Le Web 3 - A Video Brief On What's Happening There - Day 1

This is a segment of videos on the goings on at Le Web 3 in Paris, France. For more information on Le Web 3, see my video interview of Cathy Brooks , the event's producer.

Le Web 3 - Preparations:



Le Web 3 - Day One

More On Petrino's Sudden Departure From The Atlanta Falcons

Well, for some reason, I'm not surprised at this.

Petrino quits Falcons to take Arkansas job

By STEVE WYCHE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 12/11/07
Falcons coach Bobby Petrino, in a move that was said to have blindsided team officials, resigned Tuesday evening to take the head-coaching job at the University of Arkansas, the team confirmed.

Team owner Arthur Blank and the Falcons brass were caught so off guard that they are still trying to figure out who will coach the 3-10 team over the final three games.

Offensive coordinator Hue Jackson and defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer are likely candidates to coach the Falcons on an interim basis.

Each could be under consideration for the permanent job.

Before the Falcons' 34-14 loss to New Orleans Monday, Blank said that he had heard rumors that Arkansas had targeted Petrino to replace Houston Nutt as head coach. So he said he asked Petrino if he was considering that job.

Petrino, who was signed from the University of Louisville to a five-year, $24.5 million contract Jan. 8, told him Monday afternoon that he definitely would be back to coach the Falcons in 2008.

It was the second time Blank had asked Petrino about his commitment to the team and the second time Petrino told him he would be back next season.

Blank was not available for comment Tuesday evening.

The Falcons were off Tuesday and Petrino did not hold his typical day-after, post game news conference. It is not known if he spent the day talking to officials from Arkansas.

Petrino's abrupt departure puts the Falcons in position of trying to find a second head coach in less than a year. Blank fired Jim Mora Jan. 1, 2007 after three seasons.

Atlanta is in a tenuous situation because a new head coach with a radically different philosophy could require a rapid change in direction from plans already put in place to augment the roster for Petrino's scheme.

Falcons cornerback DeAngelo Hall, one of several players with a frosty relationship with Petrino, said he was surprised by the news, which he heard about from a team officials around 5:30 Tuesday.

"We felt like Petrino was going to be around for the long haul, like he had as much invested in this as we did," Hall said. "For him to jump ship is disheartening. Arthur Blank and the city of Atlanta, they deserve to win and we thought Petrino was going to be the guy to help us get there. He was a winner and wasn't used to losing.

"Maybe he didn't feel he could win at this level. I disagree with that. If he doesn't want to be a part of it, fine. We'll move on and get better and we will games without him."

It was thought that Petrino could take the Falcons offense, led by Michael Vick, and create an exciting, winning brand of football.

But Petrino's troubles in Atlanta began soon afterward, starting when Vick was questioned by security at Miami International Airport on Jan. 17 about a water bottle with a hidden compartment. Test results indicated that were no illegal substances in the bottle, and Vick was cleared of wrongdoing.

Vick's troubles continued in April when police found evidence of a dogfighting operation at a home he owned in rural southeastern Virginia.

Vick was indicted on felony charges in July of operating an illegal dogfighting operation, known as Bad Newz Kennels.

Vick was indefintely suspended by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell in August.

The Falcons are 3-10 following Monday's 34-14 loss to New Orleans. They are tied for the second-worst record in the league.

In the wake of Vick's suspension, the team has used three different starting quarterbacks, and its offense has struggled. They are 30th in the league in scoring (14.2 points per game) and 24th in yards per game (301.1 ypg).

Fan reaction was much like that at Falcons headquarters: surprised.

Brian Daniels, president of Louisville's Atlanta Alumni Club said, "I'm just absolutely floored.

"I really believe he came here to coach the best athlete in football. I think he was just at a point where he'd had enough. You can't blame a man for wanting to drive a Porsche and being handed a Cadillac."

Petrino has a history of short stays as a coach.

During his four seasons at Louisville, Auburn, LSU and the NFL's Oakland Raiders talked to him.

In an attempt to keep him, the school signed him to a $25-million extension in July, 2006.

He signed a deal with the Falcons six months later.

Petrino's coaching career started in 1983 as a graduate assistant at Carroll College in Wisconsin. He became offensive coordinator there in 1985. It was the start of a long-time career in the college ranks that saw him work as an assistant at eight colleges before being named head coach at the University of Louisville in 2003. He compiled a 41-9 record at Louisville.

