The Note: Of Chaos and Comity

May 30, 2008 -- The marathon that has been the Democratic race is now a sprint -- and while the race may be over (and certain powerbrokers seek to set the finish line), the frontrunner is stumbling, again.

From the ice and snow of Iowa and New Hampshire to the bowling and beer of Pennsylvania and Indiana . . . the hopes and aspirations of an inspired Democratic Party lift us into the quintessence of America: a hotel function room, in our nation's capital.

(Smoking is banned at Marriott properties, but ladies and gentlemen, we bring you the smoke-filled room, circa 2008. And if you don't see enough chaos inside, if you look outside and squint, you might just see 1-9-6-8.)

And a fresh wrinkle for these party insiders (and their brethren) to consider: Yet another entry into this strange new genre of the problematic pastor, this year's version of the angry ex-shipmate.

Once again, the venue was Sen. Barack Obama's Trinity United -- and the timing will not help Democrats' efforts to heal old wounds.

"The Democratic Party is trying to unite, they're trying to come together, but that might not be easy, especially with these recent comments from a long-time friend of Sen. Obama's," ABC's Jake Tapper reported on "Good Morning America" Friday. "Horrible timing for this controversy, right before the Democratic Party ruling on Michigan and Florida."

The Rev. Michael Pfleger's bizarre, inexplicable, tin-eared mockery of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton earns a featured spot on the Obama-friend lowlight reel, alongside the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers in the loop that's going to haunt superdelegates up until (and possibly well beyond) the time that there's a nominee.

Pfleger, in his own words: "I really believe that she just always thought, 'This is mine. I'm Bill's wife, I'm white, and this is mine. I just gotta get up and step into the plate and then out of nowhere came, "Hey, I'm Barack Obama," ' and she said, 'Oh, damn. Where did you come from? I'm white. I'm entitled. There's a black man stealing my show.' "

Then comes the mockery of Clinton's tears. "She wasn't the only one crying," Pfleger said.

Obama learned the lessons of Wright, this time issuing a quick denunciation -- though one that the Clinton campaign didn't find sufficient. (This lets Clinton play party uniter, at least for a day, but it's gut-check time for Camp Clinton: How much to press this storyline?)

This is another pastor with whom Obama has had a deep relationship -- going back 20 years. Obama even won state-budget earmarks with $225,000 for programs associated with Pfleger's church while in the state senate, per the Chicago Tribune's examination last May.

"It happens that there were major supporters in my district who had been supporters before they got member initiatives," Obama told the Chicago Tribune a year ago, when those earmarks were first examined.

This is some sort of Obama nightmare -- and the venue is simply not to be believed.

"His comments threaten to resurrect the politically radioactive Rev. Jeremiah Wright as a campaign issue,"Lynn Sweet writes in the Chicago Sun-Times. "Pfleger is a longtime Obama friend and was in the audience at the National Press Club for that Wright press conference, and when we talked afterward, he realized Wright created a problem for Obama. I was told Pfleger's comments stunned some in the Obama camp because they expected him to be more politically savvy -- and not take on Clinton,especially at Trinity, of all places."

ABC's George Stephanopoulos, on "GMA," talked of the raw feelings between the campaigns and their supporters: "This is going to make that worse."

Per the Tribune's John McCormick and Manya A. Brachear: " Pfleger gave Obama's campaign $1,500 between 1995 and 2001, including $200 in April 2001, about three months after Obama announced $225,000 in grants to St. Sabina programs."

From the AP write-up (just one of dozens of data points already compiled by the good oppo folks): Pfleger "also has hosted Louis Farrakhan, the controversial leader of the Nation of Islam, at St. Sabina and has called him 'a gift from God to a sick, sick world.' "

Adds Michael Saul of the New York Daily News: "Last year, the Obama campaign brought Pfleger to Iowa to host one of several interfaith forums for the campaign."

(Anyone still wondering what's kept Clinton in the race?)

Yet with the high drama of Saturday's DNC Rules & Bylaws Committee meeting (mostly) sapped, this most-hyped meeting may serve as a reminder of the diminishing leverage the Clintons enjoy.

She still controls her own timeline -- and don't expect Obama to push unless he has to. But the campaign has progressed to a point where every passing day takes just a bit of her flexibility away from her -- the inevitable (irony alert) crowding her space.

An unmistakable signal, from the Big Three: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid met with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in San Francisco Thursday, and they're banding together with DNC Chairman Howard Dean to make sure this campaign ends promptly.

"We agree there won't be a fight at the convention," said Reid, D-Nev., per ABC's Z. Byron Wolf. "The time has come to make a decision."

Said Reid, later in the day Thursday: "By this time next week, it will all be over, give or take a day."

"We cannot take this fight to the convention," Pelosi, D-Calif., told the San Francisco Chronicle. "It must be over before then."

Per The New York Times' Carl Hulse, Pelosi and Reid "had been contacting uncommitted superdelegates, encouraging them to prepare to go public and resolve any last question about the contest. . . . Given Mr. Obama's lead in the delegate race and potential support among the approximately 200 members of Congress and Democratic insiders who have yet to declare, the push to wind up the race works to his benefit."

"The push, which began this week, is damaging to Clinton, whose fading candidacy would be best-served by prolonging the contest," the Los Angeles Times' Peter Nicholas and Janet Hook report. "Clinton could use the time to press her case to superdelegates -- the elected officials and other insiders whose votes will decide the nominee -- that she is more electable than her front-running rival, Barack Obama. A delay also would improve the odds of a game-changing stumble by Obama."

The moves signal "there is little support among the party's institutional leaders for a drawn-out fight by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) to secure support from unpledged super-delegates," Paul Kane write for The Washington Post.

Two more super-D's for Obama on Friday: Boyd Richie, the chairman of the Texas Democratic Party, and his wife, Betty. (The magic number is now 41 -- though it's almost certain to grow with Saturday's DNC action.)

At least one more big endorsement is on deck: Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., is promising to endorse Tuesday morning -- and you only get one guess as to who he has in mind: "I'm not undecided, just unpledged," he told the Stamford Advocate's Alexandra Fenwick.

Per ABC's Jake Tapper: "The question is not whether Clyburn will come out for Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, but how many other Representatives come off the fence."

Here's part of what has party leaders worried: "On Saturday they may have a new image problem on their hands: the specter of angry hordes of Clinton supporters showing up at the Washington meeting of the Democratic National Committee's Rules & Bylaws Committee to protest against the disenfranchisement of 2.3 million voters in Florida and Michigan," Time's Jay Newton-Small reports. "One generally doesn't protest something that one expects to win. And that should give a pretty good hint of the likely outcome on Saturday."

Per the AP's Calvin Woodward: "At least several busloads of Clinton supporters were anticipated from Florida and perhaps scores of people from Michigan as well as demonstrators from various parts of the country. Barack Obama's campaign discouraged a counterprotest, although his supporters vied with Clinton backers for the limited public seats inside the meeting."

There will be some influential Clinton allies who ARE the meeting: "I could possibly" vote against Clinton's interests, Harold Ickes tells The Wall Street Journal's June Kronholz, "but it's highly unlikely."

But loyalty has limits: "Harold Ickes, Clinton's chief delegate hunter, warned that there may be some defections among the 13 RBC members who have endorsed Hillary," Huffington Post's Tom Edsall reports. "If Ickes and his allies cannot hold all their troops in line, a motion before the RBC to seat all 210 Florida and 156 Michigan delegates with a full vote each would face certain defeat."

There's some chance that this weekend doesn't solve anything: "Democratic strategists and other analysts foresee a resolution this weekend -- one that positions Obama to wrap up the nomination soon -- but there's always a chance Team Clinton opts to appeal to the party's credentials committee, which does not meet until summer," Linda Feldmann reports in the Christian Science Monitor.

Think this will be easy? "Top Michigan Democrats yesterday rebelled against a plan to seat just half of the state's delegates, demanding that the national party seat them all -- and give a majority to Hillary Rodham Clinton,"Daphne Retter and Maggie Haberman write in the New York Post. "The plea to the Democratic National Committee's Rules and Bylaws Committee from four prominent pols, including uncommitted Sen. Carl Levin, comes amid controversy over how to represent Michigan and Florida at the August convention."

Clinton chugs on -- even issuing a post-primaries travel advisory to reporters, with sign-ups available through June 6, per ABC's Eloise Harper. Said spokesman Jay Carson: "There are a lot of places for us to go between June 4 and November." (Indeed.)

That's a lot of new drinks to try: "One of the amusing sidelights of Mrs. Clinton's uphill struggles of recent months has been her evolving taste in liquid refreshment," Mark Leibovich writes in The New York Times, noting that cranberry juice and hot tea has turned into Makers Mark as her drink of choice on the trail.

Her backers still care, deeply: "Her staunchest supporters still pack her rallies, swarm her rope-line for autographs and brandish signs urging her to keep running," per The Wall Street Journal's Matt Phillips.

Clinton grabs the endorsement of the (South Dakota) Argus Leader: "Clinton is the strongest Democratic candidate for South Dakota," reads the editorial. "Her mastery of complex policy detail is broad and deep, and her experience as a senator and former first lady matches that." And: "Measured against her opponent, Clinton is philosophically more moderate. That is likely a good thing for South Dakota."

This is why Obama has to be careful in handling this delicate time: "The conversations I had this week with prominent female politicians from around the country who support Clinton suggest that the fury and disappointment is more than short-term maneuvering," Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne Jr. writes. "In many cases, it is rooted in the empathy of women who themselves broke gender barriers at various levels of politics."

"Is it at all reasonable to believe, even if lots of women are mad at Obama right now, that McCain is the guy to reel them in?" Jennifer Rubin writes in a New York Observer op-ed. "The answer is, it depends on what he does. Though it may not be apparent just yet, McCain will have a few tools at his disposal to at least boost his share of the female vote in a head-to-head race against Obama."

The race is fast running out of marking points: Saturday's DNC meeting is followed closely by voting in Puerto Rico Sunday -- 55 delegates are at stake. Then it's Montana and South Dakota Tuesday, then (dare we say?) the end.

"Once delegates are allocated in Montana and South Dakota on Tuesday, [Obama] is expected to be within a whisker of his party's nod -- and that's even when you consider that the 'magic number' will be higher than the current 2,026," per ABC's Teddy Davis, Talal Al-Khatib, and Gregory Wallace.

McCain, apparently under the weather, canceled his public events for Friday, which is a dicey thing to do when you're in the middle of vice-presidential speculation.

Obama campaigns in Montana Friday, while Clinton is back in Puerto Rico. Get the full political schedule in The Note's "Sneak Peek."

Don't miss former ambassador Joe Wilson Friday's "National Journal On Air" -- Tammy Haddad's guest, as Wilson shares his first public comments on Scott McClellan's book.

The General:

The fall race continues -- and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has found ways to move the race to favorable terrain. "After a strong push from Sen. John McCain's allies, the war in Iraq has moved back to center stage in the presidential election, with McCain attacking Sen. Barack Obama for making up his mind about the war without visiting the war zone and Obama charging that McCain has yet to learn the lessons of President Bush's mistakes," Jonathan Weisman writes in The Washington Post.

But what if Obama likes this landscape, too? "Both campaigns think the Iraq debate will work to their advantage," Weisman writes."McCain and the Republican Party will use it to paint their likely general-election opponent as a foreign policy naif, too weak to defend the country. Obama and his Democratic allies will turn the war into a proxy for their efforts to portray a McCain victory as a third Bush term."

Possible next front: The American Israel Public Affairs Committee meeting in Washington, where all three candidates are scheduled to appear Wednesday.

"The Aipac conference will also be the next stage in the American presidential contest, pitting senators McCain and Obama in the same forum to discuss America's relationship with the Jewish state," Eli Lake writes for the New York Sun. "Both the Republican and Democratic likely nominees have traded barbs in the last month on issues of particular concern to supporters of Israel, such as America's diplomatic policy toward Iran."

Do the gaffes add up for Obama? Wall Street Journal columnist John Fund thinks . . . possibly. "As smart and credentialed as he is, Sen. Obama is often an indifferent speaker without a teleprompter," Fund writes. "He has large gaps in his knowledge base, and is just as likely to dig in and embrace a policy misstatement as abandon it."

(Is this something a speechwriter can solve -- even if that speechwriter is the handsome and talented Jon Favreau -- the subject of a grass-roots effort by "friends" for reality-show fame?)

Do the lobbyist ties add up for McCain? Bloomberg's Edwin Chen and Jonathan Salant:"McCain has lost five top aides amid suggestions that his campaign was dominated by lobbyists, a shakeup that's created tension among remaining staffers; his image as a crusader against 'special interests' has been tarnished; and his response to the first rough patch of his general-election race leaves him vulnerable to further attacks, because lobbyists and former lobbyists continue to help his candidacy, including as fundraisers."

Is this a bigger problem for McCain? "Senator McCain's two chief policy planks in his general election platform thus far are drawing mixed reviews from some conservative activists and scholars, who are voicing approval of his prescription for health care while criticizing his proposal to combat climate change with a cap-and-trade program," the New York Sun's Russell Berman writes.

Or is this? "The presumed Republican presidential nominee is taking a serious drubbing on YouTube, the most popular video-sharing service on the Internet and the virtual town square for millions of new young voters," James Rainey writes in the Los Angeles Times.

Life of Barack:

Obama "has been given a clean bill of health to run for president," per ABC's Dr. Tim Johnson, Susan Wagner, and Sunlen Miller. The only blemish, per his doctor, David Scheiner: "His own history included intermittent cigarette smoking. . . . He has quit this practice on several occasions and is currently using Nicorette gum with success."

But this was sparse stuff: "The letter is the first publicly released information about Mr. Obama's medical history or current condition. The six-paragraph, one-page statement summarized the senator's health for the last 21 years," per Lawrence K. Altman and Jeff Zeleny of The New York Times.

They sound satisfied? "A spokesman for Mr. Obama said his campaign would not make Dr. Scheiner available for a telephone interview. Aides have said Mr. Obama's medical record is thin because he has not had any serious health problems."

Life of John:

It's profile time (again) for McCain -- and there's a neat timeline that emerges in a three-pack published Friday.

The New York Times' David D. Kirkpatrick, on McCain's decision to turn to politics: "After five and a half years of listening to senators' antiwar speeches over prison camp loudspeakers, Mr. McCain came home in 1973 contemptuous of America's elected officials, convinced Congress had betrayed the country's fighting men by hamstringing the war effort. But in the halls of the Senate, he discovered a new calling, at once high-minded and glamorous." The Los Angeles Times' Richard A. Serrano, on McCain's first run for Congress: "Some Arizonans dismissed him as a carpetbagger shopping for an available House seat -- and a future in Washington politics. Others were annoyed that he had left the wife who waited valiantly for his return from a Hanoi prison, and that he had then married a much younger bride. His political opponents derided his marriage into Arizona's Hensley beer distributor fortune as a 'money-in-law' arrangement to boost his campaign coffers."

(Early warning from an early political opponent: "How do you debate issues important to Arizona like groundwater contamination when everyone is talking about him as a POW celebrity?")

The Boston Globe's Sasha Issenberg, on McCain's early career in Congress: "McCain's inaugural campaign and his first, low-profile term in Congress were crucial to the formation of his political identity, according to a review of McCain's congressional papers made available to the Globe," Issenberg writes.

"Many of the issues McCain first encountered then have stayed with him as a presidential candidate a generation later," he continues. "He allied himself with environmentalist and immigrant causes popular among Democrats, while showing little zeal for social issues, such as abortion, dear to many Republicans. When it came to national security, McCain feared repeating the quagmire of Vietnam -- and believed earning public support was crucial to military success abroad."

Reaching back a bit further into his biography . . . McCain this week gave an interview for the DVD release of the 1987 film, "The Hanoi Hilton." Writes Variety's Ted Johnson:"The movie could undoubtedly help McCain's campaign remind voters of his Vietnam experience, but it is still uncertain whether it will be released before the election."

The Scottie Files:

Scott McClellan's media tour continues. Thursday night, with ABC's Martha Raddatz on "World News," he responded to the criticism: "No one questioned my loyalty to the president when I was there," McClellan said. "But there's a higher loyalty, there's a higher loyalty to the truth, it's a loyalty to the values I was raised upon which are speaking up, which are making a positive difference."

Interesting side note -- providing a hint of why this was such a shocker: "There are a number of signs that McClellan's focus hardened over time," Dan Eggen and Linton Weeks write in The Washington Post. "A book cover still depicted yesterday on Amazon.com, for example, had the subtitle ending with 'What's Wrong with Washington' rather than 'Washington's Culture of Deception.' "

McClellan still knows how to handle talking points: "McClellan's former White House colleagues had built and trained the former press secretary to parrot their talking points, monotonously if not mindlessly, no matter what argument or fact stood in the way," Dana Milbank writes in The Washington Post. "But now the McClellan monster is back -- and he's got a new set of talking points that attack the very people he was trained to defend. He's a bit thinner around the middle, and the sideburns are comically longer, but McClellan's famous fealty to his message is as stubborn as ever."

The Post's Dan Balz recommends the book to those who aspire to places inside the White House bubble. The people who should sit down and read Scott McClellan's blockbuster new book are the people least likely to take the time to do so right now," Balz writes. "At heart, his book is the story of a modest and perhaps naïve political operative caught between personal loyalty and ambition on the one hand, and a crisis of conscience that did not fully flower until after he put distance between himself and his White House days."

McClellan stars in a new anti-McCain Web video, produced by the DNC.

Odds & Ends:

The Christian Science Monitor's Dante Chinni takes note of some Obama e-mails that serve a few different purposes: "His campaign has proven to have the upper hand in organizing with the Web and e-mail," Chinni reports "About a week ago all his followers received an e-mail asking for 'Your feedback.' It showcases Obama's greatest strength: the ability to take a campaign that is increasingly centered on the candidate and continue to reflect it back on 'you' -- his supporters."

"The latest e-mail gets pretty personal," he continues. "A recipient who clicks the link to provide the feedback is taken to a page asking for all sorts of information (with their ZIP Code already filled in). The issues he or she cares about are at the top of the list. Other questions are about occupation, religious service attendance, group self-affiliation, volunteering history, donation history, and whether he or she speaks Spanish. It is the type of data typically gathered to develop a marketing strategy - or, say, a targeted general election campaign."

Has it come to this? "For a mere $25, Ron Paulians can order a grab bag of magnets, buttons, stickers, mouse pads, key chains, hats, wrist bands 'and more!,' " per ABC's Z. Byron Wolf. "The package will also include a single t-shirt. And if that's not enough to sway you, the $25 includes shipping."

Wolf continues: "While he realizes he can't win, Paul is still encouraging people to vote for him. His plan is to take delegates to the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis in September and demonstrate that the libertarian wing of the Republican party is not going away."

The Kicker:

"He's become a rock star, it's fantastic." -- Rupert Murdoch, on his new political crush, on Barack Obama.

"I'm intrigued by Sen. Obama's message." -- Scott McClellan, to ABC's Martha Raddatz, on his new (possible) crush.

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