Well, that went as expected. It will be interesting to see what the spin on this is. It was a feel-good event, and Hillary spoke beautifully, but I want to see what she's like stumping by herself. I bet she really lets McCain have it then.

2:02 Ah, no Dream Ticket. Yet!

2:01 Can you imagine sitting next to him on a plane? "Can we get some extra peanuts here? Yes, We Can!"

1: 55 We will recruit an army of teachers? "Sing you're A-B-C's, you maggot!"

1: 51 "...they can do it better than the boys, and they can do it in heels!" That was a little clumsy. Hillary looks like she's having fun. "I still don't know how she does it in heels." Maybe we can get him a pair.

1: 47 I want Barack Obama to speak at my son's birthday party. "He has worked tirelessly to remove every diaper, to scatter every pot and pan, to make sure that no wall, and no piece of furniture, has to go without random crayon markings.



Aha! Live video! Thanks to Diana.

Update: I spoke with a well-placed source in Hillary Clinton's campaign, who told me a couple of interesting things. He said Obama will definitely not be picking a VP just to win a state, and that the short list now includes Hillary, Joe Biden, Evan Bayh, and maybe Chuck Hagel. I've got a good feeling about this.


He also said, as I have, that Obama is doing so surprisingly well against McCain that he can pretty much pick his own ticket, but that the longer the choice takes, the better it is for Hillary.


Also, here's video of Bayh telling Andrea Mitchell today that he would say yes if asked to be VP.


The Obama campaign has sent out the final details on the candidate's first joint campaign appearance with Senator Hillary Clinton.

CHICAGO, IL- Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Barack Obama will hold a "Unite for Change" Rally this Friday in Unity, New Hampshire. Both candidates received exactly 107 votes in the western New Hampshire town in the primary. See below for important event details regarding ticketing and parking.

Full text of the press release follows the jump. There's one detail that is omitted here, and that is whether or not Barack Obama will announce Hillary Clinton as his selection for Vice President.

This comes on the heels of Barack Obama's appeal to donors, Wednesday, to help pay down Hillary's campaign debt, and a reported meet 'n greet today between Obama and Hillary's big donors. There's magic in the air!

Ordinarily, I'm not a betting man, but one of my readers issued a challenge that I couldn't just ignore. Since tomorrow is so fraught with symbolism, I have a feeling in me bones, so I'd like to give my readers, and fellow writers, a chance to get in on this. To find out why I'm so sure there will be a Dream Ticket, just click the words Dream Ticket.

Update: Further details on Hillary Clinton's first campaign appearance with Barack Obama were released today by the Obama campaign. Via email:

FRIDAY: Senators Clinton and Obama to Campaign Together in Town of Unity, New Hampshire

Candidates received 107 votes apiece in Granite State town

CHICAGO, IL- Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Barack Obama announced today that they will hold a "Unite for Change" Rally this Friday in Unity, New Hampshire. Both candidates received exactly 107 votes in the western New Hampshire town in the primary.

That's a nice bit of symmetry there. This will be an important event to watch.

The Obama campaign sent out the following press release this morning, via email:

Chicago, IL – Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced today that they will campaign together on Friday, June 27th. Further details to be announced soon.

That's it, that's the whole thing. Remember, you heard it here first.

Why the tease? That's not the usual MO. Does this portend, um, I don't know, a (echo-y voice) DREAM TICKET?!?!?

Time will tell, but you can keep checking back here for details as they are released. At the very least, their first stump appearance together will give us some clues.

John Dickerson at Slate breaks down the myth, versus the reality, of the influence that embittered Hillary Clinton supporters will actually have in this election. He likens it to a "Snipe Hunt," but I thought "Chupacabra" sounded funnier, and those have actually been found.

We're going on a snipe hunt. The quarry: women who supported Hillary and, now that she's lost, will leave the Democrats to vote for McCain. Unlike a true snipe hunt, where you never find your prey, these politically prized voters can be found. In fact, they seem to be everywhere. Hillary supporters leave angry e-mails in my inbox, and they are the topic of stories across the media spectrum, from NPR to Fox News to Slate's "XX Factor." Everyone's got an anecdote. Why, just the other day, a woman told me ...

I can back Dickerson up on the angry e-mails, comments, etc. Until today, however, I hadn't stopped to realize that I've never actually met one of them in person.

Let's start with the math. Clinton says 18 million people voted for her. That's about 13 percent of the electorate. Obama wins about 80 percent of the Clinton supporters in a recent poll, which means that the coveted Clinton-for-McCain voters represent about 2.6 percent of the electorate. These voters matter only if they live in one of the 20 or so swing states-they're not going to win Massachusetts for McCain. This means the total number of voters he needs to convince and hold onto is small.

Face Off is back! Two of our writers will be posting separate pieces on a hot-button topic. You can check out both and then vote for the one that speaks to you and aligns with your views.

Today the topic is the pros and cons of an Obama/Clinton ticket. Dreamy or nightmarish?



Tommy Christopher writes:

Should Barack Obama pick Hillary Clinton to be his vice president? Never has such an obvious answer been so hotly debated. The answer really only depends on one factor: How much does Barack Obama want to win by in November? Read more

Mark Impomeni writes:

The greatest danger that the Clintons pose for Obama comes not from their detractors, but from the Clintons themselves. And, ironically, it is here that Sen. Clinton's large following argues against her selection as Obama's running mate.... Read More

As the echoes of Hillary Clinton's concession die down somewhat, and turn into a low buzz about her chances of being named VP, Camille Paglia over at Salon throws an unusually wet blanket on the idea of a "Dream Ticket."

