Howard Dean Determined, if it is Appeasing, to Seat Florida Delegates
Howard Dean, in another typical bleeding heart liberal feel good move, said that he was committed to seating the Florida Delegates, as long as the Clinton and Obama camps agree to the seating. Which essentially means nothing.
This from MSNBC:
Sphere: Related ContentDemocratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean said Wednesday the party was committed to seating Florida’s delegates at this summer’s convention as long as any agreement is supported by the party’s two presidential contenders.
Dean met with Florida lawmakers to discuss ways of allocating delegates among Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton and prepare for the fall campaign in the battleground state.
The party stripped Florida and Michigan of their delegates to the national convention in Denver because they ignored party rules and moved their primaries to January.
Sen. Barack Obama in Philly
Sen. Barack Obama genuinely happy to have his picture taken.
Debbie Stabenow and Her Happy Husband
Just what we need another political sex scandal, but this time it isn’t politician, it is her husband. Thomas Athans, husband of Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow, was caught and admitted arranging via the internet to pay $150 for a sexual romp. Athans, is a founder of the liberal Talk Radio USA, will not be charged. Alycia Lorraine Martin (above) is supposedly the “hooker” that Athans was in contact.
Take note kids, being a Democrat gets you out of being charged criminally.
MSNBC Reports:
Sphere: Related ContentThe husband of U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow told authorities that he used the Internet to arrange a $150 sexual tryst with a prostitute at a metropolitan Detroit hotel, police said Wednesday.
Thomas Athans, 46, co-founder of the liberal TalkUSA Radio network, was stopped by police who were investigating prostitution at the hotel, according to a police report obtained by The Associated Press.
Athans, in a statement issued by his attorney, apologized and said he “fully cooperated with law enforcement. My family and I are dealing with this matter in a personal and private way.”
Michigan Congressman Offers Compromise
Michigan Representative Bart Stupak (D) has proposed an interesting compromise. This is at least a step towards not telling a few million (both Florida and Michigan) people their vote doesn’t count.
WASHINGTON - A Michigan congressman proposed an alternate plan Monday for seating the state’s delegates at the Democratic National Convention, awarding delegates based partly on Michigan’s Jan. 15 primary results and partly on the popular vote in all the nation’s presidential primaries.
Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., in a letter to DNC Chairman Howard Dean, proposed that Michigan’s 83 pledged delegates be chosen at congressional district conventions according to the results of the state’s primary.
The party stripped both Michigan and Florida of their national convention delegates because they moved their primaries to January dates that were earlier than party rules allowed.
Under Stupak’s formula, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who received 55 percent of the primary vote, would receive 47 delegates.
Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, who pulled his name from Michigan’s ballot, would receive 36 delegates. Many Obama supporters in Michigan voted for “uncommitted,” which received 40 percent in the primary.
The remaining 73 delegates would be awarded based on the percentage of the popular vote garnered nationwide by Clinton and Obama after the last Democratic presidential primary is completed.
“The last thing we want to do as Democrats is to disenfranchise voters,” Stupak wrote in the letter to Dean. “I have heard from countless Democratic and independent voters who are frustrated and angry to think that their votes are being ignored.”
Source: MSNBC
Sphere: Related ContentJewish Superdelegates Favor Clinton Thus Far
According to MSNBC First Read, Sen. Hillary Clinton is leading Three to One(Clinton has 36, Obama has 12) to Sen. Barack Obama with Jewish Superdelegates, that really isn’t that much of a surprise after Obama association with Jeremiah Wright (and his Pro- Palestinian stance). It would be surprising if the remaining undecideds lean more towards Obama, which is very unlikely, unless the Superdelegates hands are forced.
Sphere: Related ContentClinton leads Obama 36-12 among the Jewish superdelegates, according to a survey by the Forward, a Jewish newspaper. Twenty-six Jewish supers are undecided.
