The Hollywood Liberal

Quote of the Day
“I think if Senator Obama gets the number she will congratulate him and call him the nominee.”

— Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe, on NBC’s Today Show.

Clinton Will Concede Tonight
In her speech tonight, Sen. Hillary Clinton will concede that Sen. Barack Obama “has the delegates to secure the Democratic nomination, campaign officials said, effectively ending her bid to be the nation’s first female president,” according to the Associated Press.

Clinton “will stop short of formally suspending or ending her race in her speech in New York City… She will pledge to continue to speak out on issues like health care. But for all intents and purposes, the two senior officials said, the campaign is over.”

“Most campaign staff will be let go and will be paid through June 15, said the officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to divulge her plans.”

Meanwhile, Politico notes “a tsunami of superdelegates is poised to rush to” Obama “over the next 12 hours, giving him a mathematical lock on his party’s presidential nomination.”

Update: Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe disputes the report and told CNN that Clinton will “absolutely” not concede tonight.

Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson also denied to Politico that Clinton will admit defeat.

Meet the Persians
Last night John McCain made a cameo appearance as the opening act in the culmination in the Democratic Primary process. It was, as usual, a not badly crafted (if duplicitous) speech poorly delivered — in front of an almost enthusiastic crowd of dozens. There’s something about McCain that reminds me of former Communist Party Chairman Konstantin Chernenko.

Last night John McCain made a cameo appearance as the opening act in the culmination in the Democratic Primary process. It was, as usual, a not badly crafted (if duplicitous) speech poorly delivered — in front of an almost enthusiastic crowd of dozens. There’s something about McCain that reminds me of former Communist Party Chairman Konstantin Chernenko (if the latter was surrounded by lime jello). Not in ideology — although they both followed a bankrupt one — but in delivery.

But it continued on Ol’ Johnny’s constant refrain against talking to people we’re not supposed to like, a refrain he has given often — and likely will continue to do so. On Monday, for example before AIPAC:

we hear talk of a meeting with the Iranian leadership offered up as if it were some sudden inspiration, a bold new idea that somehow nobody has ever thought of before. Yet it’s hard to see what such a summit with President Ahmadinejad would actually gain, except an earful of anti-Semitic rants

And, of course, that is vitally important as it related to Iraq right?

He opposed this resolution because its support for countering Iranian influence in Iraq was, he said, a “wrong message not only to the world, but also to the region.” But here, too, he is mistaken.

Well, apparently the Iraqis agree with Obama on both counts:

Iraq’s prime minister plans to visit Iran next week to discuss security and other issues with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a government official said Tuesday.

In John McCain’s mind I suppose they’ll sit around and talk about how much they don’t like Joe Lieberman. However, I imagine that Iraqi Gilligan has other matters on the agenda too:

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is making his second trip in a year’s time to neighboring Iran. The visit comes amid growing concerns among Iraqis and Americans that Iranian agents are training and arming Shiite militants in Iraq.

The visit will be his third trip to the country as prime minister. He visited Iran in September 2006 and again in August.

According to Iran’s state-run Islamic Republic News Agency, Abu Heidar al-Sheikh, Iraqi ambassador to Iran, told reporters the trip will last two days and will focus in part on strengthening political and economic ties between the two countries.

The news agency paraphrased al-Sheikh as saying that al-Maliki also would “confer with the supreme leader of the Islamic revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei on [the] security pact between Iraq and the U.S.”

Oh noz! He’s meeting, despite all of McCain’s bluster about Iran’s undermining of him, to strengthen political and economic ties between Iraq and Iran — home of the world’s most dangerous Member’s Only Jacket. And he’s even meeting with Khamenei so that means he’s actually meeting with somebody in charge. Maliki doesn’t hope to end Iranian influence, he hopes to permanently fix it [unlike that little pact with the U.S. he and many others are not so keen on].

Finally, talks involving the real winner of Bush’s invasion.

I wonder if Nuri brought the floor plans to the U.S. Embassy so they can pick our their future suites?

McCauliffe: Absolutely No Concession Tonight

4:45 pm: Terry McCauliffe tells Wolf Blitzer Hillary absolutely will not drop out tonight.

He says he and Hillary are making superdelegate calls. She has more voters than any other candidate in presidential primary history. “We're still going.”

Laugh of the segment: Going into a commercial break, Wolf says: “But could the superdelegates still sway her way? Come back and we'll ask our expert, Donna Brazile.”

These threads are filling up fast. We need some topical music video suggestions. Ideas?