Petrino previously worked in the pro ranks as quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator for the Jacksonville Jaguars from 1999-2002.

Petrino also has a previous stint in the SEC, as offensive coordinator for Auburn University in 2002.

While Obama Offers Solution To Preditory Credit Cards, Clinton Has Flip Flopped On Issue

Today, in Iowa, Senator Barack Obama offered a solution to the growing problem of credit card debt:

Obama called for new restrictions on "predatory" credit card companies he says deceive consumers into piling up massive debt they have little hope of repaying.

"The truth is, our middle-class families are not going to be secure so long as they can't get out of debt," Obama said Monday, sharpening the populist rhetoric of his presidential campaign. "If we're serious about stopping Americans from falling deeper in debt, we've got to crack down on predatory credit card companies that are pushing them over the edge."

Obama pointed to studies showing that consumers have an average personal debt of more than $8,000, a load driven higher by credit cards. He said soaring credit card debt could turn into a crisis as big as the one in the subprime mortgage industry.

"The larger risk is that what's happening in the housing market could lead to a slowdown in the entire economy," he said.

While Obama takes the issue head on Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has a history of flip-flopping on the matter. Take what Harvard Professor Elizabeth Warren said on Frontline regarding how Clinton first had President Bill Clinton reject, then turned around and as Senator supported the same banruptcy legislation that would have forced credit card companies to change their policies...

And Sen. [Hillary] Clinton?

Sen. Clinton, when she was first lady, [was] responsible for stopping the proposed bankruptcy legislation. The White House had been quietly supporting it, and it was First Lady Clinton who talked with her husband and persuaded him that the bankruptcy bill was hard on women, hard on families, hard on older Americans, and was a bad idea in general. And the last act that President Clinton took with Congress was to veto the bankruptcy bill. Mrs. Clinton took credit for that in her autobiography, and by golly, she deserves it. She stood up --


And today?

Sen. Clinton, when she was elected, the financial services industry brought this bill back. And so one of the very first bills that came up after Sen. Clinton had taken office was the bankruptcy bill. Oh, [there were] a couple of cosmetic changes to it, ... but it was the same bill that had been there at that point already for four years. And Sen. Clinton voted in favor of the bill.


Better bill?

No.


Why?

The financial services industry is a big industry in New York, and it's powerful on Capitol Hill. It's a story of how much influence this industry group wields in Washington that ... they can bring to heel a senator who obviously cares, who obviously gets it, but who also obviously really feels the pressure in having to stand up to an industry like that.

So it's clear the credit card lobby "got to" Senator Clinton, making it doubtful Americans will see any real advance or relief in this area if she's elected President.

On Fox, Tom Tancredo Says That Republican Debate For Spanish Speaking Americans Is For Those Who Aren't American

I could not believe what I was hearing when I heard it today, but out of the mouth of Republican U.S. Presidential Candidate Tom Tancredo was a series of very bigoted statements which essentially add up to this:

If you're speaking any language other than English, you're not American.

That was the message he sent and it was totally ugly. So much so that Fox's Shepard Smith could not resist grilling him with a set of "setup" questions on this.

I'll call him "Tom The Terrible" from now on!

Vick receives 23-month sentence on dogfighting charges

Richmond, Virgina judge Henry Hudson sentenced embattled Atlanta Falcons quarterback
Michael Vick to nearly two full years in prison Monday morning.

Since the disgraced star has already spent three months behind bars, it is probable to assume that with good behavior the sentence will be reduced to 19 months. Either way, it will have been three years without playing professional football and the likelihood of Vick acclimating himself back into the league is very minimal.

Petrino reportedly phones in resignation to Falcons

Petrino's departure from the hapless Falcons continues to further the notion that college coaches that immediately embark upon the NFL fail miserably.Outside of Jimmie Johnson leaving the University of Miami to coach the Dallas Cowboys, the line of success is minimal.

ESPN.com news services

Bobby Petrino abruptly resigned his position as coach of the Atlanta Falcons on Tuesday and is negotiating an agreement to become the new coach at the University of Arkansas, multiple sources told ESPN.

Petrino and his agent had been talking with the Falcons about his preference to return to the college ranks. The former Louisville coach was looking for an opportunity to break into the Southeastern Conference ranks, and Arkansas was a natural fit.

