As we get deeper into the primary season and with Labor day past, things will start revving up. The first primary will be in four months and we'll see the lesser candidates dropping once that begins.

Here's the latest in a series rating the Oval Office hopefuls on the Democrat side.

UP

Hillary Clinton: Clinton was rolling along, not taking too many hard shots and avoiding taking a stand on the major issues. She's played to her audience and she has comfortably maintained a solid lead with neither Barack Obama nor John Edwards able to get serious traction against her. Enter Norman Hsu, the former-fugitive "Hill-Raiser" who amassed donations from myriad sources and is under scrutiny for possibly reimbursing donors to several prominent Democrats, Hillary being the most well-known. This is the type of scandal the GOP needed and they will hammer Clinton mercilessly with it as it is a scandal that is easy to explain to the American people. The public already has made their decision on Hillary, there's generally no middle ground with the exception of maybe 5% so the effects of the scandal will be interesting to see play out. It may just be enough to allow the GOP to use the Clinton-Bush fatigue factor to win the general if she is, as expected, the nominee.

STEADY

Barack Obama: Obama is certainly an attractive candidate and has captured the youthful vote who want change and believe Obama the man to do it. In my humble opinion, he started the campaign too early to capitalize on the wave of being the first African-American in the race and has been on the stump so long now that he has lost his luster. His youth has allowed him to campaign continuously and it has cost him somewhat as he has made inane statements that will come back to bite him. The Clinton juggernaut will sink Obama when it finally kicks into high gear and he'll find himself on the defense constantly. Overall, Obama is a good candidate and he will be a player in the 2012 or 2016 campaigns, unfortunately for him, his inexperience has been more than evident and has hampered his campaign to this point.

DOWN

John Edwards: Edwards has not been able to gain much traction against either Hillary or Obama and has struggled to stay in double-digits in polls. In fact, his current polling average is 11.6% with several below the ten per cent threshold while Hillary is averaging 37.4% and Obama is at 21.4%, nearly double that of Edwards. The issue with Edwards is the way he comes off to most Americans. He seems elitist and his populist rhetoric seems to ring hollow. Even when talking about his major campaign themes, he sounds as if he's telling us what we'll do instead of asking us to join him and make changes. It doesn't come across well to the public and you see the ineffectiveness in his numbers. In my opinion, Edwards has run the worst campaign of any of the front-runners; he has stumbled and made huge missteps that show that he is just not ready for prime time. Edwards should be gaining on the two leaders but just can't seem to grab the attention of the party as a whole. Many Democrats know that Hillary in the general would get beaten and want someone to challenge her, Edwards just hasn't lived up to that expectation and as a veteran on the presidential campaign stump, he had an advantage over Barack Obama that he's thus far failed to exploit.

Bill Richardson: Richardson was behind the eight-ball from the beginning. He's the Governor of a state that is not well-known to many and he has failed to build on his experience in the Clinton administration, especially his diplomatic experience that is by far the most extensive in the field. He's a tough negotiator and has dealt with some tough nations. With Hillary, Obama and Edwards constantly getting the ink and pixels, Richardson has fallen by the wayside and is polling poorly, often only 1-5%. My assessment is that he will drop out after the first primaries and support Hillary while angling for the Vice Presidential spot or a high cabinet position. Whoever wins the nomination could do worse than putting Richardson on the ticket.

The other candidates are not mentioned due to space restrictions, but none seem to be edging upward at this point. This is a crucial time for the candidates as the public will start to pay attention and the polling data may start to shift. The war in Iraq, illegal immigration and healthcare will remain major issues as the campaigns move on, it should be interesting to see if any of the candidates can erase Hillary's sizable lead.

Previous Cattle Call here.

Wednesday marked the two-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The storm devastated the city of New Orleans, along with many other places on the Gulf Coast. John Edwards used New Orleans to launch his 2008 presidential campaign, while fellow Democratic hopefuls Sen. Chris Dodd and Gov. Bill Richardson criticized the Bush administration's response to Katrina during the South Carolina debate. President Bush spoke in New Orleans on Wednesday and sounded encouraging, but the situation seems anything but. Much of the city is still devastated, and tax breaks tied to Katrina are helping investors develop luxury football condos near the University of Alabama. Bob and Susannah discuss Katrina in the latest "Running Gags"!

Merci to my muse for the idea...

