Indiana Race Part III…IV?

Professor Taylor at PoliBlog links to this story from the Congressional Quarterly which quite scientifically projects what I said last week and earlier this week: Indiana doesn’t matter.

Indiana offers 72 delegates that will be apportioned by the results of the voting. Forty-seven of those 72 are directly related to results in Indiana’s 9 congressional districts. Of those 47, CQ predicts Obama and Clinton will split them right down the freaking middle with Clinton earning 24 and Obama 23. I figure if CQ is wrong by a few thousand votes in every district the result may come back a surprising 24 for Obama and 23 Clinton–a major (MAJOR) upset for the “Comeback Kid” but still close enough for her to drag on her continued presence in this race.

Of the rest CQ says this:

The other 25 pledged delegates at stake — 16 “at-large” delegates and nine party leader and elected officials (PLEOs) — will be distributed in proportion to the statewide vote. The 16 at-large delegates will split 8-8 if the winner takes less than 53.1 percent of the vote. The statewide winner is guaranteed a 5-4 victory among the nine PLEOs; it would require 61.1 percent of the statewide vote for a 6-3 edge.

So the remaining delegates will be apportioned based on statewide totals, and of course, we know that race is close. Two local pollsters have it a deadheat (48/47) and (46/46). Survey USA has Clinton by 9 with Obama closing the gap. (I don’t know if any of those polls were done after Rev. Wright’s most recent ridiculousness and none of them are post-Obama’s speech from yesterday). At any rate I suspect that the statewide delegates will be split basically down the middle with a tiny edge to Clinton.

If she’s lucky she will tighten her 159 delegate deficit by two or three. She will widen her superdelegate lead here by another handful–which still leaves her behind in the popular vote, behind in the delegate vote, and behind in votes overall.

¿Puede Ganar en Indiana el Sr. Obama? [No lo sé.]

This question is so blindingly obvious I can’t believe I hadn’t thought of it on my own yet…nor have our local NPR affiliates. “The Latino vote” has been one of those bizarro story arcs for the whole campaign season and, like most northern states the recent wave of Latino immigration is a story on the tips of every tongue. The combination is the result of a natural fit. Get on it WFYI!

I have been saying that Obama’s populist jibber-jabber should appeal to Latin Americans who are not only accustomed to but seem to like politicians that cater to populist policies. But Clinton, probably because of something her husband did 15 years ago, seems to pull their vote anyway.

But Indiana, as I mentioned a few days ago, is a battleground state, sitting between Clinton-dominated Ohio and Obama-lovin’ Illinois. The demographics of the area show that its about 25% Latino, which should favor Obama getting the Latino vote there since East Chicago, Gary, Whiting, etc in the Lake County region (for those of you who are map-skillz deficient) is the part of the state that borders Chicago…Illinois….Obama’s home state. Their major news outlets are all Chicago-based. The name recognition for Obama in that region is particularly strong.

But if Clinton is able to rally the Latino vote here the same way she’s been able to elsewhere it could significantly undercut Obama’s lead in the delegate-heavy, urban northwest–an area that, without Latinos, would clearly favor him.

This is a particularly relevant threat for him since that region is steel mill-heavy too–if Pennsylvania taught us anything.

Obama should start putting soccer in his “I can play sports” repertoire.

Pennsylvania Post Mortem

I’m just dropping in real fast to leave some rabbit-pellet sized commentary on the results of the Pennsylvania primary last night. Hillary won big. Check out all the pollsters and commentators to find out why or how. I just want to comment on a few things, all of which, to some degree are related to why I haven’t blogged about the state of the campaign for a while.

None of this matters anymore. Obama and Clinton will be charging my state, Indiana, now. As a matter of fact, I think she’s in my city, giving a speech right now, as I write this. I thank them both in advance for the wheelbarrows of money they bring with them. I will gladly where a PORCH DOG PROUDLY SUPPORTS ___(Fill in the blank)___ for whichever candidate will pay for the insane amount of money it now takes to get to and from my poorly-paying non-profit job.

And this amount of attention has already inspired some of the local commentariat to say something akin to “for the first time, Indiana matters during the primaries.” No we don’t. No state has mattered since Tsunami Tuesday when both candidates proved that both would stay in and continue to split each states’ votes basically down the middle thereby depriving both of them the overwhelming majority needed to lock up the nomination.