Citing the team as its source, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported on its Web site that Petrino phoned the Falcons about 5:45 p.m. Tuesday and resigned. Petrino and the team agreed he would not coach the Falcons' remaining three games, a source told ESPN.com's John Clayton.

Negotiations between Petrino and Arkansas are ongoing, the sources told ESPN. Once a deal is in place, Petrino is expected to be paid around $3 million a year, the sources said.

Petrino signed a five-year, $24 million contract to be the Falcons head coach, so he will be taking a pay cut to re-enter the college ranks. The Falcons are 3-10 and have had their season torn apart by Michael Vick's involvement in a dogfighting ring and subsequent 23-month jail sentence, which was levied Monday.

NFL sources said there was no buyout in Petrino's contract with the Falcons.

Petrino will succeed Houston Nutt, who was hired by Mississippi immediately after resigning at Arkansas. Tommy Tuberville and Tommy Bowden were both linked to the Arkansas opening, but they remained as coaches at Auburn and Clemson, respectively.

Arkansas flirted with hiring Jim Grobe -- a private fundraising arm for the Razorbacks approved a salary supplement for the Wake Forest coach -- but Grobe stayed with the Demon Deacons.

Clinton People Who Mention Obama's Past Cocaine Use; Must Answer For Clinton's Alledged Involvment In Cocaine Trafficing

According to a Huffington Post blogger , Clinton cronies are set to mention Senator Barack Obama's past and his use of cocaine, but this proves how the Clinton Camp is starting to panic and for two reasons:

1) It opens up the question of Senator Clinton and any past drug use she may have done. (Important, because Senator Obama is not covering up his past; what about Clinton?)

2) Now Senator Clinton has to answer -- again -- for the MENA controversy, which is expresses in this video:

Part One:



Part Two:



Part Three:



Part Four:



The video's description reads:

An independent group of researchers in Arkansas are charging that Governor Bill Clinton is covering up an airport used by the CIA and major cocaine smugglers in a remote corner of the Ozark mountains. According to Deborah Robinson of In These Times, the Inter mountain Regional Airport in Mena,Arkansas continues to be the hub of operations for people like assassinated cocaine kingpin Barry Seal as well as government intelligence operations linked to arms and drug smuggling.

In the 1980's, the Mena airport became one of the world's largest aircraft refurbishing centers, providing services to planes from many countries.Researchers claim that the largest consumers of aircraft refurbishing services are drug smugglers and intelligence agencies involved in covert activities.In fact, residents of Mena, Arkansas, have told reporters that former marine Lt. Colonel Oliver North was a frequent visitor during the 1980's. Eugene Hasenfus, a pilot who was shot down in a Contra supply plane over Nicaragua in 1986, was also seen in town renting cargo vehicles.

A federal Grand Jury looking into activities at the Mena airport refused to hand down any indictments after drug running charges were made public.Deborah Robinson says that Clinton had "ignored the situation" until he began his presidential campaign." Clinton then said he would provide money for a state run investigation of the Mena airport. But according to Robinson, the promise of an investigation was never followed up by Clinton's staff. In fact, a local Arkansas state prosecutor blasted Clinton's promise of an investigation, comparing it to "spitting on a forest fire."

...and in this Salon article , where the makers of the video "Citizens for Honest Government" paid their sources, which taints their claims, but one of the allegations is of President Clinton's cocaine use and the person behind the story is sticking to it.

Here's the article below, in full:

Among the allegations spread by Citizens for Honest Government's paid "expert witnesses" was that Bill Clinton, as governor of Arkansas, provided protection for the cocaine trade.

Beginning in late 1993, Nichols and three other individuals who received payments from Citizens told the press that Clinton, while governor of Arkansas, ordered state law enforcement officials to turn a blind eye to a cocaine trafficking ring operating out of Mena, a small Arkansas airport 120 miles west of Little Rock. Nichols and the group's other paid "witnesses" alleged that Clinton protected the cocaine operation because one of the ring's backers was a Clinton campaign contributor. They also alleged the drug smuggling ring was connected to a covert U.S. intelligence operation in Central America.

The allegations quickly found their way to talk radio programs and onto the Internet and began moving into the mainstream via articles in the American Spectator and the conservative Washington Times.

