I’m not surprised that the RNC is hiring former insta-US Attorney and expert vote cager Tim Griffin.

Indicating what lies ahead is the McCain campaign’s plan to bring in Tim Griffin, a protege of Karl Rove, who is a leading practitioner of opposition research — digging up derogatory information about opponents. Although final arrangements have not been pinned down, Griffin would work at the Republican National Committee, as he did in Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign.

I’m rather more struck by the timing.

Griffin’s return comes just days after Mark McKinnon, who refused to use smear tactics to campaign against Obama, stepped down.

More alarming still, it comes just days after Hans von Spakovsky, whom Bush had selected to be the FEC’s expert in disenfranchising brown people, gave up his bid for that position.

I guess the Republicans felt they couldn’t run this year without having somebody in charge of disenfranchising brown people.

All of which leaves me wondering. If Tim Griffin helps McCain win the Presidency using the same methods he did in 2000 and 2004, how will President McCain reward him? Will he try to illegally fire Justice Souter and replace him with Tim Griffin?

The Democratic Party’s charter requires that the Party:

Establish standards and rules of procedure to afford all members of the Democratic Party full, timely and equal opportunities to participate in decisions concerning the selection of candidates, … and further, to promote fair campaign practices and the fair adjudication of disputes. (Charter, Article I, Section 4)

Yet both the Democratic National Committee and the Michigan Democratic Party appear to be violating that requirement in their selection of which challenges to the MI Clusterfuck to hear at the May 31 Rules and Bylaws Committee meeting.

At least one group of ordinary Michigan citizens submitted a complaint that appears to fulfill all legal requirements. Yet the MDP has failed to follow its own rules on how to assist with and respond to that complaint–and it also did not comply with the requirement that it publish the names of those selected in the April 19 district conventions (which triggers a deadline for the submission of complaints). And the DNC will only hear the two state party-led complaints at the May 31 Rules and Bylaw Committee, thereby violating the requirement that "all members" of the party be able "to participate in decisions concerning the selection of candidates."

This complaint is similar to the petition I launched in April, in that its solution would reflect a compromise number between the results of the January 15 Clusterfuck and a 50-50 split: it works out to be the same 69-59 that the "Blue Ribbon Commission" has proposed. Also, like my petition, this complaint calls for the super-delegates to receive no vote.

But it’s different in two ways. First, it advocates giving MI’s elected delegates just half a vote each, not the full vote I suggested (in that respect, I like mine better, but then I didn’t get off my ass and file an official complaint; though this complaint has the advantage that it matches what the rules call for). More importantly, the complaint justifies its solution based on the MDP’s and the DNC’s own rules.

My favorite part of the petition is that it notes that, on March 26, a Court ruled the January 15 primary unconstitutional. That meant, the petition asserts, that the,

Michigan Presidential Primary of January 15, 2008, was "invalid, inoperable, and without effect." The result was non-binding.

And since the DNC’s own rules stipulate that,

Delegates shall be allocated in a fashion that fairly reflects the expressed presidential preference or uncommitted status of the primary voters or, if there is no binding primary, the convention and/or caucus participants. [my emphasis]

In the absence of a binding primary, the presidential preference must be judged by the preferences of the participants in "the convention and/or caucus." MI had district conventions, on April 19. And Obama supporters vastly outnumbered Hillary supporters–generally by at least 2 to 1, and in places by much greater margins. In other words, the legal preference of MI’s voters is that Obama–not Hillary–get the larger proportion of delegates.

Now, I don’t actually think that solution–any more than accepting the results of the Clusterfuck–is fair, though it does make for good legalese. The other proposed solutions, based on the fact that the MDP delegation allotments provide Hillary a much greater percentage of the delegates than her 55% vote total would dictate (for example, the allocation gave Hillary 80% of all alternate slots), are actually quite reasonable.

But the MDP and the DNC ignored it, in violation of their own rules.

Here’s the complaint and here are the rules on which it is based. I’ve seen a group of the notarized signatures to the petition. I won’t post those, since they include home addresses, but I will say at least one (I think two, actually) are officers in the 15th Congressional District Democratic Party, so this is not just a bunch of DFHs whning.

How does one equate vegan potlucks with this restriction on permissible terrorist investigations?