Return with me if you will to the last time we had a slate of candidates running for the presidency in 2003-2004. There were many issues discussed. Some of them -- including he Iraq war -- are still issues. But perhaps the greatest issue was military service. Being on active duty meant you had a view on war that was more nuanced and righteous than those who did not.

George W. Bush was pilloried by the Kerry campaign, the media and the anti-war left because he did not get activated and sent to Vietnam. This triad sent near-daily press releases detailing John Kerry's 45-days of service as if he were Audie Murphy. The campaign made his Vietnam service the center-point of his campaign--a tactic that back-fired spectacularly once the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth went into action and dispelled the carefully crafted biography Kerry had laid out. The military issue was so prominent that a well-respected newsman--Dan Rather-- lost his job because of a falsified letter he presented as truthful was brilliantly picked apart by bloggers.

Fast-forward to the present; there's zero discussion of military service by either side. Why the sudden change in attitude about whether or not someone served? Simple, only a few have and none of them are Democrats.

Let's look at the candidates and see who did, who didn't and who plain came up with a reason not to serve in the greatest military in the world:

Democrats:

Delaware Sen. Joe Biden: None. Rejected for medical reasons, but would have been eligible in a national emergency.

New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton: None.

Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd: Army Reserve (1969-75).

Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards: None. Draft number was never called.

Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich: None. Was rejected for military service because of a heart murmur.

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama: None. Too young to have been drafted for the Vietnam War.

Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico: None. Received student and medical classifications. Draft number was never called.

• • •

Republicans:

Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback: None. Came of age as draft was ending.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani: None. Received student and occupational deferments. Draft number was never called.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee: None. Came of age as draft was ending.

California Rep. Duncan Hunter: Served as an Army paratrooper and Ranger in Vietnam (1969-71).

Arizona Sen. John McCain: Served in the Navy (1958-81); prisoner of war in Vietnam (1967-73).

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney: None. Received a deferment as a Mormon missionary in France. Was eligible for the draft upon his return to the states but was never selected.

Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo: None. Received student deferments. Was available for military service in 1969. Reclassified in 1970 because of stress-related anxiety and could have been called up only during a pressing national emergency.

Former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson: None. Gained deferment because he had children. (Note: Not on original list, added by author)

Texas Representative Ron Paul: Served in the Army as a Flight Surgeon (1963-1965); Air National Guard (1965-1968) Never served in Vietnam, served in South Korea, Iran, Ethiopia and Turkey. (Note: Not on original list, added by author as an update on 8/22/07 0857))

If we go by the criteria set-forth in 2004, the only candidates who would warrant any attention and would have authority to speak on Iraq are Sen. John McCain, Rep. Ron Paul and Rep. Duncan Hunter. In fact, Hunter's son is currently active duty and boots on the ground. Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John Edwards, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson would not be considered (however Thompson's exemption is more warranted than others). In fact, if we were to silence all who never served from talking about the war, the discussion would be pretty small.

I said it in 2004 and I'll say it again, the Founding Fathers believed strongly in the concept of civilian control of the military. There's a reason the Commander in Chief is the President and not a five star General or Admiral. The Democrats and liberals made it an issue because they had a candidate who had served in Vietnam and the GOP did not. Now that circumstances are different, the fact that their candidates have no service time is not even muttered and that is disengenuous at best.

If I were John McCain and Duncan Hunter, I'd make this a priority on their campaigns, however, most who served are too proud or humble to do that. Of course, John Kerry was neither and wore his like a badge of courage while John McCain -- a man beaten in a POW prison for years -- did not.

The Democrats waged another round of meaningless debate today with George Stephanopoulos' moderating. My first thought upon pouring my coffee and watching this unfold was that Stephanopoulos asked better questions than Dem shill Keith Olbermann. But then again, Karl Marx would have asked better questions, but I digress.

The experience of Barack Obama was a main issue and Hillary Clinton pressed that his comments on meeting with various world leaders just shows his inexperience:

Despite her initially conciliatory tone, when pushed to comment on Obama's position, Clinton reiterated her initial criticism of Obama's statement, saying, "I don't think any president should give away a bargaining chip of a personal meeting with any leader, unless you know what you're going to get out of that."

Finally! Bill Richardson gets some media attention. But this is probably not exactly how he envisioned it.

One of Democratic presidential candidate Bill Richardson's top organizers in rural Nevada resigned Thursday after the campaign learned he had worked for a brothel and was wanted on a felony arrest warrant in California.