But what ultimately legitimized the allegations was a series of editorials and articles on the subject that appeared in 1994 on the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal.

Rep. Jim Leach, (R-Iowa), chairman of the House Banking Committee, acknowledged in an interview in the fall of l996 that he had directed his committee staff to conduct a comprehensive investigation of the Mena allegations after first reading about them in the Wall Street Journal.

"I read the Journal editorial page with great interest," Leach told Salon. "They raised some very serious and interesting issues. And I made the decision that it should be an appropriate subject of a committee investigation."

Two committee sources told Salon that House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., also had read about the Mena allegations on the Journal's editorial page and had learned more about them from conservative supporters of his political action committee, GOPAC. Gingrich personally urged that Leach investigate the matter, the sources said.

David Runkel, a spokesman for the House Banking Committee, said that despite an exhaustive two-year investigation, the committee found absolutely no evidence showing any Clinton involvement in Mena drug-smuggling operations. "We engaged in an appropriate inquiry that uncovered valuable information about money laundering and other issues," said Runkel. "Regarding the president, we found no evidence of wrongdoing."

An investigation by the CIA Inspector-General also concluded last year that there was no evidence that Clinton had any role in protecting the Mena cocaine ring. Leach's House Banking Committee requested the CIA investigation.

Rep. Henry Gonzalez, D-Texas, the House Banking Committee's ranking minority member, was highly critical of the investigation. Gonzalez said it took up more than 13,000 staff hours at the Department of Justice -- "the equivalent of about one year's worth of work by eight full-time employees," said Gonzalez.

The request by Leach to have the CIA Inspector-General investigate, Gonzalez said, led to "six [additional] full-time [CIA] people reviewing over 40,000 pages of documents." In addition, four banking committee staffers worked on the probe at the expense of other important committee business, Gonzalez said.

Among those who were cited as sources about the alleged Mena operation in the Wall Street Journal's editorial page -- and received generous payments from Citizens for Honest Government -- was John Brown, a former deputy sheriff of Saline County, Ark. In l994 and l995, Brown received more than $28,000 from the organization, according to the accounting records. Brown also appeared on a Citizens-produced video about Mena.

"I did investigative work for them," Brown told Salon, adding that Citizens paid him while he worked as a private investigator and not as a police officer.

On Sept. 21, l996, Brown received at least one additional payment of $1,000 from the joint bank account controlled by Matrisciana and Ruddy, according to a copy of the canceled check obtained by Salon.

Another recipient of Citizens funds was Jane Parks of Little Rock. Shortly before the l996 presidential election, the American Spectator published a story by the magazine's editor, R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr., that quoted Parks as saying that she had personally witnessed Clinton using cocaine in 1984, while he was governor of Arkansas. At the time, Parks said, she had been resident manager of an upscale Little Rock apartment complex. Parks claimed that her office was subdivided by a flimsy temporary wall. Parks told Tyrrell that she worked on one side of the partition while on the other side, the president's brother, Roger Clinton, maintained a bachelor pad.

"Mrs. Parks observed cocaine being brought into the apartment," Tyrrell wrote. "She also had to relay complaints to Roger about noise from his parties ... She stated: 'Once when I opened the door, Bill Clinton was sitting on the couch. He was staring straight ahead, looking stoned ... There were lines of cocaine on the table in front of him."

Later, she told the London Daily Telegraph that her husband, a private investigator who once did security work for the l992 Clinton presidential campaign, was killed because he had been involved with drug smuggling at the Mena airport. Parks also claimed she found hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash in the trunk of her late husband's car. She said that her husband had told her that Vincent Foster had directed him to smuggle drugs at Mena.

In l994 and l995, Parks and other members of her family received more than $16,000 from Citizens for Honest Government, according to the organization's accounting records. In 1995 Parks received an additional $6,000 from the joint bank account maintained by Nichols and Patterson, according to records and individuals with direct knowledge of the transactions.

Parks declined to comment for this article, but her son told Salon that she stands by her stories.

A former employee of the American Spectator told Salon that Tyrrell had several conversations with conservative activists in the closing days of the l996 presidential race to discuss ways to publicize Parks' charges against Clinton. The former employee said in an interview that "a lot of us had serious questions about the 'the president is a cocaine addict story,' and [Tyrrell's] sources ... But he does believe in these things, and it is his magazine."