Mere speculation that force or violence might occur during the course of an otherwise peaceable demonstration is not sufficient grounds for initiation of an investigation under this Subpart, but where facts or circumstances reasonably indicate that a group or enterprise has engaged or aims to engage in activities involving force or violence or other criminal conduct described in paragraph (1)(a) in a demonstration, an investigation may be initiated in conformity with the standards of that paragraph. [my emphasis]

I ask because apparently, Minneapolis’ Joint Terrorist Task Force is recruiting people to infiltrate vegan potlucks to look for potential–what?–tahini enthusiasts?–in advance of the RNC convention this fall.

Paul Carroll was riding his bike when his cell phone vibrated.

[snip]

When Carroll called back, Swanson asked him to meet at a coffee shop later that day, going on to assure a wary Carroll that he wasn’t in trouble.

Carroll, who requested that his real name not be used, showed up early and waited anxiously for Swanson’s arrival. Ten minutes later, he says, a casually dressed Swanson showed up, flanked by a woman whom he introduced as FBI Special Agent Maureen E. Mazzola. For the next 20 minutes, Mazzola would do most of the talking.

“She told me that I had the perfect ‘look,’” recalls Carroll. “And that I had the perfect personality—they kept saying I was friendly and personable—for what they were looking for.”

What they were looking for, Carroll says, was an informant—someone to show up at “vegan potlucks” throughout the Twin Cities and rub shoulders with RNC protestors, schmoozing his way into their inner circles, then reporting back to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, a partnership between multiple federal agencies and state and local law enforcement. The effort’s primary mission, according to the Minneapolis division’s website, is to “investigate terrorist acts carried out by groups or organizations which fall within the definition of terrorist groups as set forth in the current United States Attorney General Guidelines.”

Carroll would be compensated for his efforts, but only if his involvement yielded an arrest. No exact dollar figure was offered. [my emphasis]

Now, maybe the vegans we’ve got here in Michigan are dramatically different from those infesting Minnesota. But where I’m from, vegans tend to be fairly peaceful people. If they’re unwilling to steal a bee’s honey, I figure, they’re going to be unwilling to use force to make their point. So I’m really curious how this operation got beyond the "mere speculation that force or violence might occur" that the US Attorney’s own guidelines demands. And if you’re really intent on infiltrating groups of vegans in anticipation of a bunch of violence-loving Republicans coming to town, why use the JTTF? Last I heard, we were so threatened by terrorists that we had to give up all our phone data to AT&T. But now we’ve got time to infiltrate vegans.

I can only think of one explanation for this. Somehow, Rachel Paulose escaped the cubbyhole they’ve assigned her to in DC and returned to Minneapolis to continue doing absurd things with Minnesota’s federal law enforcement efforts.

The USA Today has the news that, like McCain’s energy policy, McCain’s foreign policy was crafted by a lobbyist actively lobbying on those same issues (h/t freepatriot).

John McCain’s top foreign policy adviser lobbied the Arizona senator’s staff on behalf of the republic of Georgia while he was working for the campaign, public records show.

Randy Scheunemann, founder of Orion Strategies, represented the governments of Macedonia, Georgia and Taiwan between 2003 and March 1, according to the firm’s filings with the Justice Department. In its latest semiannual report, the firm disclosed that Scheunemann had a phone conversation in November about Georgia with Richard Fontaine, an aide in McCain’s Senate office.

Orion Strategies earned $540,000 from its foreign clients over the year ending on Dec. 1, reports show. Scheunemann also received $56,250 last year from March to July from McCain, according to campaign finance records.

But wait, it gets better. That lobbying call Scheunemann had about Georgia with McCain’s aide? He had it at a time when Scheunemann was working for free for McCain. Apparently, when he was broke last year (and, appropriately, flying around on the Sugar Momma Express), McCain was compensating his campaign staffers in access.

Given all the discussion of retroactive immunity for FISA, you guys are especially going to love this bit:

Campaign spokesman Jill Hazelbaker said the ethics policy is not retroactive.