"We did not know about all of this," Richardson spokesman Josh McNeil said after the staffer's record was brought to the campaign's attention by The Associated Press. "We accepted his resignation today."

This doesn't even win him any votes in the pro-brothel community, as one of the charges against the guy in question was that he was stiffing the workers their pay. What can you say about a guy that can't run an honest brothel?

For Richardson, apparently a lack of funds also means a lack of means for background checks and such. Either that or building an organization means scraping the bottom of the barrell so to speak. Long term damage to the campaign is minimal, except for the Nevada organization.

Not much of a debate if you ask me. Democratic candidates, one at a time, get asked pointed questions about their position on issues that matter to gays. Ryan Sager has a good liveblogging summary, and the Sun-Sentinel has a write-up:

The candidates underscored differences with Republicans on gay and lesbian rights, but leading candidates also faced aggressive questioning on their reluctance to embrace marriage for same-sex couples.

All of the Democratic candidates support a federal ban on anti-gay job discrimination, want to repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" policy barring gays from serving openly in the military and support civil unions that would extend marriage-like rights to same-sex couples.

Sure, but that's the easy stuff, what about gay arriage, an idea against which amendments have passed by large margins in most states of the union, including states that Democrats need to win the presidency.

This is interesting: The New York Times political blog 'The Caucus' reports that while all of the Democratic presidential candidates are visiting YearlyKos, the convention of left-wing bloggers, Hillary Clinton didn't get quite the reception she would have liked:

Senator Hillary Clinton, Senator Barack Obama and former Senator John Edwards are among those coming. And, it seemed, they were all participating in the break-out sessions.

While they are all still coming for the main show, it turns out that Senator Clinton is not attending the break-out session. Her campaign says it told the Kos organizers a week ago that she would not be attending the individual session, but the organizers did not announce it until tonight, at the opening dinner. The announcement drew big boos from the audience.

We already know that the left-wing bloggers do not have a lot of love for Hillary due to her Iraq war vote, worries about scandals, and general concerns over her electability. So did the Kos people intentionally hold back on the announcement to present her in a bad light? Could be.

The next few weeks should be very interesting in Democratic presidential politics. John Edwards is a non-candidate, everyone but him knows he doesn't have a prayer. Barack Obama is falling apart at the seams, as his statements on Pakistan and visiting our enemies have highlighted exactly the sort of inexperience that makes him unelectable. For those who do not want Hillary as their nomination, they are running out of choices. It's either make their peace with her, reach down and take another hard look at Bill Richardson, or startup the Draft Al Gore machine.

Full disclosure: This debate snuck up on me, and I was only able to catch some of the highlights this morning. From all the reactions, it appears that this debate has been the best Democratic debate so far, and from what I saw, I agree.

The main difference is probably the questions. The Youtube-submitted videos included several questions that usually don't make the cut but were able to bring out some differences and information about the candidates that we usually don't see. For example, we learned that every Democrat will draft your daughter along with your son for the next war. If we need a draft. Which we as a country have needed about every 40 years or so, on average. Anyway, the next one the daughters get to go. Chris Dodd said, "sure, send women, what's the difference". Folks this is the best example I've seen of liberal ideology over common sense and nature.

On another question, about saying something nice to the candidate on your left, John Edwards definitely had the gayest response of the evening when he joked that he "wasn't sure about that [Hillary's] coat." Much yuk-yuks all around, but this was probably telegraphing some annoyance that all the men had to wear standard dark suits while Hillary Clinton, as a woman, could stand out with a bright pink jacket. An ability she used to full effect.

I've been wondering for a long time when the Democrats would discover they had, underneath their noses, a qualified, experienced presidential candidate who would be an electoral nightmare for Republicans to fight. This week Bill Richardson has gotten some attention. Walter Shapiro in Salon:

This week, for the first time, the respected Granite State Poll, sponsored by CNN and WMUR, put Richardson in third place (10 percent support), just ahead of John Edwards and Al Gore (tied at 8 percent), giving the New Mexico governor new bragging rights. But the most relevant number by far in the poll -- and another statistic that can only give Richardson hope -- is that 64 percent of New Hampshire Democrats say they are "still trying to decide" on a candidate.

Good news for the Richardson team. Focused attention on a key state may do the trick. Also, a widespread realization that Edwards is not a serious potential candidate if the Democrats want to, you know, win. The article goes on to quote Richardson on a couple of interesting topics:

...since he has gone from his initial support of the Iraq war to being an outspoken anti-warrior....