Here’s the Forward’s list of who’s fallen behind whom and who’s undecided:
CLINTON
Patti Higgins (AK-Chairwoman of Alaska Democratic Party)
Rachel Binah (CA-DNC)
Maria Echeveste (CA-DNC)
Diane Feinstein (CA)
Jane Harman (CA)
Brad Sherman (CA)
Rosalind Wyman (CA-DNC)
Ellen Camhi (CT-DNC)
Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (FL)
Debra DeLee (MA DNC chair)
Barney Frank (MA)
Steve Grossman (MA-DNC)
Diane Saxe (MA-Clinton)
Nancy Kopp (MD-DNC)
Carol Pensky (MD-DNC)
Sander Levin (MI)
Anita Freedman (NH-DNC)
June Fischer (NJ-DNC)
Shelley Berkley (NV)
Gary Ackerman (NY)
Eliot Engel (NY)
Emily Giske (NY-DNC)
Steve Israel (NY)
Nita Lowey (NY)
Jerrold Nadler (NY)
Chuck Schumer (NY-Sen)
Sheldon Silver (NY)
Anthony Weiner (NY)
Randi Weingarten (NY-DNC)
Robert Zimmerman (NY-DNC)
Marcel Groen (PA-DNC)
Gov. Ed Rendell (PA)
Allyson Schwartz (PA)
Mark Weiner (RI-DNC)
Eric Kleinfeld (DC-DNC)
Robert Bell (Democrats Abroad-DNC)OBAMA
Eric Garcetti (CA)
Adam Schiff (CA)
Robert Wexler (FL)
Jan Schakowsky (IL)
John Yarmuth (KY)
Paul Hodes (NH)
Steve Rothman (NJ)
Steve Cohen (TN)
Russ Feingold (WI-Sen)
Paul Strauss (DC-DNC)
Allan Katz (FL-DNC)
Alan Solomont (MA-DNC)UNDECIDED
Gabrielle Giffords (AZ)
Howard Berman (CA)
Barbara Boxer (CA)
Henry Waxman (CA)
Bob Filner (CA)
Susan Davis (CA)
Mitchell Ceasar (FL-DNC)
Diane Glasser (FL-DNC)
Ron Klein (FL)
Andrew Tobias (FL-DNC)
Rahm Emanuel (IL)
Carol Ronen (IL-DNC)
Ben Cardin (MD-Sen)
Susan Turbull (MD-DNC)
Carl Levin (MI-Sen)
Richard Wiener (MI-DNC)
Muriel Offerman (NC-DNC)
Frank Lautenberg (NJ-Sen)
Sam Lieberman (NV-DNC)
Irene Stein (NY-DNC)
Ron Wyden (OR-Sen)
Sophie Masloff (PA-DNC)
Bob Strauss (TX)
Herb Kohl (WI)
Alice Travis Germond (WV-DNC)
Larry Cohen (DC-DNC)
Howard Dean Wants the Nomination by July 1st
Howard Dean DNC chairman wants the Superdelegates to decide the race by July 1st, or he warns that the Democrats will lose the election in November. At this point, it might take a miracle to pull that off. What if all the Delegates and Superdelegates fall 50/50 will that be enough for Obama to secure the nomination, probably not, which means they might have to count Florida and Michigan, would that be enough to push one candidate over the edge?
In a Friday interview on “Good Morning America,” Dean cited record turnout but noted “some personal criticism” between the candidates.
“We have to keep our mind focused on the idea that at the end of the day we really need change in these country,” Dean told ABC’s Diane Sawyer. “One of these two candidates needs to win. We’re going to win unless we divide ourselves and that, we cannot do.”
Dean Suggests Super Deadline
Intense back-and-forth on the campaign trail have left the two Democratic candidates with a narrow margin between them.
In a race that could be left to the party’s nearly 800 leaders who have independent votes in choosing the Democratic nominee on the convention floor, Dean says he’d like the superdelegates to announce who they’re supporting by July 1.
“We don’t want this to degenerate to a big fight at the convention,” Dean said, “This is an evenly divided party with two great potential nominees. I need to make sure that we all play by the rules that we all agreed to a year ago that the person who loses will be just as strong a supporter of the person who wins.”
Source: ABC News
Sphere: Related ContentObama Gains Casey Endorsement
Senator Bob Casey Jr. has endorsed Sen. Barack Obama. Sen. Casey and Gov. Ed Rendell (a Clinton supporter) both have ties to the Governor of Puerto Rico Anibal Acevedo-Vila that was indicted Thursday. Acevedo-Vila was a Superdelegate that was for Obama, one has to wonder if Casey cast his lot for Obama now, to replace Acevedo- Vila Superdelegate that was or will be striped. Here is what MSNBC: First Read has on the Casey endorsement.
Sphere: Related ContentObama called Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey’s endorsement one of the most meaningful endorsements he’s received on the campaign trail.
“You know, I did not press him on this endorsement, you know there were some people that I was nagging all the time,” Obama said of reaching out to Casey. “Bob I thought to myself, there’s great reason for me to press him; I told him I’d love to have his support, but I understood that you know we’re behind in the Pennsylvania polls. I just want to say it would have been easy for Bob just to stay out of it, just to stay neutral. I think everybody would have accepted that.
“But when he called me and said, ‘I think this is the right thing to do,’ it meant as much to me as any endorsement that I’ve received on the campaign trail,” Obama added.