That’s what you’d expect out of a campaign managed by a lobbyist who, until March, was lobbying Senators (including McCain?) to pressure them to give telecoms retroactive immunity. But Hazelbaker’s insistence that there is no retroactive ethical fix reinforces my point from yesterday: once your campaign policies have been developed by a bus full of lobbyists, there’s no way to cleanse those policies of ethical taint.

Really, McCain ought to give up this lobbyist disclosure whitewash. We’d all get through detailed discovery of the degree to which lobbyists own McCain’s campaign faster if he would just tell us which of his policies weren’t developed by active lobbyists.

Problem is, I can’t think of a likely policy area where McCain’s campaign isn’t dripping with lobbyists. You think maybe his blog outreach program is free of lobbyist taint?

Yesterday brought the news that Mark McKinnon–one of McCain’s key campaign advisors–fulfilled his promise to step down rather than work against Barack Obama.

Mark McKinnon said last year that he would leave McCain’s campaign after the primary season if the Arizona senator were to run against Obama.

[snip]

In a 2007 interview with Cox News, McKinnon said he would vote for McCain, but "I just don’t want to work against an Obama candidacy." He added that if Obama were to reach the White House, it "would send a great message to the country and the world."

Part of McKinnon’s unease with running against Obama, incidentally, is that he didn’t want to run negative against Obama. So I guess we can look forward to lots more smear campaigning from the Republican side, now that McKinnon has stepped down.

More interesting than McKinnon, though, is reality-based Republican Chuck Hagel’s apparent support for Obama.

The Republican Senator from Nebraska was a political thorn in McCain’s side on Tuesday night, repeatedly lavishing praise on the presumptive Democratic candidate and levying major foreign policy criticisms at the GOP nominee and the Republican Party as a whole. At one point, Hagel even urged the Arizona Republican to elevate his campaign discourse to a higher, more honest level.

[snip] 

Much of Hagel’s address, hosted by the Ploughshares Fund, was spent weaving between Obama praise and McCain quips. He urged the media, for example, to focus on important policy issues an "not just why Barack [doesn’t] wear flag pins on his lapel."

Asked whether he would be open to serving as Secretary of Defense in a hypothetical Obama administration, Hagel demurred. But in the process, he praised the Illinois Democrat for being open to a bipartisan cabinet.

You see, Chuck Hagel is not just any reality-based Republican. Chuck Hagel was the Co-Chair of McCain’s 2000 Presidential campaign.

Now, there are several conclusions one might draw from Hagel’s apparent endorsement of Obama over his former candidate. Perhaps Hagel is fickle or a flip-flopper. Perhaps Barack Obama is so charismatic, he has been able to woo Hagel over just a few years in the Senate, in spite of Hagel and McCain’s lifelong friendship and shared background as Vietnam Vets. 

Or perhaps McCain is not the man he was in 2000. 

DHinMI is right. Tom Davis’ memo about how to save the Republican brand is worthy reading–if only because one of the few Republicans who believes in gravity penned it.

To me, the most interesting passage is where Davis reviews the reasons why Republican fundraising sucks.

(1) Abandonment of many traditional GOP interest groups or a hedge strategy to “buy in” on a perceived longer term Democratic majority. For example, Pharma, UPS, government contractors and FED Ex are now giving strategically to Democrats for “protection money”.

(2) GOP leaders turned lobbyists, from Bob Livingston to JC Watts, are giving Blue. Are there any Democratic lobbyists returning the favor?

(Is anyone weeping "K Street Project" tears right now? I guess it’s not enough to ensure all the lobbyists are Republicans, now, is it?)

(3) Net roots and money from the internet have swelled Democratic coffers, from the Obama campaign, to their Red to Blue programs, giving Democrats huge
fundraising advantages across the board. Much of this is fueled by a strong Democratic desire to seize power after eight years of Bush and Cheney, coupled with a strong disappointment among grass roots Republicans at the party’s performance in office. Governance is a tough business requiring tough choices and holding together coalitions of economic and social conservatives is difficult to sustain.

Thank you Tom. Though there are bigger reasons why you Republicans suck at the netroots. First, transparency kills Republicans in the same way sunlight kills vampires. That, and dirty fucking hippies scare you Republicans–in fact, anything that operates on any but a top-down hierarchy. So the Republican Party is just constitutionally inappropriate for the netroots. But thanks for the nod of recognition.