More to the point, Obama came out far enough ahead on February 5 that it was mathematically impossible for Clinton to win the lead at all and pragmatically impossible that either would do it. So, while previous Super Tuesdays reduced the remaining states to no more than symbolic democratic value by choosing the nominees before their primaries, Tsunami Tuesday has reduced states to merely repeating the decision of all previous primaries. Each subsequent primary has amounted to negligible gains in the overall division of delegates.

The voters in Indiana don’t matter. Superdelegates in Indiana matter. For example, some of the talk today is whether Baron Hill will endorse Clinton (because that’s who his district seems to support) or whether he will go for Obama to undercut the progressive vote that currently supports one of his three competitors in the primary.

And Indiana superdelegates are just a smaller version of what the race has come to mean nationally. Large victories in certain states, like Pennsylvania, are supposed to act as messages to unpledged superdelegates around the country. Clinton’s 9-point victory in the Keystone State yesterday is supposed to reassure the ambivalent that she has what it takes to win in November.

But that is all neither here nor there. What it has really come down to is this: the superdelegates are either going to vote for Obama and therefore confirm the votes of the majority of the nation, or they will vote for Clinton (who cannot earn the majority vote at this point) and deny the majority opinion. How you feel about that is the largest determinant on how you feel about this continuing primary season. Personally I would prefer if Indiana’s vote didn’t matter in the old fashioned way it used to not matter.

Clinton has been unrelenting in her pursuit of seating the Michigan and Florida voters–a tactic that is as undemocratic as it is disgusting. But if she finds a way to convince the rules committee that doing so would benefit the party (it won’t) she stands a better chance of gaining the nomination but still at the risk of alienating a large segment of her voters.

Furthermore, Pennsylvania proved nothing. Pennsylvania will go to the Democrat in November (most likely) regardless of whether Clinton or Obama is on the ticket on Election Day. They will go Democratic because 160,000 Republicans have already switched parties there (a deficit of 320,000 to the Republicans) and that number is likely to grow between now an the general. They will go Democratic because of the war in Iraq and they will vote Democratic because of the economy which is only going to get worse between now and the fall. At the very least we are going to see increased gas prices during the summer which is sure to hurt McCain’s continued support of Bush’s military and economic “strategies.”

Sure Pennsylvania is a swing state, but the numbers are in and in the general they support Clinton and Obama not one or the other. Voting preference in the primaries does not reflect voter preference in the general and superdelegates are more aware of this (I would hope) than the general public and (apparently) the reporters covering the race.

Clinton deserves kudos for her big win last night (kind of) but she should still just sit down and let Obama and the DNC take on McCain.

Blueprint for the Presidency?

I had a Jay-Z/Obama joke but WordPress won’t let me post it. You can see it here.

Obama the Elitist! Seriously?

I’m about as pro-Obama as I’ve been pro- any candidate since as far back as I can remember following politics–and I’m counting the several years when I was really too young be at all sensible about such things. Like, when I was 5, Ronald Reagan was pictured on a horse pretty regularly and that may be one of the reasons I can’t quite shake the warm feelings I have of the Gipper. As a steady reader of Cracked magazine from 1984 to 1988 the various comic iterations of Reagan were always more favorable than their satirical swipes at Mondale too. I even have a solid memory of a Cracked magazine cover that showed Bush (41) debating Dukakis who was so short he had to stand on a box!!! (WHOO!) Hee-larious. I throw those in there only to add contrast to the way I like Obama. Even compared to my youthful, completely uncynical-about-government five-to-thireen year-old self, I’m pretty pro-Obama.

And I offer that paragraph as my way of “full disclosure” for what is about to come.

Are people really upset by the things Obama said in San Francisco?–because—if they are– they need to find a way to relax. That probably isn’t the way I’d say it if I were a Democratic worker or an Obama campaign staffer, but …I don’t know…seriously?

One comment I read on the topic quoted Obama at length with a link to the full transcript at Time’s website with the additional commentary that “reading them in context doesn’t make them better.” Well, I had read the quoted paragraph and thought: What’s the big deal? So I went to Time’s website to see if reading them in context made the comments worse.

It turns out that on that one point the commenter was right, reading them in context changed nothing whatsoever about the quoted passage. Obama was right when I read him out of context and he was right when read in context.

