Most polls do suggest Obama enjoying a surge at the moment. But most polls have been wrong lately.

Make no mistake: As the prohibitive frontrunner for over a year, Clinton should win tomorrow. She's got the name recognition and the party establishment behind her. And indeed, Tsunami Tuesday was originally crafted to play to her strengths.

If Obama can keep it relatively close in the delegate count, he's done what he has to do to move forward. If anything above and beyond that happens, it's gravy. But right now, it's just about Obama staying alive to get it back to more manageable contests in the near future.

Actually, warrior dowager, polls seem to indicate that the more classes -- political science and otherwise -- people young and old take, the more likely they are to support Senator Obama. (For examples, see: http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/pol/559889117.html)

Better a rising eagle than a wounded grouse and her albatross of a husband.

I have an idea. Has anyone at Salon thought about writing an article on Obama's race?

Just a thought. It seems undercovered.

Obama ads pop up on Talking Points Memo all the time, and Josh Marshall has said pretty clear he tends to lean Clinton.

Advertising space is advertising space. I wouldn't make too much of it.

Godwin's law has been invoked before this conversation even got off the ground. Sigh...what's the next issue?

Small world.

It's a common misconception to say Clinton and Obama's record is the same in all things, but on campaign finance and ethics reform, their records do differ in substantive ways (even if they both claim to be for public financing now.)

Sen. Obama passed the first comprehensive campaign finance legislation in Illinois in 25 years. He's backed Feingold on both campaign finance and ethics reform in the Senate -- the latter in particular is legislation he played a large role in developing.

Sen. Clinton -- even notwithstanding all the '96 fundraising scandals -- has ridiculed the idea of campaign finance reform. (She famously told Sen. Feingold he's "not living in the real world.") Feingold has numbered her among 5-6 key Dems trying to undermine campaign finance reform legislation. And, on ethics reform, she voted against creating an Office of Public Integrity. (She now claims the Obama/Feingold ethics bill is too weak, while neglecting to mention she voted to weaken it.)

So, yesh, Obama and Clinton's votes are similar on many, many issues. But these are two -- two that are particularly important to me, and why I decided to back Obama almost a year ago -- where they differ substantially.

Godspeed, John Edwards. He ran an above-the-board campaign, and he drew much-needed attention to the issue of poverty's persistence here in America. I'm an Obama supporter, but I liked having John Edwards in the race.

The key phrase in that article there is "if he's the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee." Everyone seems inclined to agree that if there were a full-fledged frontrunner, as most everyone expected by Super Tuesday if not by after NH, then Florida and Michigan would get seated as afterthoughts.

But the calculus becomes quite different if there is no presumptive nominee. Go read Deadhead's post a few pages back. It's worth an editor's star and then some.

Maybe Obama didn't see Clinton. Maybe Obama decided to give Kennedy and Clinton a chance to talk without hovering over them. Maybe Obama felt like taking to McCaskill more. Maybe Obama is dead sick of Clinton and didn't feel like talking to her. Really, who cares?

This is such a weird and stupid high-school thing to be talking about that I can't even believe I'm writing this comment right now (nor can I believe Clinton didn't take the opportunity to nip this in the bud on FOX this evening.)

But, if you think this "snub" tells you everything you need to know about Senator Obama, well, so be it. But you might want to put it in snub context:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/07/us/politics/07rivals.html

"The relationship began to change when Mr. Obama began musing aloud about a presidential bid. The day he opened his exploratory committee, several Senate observers said, he extended his hand and said hello on the Senate floor. She breezed by him, offering a cool stare. Many Senate observers, even those close to Mrs. Clinton, say they believe she set the less-than-collegial tone."

So, she's a snubber too. Scandal! We'll all just to have to vote for Edwards or Gravel for president, I guess. They don't snub, do they?

Great post.

Rescheduling caucuses at a later date in both states would seem to make the most sense. If deadhead's math is correct and we're due for a brokered convention, simply changing the rules and seating the current delegates will never, ever work.

For the record, I'm an Obama supporter, and I find Clinton's situational ethics pretty gross in this instance, as in all too many of late.

Regardless, if the election is decided either way - or in any way, to be fair to JRE's longshot chances -- by the the current status of Michigan and Florida, there'll be blood on the floor, and the losing side will think they got screwed. Best to attempt a do-over.

That's 71 years of change.

I think the DNC response is that Florida and Michigan are welcome to set up caucuses at a later date, for the apportioning of delegates.

There's a precedent for this in Washington State, which had a beauty contest once and then later held a caucus.

I expect they'll stick to their guns on this if the delegate count at all matters by the time of the convention. If we obviously have a candidate by then, they'll just let them sit.