geraldine Ferraro leaving Clinton campaign

Keith Olbermann on Hillary and Geraldine Ferraro's appeals to racism. See:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001/vp/23601329#23601329

via MAL Contends

Hillary Clinton's evolving attacks to define and brand Barack Obama involve what advertising and marketing professionals call impressions—the projection of one image (in this case Barack Obama) onto one human brain (a voter).

Designing and managing Obama’s brand by generating impressions for the benefit of Hillary running in the primary, it is necessary to merge negative (ostensibly plausible) aspects of Obama onto the consciousness of key voting demographics susceptible to certain appeals based on fear and xenophobia.

The more frequent and emotionally potent the impression, the greater is the political impact.

In the card game contract bridge, there is an old saying that guides players attempting to make contracts when the partner (and it's always the partner) has a few too many, and bids a seemingly unmakeable contract.

You have to play the game like the cards are where you want them.

In this way, a player might be able to make a contract (successfully scoring points in the game), though the hands dealt would not indicate likely contract-winning cards.

That's what Hillary is doing in the Democratic primary. She is adapting this occasional bridge imperative to her campaign, most recently thought dead after the Wisconsin primary.

She knows she cannot win on popular vote, pledged delegates, number of states won, and so on; so she plots a path to the nomination with the needed assumption that the political cards will be where she needs them to be.

But bridge is not a Rovian game.

In bridge, you don't change the rules in the middle, and though it's extremely competitive, bridge is a well-mannered game where you don't make up and say bad things about your opponents, and you never cheat.

See Ohio Buckeye State Blog for updates on Ohio.

For Texas updates, see Texas Burnt Orange Report.

Better than what you can get from CNN or MSNBC. 

 

One has to love the substance of Hillary's campaign lately, particularly her speech at the Jefferson/Jackson dinner in Virginia this weekend, where she hit Bush on the War, cowboy diplomacy, and assorted Bush idiocies.

That said, the Stand for Change Rally with Barack Obama address Tuesday in Madison can be expected to attract a crowd over 10,000, and the old I-94 coalition (Madison and Milwaukee) looks to lead to an Obama victory in Wisconsin on Feb. 19.

University of Wisconsin-Madison

One of the few positive things that can be said of President Bush’s 2009 budget is that it reveals the outrageous priorities of the Republican Party as America dashes through the high-stakes 2008 campaign.

The GOP candidate(s) are going to have to decide whether to use the dead-on-arrival Bush budget as a punching bag or an embarrassing political imprecation from which they should run at full speed.

The Bush budget is devoid of commitment to the public welfare, revealing an ideologue’s mind-set to slash at anything that collectively advances human concerns.

From today’s NYT: