Posts by Holly Yeager

Republicans were already gloomy about the scenario facing their House candidates in the fall. But things got worse on Tuesday, when Democrat Travis Childers won a special election in a deep, dark red congressional district in Mississippi.

The district went for President Bush in 2004 by a whopping 62-37 margin, and, as Terence Samuel wrote in [...]

Hillary Clinton is expected to win big — ok, huge — in West Virginia today. But, as TPM notes, at least some of those around her do seem able to see the writing on the wall.

Check out what longtime Clintonista James Carville had to say Monday at Furman University in South Carolina:

"I still hear some [...]

Tuesday’s Washington Post has something I haven’t seen before — a rough-and-tumble account of racist sentiment that people out campaigning for Barack Obama have encountered:
For all the hope and excitement Obama’s candidacy is generating, some of his field workers, phone-bank volunteers and campaign surrogates are encountering a raw racism and hostility that have gone largely [...]

Rahm Emanuel — the usually outspoken Illinois congressman who has remained oddly quiet during the Democratic primary contest — is causing a bit of a stir.

"At this point, Barack is the presumptive nominee," Emanuel said Friday at a conference organized by The New Yorker.

As Sam Stein reports on Huffington Post, he continued, "Hillary can’t [...]

The Washington Post has a tough story Friday about moves by John McCain that helped a big fundraiser. As the Post put it (above the fold, for people who care about that kind of old-media thing):
Sen. John McCain championed legislation that will let an Arizona rancher trade remote grassland and ponderosa pine forest here [...]

Sure, it’s a bit yucky to use Mother’s Day as a fund-raising gimmick.

But that’s what John McCain’s campaign is doing this morning. And the attached video, which Cindy McCain calls "a special Mother’s Day message from our family to yours" in an email introduction, features the candidate’s 96-year-old mother — and somehow makes it OK.

I [...]

Former presidential candidate John Edwards still hasn’t endorsed a candidate in the Democratic primary.

But he voted in his home state of North Carolina on Tuesday — and that may offer a clue about who he prefers.

Check out this clip from a conversation Edwards had Friday morning on MSNBC, courtesy The Page.

What do you think? Did [...]

From most perspectives, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared Wednesday to be shrugging off the death notices her campaign received after the votes were tallied in North Carolina and Indiana.

Two campaign events were quickly added to what was supposed to be a quiet day, including a trip to West Virginia, which holds the next primary contest [...]

Thanks to TPM for spotting what appears to be the first big defection from the Clinton camp in the wake of Tuesday’s results in North Carolina and Indiana.

Former Sen. George McGovern, who had backed Hillary Clinton, said Wednesday he is switching his support to Barack Obama.

According to the AP’s report, "McGovern says he is calling [...]

I was just looking at some notes I took during the Clinton campaign’s conference call with reporters on Monday.

It’s pretty clear that the kinds of things Geoff Garin, the campaign’s top strategist, and Howard Wolfson, Clinton’s communications director, were saying then — even before polls had opened in Indiana and North Carolina — are likely [...]