Immigration pits our business wing against our grass roots wing. The War has turned many educated, affluent Republicans away. Spending priorities, scandals, gas prices and home value declines leave little for Republicans to be enthused over, particularly when our ability to draw issue lines and force choices by Democrats is frustrated by House Rules, inarticulate and unfocused national leadership and finger pointing.

Davis could have written a whole memo about these few subjects, starting with the recognition that you can oppose undocumented workers being hired to bring down wages, but focus on prosecuting employers, not brown people. Given that it’s not even in the realm of imagination for Davis, I guess he’s just got a paradigmatic inability to understand the issues that–even he says–could flip this election. And that’s way before we get to the war, which he considers a "cultural" issue and only a cultural issue.

4) Incumbent giving was a Republican invention from 1994 to 2004. We outraised Democrats because we were more committed to keeping our majority and the attendant perks of leadership. But guess what? We are being badly outraised by Democratic members’ contributions.

Democrats are giving more because they like their majority status; they want to keep it. Republicans don’t think they can win this time. Moreover, most Democratic members do not have re-elects that require they spend their money on themselves – particularly senior members on A committees. Republican incumbents are nervous and don’t want to give away their money if they may need it, in October.

Democrats are finding it easier to raise money. Republicans are finding it tougher to raise money in the minority. And, Democrats punish and reward party contributors. Republicans haven’t done so in the past and do not have the perks and appointments they could disburse that they had when they were in the majority.

The GOP ranks have started to splinter into an “everyman for himself” psychology. This is not conducive to the teamwork necessary to close the financial gap.

(5) Labor unions, long the mainstay of the Democratic Party have gone even deeper into their members’ pockets to ensure Democratic majorities. Not resting on their laurels, labor has upped the ante to Democrats and the leadership has delivered. From CardCheck, to Columbia Trade, Democrats have delivered and labor has responded, with cash, enhanced 527s and ground troops. The Democratic financial advantage has been amplified with increased money from Labor. Ironically, the Democrats are not paying any price with Business, as Business PACs have given more to Democrats, not less.

There’s an implicit recognition that Democrats have delivered on issues important to labor–and that ties directly to union enthusiasm for elections. But again, since Davis doesn’t believe that union members might actually support things like forming unions, he doesn’t get the connection.

Liberal and Democratic use of the internet has far outperformed conservative and Republican deployment of the same. Failure to invest in on-line funding over the last two cycles has put the GOP behind the technology eight ball. This doesn’t even address the numerous 527s dominated by the left.

The whole netroots phenom seems to bug Davis. Good.

Now, Davis does say a few things that are important for Congressional Democrats to hear. We haven’t accomplished any grandiose agenda. On a number of key issues–like healthcare–we haven’t really started advocating for real promises rather than opposing Bush’s Medicare giveaway to Pharma or trying to ensure children get healthcare. Even if it’s only rhetorical, we need to be better about advocating our own agenda.

One area where I believe this is particularly important is on terrorism. Tom Davis thinks–even now–that FISA is a winning issue–largely because Democrats haven’t noted that Bush and the Republicans are still falling woefully short on a number of no nonsense things to keep the US safe. We need to keep pushing for the things that will keep us safe, beyond the 9/11 Commission recommendations we championed. For example, we ought to talk about inspecting more cargo containers. The reasons we’re not, after all, is because it’d hurt WalMart, though it actually might create some American jobs. So we need to be sure to be advocating for our policies, even if they won’t get passed so long as Joe Lieberman can flip a vote.

Finally, though, consider the source. Yes, Tom Davis is intelligent. Yes, unlike many Republicans, he does believe in gravity and other reality-based concepts.

But Tom Davis is retiring this year because he’s not sure he can win his increasingly Democratic district comprising a bunch of affluent VA suburbs of DC, along with some rural horse country. Mind you, his is not one of the areas he lists as urban or "granola belt," though big parts are the inner circles of suburbs he admits Democrats are solidly winning. But his district also encompasses a whole lot of Pentagon employees, CIA employees, defense contractors. And in spite of the fact that he includes military veterans in his description of the GOP base,

So let’s focus on shoring up our base: social conservatives, lunch bucket blue collar whites, Hispanics (they are in play for McCain), and military veterans.