This is an open thread.

Arab Street Conspiracy Theories
Yglesias:

In the hawk faction of the U.S. politics you have radical clerics musing about the apocalypse playing a key role in the process to determine who the GOP standard-bearer will be. And even in the more dovish faction, the lead contenders won’t acknowledge our own intelligence findings about the Iranian nuclear program. Someone, someone in Iran is penning a furious blog post or article or memo about how you just can’t appease the Americans, how we’re irrational and our political system is dysfunctional, about how we were determined to invade Iraq irrespective of the facts and we’re not invading Iran right now just because it’s not logistically feasible and that restarting a crash weapons program before it does become feasible is Iran’s only hope.

Yes I realize Iran is Persian, not Arab, but, hey, what’s the difference. The inability of the elites in our country to spend 5 minutes thinking about just what things look like to people in other countries and how they might quite reasonably see the country as a powerful lunatic is maddening.

Obama Says He Won, But Clinton Does Not Concede
Even as Obama wins dozens of super delegates, Clinton says she will review her options for “the best interests of our party and our country.”

How the Media Abandoned Iraq
How America’s mainstream media has let the country’s third longest war in history slip off the radar screen.

John McCain’s Primary Night Speech
Here’s McCain’s speech from tonight:…

Sen. Clinton’s Speech

Now, The Fun Begins

This was an unpleasant primary process. The Democratic Party which began proud of its historically diverse field of candidates ended up suffering from race and gender divisions.

Yet, neither racism or sexism won the day.

While questions about a female commander-in-chief were pondered early on, Sen. Clinton’s capacity to be commander-in-chief was ultimately not judged by her gender. In turn, she blazed a path for future women candidates to follow.

Obama was more directly challenged by racial issues later in the campaign, with some voters publicly expressing bigoted sentiments. Yet he still won plenty of predominantly white states on his way to the nomination, including final victories in Oregon and Montana.

Most importantly, after facing a litany of guilt-by-association attacks and other smears, he still remains ahead of McCain in nearly every poll.

Now, we can turn our attention to the battle against Sen. John McCain and the flagging conservative movement.

We have an golden opportunity to bury the failed conservative policies of the last eight years.

We can eagerly engage a clear contrast between guaranteeing health care for all and trashing employer health benefits for many.

Between Social Security and privatization.

Between investing in our foundation or letting America continue to crumble.

Between a clean energy future, or more double talk not backed up with votes.

Most importantly, we have a principled, seasoned and skilled candidate willing and able to challenge conservatism on most every front.

When the predictable “soft” and “weak” attacks arise, there will be no crouching into a timid ball, merely confirming the charge.

There will only be cool defiance, leading the way for all of us to fundamentally reframe the debate.

Will there be more nastiness to come? Probably.

But do not let that get you down. There is way too much to be excited about, and too much fun to be had.

Let’s get to it.

Sect children reuinited with family
Sect children reuinited with family

Politico: ‘Who is Matt Drudge?’
May 19 was a fairly typical day in the recent life of the Drudge Report. There was a breathtaking picture of Sen. Barack Obama?s rally in Portland, Ore., framed by the words ?AS FAR AS CAMERA’S EYE CAN SEE ? THE OBAMA MASS.? And there was thinly veiled mockery of two other candidates: ?Clinton Sits Through Sermon About Adultery,? was one headline. ?State GOP chair: McCain ?kind of like Jesus,?? was another, closely followed by ?McCain?s national finance co-chair exits over lobbyist ties ??

Army scientist: The sun is responsible for global warming.
Dr. Bruce West, chief scientist of the Army Research Office’s mathematical and information science directorate, is arguing that global warming is “directly linked to…the short-term statistical fluctuations in the Sun’s irradiance and the longer-term solar cycles,” according to Wired: In an advisory to bloggers entitled “Global Warming: Fact of Fiction [sic],” an Army public affairs official […]

Dr. Bruce West, chief scientist of the Army Research Office’s mathematical and information science directorate, is arguing that global warming is “directly linked to…the short-term statistical fluctuations in the Sun’s irradiance and the longer-term solar cycles,” according to Wired:

In an advisory to bloggers entitled “Global Warming: Fact of Fiction [sic],” an Army public affairs official promoted a conference call with West about “the causes of global warming, and how it may not be caused by the common indicates [sic] some scientists and the media are indicating.”

As Wired notes, the position puts West at odds with the American Meteorological Society, the American Geophysical Union, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which have all recognized mankind’s significant contribution to climate change.