Except for a brief stay in northern Virginia I’ve only ever lived in economically depressed areas–often in economically depressed areas of economically depressed areas. I myself have been economically depressed for most of my life. Sometimes due circumstances growing up and sometimes do to poor decision-making on my own part.

I currently live in a state, Indiana, that self-identifies as a “blue collar” or a “manufacturing” state, despite the fact that the factories, plants, and farms here started closing down decades ago never to return. DECADES AGO. And despite the fact that, like most states, our largest growth sectors are service and health. Among Indiana’s most recent major success stories is its catering to the bio-engineering folks.

And you know what? The people are bitter. They do distrust the government. They do think that free trade agreements and immigrants have colluded to deprive them and theirs of their well-being. They do believe, at best, that their government has stood by and allowed this to happen and, at worst, have been an integral part of this demolition of their quality of life. Part of that bitterness is evident in the mere self-identification as an industrial state when in fact Indiana is hardly any such thing anymore. Like Ohio and Pennsylvania, Indiana would be more accurate to call itself “a McDonald’s state” or “a strip mall state” or “a Wal-Mart” state since that’s the employment that defines not just the character of the state but also it’s shifting landscape. But it doesn’t–for a couple of reasons. One, of course, is America honors its working class heroes and has for a long time…at least in its rhetoric. There is honor in being a “manufacturing state” that one cannot find near the grease trap of a Wendy’s. But the more important reason that Indiana (and Ohio and Pennsylvania) identify as “blue collar states” is because, they are upset that those jobs left and they want them back. Each successive presidential election comes with a slew of promises that those jobs are coming back and they never do. Living lives of constant disappointment and deprivation makes one bitter.

I suppose that it does require a little bit of care to fully parse the following sentence:

And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

But parsing or not, it does not say that people are ignorant or mean or stupid or unsophisticated. It does not say that religion is “economically based” or anything else. What it says is that people are looking to the wrong things in order to create their politics. It says that when the real concern should be how to put food on the table, people are voting for the president that won’t take away their guns. It says people should be voting on how we are going to retrain an outmoded workforce but instead they’re focus on religious differences. It says that when people need to be concerned with how their government can and should be guiding them to better futures they are more concerned with how many immigrants walked through the desert last year.

Once again the people prove themselves incapable of perceiving the irony of real life. To react the way they did to this sentence actually proves how right Obama’s statement is. Now people are screaming: “Did you hear that, Obama thinks that I’m an ignorant redneck because I own a gun!” “He thinks I’m stupid because I love the Lord!”

So they have found a way to ignore their problems by concentrating on the second part of a statement that tried to remind people what their real problem is. Unbelievable.

But let’s take it one step forward. Obama was a community activists before he was a state senator. In that capacity he worked with some of the poorest people of one the country’s largest manufacturing centers (and third largest city). If Obama is an “elitist” who doesn’t understand working class America then what chance does corporate lawyer Hillary Clinton have? Or the son (and grandson) of a Navy admiral? Their positions are practically the definition of “elite” in America’s “military-industrial complex.”

Perhaps the only person in the country who can out elite these two is George Bush. As the son of a senator George Bush meets the minimum standard of “fortunate son” set by Creedence Cleawater Revival. But Bush’s dad went on to serve as head of the CIA, vice president, and president. Bush (43) himself was the CEO of an oil company and owner of a baseball team. AND he’s president. His brother was governor of Florida. His family is still regular visitors to the Royal House of Saud and…last I heard…Bush’s niece Lauren repeatedly has to defend herself against rumors that she is dating this or that prince. She is currently dating Ralph Lauren’s son.

I guess what I’m saying here boils down to this:

1. The statement would not be that bad, even if it was wrong.
2. It wasn’t wrong.
3. You can bitch about Obama’s “elitism” all you want but your choices are between his elitism, Clinton’s elitism, or McCain’s elitism and the latter two are head and shoulders more distinguished than Obama’s is and you’d have to be willfully ignorant to think otherwise.

Barack Obama’s Speech on Race

I just finished hearing (and reading) the speech Obama gave today. I thought it was excellent. In terms of performance, Obama did not reach the heights he has with previous oratorical efforts but he definitely got close, especially in the second half. He bumbled a couple of times, nothing big at all and he recovered gracefully. He varied very little from the speech that was sent out to reporters ahead of time.