…with his very retirement, he’s admitting that veterans–at least those still tied into government–aren’t necessarily the GOP base anymore (and particularly not after it takes Obama to make sure veterans with PTSD get diagnosed properly–isn’t Davis on an Oversight Committee of some sort?).

And that’s just Davis, who is, admittedly, in an increasingly tough VA district. But the whole state of VA (well, except for the Appalachian counties) went in big numbers for Obama this year, even while McCain was worried about depriving Huckabee of a moral victory. Worse for Davis, no one in their right mind thinks the GOP will retain Senator John Warner’s seat this year, not with Mark Warner in the race.

Tom Davis has a bunch of ideas. But his retirement, by itself, suggests they won’t even work for a reddish-purple state like VA.

Of the dozens of lobbyists that work on John McCain’s campaign, one already got nabbed in McCain’s recent "conflict of interest vetting for everyone but my wife" initiative: Eric Burgeson (though the NYT also reports that Tom Loeffler, Fundraising Chair, "was expected to give up his position to comply with the new rules "–presumably that’ll happen once Loeffler has finalized the next round of $30,000 a person fundraising dinners).

One lobbyist out of dozens. Why was Eric Burgeson, an advisor on energy and environmental issues, so much more of a problem for McCain than all the other lobbyists working on his campaign?

Burgeson’s recent job history looks like a wildly revolving door taking him from the White House, to the Department of Energy, and then into lobbying (I’m still trying to figure out whether Burgeson played a part in Dick’s Energy Task Force):

October 2006 to present: Barbour Griffith & Rogers, Vice President, Energy and Environment

April 2005 to October 2006: Chief of Staff, Department of Energy

November 2004 to April 2005: Special Assistant to the President and Associate Director of the Office or Presidential Personnel, White House

May 2004 to November 2004: Deputy Chief of Staff and White House Liaison, DOE

January 2001 to May 2004: Associate Director in the Office of Cabinet Affairs in the White House, Senior Policy Advisor to the Secretary of Energy and Senior Legislative Advisor in the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy

1999 to 2001: Lobbyist for Mercury group, representing (among others) BP Amoco, Lockheed Martin, and the NRA

His 2008 first quarter lobbying for BGR offers more insight into the conflicts Burgeson represented for McCain:

Breakthough Fuel, energy and environment, new client (no quarterly reports)

Coal 2 Liquid, liquid coal, includes Senate lobbying

Contractors International Group on Nuclear Liability, IAEA Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage, includes Senate lobbying

Deloitte Consulting, procurement of technology and systems management, includes Senate lobbying

Energy Enterprise Solutions, IT Management, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

Flambeau River Biorefinery, energy and budget, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

Forest County Potawatami Community, tribal affairs, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

Kurdistan Regional Government, foreign relations, includes Senate lobbying (and Presidential and NSC lobbying)

MLBA Services, insurance reform, includes Senate lobbying

MPI Corporate Holdings, business development, US Mint

Materials Processing Corporation, electronics recycling, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

O2 Diesel Company, renewable energy, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

Qioptiq, defense issues, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

Southern Company Services, climate change, energy independence, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

WE Energies, climate change, electric utilites, and energy independence, includes Senate lobbying (more background)

In other words, one of the campaign advisors who has cultivated McCain’s "green" image has, at the same time, been representing companies from the renewable energy, nuclear energy, and liquid coal industries. Though lobbyist declaration forms don’t specify which Senators Burgeson has been lobbying, it would have been hard for Burgeson to avoid the former Chair of the Commerce Committee–especially since he was sitting with him on the Straight Talk for Lobbyists Express. Which is why I find Burgeson’s answer on the influence of special interests–speaking as McCain’s advisor–to be so amusing:

Renville, Minn.: While I support ethanol and believe that it is a valuable first step, I do not believe that the criticism of subsidies for ethanol is fair. I gladly would support no subsidies or tax breaks for ethanol if the same were done for the oil industry. I cannot believe anyone is strong enough to stand up to the oil industry. Does Sen. McCain believe that this is possible?