Hillary for veep? Are you mad? What party nominee worth his salt would chain himself to a traveling circus like the Bill and Hillary Show? If the sulky bearded lady wasn't biting the new president's leg, the oafish carnival barker would be sending in the clowns to lure all the young ladies into back-of-the-tent sword-swallowing. It would be a seamy orgy of scheming and screwing. Hillary could never be content with second place. But neither could an alpha male like Obama. The vice president should be an accomplished but subordinate personality. An Obama-Hillary ticket might tickle party regulars, but it would be a big fat minus in the general election. Republicans have shrewdly stockpiled a mammoth arsenal of past scandals to strafe Hillary with. Only a sentimental masochist would want to relive the tawdry 1990s.

I've heard Camille interviewed before, heard people talk about her, but never actually read anything by her. She pulled off a neat trick here. She got me to completely disagree with her, yet want to go out and buy all of her books.

Actually, there were other, less colorfully written, things in the piece that I did agree with.

It's the question on every political pundit's mind: Should Barack Obama choose Hillary Clinton as his running mate on the Democratic ticket? Most of the arguments in favor hinge on Sen. Clinton's performance in swing states in this year's primary, her support among women voters, a key demographic for Democrats, and her nearly 18 million total votes received in the primary contests. But the answer to the Clinton question may come from Sen. Obama's general view of the Clintons, rather than from any reading of this year's primary results. Fundamentally, Sen. Obama must first decide which view of the Clintons he ascribes to before making his decision.

The Clintons are viewed by many as a force for good in American politics. Nostalgia for the less complicated times of the 1990s is running high. When the Clintons were in the White House, so the popular history goes, there were no wars, no mortgage troubles, and no rocky economy. If Sen. Obama agrees with this view of the Clintons, than he should choose Sen. Clinton as his running mate. But if he adheres to a different view, one held by an equally large number of Americans, he should back away from that ledge slowly. The Clintons are also viewed as a selfish and ruthlessly ambitious couple willing to do almost anything to secure their own power. Mrs. Clinton's large following from the primaries may serve to kindle all the worst instincts in her, with potentially disastrous consequences for the Obama campaign.

John McCain wasted no time responding to Barack Obama's firing of a key vetter for his Vice Presidential pick:

"Jim Johnson's resignation raises serious questions about Barack Obama's judgment. Selecting the vice presidential nominee is the most important decision a presidential candidate can make and one even Barack Obama has said will 'signal how I want to operate my presidency.' By entrusting this process to a man who has now been forced to step down because of questionable loans, the American people have reason to question the judgment of a candidate who has shown he will only make the right call when under pressure from the news media. America can't afford a president who flip-flops on key questions in the course of 24 hours. That's not change we can believe in." -McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds

"We're going to go through a process in the vice-presidential search where I look at a whole range of options. This is one of the most important decisions I can make, and I think I'll signal how I want to operate my presidency." (Barack Obama, Interview With NBC's Brian Williams, 6/4/08)

Jim Johnson, a member of Sen. Barack Obama's Vice-Presidential selection committee embroiled in a controversy over discounted mortgages he received from mortgage giant Countrywide Financial, resigned his position with the campaign today. Sen. Obama released a statement announcing the resignation and said that Johnson did not want his service to the campaign to become a distraction.

"Jim did not want to distract in any way from the very important task of gathering information about my vice presidential nominee, so he has made a decision to step aside that I accept."

When asked about the controversy yesterday, Sen. Obama initially tried to defend Johnson, saying that the members of the running mate selection committee, "aren't folks who are working for me," and that the accusations against Johnson were part of a, "game that can be played," with members of the campaign and their associations. The McCain campaign jumped on those assertions, calling them, "preposterous."

Johnson was reported to have received special loan rates on loans totaling nearly $6.3 million from Countrywide under a program that granted special below market mortgages to friends of Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozillo. The loans were a problem for the Obama campaign because Sen. Obama has railed against Countrywide and its executives specifically as, "the folks who are responsible for infecting the economy and creating, helping create a home foreclosure crisis." Johnson's continued presence on the campaign would have called Obama's credibility on the mortgage issue into question, and it was only a matter of time before he was pushed out once the information about his special mortgage dealings was made public.

Johnson is the third high-level Obama staffer to leave the campaign amidst controversy after initially being defended by Sen. Obama. Samantha Power left the campaign after a British television interview in which she called Sen. Hillary Clinton a "monster," while Sen. Obama's Middle East adviser Robert Malley was similarly let go after reports that he had been regularly meeting with Hamas officials surfaced. In each case, Sen. Obama first decried the questions about the controversies as a distraction before sacking the offending staff members.

Doesn't it seem like this primary campaign began about the same time they replaced the pull-off tabs on Pepsi cans with the safety tabs we have now? Wasn't it around the same time that Shelley Hack made her debut as the fifth Charlie's Angel? Didn't the Fonz actually jump a shark in the middle of it?

But now, it is finally over. The general election has begun. Hillary Clinton has conceded, which means no more even remotely fun conference calls. The confetti that I collected from the floor of the Hillary Clinton celebration in Philadelphia has been duly delivered to its rightful owner. We have the Veepstakes to look forward to, and after that, a string of lopsided debates. The only real suspense now is the possible nature and effectiveness of the "October Surprise."

To help me laugh through my tears, MSNBC's Countdown put together a nifty compilation of video clips to summarize the 2008 Presidential Primaries.
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