Casey introduced Obama and spoke to the potential of his leadership.
“This campaign is a chance for America, a chance for America to chart a new course, to go down a different path,” Casey said of his endorsement. “A path, first of all, of change, a path of a new kind of politics, a path — and finally a path of hope and healing.”
Governor Anibal Acevedo-Vila the Superdelegate
Just for those keeping count, the Puerto Rican Governor Acevedo-Vila, is/was a Super Delegate, that is a supporter of Obama. So it looks like Obama is winning the Superdelegate race, in the sense that Obama has lost two in the last two weeks, last two weeks because of scandals (Acevedo-Vila and Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick) with indictments and Clinton has only lost one (NY Governor Eliot Spitzer) because of scandal and no indictment as of yet. Score one for the Obama camp.
Sphere: Related ContentPuerto Rican Democratic Governor Indicted
Puerto Rico’s Governor Anibal Acevedo-Vila has been indicted along with twelve others. The indictment is a result of a campaign finance probe.
Puerto Rico’s governor and four Philadelphians, including prominent fund-raiser Robert M. Feldman, were charged this morning in San Juan with federal campaign-finance related crimes.
The investigation of Gov. Anibal Acevedo-Vila, a Democrat who faces re-election this year, was triggered by the FBI’s Philadelphia City Hall corruption probe in 2003.
Feldman, who raised more than $1 million for Democrats, including U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. and Gov. Rendell, was a former business partner of Ronald A. White, the late power-broker who was the lead defendant in the Philadelphia corruption case.
Feldman was investigated but not charged in the Philadelphia case. In San Juan, he was charged with one count of conspiracy to violate federal election laws.
The governor was charged with conspiracy to violate federal campaign laws, wire fraud, conspiracy to defraud the IRS and filing a false tax return.
Feldman and others from Philadelphia were charged with conspiring to help Acevedo-Vila evade federal election rules to raise more than $100,000 in campaign funds as a way of gaining access and “to further their business interests” in Puerto Rico.
The indictment says that shortly after Feldman helped with a fund-raiser in Philadelphia in 2002, Acevedo-Vila contacted a Puerto Rico government agency to request a meeting on behalf of a company associated with Feldman. Authorities also say Acevedo-Vila set up a second meeting with an island housing agency on Feldman’s behalf in 2003.
The indictment says that it was Feldman who came up with the idea of skirting campaign-finance laws by funneling cash to Avecedo-Vila through others in Philadelphia and South Jersey.
Feldman’s lawyer, Henry Hockeimer, said this morning in a statement: “Mr. Feldman did nothing wrong. We are shocked and disappointed that the U.S. Attorney in Puerto Rico included Mr. Feldman in one count of this 27 count, 13 defendant, politically-inspired indictment. We are very confident Mr. Feldman will be vindicated at trial.”
The case could have political ramifications beyond Philadelphia and San Juan. Acevedo-Vila has endorsed Sen. Barack Obama in the Puerto Rico primary, which holds the nation’s last primary on June 6.
In addition, some of the governor’s allies in Congress have tried to link it to the national U.S. attorneys scandal, alleging a partisan investigation. The Justice Department has said it prosecutes crime where it finds it.
The federal indictment of Acevedo-Vila, Feldman and others was unsealed in San Juan this morning. A morning press conference is scheduled in San Juan.
Acevedo-Vila, who has called the investigation politically inspired, was expected to surrender to federal authorities and appear before a federal magistrate in San Juan later today.
Among the four Philadelphians charged, in addition to Feldman, is Feldman’s fellow-fundraiser, Candido Negron of Glen Mills, Delaware County. Also charged were Philadelphians Marvin Block and Salvatore Avanzato Sr. All three are charged with conspiracy to violate federal election laws.
The FBI’s investigation of Acevedo-Vila began during its Philadelphia City Hall corruption probe in 2003, which focused on White and then-Mayor John Street and his top aides.
In 2003, FBI wiretaps recorded Feldman and Negron working closely with powerbroker Ronald A. White on deals.
White became the lead defendant in the City Hall case, charged with corrupting former City Treasurer Kemp and conspiring with Commerce Bank executives to win sweetheart deals for his clients. Kemp and the bankers were convicted, and Kemp was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
White died of cancer before trial, but wiretaps and other evidence in the case spawned other investigations, including the one bursting into the limelight today in Puerto Rico.
Feldman, who was not charged in the Philadelphia case, was White’s partner and superstar fund-raiser for many Democrats. In addition to Rendell and Casey, Feldman raised nearly $500,000 for Street. He was the second-most proficient fund-raiser for former New Jersey Gov. James McGreevey.