Eric Burgeson: You are right, powerful interests in Washington, DC are difficult to stand up to. But if there is anyone in Washington who can do it, it is Senator McCain who has built his career and reputation standing up to special interests. As for subsidies, Senator McCain has a clear position that he opposes subsidies, not just ethanol subsidies, but all subsidies. [my emphasis]

That’s right. McCain stands up to all the special interests–unless they work on his campaign staff.

As an added bonus, I like that McCain, until he decided the lobbyist schtick was ruining his image, had a lobbyist for a Potawatami tribe working for him who, with one other person, billed $80,000 in the first quarter of this year. It seems John McCain’s energy policy was being run by the second coming of Jack Abramoff.

After losing a slew of dictator-connected advisors in the last week, the McCain campaign has finally decided it might be a good idea to vet the people hanging out with John McCain.

McCain campaign manager Rick Davis moved to avoid a recurrence of the situation with his conflict-of-interest policy, released late yesterday. It also sought to stem the impression that McCain’s campaign is run by lobbyists — a characterization Democrats have tried to make since it was reported that a senior adviser, Charlie Black, made lobbying calls from McCain’s signature bus, the Straight Talk Express. Davis himself is currently on leave from his lobbying and consulting firm, and the campaign removed two other officials this week for work they’d done on behalf of Burmese junta.

[snip]

The memo establishes a new vetting process, requiring campaign aides to fill out a questionnaire on their status and to provide proof to the campaign legal department that they’ve terminated outside contracts.

In an show of civic responsibility, Progressive Media USA has filled out the forms for five of McCain’s top advisors. Here, for example, is part of Charlie Black’s now-completed survey:

McCain Staff Lobbyist Survey

NAME: Charlie Black

CAMPAIGN ROLE: Senior Political Adviser

Have you ever registered as a federal lobbyist?
Yes

Have you ever been a registered foreign agent?
Yes

Please list all of the foreign governments, political and other interests you lobbied for:
Jonas Savimbi (leader of UNITA rebels in Angola)

[snip]

Government of Zaire

Please list any clients you think could potentially cause a conflict of interest for the McCain Campaign:
Yukos Oil
Philip Morris
JP Morgan
Johnson & Johnson
G-Tech
United Technologies
Washington Mutual Bank
U.S. Smokeless Tobacco
Occidental Petroleum Group
Accenture
Fluor
AT&T
Lincoln Group
Lockheed Martin
National Association of Mortgage Brokers
Ocean Duke Corp.
SAP America

Please list the times you have lobbied Senator McCain or his office:
NOT DISCLOSED

See how helpful that is? Transparency is a wonderful thing.

Only, McCain’s campaign forgot to ask for disclosure from one additional source of conflicts of interest. So, out of my own sense of civic responsibility, I’ve started to fill out the very special survey the campaign forgot:

McCain Staff Lobbyist Survey

NAME: Cindy McCain

CAMPAIGN ROLE: Sugar Momma

List Total Net Worth
$100,000,000

Please list all campaign donations provided that have not been fully reimbursed:

Six months of flights on the Sugar Momma Express
One large barbecue at my Sedona "ranch"

(More to come as "the base" requires it)

Please list all past or present investments that directly undermine a stated McCain campaign promise:
American Funds Europacific Growth fund
American Funds Capital World Growth and Income

(others to be filled in after the AP discovers them)

Please list all business partnerships with corrupt owners of savings &loans, mortgage banking firms, or other financial institutions for which Senator McCain has done legislative favors:

Charles Keating

(others to be filled in after the AP discovers them)

Please list all business partnerships with business owners that have or will be bailed out at taxpayer expense:

Charles Keating

(others to be filled in after the AP discovers them)

Please list any products you sell that offend the cultural sensitivies of a significant portion of the Republican base:

Alcohol

Wait. This isn’t working. There are just too many potential conflicts to fit into one simple survey. There must be an easier way of vetting the Sugar Momma‘s improper conflicts.

Thankfully there is, though it’s an invention of evil big government. For easy vetting and disclosure, the McCain camp might want to try this.

I joked to some folks yesterday that Will Rogers is probably rolling over in his grave about now. Between Obama’s insistence on running one, unified message and party and Obama’s masterful implementation of the Edwards endorsement yesterday, we Democrats may no longer be able to quip–at least for the next several months–that we "belong to no organized party."

