Hillary Clinton > DCCC Email Controversy Update

Ok. After a phone call I made to the DCCC regarding the Hillary Clinton Birthday email issue , I did get a call back from the DCCC's person in charge of the email effort, Nick Jeffrey.

Mr. Nick Jeffrey told me that the DCCC was "in negotiations with the other presidential campaigns regarding email swap programs like the one that resulted in the Hillary Clinton birthday emailer." But I told Mr. Jeffrey that the DCCC should get its story straight because another DCCC spokesperson said...

UPDATE: It's a "list-swap," says DCCC spokeswoman Jennifer Crider. The campaign committee -- as Politico reported yesterday (!) -- is trying to broaden its fundraising base with an offer to send an email on a candidate's behalf to its list, in exchange for access to their similar-sized lists. The offer has been extended to Clinton, Obama, and Edwards; Clinton is the only one to take them up on it so far.

Mystery solved.

So that's where the story is. The next step is to get word from the Obama and Edwards camps to determine if they were actually contacted or if it's all just political smoke!

A380 - Singapore Airlines A380 Maiden Flight

Singapore Airlines' A380 completed it's maiden flight this week. Here's video of that event and video of the cabin interior. Business class is particularly interesting.

Landing in Sydney:



Interior Video:



Singapore Airlines Crew Training Video:

Hillary Clinton > Did DCCC Violate FEC Laws In Emailer For Her Birthday?

It's spreading all over the Internet. This email letter you see is from Bill Clinton and asking receivers to help celebrate her 60th birthday. This has got many non-Clinton supporters in an uproar, as the email was sent through the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, or "DCCC".

This news first hit my attention via the Obama listserv and was the focus of a blog post on DailyKos today. To get to the bottom of this, I called the DCCC, and the receptionist told me, in response to my question on this that "The DCCC does not support anyone for president; we were just trying to expand our email list. You should talk to Nick Jeffrey, who runs the email campaign."

So I called Mr. Jeffrey, but got his voicemail.

Even if the DCCC's not taking a position, it sure looks that way and seems to be another example of "triangulation politics" where a person says they're for or against something in word, but not in deed. I call it being dishonest myself.

The question for me is this: does this count as an FEC violation? I don't know the answer. But it seems that if the DCCC is raising money and working on behalf of Congressional democratic candidates, this move is against their mission, as it looks like the DCCC's supporting a single Presidential candidate. They didn't do this for Senator Obama's birthday August 4th.

More on this.