Tyrrell did not return several phone calls from Salon.

A massive can of worms.

Hillary Clinton's Trading Of Money From Developers For Bill "Earmarks" Draws LA Times Article' - John McCain Calls It Corrupt

It's about time this matter was given the attention it so needed.

YRACUSE, N.Y. — It's a real estate developer's sugar-plum dream: a mega-shopping mall complete with 10 Broadway-style theaters, an indoor river, a Tuscan village and a 39-story luxury hotel sheathed in green solar panels shaped like giant blades of grass. Plus as much as $1 billion in government-backed financing, thanks in part to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Not everyone thinks the plan, known as Destiny USA and still in the early bulldozer stage, is a good idea. Many on the Syracuse City Council consider its tax breaks a waste of public money. Others fear it could damage the struggling downtown area. Others question whether all its dazzling features will ever be built.

One thing is clear, however: Destiny is a classic example of how New York's junior senator has embraced old-fashioned pork-barrel politics, first to build power in the state, then to extend it nationwide as she becomes a leading candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

And to fuel her rise, Clinton has relied on the controversial funding device known as "earmarking." The earmarks enabled her to win favor with important constituents, many of whom provided financial support for her campaigns.

In the case of Destiny, she teamed up with other New York lawmakers to secure federal backing for the private investment project. And she collected tens of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from the developer and others associated with the project.

Nor does the Syracuse project stand alone. From the beginning of her Senate career, Clinton saw earmarks -- which enable lawmakers to bypass the normal budget process and insert narrowly drafted spending provisions directly into legislation -- as a key to funneling aid to a depressed area and building political power among normally Republican-leaning voters.

Since taking office in 2001, Clinton has delivered $500 million worth of earmarks that have specifically benefited 59 corporations. About 64% of those corporations provided funds to her campaigns through donations made by employees, executives, board members or lobbyists, a review by the Los Angeles Times shows.

All told, Clinton has earmarked more than $2.3 billion in federal appropriations for projects in her state since her election to the Senate, much of it for public works projects funded in conjunction with fellow Democratic Sen. Charles E. Schumer and others in the New York congressional delegation.

A different scale

Clinton is not the biggest earmarker in Congress; senior congressional leaders and members of the appropriations committees can and do write many more such provisions into the huge spending bills they draft. But Clinton does significantly more earmarking than most others with her relatively low level of seniority.

Clinton's staff said she used the earmark privilege effectively for her constituents and denied any connection between her legislative action and campaign contributions.

Her record stands in contrast with others in the Senate seeking the presidency, particularly John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.). McCain, who has long opposed earmarks, does not write them. Obama has used the device, but now declines to earmark funds for private companies; he uses earmarks only to secure funds for government projects such as road building and hospital construction. Other senators seeking the presidency provide earmarks to home-state constituents and collect donations from recipients of the federal largesse. But The Times review found that Clinton does it on a different scale.

For example, in the appropriations bills that have passed the Senate so far this year, Clinton earmarked 216 separate projects for a total of $236.6 million. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) secured $112.8 million; Obama earmarked $90.4 million, and Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) earmarked projects totaling $70.8 million.

Since Clinton arrived in the Senate, she has collected in excess of $1 million from earmark beneficiaries and their associates.

"This pattern shows that Clinton has made aggressive use of the pay-to-play earmark game," said Keith Ashdown, research director for the Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington.

The practice of congressional earmarking has a long history. But in recent years, its use has skyrocketed, and earmarking has emerged at the center of high-profile scandals, including the one that sent former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham of Rancho Santa Fe and former lobbyist Jack Abramoff, both Republicans, to prison. Those scandals involved earmarks that led to the personal enrichment of lawmakers. There is no evidence of that in Clinton's case.

Because of the scandals, the practice of earmarking has become the subject of a heated debate among politicians, watchdog groups and good-government advocates.

Critics of earmarking object that it remains a relatively closed process that adds billions in spending directives, often over the objection of the president and Cabinet departments.

Democrats made earmark reform a priority when they took over Congress in January. The Senate passed rules making it easier to identify the authors of the once-secretive practice.

Clinton supported those basic reforms, but she and other Democratic senators running for president balked at a proposal by Obama that would have required members to disclose their proposed earmark requests, not just those that were enacted into law.

More...

Obamas and Oprah Wow New Hampshire - Give Access To Bloggers

On top of the rallies in Iowa and South Carolina, Senator Barack Obama and his wife Michelle joined again in New Hampshire, with a crowd estimated at 9,000 people who came out in the snow to hear the trio. But what's equally amazing is the full access give to bloggers and student newspapers to cover the event, a fact pointed out by DailyKos writer JHutson.

I can't remember this much excitement ever in politics and I do believe it will translate into victory for Senator Obama, and a new direction for America.

Oprah Winfrey and Senator Barack Obama Draw 29,000 In South Carolina - NY Times

COLUMBIA, S.C. — It was a staggering sight. Upwards of 29,000 people at a political rally. And the Democratic primary in South Carolina is not until Jan. 26.

The Double O Express — Oprah for Obama — drew what is easily the biggest crowd at a campaign event, for any candidate, so far this season. It may have helped that the day was unseasonably warm, above 70 degrees, and gorgeously sunny. But this size crowd is rare even for a general election in the fall. (JFK drew about 35,000 for a Labor Day rally in 1960; get to work, Caucus readers, and tell us if you know of a bigger campaign rally without an incumbent president.)

This event, which was moved to the University of South Carolina’s football stadium to accommodate the crowd, drew mostly African-Americans and, it seemed, more women than men.

About half of the state’s Democratic primary voters are black, and more than half of them are women. So Oprah Winfrey certainly seems to have reached the intended audience, one who will be pivotal to the primary.

And Ms. Winfrey knew her audience. From the moment she stepped on stage — to Aretha Franklin’s “Think” — she established a connection. Referring to her upbringing in Mississippi and Tennessee, she said: “I know something about growing up in the South and know about what it means to come from the South and be born in 1954.”

She did not spell out that 1954 was the year of the landmark Supreme Court decision in Brown vs. Board of Education that desegregated the public schools, but it is a year with resonance in American racial history.

Nor did she explicitly acknowledge that she was addressing a largely black audience about a black candidate. Rather, she spoke, in a somewhat raspy voice, with understood aspiration. “It’s just amazing grace that I get to stand here on this South Carolina stage to talk about the man who’s going to be the next president of the United States,” she said. Mr. Obama, she said, “speaks to the potential inside every one of us.”

Ms. Winfrey noted that some say Mr. Obama should “wait his turn.” But, she said, “I wouldn’t be where I am if I waited on the people who told me it couldn’t be.” The audience erupted with applause.

Her low-key approach to the fact that Mr. Obama is black reflected in his own low-key approach to the issue. This was very different from the much more explicit rallies for Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton, African-American candidates for the Democratic nomination in past elections.

Those who saw Ms. Winfrey speak in Iowa on Saturday said that she appeared more comfortable here, even though the venue was a giant stadium that seats 80,000. She made a remark about what Southern humidity can do to a girl’s hair. And when she spoke of “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,” there was a knowing response from her listeners.

In perhaps her most overt racial reference, and a diversion from the Iowa script, Ms. Winfrey said here: “Dr. King dreamed the dream. But we don’t have to just dream the dream anymore. We get to vote that dream into reality.”

While the crowd went wild for her, they were subdued for moments of her 18-minute speech, when she read from a prepared text from behind a lectern. She reflected the awkwardness of delivering the necessary but canned lines and read through them quickly.

The big question remains whether she can transfer her own popularity to Mr. Obama, which may never be known.

Her appearance today coincides with a new McClatchy-MSNBC poll that puts Mr. Obama and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, his chief rival, in a statistical tie in South Carolina. But a rally as large as this, and with its extensive publicity, could prove reassuring to Obama supporters who are worried that a black man cannot win.

For her part, Ms. Winfrey at once downplayed her influence but pointed to the special nature of Mr. Obama’s candidacy.

“People are thinking, is this going to be like my book club?” she said. “I’ve got some sense,” she said, suggesting to the crowd that she was not expecting them to follow her blindly. At the same time, she added: “I know the difference between a book club and this seminal moment in our history.”

Most people here to whom the Caucus spoke said they were already Obama supporters.

Michella Troy, 36, a programmer analyst, said she came for both Ms. Winfrey and Mr. Obama. “He’s making sure that things are being addressed,” she said of Mr. Obama. “He’s focused on the middle class and not on the rich.” Ms. Winfrey, she said, can help motivate people.

Ms. Troy and her friend, Deitra Golson, 39, who works at the post office, said they were both eager to vote for an African-American. “We’re excited about making history,” Ms. Golson said.

Vernelle Heyward, 51, a homemaker who drove from Beaufort, said she was already supporting Mr. Obama, saying “he has our interest at heart.” Like many others, she said she was glad Ms. Winfrey was here for Mr. Obama but she doubted she would influence many votes.

Among white voters, Elizabeth Montgomery, 55, a teacher who drove almost three hours from Pawley’s Island, said she had been a volunteer for Mr. Obama long before Ms. Winfrey announced her endorsement. “He’s the only one who will bring real change, and I trust his judgment,” Ms. Montgomery said, adding that he had won her over with his opposition to the war in Iraq.

And David Clyburn, 75, a retired United Methodist clergyman, said he respected Ms. Winfrey for supporting a senator from her own state, Illinois. “She’s not a hired Hollywood gun,” he said. But he, too, had already made up his mind to support Mr. Obama, and had already persuaded his daughter, Debra Lyles, 49, director of child and family services at a community mental health center, to support him, too.

Among the undecideds was A. Jewell Moore, 61, a project manager for public schools. She said she liked Mrs. Clinton, too, and would have a tough time making up her mind. She said Ms. Winfrey would not influence her decision. But she came today to show her daughter, Savannah, 14, who wants to be a lawyer, that she could be up on a stage like Ms. Winfrey and Mr. Obama some day herself.

Ms. Winfrey, Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle, exited the stage to an interesting tune: Stevie Wonder singing “Signed, Sealed, Delivered.”

DailKos Writer Attacks Netroots For Positions On Obama

This is an interesting presentation of how some "netroots" don't support Barack Obama, but also a window into why some have changed to now back Barack Obama. I do agree with Senator Obama that it's easy to predict what the Daily Kos writers are goiing to bring to a discussion; all too predictable.

The blogosphere's problem with Barack Obama
by PsiFighter37 [Subscribe]

Sun Dec 09, 2007 at 11:06:28 AM PST

In the past couple of days, there have been some particularly incendiary pieces written about Barack Obama by prominent bloggers within the netroots community. First, Jerome Armstrong over at MyDD decided to post two entries that attacked Obama - one for what his spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said about Paul Krugman; the other was about how Oprah Winfrey allegedly helped George W. Bush in 2000. Both were off-base, and they're fairly indicative of the decline in quality at MyDD that's occurred since Chris Bowers and Matt Stoller left the site to start Open Left. The other piece, penned by Taylor Marsh, speaks of Obama's 'progressive cannibalism' - which becomes a completely digressive attack on just about any straw she can reach for.

One thing to highlight, though, is that it's Obama - and only Obama - that has been the target of these kinds of irrational attacks. Neither Hillary Clinton or John Edwards have been targeted in the same manner. Why?

PsiFighter37's diary :: ::
I don't think that the vast majority of the netroots has a vested dislike of Obama. As I wrote in a diary a few months back about my disappointment with Obama:

Obama was a cipher - in all manners, including ones that the magazine skipped over. His rhetoric can be seen in many different ways, and what he believes can also be subject to interpretation. And the problem is that after his speech in 2004, he became everything to everyone. It was inevitable as the primary campaign aged, Obama would become something less of a cipher to some of us. Unfortunately, what I've seen is a letdown. Some might call it pragmatism, but he's been very cautious with his rhetoric. His calls for 'change' ring fairly hollow, as it's become quite clear that Obama has been the consummate politician since he entered the Illinois State Senate. He has an amazing base of support, but the campaign is afraid to let anyone else have control.

That being said, times have changed since September, when his campaign was in a malaise and he could get no traction. His rhetoric has become better, highlighted by his speech at the Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner in Iowa. One part of his platform - about modernizing our technology infrastructure - was well-received, even swaying Stoller (who had previously written off Obama) to say that such proposals were pushing him to lean towards supporting Obama. And there is no doubting that of the serious candidates, Obama is the most liberal of them all - and he has the ability to convey progressive themes that will attract people of all political stripes to his candidacy. No one else has demonstrated they can do or will do that. With an election coming up that could arguably swing the direction of this country for a generation, it's important to have someone who can effect real reforms in Washington.

There are a couple of reasons that Obama is taking a couple of hits. First, the blogosphere is once again stepping into the trap of becoming little more than a group of purity trolls. None of our candidates are perfect, but we're letting that be the enemy of pretty damn good. Some of our candidates are better than others; there's no doubt about that. But I feel that people have such astronomical expectations of what Obama - a person who has lived and breathed the American dream his entire life, a politician who was the most liberal state senator in Illinois, and was probably one of the only Democratic senators to get something useful passed when Congress was controlled by the GOP (the Coburn-Obama bill that increased government transparency) - can do. But they're inevitably let down because he doesn't meet those standards. It's clear that he's his own person and always has been, though. Whether you've read his books or listened to him speak, it's clear that he has his own way of going about politics. His stump speeches can at times resemble that of a fiery pastor or a college professor. But he's not going to be the firebrand (in the verbal sense) that Howard Dean was in 2003. I get the feeling that many in the netroots are very easily swayed by people who talk the talk, but walking the walk doesn't get much credit.

For those of you who weren't around back then, Obama actually came to Daily Kos and made two posts more than two years ago (seen here and here). There was obviously a lot of passion within these entries, but I think there was a great deal of disillusionment from Obama after the experience. As he later said about Daily Kos:

Obama’s first year in office, he voted for cloture on the nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court (though not for the nomination itself), earning dozens of angry posts on Daily Kos, a hugely well-trafficked liberal blog. Obama responded with a polite but stern four-page note.

"One good test as to whether folks are doing interesting work is, Can they surprise me?" he tells me. "And increasingly, when I read Daily Kos, it doesn’t surprise me. It’s all just exactly what I would expect."

While the netroots have traditionally played the role of attack dogs, they have demonstrated little, if any, willingness to play a serious role in partnering with the Democratic Party when it comes to governing. Sure, we'll raise money for candidates who talk a good game but are by no means progressive, but we rarely take action unless someone panders to our sense of self-importance (see Chris Dodd in the past couple of months). Obama doesn't do that; it's fairly clear that he walks to the beat of his own drummer and won't become someone he's not just to win a few nice words.

The netroots needs to understand this about Obama: he's not going to ever be the person who comes out and says he's sick of listening to religious fundamentalists running the country. That's not his style. But that doesn't mean he's not the most progressive candidate with a serious chance of winning the presidency in a generation. Netroots activists need to stop fooling themselves into believing in a definition of 'progressivism' that is false. Howard Dean would not have governed as a liberal if he were elected, and he certainly didn't govern as one when he was Vermont's governor. Hillary Clinton is no liberal, either in rhetoric or in governance. But I have trouble with folks like Jerome Armstrong, a self-described libertarian, telling us that Obama isn't progressive enough. I have trouble with people like Taylor Marsh, as transparent a shill for Hillary Clinton as there is without stating so, telling me that Obama isn't progressive enough. Why? Because in the end, they're about tooting their own horn. Armstrong is hardly involved in the netroots anymore and has effectively abandoned the movement he helped to create. He was working for Mark Warner, who is nothing if not the personification of the DLC. Marsh abused MyDD's 'Breaking Blue' feature for months on end to simply post links to her own blog. Certain bloggers are simply nothing more than self-promoters - not people truly interested in pushing for a new brand of transformative progressive politics. I don't like impugning people's motives, but especially with these two, it is extremely difficult to accept their words at face value.

In the end, the blogosphere needs to accept Barack Obama for who he is. He is not going to pander to you, nor is he going to work within the frameworks that are already set up by the netroots for how outreach on the Internet is supposed to be done. But he's doing a pretty damn good job of setting up a movement of hundreds of thousands of Americans across the country that want something different. Just because he may not be doing it our way doesn't mean he's not a progressive. It just means that his belief about what progressivism is - in the political sense and in the activist sense - are different.

And maybe, just maybe, he's right.

John McCain - In TV Ad Claims A Backbone Of Steel - But Do Voters Care?

U.S. Senator John McCain, a person I admire very much even though I don't back him for president, has come out with a new campaign ad with Red Sox pitcher Curt Shilling stating that McCain has "a backbone of steel" -- but will the 30 second spot translate to votes?

I think the basic error is really in that not a lot of people who vote know who Curt Shilling is without a proper annoucement; that wasn't in the video.

Stay tuned.