Negron considered Feldman a mentor, and together they raised at least $50,000 for Acevedo-Vila at two Philadelphia campaign events. At the time, Acevedo-Vila was seeking re-election as Puerto Rico’s non-voting delegate to Congress.
Of the $800,000 Acevedo-Vila raised during that campaign, $180,000 of it came from donors in Philadelphia and South Jersey, a percentage that authorities found suspicious.
In 2006, three contributors to that campaign told The Inquirer that Negron gave them money to make the contributions.
The 55-page indictment charges 13 people; four in Philadelphia and nine in Puerto Rico, including the governor.
The charges are related to Acevedo-Vila’s 2000 and 2002 campaign for Resident Commissioner, which is Puerto Rico’s non-voting delegate to the U.S. Congress.
According to the indictment, Acevedo-Vila carried a $545,000 debt following the 2000 campaign and Feldman was Acevedo-Vila’s “United States finance chairman.” Negron was deputy finance chairman.
“It was an object of the conspiracy to knowingly and willfully solicit and receive illegal contributions for the candidacy of Acevedo-Vila,” the indictment said.
“It was a further object of the conspiracy to conceal from the Federal Election Commission and the public the illegal nature of the contributions and the true extent and nature of the relationship between defendants Feldman, Negron and Avanzato and their associates and Acevedo-Vila, including the access and influence that Acevedo-Vila afforded and exercised on their behalf in Puerto Rico.”
Negron and Avanzato “directed their employees, friends and family members to give campaign contributions” and then “reimbursed” them for the donations, according to the indictment.
Negron and Avanzato allegedly used corporate bank accounts and credit cards to disguise the payments, and, the indictment said, paid for “lavish dinners” for Acevedo-Vila.
The indictment says the governor “personally participated in the solicitation, receipt and recording of campaign contributions from Feldman, Negron and Avanzato.”
After the FEC raised concerns that some Philadelphia donors had contributed amounts higher than the $2,000 federal limit, Acevedo-Vila’s campaign refunded the money directly to Negron–and not the contributors, according to the indictment.
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
Sphere: Related ContentGallup Says Higher Percentage Of Clinton Supporters Will Defect
Gallup reports that a higher percentage of Clinton supporters (28%) would vote for McCain if Clinton does not get the Democratic Nomination. 19% of Obama supporters stated they would vote for McCain is Obama didn’t get the Democratic Nomination. This poses an interesting question, which candidate would have the best chance of winning, if these numbers are true, and the vote really is close to being split down the middle for the democratic nomination. Of course, if you take all that into account and it is true, then Clinton would have the best opportunity for winning the Presidency within Democratic voters.
Sphere: Related ContentPRINCETON, NJ — A sizable proportion of Democrats would vote for John McCain next November if he is matched against the candidate they do not support for the Democratic nomination. This is particularly true for Hillary Clinton supporters, more than a quarter of whom currently say they would vote for McCain if Barack Obama is the Democratic nominee.
These conclusions are based on an analysis of Democratic voters’ responses to separate voting questions in March 7-22 Gallup Poll Daily election tracking. In each day’s survey, respondents are asked for their general election preferences in McCain-Clinton and McCain-Obama pairings. Democratic voters are then asked whom they support for their party’s nomination.
Obama Tax Returns
Here is the Obama’s Tax Returns (in short form) for the last seven years from TaxProf via Instapundit. These are the numbers from the joint filing of Michelle and Barack Obama. Tax Prof noted that the Obama’s didn’t give nearly 10% of their income to Trinity United Methodist Church, or at least they didn’t list it. It is also worth noting that Michelle Obama had a big increase in her salary after her husband Barack was elected to the Senate, and that Barack had a substantial income from his books over the last two years. Barack Obama is now urging Senator Hillary Clinton to show her tax returns.
Sphere: Related ContentHere is a summary of the figures:
Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick Chraged With Perjury
Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick had as affair with his former Chief of Staff, Christine Beatty, and then both lied about it under oath. Text messages have since surface and led, to a public apology from Mayor Kilpatrick apologizing for the affair, and the dismissal of Christine Beatty from his staff. He has been under investigation for perjury. Prosecutor Kym Worthy of Detroit announced that Kilpatrick and Beatty are being indicted with perjury and obstruction of justice charges. Kwame Kilpatrick is also being charged with misconduct while in office, and various other related charges. Christine Beatty also charged with misconduct. Kilpatrick and Beatty are being indicted with a total of 12 counts. Kilpatirck is expected to make an announcement later Monday, up to this point the Mayor has been unwilling to resign from office.
Photo Source: Donyell.net
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