...Richardson grimaced comically and then said, "Full disclosure -- the National Rifle Association has given me an 'A' rating."...

... I'm not going to rail against rich persons. That's not me. I believe that we should have a pro-growth economy."...

So we have an anti-war liberal, who is also a pro-business, pro-gun governor from a key western state. This is a scary combination for a potential GOP opponent. Think Jon Tester in Montana and you have about sized up the situation. Thankfully for the GOP, the Democrats appear to be hell bent, just like 2004, in nominating one of their weaker candidates.

A few observations from the second Dem debate.

-Unlike Ron Paul, Democratic spoiler Mike Gravel could not keep up the entertaining hijinks from the first debate and looked rather bumbling all around.

-At times it felt as if John Edwards and Barack Obama were having a private conversation.

-Hillary Clinton continues to show that she's a polished candidate. She has an alert, articulate presence, and doesn't wither from attacks (be they from Dennis Kucinich or Edwards).

-If you assumed that each of the moderators' microphones would have been tested before the debate started, you would be wrong.

-Obama is damn good at thinking on his feet, and, of the big three, seemed to answer each question the most directly.

-Bill Richardson did well in stressing his experience, but tends to bite off more than he can chew. Why is Bill Clinton angry at him, and why do we keep worrying about what job the former president will be given?

-Whose bright idea was it to get rid of the podiums and tell them to sit down? And where's Oprah? Somehow I think she'd be better at this format than moderator Wolf Blitzer.

-Thanks to the Fox News Republican debate, it seems that idiotic hypothetical questions will now be a staple of all future debates.

-Joe Biden (whose delivery was, at times, the most impassioned) and Chris Dodd did pretty well but have no chance whatsoever.

-Kucinich and Gravel did poorly and have no chance whatsoever.

Bottom line. A fairly substantive, if not boring, debate.

In a past post, I wondered whether country-music star Toby Keith could help Democratic presidential hopeful Bill Richardson come election time in 2008. A little Web searching indicates that both men have something in common: They sure can flip-flop.

"Richardson, who went to college in Boston and pitched a season in the storied Cape Cod summer league, has long described himself as a Red Sox fan," the Albuquerque Tribune reported. "But in a recent question and answer session with the Associated Press, the two-term New Mexico governor and second-tier Democratic presidential candidate gave a surprising answer when asked for his other-than-politics dream job. Center field, he said. New York Yankees."

Meanwhile, T.K. mocked anti-war heroine Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks, voted for George W. Bush, and became famous for the patriotic anthem "American Soldier" ... yet this registered Democrat doesn't like the Iraq War and pals around with Richardson.

"When you support your troops, people automatically think you're a Republican," Keith told the Rocky Mountain News last year. "When you're antiwar, people think you don't support the troops. That ain't the case, either. It's such a hard-core line these days. I'm not a very political guy. I just support the troops and I'm very patriotic."

Perhaps all this flip-flopping is a good thing. It suggests a creative mind, adaptable to changing circumstances. John Kerry was unable to persuade voters of the wisdom of "nuance," but perhaps the New Mexico governor and the Oklahoma country-music legend can do the job.

New Mexico governor and presidential aspirant Bill Richardson has been telling a story on the stump about his efforts to get the family of a dead Marine additional benefits. He's used the name of the Marine for political benefit and is accused of embellishing the story somewhat:

Richardson has told how he attended a memorial service three years ago for Lance Cpl. Aaron Austin, 21, who was killed in April 2004. The governor said Austin's mother, De'on Miller of Lovington, N.M., thanked him for the federal death benefits she had received.

Miller says the conversation about money never took place.

He has said he would stop using Austins name, which says to me that he was using it for no more than to score points and get votes. That's plain despicable if true.

I guess one shouldn't be too surprised as Richardson served under the Clinton team and they were well-known for taking every opportunity and making it political.

Richardson is a second-tier candidate who may appeal to some disaffected voters who don't like Hillary and believe Barack Obama to be too inexperienced. He comes off as a strong leader who has good foreign policy experience and would make a good running mate for one of the aforementioned. Here's hoping that Richardson reexamines his thinking on issues such as that of Lance Cpl. Aaron Austin.

Update: Can any of you make a bit of sense out of this blathering?

He's got a popular new song, "High Maintenance Woman," on WKLB-FM, the country-music station in the greater Boston area. He's brought inspiration to American servicemen stationed around the world. Could Toby Keith deliver another hit performance for a friend in 2008?

