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Gallup Daily: Obama Takes Lead Over McCain, 48% to 42% — Has consistently led McCain since Clinton decided to suspend campaign — PRINCETON, NJ — Barack Obama is enjoying a modest bump in support following Hillary Clinton's exit from the presidential race.
Discussion:
The Swamp, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, TPM Election Central, Donklephant and The Other McCain
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OBAMA vs. McCAIN....Gallup's latest Obama-McCain tracking poll shows exactly what you'd expect: now that Obama is firmly the Democratic candidate, he's making up considerable ground. There will be more ups and downs, especially around the conventions, but I'll bet that Obama never has much less …
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TalkLeft

Beginnings Of A Bump — Obama has his strongest showing to date …
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Eunomia

‘Bush Lied’? If Only It Were That Simple. — Search the Internet for “Bush Lied” products, and you will find sites that offer more than a thousand designs. The basic “Bush Lied, People Died” bumper sticker is only the beginning. — Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.) …
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Pelosi backs Emanuel for senator from Ill. — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is reported to be privately talking about Rep. Rahm Emanuel, the House Democratic Caucus chairman, as the next senator from Illinois if Sen. Barack Obama wins the presidential election.
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A Campaign We Can Believe In? — Hillary Clinton's concession …
Discussion:
The Moderate Voice, Salon, The Carpetbagger Report, TPMCafe, The New Republic, The Hill's Blog Briefing Room, Swampland, Trailhead and marbury

The “grumpy Republican” problem; Update: E-mail from a Texas GOP convention attendee — Scroll down for updates...e-mail from Texas GOP convention attendee... The Texas GOP convened its party convention this week. It's finding the same problem plaguing the party in other states and at the national level: Disgruntled grass-roots.
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State GOP fears grouchy voters won't go to polls — Convention opens here amid some discontent within the party — AUSTIN — After a decade of political dominance, the Texas GOP is opening its party convention in Houston this week with a troubling prospect: Grumpy Republicans may not turn out to vote this fall.
Discussion:
WTF Is It Now?!?

Top Obama-Clinton Officials Begin Reconciliation Process — The reconciliation process between the upper echelons of the Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton campaigns has already begun, as advisers and fundraisers look for areas of commonality in a somewhat disjointed party.
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Obama Campaign Manager Plouffe To Hold Private Outreach Meeting …
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TIME.com

Senate Votes To Privatize Its Failing Restaurants — Year after year, decade upon decade, the U.S. Senate's network of restaurants has lost staggering amounts of money — more than $18 million since 1993, according to one report, and an estimated $2 million this year alone, according to another.

Elizabeth Edwards to have Obama's ear — Barack Obama announced in his economy speech today that Elizabeth Edwards will work with him on healthcare policy — the issue that is the cause of her life and on which she preferred Hillary Clinton. — While her husband John Edwards gave …
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Top Talent Scout for Obama Tied to Subprime Lender — Could Become a Political Liability — Long-standing ties between a member of Senator Obama's new vice presidential search team and a prominent mortgage executive the senator has pilloried could become a political liability that hampers …
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It's a Different Country — Fervent supporters of Barack Obama like to say that putting him in the White House would transform America. With all due respect to the candidate, that gets it backward. Mr. Obama is an impressive speaker who has run a brilliant campaign — but if he wins in November …


McCain resurrects call for gas tax holiday — From CNN Political Producer Peter Hamby, CNN's Dana Bash — WASHINGTON (CNN) - With gas prices reaching a national average of four dollars a gallon — a record high — John McCain is planning to resurrect his call for a national gas tax holiday …
Discussion:
Jonathan Martin's Blogs, The Carpetbagger Report, Below The Beltway, Argghhh!, Reuters, FP Passport and Blog entry

Citing History, Bush Suggests His Policies Will One Day Be Vindicated — Meet George W. Bush, time traveler. — He's in Poland in 1939 as Nazi tanks advance on Warsaw, then flying with his Navy-pilot father to battle imperial Japan. He's alongside Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War …
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McCain's Web site talks about the anti-Christ being ‘a Jew,’ Hillary being a ‘bitch,’ Obama being a ‘Muslim fag,’ and America bringing 9/11 on itself — · Digg It! · — UPDATE: Jed finds more on other McCain sites, including a reference to Obama as a n*gger.


Hillary Clinton paid a heavy price for presidential run — Eighteen million votes: $212 million. Some 1,926 delegates: $109,823 a pop. Blowing the biggest head start in presidential history: priceless. — From anointed to also-ran, Hillary Clinton spent more money to lose a primary election …


Obama ‘fist bump’ catching on — (CNN) — In a reference to Barack and Michelle Obama's celebratory fist bump on Tuesday, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, ended their conversation on CNN's Late Edition with their own version of the “hand shake.”
Discussion:
Crooks and Liars

White Male Pundit Power — It's still all about the white men. Hillary Clinton's loss has renewed critiques that American political media is slanted, sexist and dominated by men. While Clinton and Obama broke barriers in the Democratic primary, swiftly dispatching white male Senators …
Discussion:
Outside The Beltway, MoJoBlog, The Other McCain, Matthew Yglesias and American Spectator