(The version provided here [PDF] was edited, by me, to account for the minor differences. I did not edit in phrases that were repeated do to pauses, nor did I mark pauses for applause or what were clearly errors in delivery except for one that Obama himself edited to fit in. I marked conjunctive additions and substantial changes made for either clarity or rhythmic reasons).

What is most striking about this speech, and there are a handful of striking things, is its level of nuance. It is not a sound-byte heavy speech and when there are sound-bytes to be had, they are likely to favor Democratic opposition. Saying that Reverend Wright “has been like family” to him has already been picked up by Fox News despite the fact that the phrase is immediately preceded by “as imperfect as he may be” (4).

Another striking element is that I just can’t imagine any other person, politician or not, being able to pull this speech off other than Obama. His eloquence combined with his mixed racial and ethnic heritage make him uniquely capable of delivering a speech on the innumerable reasons it is difficult to talk about race in this country.

Would even John Edwards, populist that he is, be able to talk straightforwardly enough to say that “…the white community…[must acknowledge]…that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people” (7) or that white people have justifiable resentment toward government actions like busing or “…when they hear that.an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed” (6)? I don’t think so.

Would any current politician risk quoting William Faulkner in any speech about race, if they ever got brave enough to give a speech about race?

I doubt it.

I guess the last most striking thing about the speech is that I think it might work. The hardcore racists and the hardcore conservatives in this country were never going to vote for Obama to begin with. They were lost to him before he was in the race. They will use Reverend Wright’s sermons to galvanize themselves and to convince themselves that they are making the right decision based on something other than emotional reasons. But for those voters who were considering Obama but that might have gotten scared away by his association with Reverent Wright, I think this speech may help assuage their fears. Furthermore, and more importantly Obama has re-engineered the biggest strike against him so far into nearly 40 minutes of free press coverage. He gave a speech today that every news outlet in the country either covered or aired. In that speech Obama looked presidential to the Nth degree. He was reasoned, he was calm, he was humble, he was eloquent. He was sensitive and level-handed on a possibly riot-inducing issue. He favorably worked in the OJ trial. He called attention to the ridiculousness of modern campaign coverage without sounding whiny. He appeared literate and well-educated without appearing elitist or demagougish. He sounded respectful not only of his Republican opposition but of the differences over racial issues within the Democratic Party. He was even able to extend the wide expanse under his protective wing to Hillary Clinton without appearing to be condescending to her campaign at all.

It was a master stroke of politicking. If Obama goes on to win the election in November, those that chart the course for such things will mark today’s speech as an important move. It was exactly this sort of thoughtful response to vicious attacks that Kerry failed to do in 2004. One thing Obama has made clear is that he is rubber and everybody else is glue. If you attack him he will use his 9th level verbal judo to make you look like an ignorant buffoon. In the wake of his speech those that continue to attack him on this issue are already finding that they look insipid or worse.

The speech is worth the read but, obviously, it’s better if you can watch or listen to it. We simply don’t talk about race in this country at this level and for Obama to do so is fairly amazing. It’s going to be an important moment in this election cycle and it may well prove to be one of the more important moments in early 21st century politics. Of course, I may be too optimistic when it comes to these things. Get back to me in 20 or 30 years, will ya?

The Head-to-Head: Dems 1 and 2 vs. Citizen McCain

Survey USA has done the head-to-head match-ups for November: Obama vs. McCain and Clinton vs. McCain. As can be seen by their handy graphic to the left there, either Obama or Clinton will beat McCain and by roughly the same amount of electoral votes.

A few things should be pointed out however. First of all, the sample size is incredibly small. Just 600 people per state. Also, a lot can happen between now and November. Some things will happen that will be good for Republicans…like a war in Iran, or Democrats’ continued failure to pass anything meaningful in Congress (or, more likely, they might actually stand up to Bush from time-to-time but as a consequence get knocked down for making the country vulnerable to terrorists). Some things will be good for Democrats like…constantly reminding everyone that McCain thinks it’s a good idea to commit to being in Iraq for the next 100 years. I mean, I know what it is he (probably) means, but I don’t think it makes a good sound byte.