That sentiment was widely shared among a bunch of local political types in MI with whom I just had beers. It wasn’t just that Obama (and David Bonior, surely) had managed to headline Obama’s first MI event with the guy in the race who spoke most about the crappy economy. It wasn’t just that it was MI where he chose to get the endorsement–making up for a lot of the bad things some Michiganders have been told about Obama. It wasn’t even just the nice touch of keeping the Edwards endorsement a secret from the thousands who showed up in Van Andel arena to see Obama until Obama got to announce it himself on stage–magnifiying the specialness of the Edwards endorsement. It was, obviously, also the way Obama managed to pre-empt Hillary’s biggest win since Arkansas with the news that both of them have been chasing since February.

But the more I think about it, Obama’s management of the Edwards endorsement was even more brilliant than that.

Consider, for a moment, Robert Reich’s explanation of why Hillary remains in the race (h/t Jane).

She wants the best possible deal she can strike with Obama. She wants Obama to agree to pay her campaign debts, to seat the Michigan and Florida delegations (so she can claim a moral victory), and – the quietest deal of all – a personal commitment from him to appoint her to the Supreme Court when the next vacancy occurs.

Just as a picky point, the Edwards endorsement simplifies any resolution of MI. If the MI compromise proposal goes forward, it’ll make it a lot easier to award Obama 59 delegates now that the other major candidate who took uncommitted votes has endorsed Obama–Edwards isn’t going to complain that "his" votes from uncommitted are awarded to Obama. And even if Obama does feel generous and gives Hillary her MI "win" (which will piss me off, but I’m willing to be used once again for the sake of party unity)–having the Edwards endorsement will make it more likely that the roughly 5 elected delegates who support Edwards and the At Large delegates yet to be assigned to uncommitted will support Obama. (Obviously, that’s true of FL as well.)

But that’s a picky point. What I’m really interested in, with regards to the timing and implementation of the Edwards endorsement, is that it happened just as Hillary’s team had intensified its lobbying to secure the VP nomination for Hillary. A few days ago, everyone was talking about the dream ticket Obama-Clinton. Now, after last night’s endorsement, everyone is talking about the dream ticket of Obama-Edwards; talk of a Obama-Clinton ticket now seems dated, flat.

Consider the pressure that puts Hillary under. Whether she wants SCOTUS or VP or some other prize for a concession, everything she might be a good candidate for, Edwards would also be an excellent pick for. VP? AG? SCOTUS? Yup.

Yet Edwards, of course, jumped in when the concession prizes were all available–and jumped in in a way that made Hillary’s concession less necessary (though still pretty important) even as it isolated Hillary further in her opposition to Obama. If Hillary holds out much longer, it’ll be easy for Obama to give Edwards whatever prize Hillary might have wanted as a reward for Edwards endorsing to bring the party together.

By bringing in Edwards when he did (and mind you, I don’t imagine that Edwards is missing this significance either), Obama takes away much of Hillary’s bargaining position. That’s not very nice, mind you. But it is effective politics.

Will Rogers. I’m sorry, but you may have to take a pass this year.

Boy, George Bush must not have liked his Granddaddy Prescott very much. Here’s what he just said to Israel’s Knesset:

Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: "Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided." We have an obligation to call this what it is – the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

Or maybe it’s just negotiating with Nazis that’s the problem–making tons of dough by serving as their banker? The Bush family doesn’t appear to have any problem with that.

George Bush’s grandfather, the late US senator Prescott Bush, was a director and shareholder of companies that profited from their involvement with the financial backers of Nazi Germany.

The Guardian has obtained confirmation from newly discovered files in the US National Archives that a firm of which Prescott Bush was a director was involved with the financial architects of Nazism.

His business dealings, which continued until his company’s assets were seized in 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act, has led more than 60 years later to a civil action for damages being brought in Germany against the Bush family by two former slave labourers at Auschwitz and to a hum of pre-election controversy.

If we had a press corps with any historical memory, I guess, such a statement might get Bush in trouble (not to mention make it difficult for his hosts who invited a lame duck grandson of a banker to the Nazis to speak to the Knesset). But instead they’re likely to focus on the false claim that Obama wants to appease Hamas.