Keith "counts among his friends several prominent Democrats," Newsday reported in January, and that list includes "New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson..."

Could Keith help out Richardson? Music has played a role in past presidential campaigns. "When Ronald Reagan faced Walter Mondale in 1984," the St. Petersburg Times reported, "(Bruce) Springsteen publicly complained about Reagan invoking 'New Jersey's own Bruce Springsteen' during a campaign appearance." The Boss himself campaigned with fellow performers for John Kerry in 2004.

Then again, any Keith support of Richardson might be problematic for the candidate. First of all, the country-music star was among a list of musicians who backed Bush in 2004. Second, Keith was involved in a dispute with liberal icons the Dixie Chicks after lead singer Natalie Maines blasted President Bush. Maybe Keith ought to sit this campaign out.

An AP story from the Santa Fe New Mexican contains an embarrassing revelation about Democratic presidential (or is it vice presidential?) candidate Bill Richardson. It seems he is in the habit of telling a tall tale in stump speeches around the country.

This case of embellishment ironically centers on an accomplishment that Richardson should be proud of, and that needs no further exaggeration. Richardson pushed for legislation to up New Mexico's National Guard death benefits for veterans to $250,000. It was a good measure, and Richardson should tell everyone about it on the campaign trail. But in campaign speeches, especially recently in New Hampshire, he goes further with the story by reporting that he was prompted to raise the benefit by a conversation with the mother of a son who was killed in Iraq:

Three years ago, Richardson attended a memorial service for Lance Cpl. Aaron Austin, 21, who died in April 2004. As he campaigns for the Democratic nomination, the New Mexico governor often recounts an emotional conversation with Austin's mother, saying she thanked him for the federal death benefits she had received and even showed him the government check.

But he continually botches the story, and even has lied about the conversation:

In speeches in New Hampshire, Richardson has gotten Austin's name wrong at least once and age wrong at least twice. He also has called Austin the first New Mexico soldier killed in Iraq - instead of the third.

But that's not what bothers the Marine's mother, De'on Miller, of Lovington, who says the conversation about money never took place. "I didn't exchange words at all with the governor there except when he gave me the flag. And those few words - whatever was exchanged when he handed me the flag and the Spirit of New Mexico award - certainly had nothing to do with money," she said Thursday in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.

The scenario is similar to another event in his life that he's long told stories about, but turned out not to be true -- his being drafted by baseball's Kansas City Athletics (Richardson was forced to retract the claim). That case, like the one reported today, is yet another example of a politician, this time Bill Richardson, lying about something that he or she didn't have to lie about to look good. Is their need for self-aggrandizement that pathological?

This is just Richardson shooting himself in the foot needlessly. And it doesn't help his political aspirations at all, be they presidential or vice presidential. People uneasily view politicians as habitual liars in the first place. Leaving such a paper trail of the lies, however, is particularly unhelpful in overcoming that perception.

Most Americans would agree that a candidate's character and actions matter more than what race or gender he or she happens to be. This might help explain why there's no uproar over the fact that the Republican party has so far put forth 10 white guys from which to choose a presidential candidate. Of the eight Democrats who appeared in the first debate, the country saw a slightly more representative demographic sampling, with a noticeable shortage of women and Asians (who make up roughly 4.3% of the population). What with the fact that women continue to far outpace men in terms of earning college degrees, however, we should start to see more and more female candidates in the near future.

The only Hispanic running for president in 2008 is Bill Richardson. So far, his campaign has been centered squarely on the question of competence and experience, and in the process, he has produced the season's best political ad. In other words, he had chosen to highlight his deeds rather than his ethnicity. Until now, that is:

It's no accident that he [Richardson] chose Los Angeles as the place where he'll announce officially today that he's seeking the presidency. "I'm not running as a Hispanic candidate, but I'm trying to convince Hispanics that I am Hispanic, and they don't know," he told The Post during a swing through Washington past week. "I go to Los Angeles, they don't know I'm Hispanic. When they know, it's a positive. So it's a question of building that."

Smart move. After all, according to the US Census Bureau, more than 35% of California's 36-million-plus residents are Hispanics. That's more than all the other racial groups who reside in the Golden State combined. And seeing as the state recently moved its primary up to February 5, that puts a lot of importance on courting the Hispanic vote. So will the act of highlighting Richardson's ancestral lineage help his chances in the primary? Well, it won't hurt.