Also, I think in both instances above there are some pretty big Ifs. For example, Clinton wins Florida, presumably on her strengths with Hispanics; and, Obama wins Michigan, presumably on his tough anti-Nafta talk and appeal amongst African-Americans…or something; but both lose the other. However, unless something happens between now and then regarding the seating of delegates from those states, there’s a good chance that Democrats disenfranchised now will be uninspired to go to the polls. If Democratic numbers are tenuous enough in those regions that merely switching from one Dem to the other causes a loss or gain, then I don’t think that either candidate has a strong chance in either state.

There’s a similar weakness in fundamental sentiment in each of the other states that one, but not the other Dem wins: West Virginia, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Arkansas, etc. By Survey USA’s accounting nearly 20% of states are swing states this time around. I am no stranger to the “Purple America” theory, but it seems that if we’re as purple as people say we are; and if there’s enough Republican backlash right now, then wherever Clinton wins, Obama wins and vice versa. I can see a handful of states where that wouldn’t be true. Clinton wins Arkansas, for example, and Obama loses. Obama wins Washington where Clinton loses–but that’s just based on Clinton’s homefield advantage in AR and Obama’s appeal to the Washington demographic.

The closeness of the primaries alone should lead one to suspect that the race won’t have as much discrepancy between the two options as presented here. But what do I know?

Prolonged Campaign Helps Democrats?

Bouncing between historical analogs and modern day media realities Walter Shapiro answers the biggest question bounding around the blogosphere yesterday: Is the prolonged Democratic race bad for Democrats come November?

Conventional wisdom and Rush Limbaugh (oddly enough) agree that it does. Clinton and Obama both vying for the lion’s share of the ever-diminishing pool of available delegates will resort to nastier and nastier attacks. Already critics of Clinton’s smear machine have spoken up against Clinton’s 3AM ad which implies, not only that Clinton will be ready on Day One, but that Obama will cause your children to be murdered in their sleep if he’s the guy in the Oval Office. The problem, of course, is that a charge like that doesn’t go away when the person delivering the message is John McCain. In fact, it gets worse. “Look,” Citizen McCain can say, “Even his fellow Democrat doesn’t trust this guy to keep your children safe.”

Shapiro takes issue with the conventional wisdom by focusing on two specific pieces of data. Democrats are famous for settling on a candidate fairly early, by March at least and it hasn’t helped them so far. Even Bill Clinton, he points out, was only nominally challenged until the California primary and despite his early clinching of the DNC nomination, he trailed behind both Bush 41 and Ross Perot.

And the other reality is the slathering maw of a press hungry for drama-laden stories. There is no more drama in the Republican race. According to Shapiro there were roughly four times as many stories following up on the Democratic primaries as on the Republican ones–and that despite the fact that McCain still had a “challenger” in Mike Huckabee.  In the months and weeks ahead, with McCain campaigning for November with the full arsenal of the GOP, he can only divide his attacks between both candidates or hurl them more broadly on Democrats  in general–and no one will care.

Meanwhile Clinton and Obama will dominate the press as they go for each other’s jugulars.

It bears pointing out that this is exactly what did in John Edwards  before Nevada and South Carolina. Despite running strongly in both Iowa and New Hampshire, the press completely ignored Edwards when Obama and Clinton began flaring up at one another, focusing instead on the tit-for-tat going on between the frontrunners.

Is the double-headed beast Clintama-Obamaton going to Edwardsify McCain? It could happen. I think Shapiro is ignoring the harms of a prolonged campaign in favor of underscoring the gains, which is probably for the best since most everybody else is doing the opposite.

TX, OH, RI, VT: A Sloppy Autopsy

The largest margin of the night was Vermont where (with 90% reporting) Obama walked away with 60% and 38% went to Clinton. It’s hard to think of Vermont as mattering most but in a race to collect delegates it’s not “winning” the state that matters, it’s “winning by a lot.” The larger the margin the more net delegates each candidate wins from that state. Vermont (so far) places delegates 9 to 6 for Obama (a net of +3)*.

