Top Items:
Mary Beth Schneider / Indianapolis Star:
Illinois Senator ahead by 3 points — Officials in both camps agree: The race is a toss-up that will remain hotly competitive — Sen. Barack Obama holds a narrow lead over Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in Indiana, with the outcome of the May 6 primary likely in the hands of a large number …
Discussion:
Marc Ambinder, Top of the Ticket, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, The Page, FiveThirtyEight.com and TPM Election Central
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Mark Leibovich / The Caucus:
Black Leader in House Denounces Bill Clinton's Remarks — The third-ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives and one of the country's most influential African-American leaders sharply criticized former President Bill Clinton this afternoon for what he called Mr. Clinton's “bizarre” …
Discussion:
Firedoglake, Spin Cycle, MSNBC, Brilliant at Breakfast, US Presidential race 2008 real …, Fox News, The Page and Swampland
Elizabeth Drew / The Politico:
Dems' suspense may be unnecessary — The torrent of speculation about the end game of the Democratic nomination contest is creating a false sense of suspense - and wasting a lot of time of the multitudes who are anxious to know how this contest is going to turn out.
Richard Cowan / Tales from the Trail:
Top House Democrat denounces Clinton campaign tactics — WASHINGTON - “Scurrilous” and “disingenuous” were among the words a top Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives used on Thursday to describe Hillary Clinton's campaign tactics in her bid to defeat Barack Obama for their party's presidential nomination.
Perry Bacon Jr / Washington Post:
Clinton's Hopes May Lie With N.C. — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday emphasized her plans to remove combat troops from Iraq and challenged Sen. Barack Obama to a debate in North Carolina, as she turned her attention to a state that could upend her hopes of a comeback.
Paul / Power Line:
OBAMA'S BAD LUCK WITH ADVISERS CONTINUES — Gabriel Schoenfeld reports on the latest Obama foreign policy adviser who turns out not to like Israel very much. Add Joseph Cirincione to the list that includes Samantha Power, Robert Malley, Merrill McPeak, Zbigniew Brzezinski , and his spiritual adviser Jeremiah Wright.
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Juan Cole / Informed Comment:
Syria Reactor Story a Diversion; But From What? — The US and Israel accused Syria on Thursday of building a secret nuclear reactor with North Korean help. There was a lot of innuendo in the press that the reactor was intended for nuclear weapons production. But AFP notes:
Paul Krugman / New York Times:
Self-Inflicted Confusion — After Barack Obama's defeat in Pennsylvania, David Axelrod, his campaign manager, brushed it off: “Nothing has changed tonight in the basic physics of this race.” — He may well be right — but what a comedown. A few months ago the Obama campaign was talking about transcendence.
Discussion:
Anglachel's Journal, The Confluence, The Democratic Daily, Liberal Values, BlueOhioan and PoliGazette
Geoff Garin / Washington Post:
Fair Is Fair — What's wrong with this picture? Our campaign runs a TV ad Monday saying that the presidency is the toughest job in the world and giving examples of challenges presidents have faced and challenges the next president will face — including terrorism, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan …
The Politico:
Obama has a punctuation problem — Barack Obama's real opponent now is not Hillary Rodham Clinton. It is a pair of punctuation marks. — The first is a question. The second is an asterisk. — Both threaten to hover over Obama if he wins the Democratic nomination without confronting …
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Chris Cillizza / The Fix:
Friday Line: McCain's Best Strategic Moves — With Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and Barack Obama (Ill.) locked in a seemingly endless fight for the Democratic nomination, The Fix is taking a pass on the vice presidential Line this month. There's too much uncertainty — even for us.
Jonathan Weisman / Washington Post:
McCain changes his tune on taxes — Reversal includes new support for Bush cuts — Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., delivers a speech in Baton Rouge, La., on Thursday. — McCain slams Bush — April 24: John McCain slammed the White House's response to Katrina while on a visit to New Orleans.
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Charles Krauthammer / Washington Post:
Obama's ‘Distractions’? — Real change has never been easy. . . . The status quo in Washington will fight. They will fight harder than ever to divide us and distract us with ads and attacks from now until November. — Pennsylvania primary night speech — With that, Obama identified …
Discussion:
Salon, Political Machine, Publius Pundit, Hot Air, Fausta's blog, Blue Crab Boulevard and Betsy's Page
Times of London:
The men in black vanish and Basra comes to life — The first Western journalist to enter the city since Operation Charge of the Knights was launched a month ago — Young women are daring to wear jeans, soldiers listen to pop music on their mobile phones and bands are performing at wedding parties again.
Discussion:
The Strata-Sphere, QandO, The Long War Journal, USA Today, Commentary, Hot Air and PoliGazette
Ed Morrissey / Hot Air:
The Wright Stuff: ABC provides the context — Barack Obama needs another eruption of the Wright Stuff like he needs another video of him making fun of embittered Bible-thumping bigots, but at least the former appears inevitable. ABC News responds to Jeremiah Wright's allegation that his words …
Discussion:
NewsBusters.org, Redstate, Media Blog, ABCNEWS, Gateway Pundit, protein wisdom, Taylor Marsh and JammieWearingFool
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New York Post:
THE WORST OF TIMES — STAFF BRACES FOR LAYOFFS AFTER BUYOUTS FALL SHORT — THE New York Times' news room is bracing for a bloodbath in the next 10 days. — The word from inside is that approximately 50 unionized journalists have accepted the buyout proposal, and only another 20 non-union editorial employees have gotten on board.
Discussion:
JammieWearingFool
WESH-TV:
Snipes Gets Maximum Sentence: 36 Months — OCALA, Fla. — Wesley Snipes was sentenced to 36 months in prison Thursday, the maximum sentence allowed. — Watch The Story — Snipes was convicted of three misdemeanor charges for not filing his taxes. — During the sentencing, Snipes did apologize.
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