Bob Bauer

So the Obama campaign has unleashed its scary lawyer Bob Bauer to provide about 200 small reasons why a new Michigan primary might not be a good thing. This proves that the Obama campaign still can't grasp the one big reason why they shouldn't be fighting this: It's bad politics.

By offering resistance, the Obama campaign is handing a juicy story to the media and a priceless issue to the Clinton campaign, which is now free to argue that Obama is (a) afraid of a fight; (b) trying to disenfranchise voters; and (c) endangering the party's chance to carry a big state in the fall.  read more »

The Clinton campaign just held what they called an "emergency" conference call to discuss what they claim are examples of caucus "intimidation" and "irregularities" in Texas.

In the call, the campaign accused Obama campaign of disenfranchising voters by locking Clinton supporters out of voting places, prematurely filling out sign-in sheets and calling in results before 7 p.m., when caucuses are supposed to start.

"We're here to talk about a tremendously disturbing pattern" said Ace Smith, who is running the Clinton campaign in Texas. "What is happening tonight is just truly an outrage."

Then things got interesting.  read more »

The vicious reaction of Barack Obama's lawyer to the emergence of an anti-Obama 527 group calls to mind yet another parallel between this year's Clinton-Obama race and the 1984 contest between Gary Hart and Walter Mondale.

Mondale, the Hillary-like machine/establishment candidate of 1984, was—like every other candidate back in those days—accepting federal matching funds for his campaign, meaning that his primary season spending was capped at $20 million.

Like Hillary's brain trust, the Mondale campaign never anticipated a prolonged primary season, believing that a frontloaded calendar (which was rammed through the DNC by Mondale allies) would hand the nomination to their man by early March. They spent their money accordingly.  read more »