But it’s OK, I’m not here to buck all your conventional wisdom. Most said Ohio would be an important state and it is…way more important than Vermont. The difference there (with 99% reporting) is a sizable 10% (54% to 44%-Clinton). Assigned delegates are 62 for Clinton and 46 to Obama. (A net loss for Obama, -16)

I feel compelled to note here too that this is startling in some ways. Most polls two weeks ago predicted this Clinton win by this margin. As of yesterday most polls showed Obama having tightened the race considerably. And many very educated commentators noted that Obama tends to outperform the polls, especially in states where he experienced last minute surges. Here, Obama underperformed his last minutes surge by a significant margin and with that underperformance lost his best way to pressure Clinton out of the race.

The second largest margin in last night’s races was Rhode Island (a staggering 18 point difference in Clinton’s favor). Delegates went 12 to 8 for Clinton (A net loss for Obama, again, -4) (er…with 98% reporting).

If you care, follow that link to Talking Points Memo which breaks down the delegates better than I do here. But he basically reports that VT and RI cancel each other out…which you can also see in the CNN numbers here. But the video linked above has a more favorable-to-Obama take on OH and TX than I offer here and Josh Marshall’s accompanying post mentions why something as cut-and-dry as “winners win” is more complicated win it comes to delegates…something I’ve mentioned here too.

Lovely Texas has, I think, the most convoluted process of all. Some states have primaries, some states have caucuses. Texas (and a few others, like Washington) have both. Some states, to make up for slimmer voting options, add a messy delegate apportionment system…like California. Texas, despite already being complicated..also has a complicated delegate apportionment system. Neat!

Nevertheless, with 99% of primaries voting, Clinton is on top with a narrow 3-point lead (51/48). Only 36% of caucuses are reporting and Obama is (so far) scraping out a narrow 4-point win. Of course, that could change with the remaining 64% of uncounted votes. There are less caucus voters than primary voters so it looks like Clinton will “take Texas” too. Texas delegates (again, so far) are going 16/10 to Clinton, a net Obama loss of -6.

So far Obama is 23 votes less ahead than he was yesterday. That number won’t change much between now and 100% of all votes counted everywhere. Even if Obama maintain his narrow lead in the Texas caucus, he’ll only clip Clinton’s gains by a couple of delegates.

Overall this was a big win for Clinton. Obama walks away with tiny Vermont and Clinton takes the rest, including her “firewall” states, Ohio and Texas. Which means…Rush Limbaugh wins! The race will continue with neither Obama (still ahead) nor Clinton (the new, new Comeback Kid) dropping out.

The most important thing to come out of last night was not these delegate numbers. Clinton is clearly unwilling to drop out of this race and she has been looking for any opportunity to lay claim to something like viability. She bet hard on wins in Ohio and Texas and she pulled them out. Even if she lost the delegates in those states, she would have used popular vote totals to encourage a new round of donations and stay in.

So while CNN may be overestimating the size of Clinton’s win last night (+23) I don’t think it much matters. What was important for her is that she could prove that she could overcome the odds against Obama’s momentum and prove that she could still get voters to vote for her.

In the two weeks leading up to last night’s contests she benefited from SNL and Daily Show appearances while Obama has been hit by a series of smear campaigns 1) that he’s a secret Muslim, supported by a Clinton-released picture of Obama in Somali elder gear (complete with turban) 2) that he secretly contacted the Canadian prime minister to alert him that he would be lying about his Nafta policy to get elected and that 3) his wife hates America. The Rezko and Weather Underground “connections” are just starting to get legs and will probably gain dominance as the other stories drop out.

I’m not commenting on whether or not this is “fair” or “nice” because that doesn’t matter. I’m just saying that Clinton had a good couple of weeks and Obama had a bad couple. The numbers in the polls essentially reversed what we saw in the Piedmont primaries with Clinton last night earning the better part of the 60/40 split.

If it proves anything, it proves that Obama isn’t invulnerable and it proves that the voters haven’t moved to him on matters of policy but on superficial matters of appearance and personality–which is the largest part of what this election, and all the most recent elections, have been about.

This is no doubt an encouragement to the Clinton campaign which seemed more-or-less directionless in the four weeks since Tsunami Tuesday.

*All numbers courtesy of CNN.

And then there’s this…

Obama plagiarizes speeches.

Hillary Clinton plagiarizes (her husband’s) speeches.

And now if someone would just let us know for sure that McCain plagiarizes speeches, we could call this one a wash and move onto something substantial like who has the best poster (Obama), choice in golf sweaters (McCain), glisten in her eye (Clinton).