Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s biggest challenge in Iowa may be the Iraq War and her reputation as a hawk. She tries to dodge the single most important issue in the 2008 race; she knows it is her Achilles heel. When asked at the IDP Central Committee meeting this morning, she almost apologized for her 2002 vote authorizing Bush to use force against Iraq. Almost. She said she takes “responsibility” for the vote and said she would not have voted that way had she’d known what she does now. But she added that there are no “do-overs” in life, and we need to discuss what to do now.

It was just dumb luck that I got to have a personal, 5-minute conversation with Hillary. I just happened to be by the coffee machine as she was exiting the building, and I struck up a conversation over her hawkish reputation as she shook my hand. To tell you the truth, I was surprised at how personable she is in conversation, unhurried and very at ease (I think JoDee Winterhof is not yet confident enough with Hillary to pull her away from worthless conversations with party activists like me).

During the early stages of the caucuses we see a lot of names of various “nice catch” staffers, but unless you are even more of an IDP molester than me you probably don’t know what they look like.  So imagine my surprise when Tom Vilsack put his January staff meeting online!  My connection at the hotel here is too slow for me to actually watch it, but I was able to see that Jesse Harris apparently lost his razor.  Let’s see if this sucker works:

I found it on Myspace – it apparently still isn’t on the Vilsack website.  I dig the semi-exclusive content, especially from my top 8 buddy Vilsack.  I also definitely dig giving the staff some face time.  I hope other campaigns follow suit!

UPDATE:  It’s now on his website, too.  I guess there aren’t any perks to being top eightsies.  🙁

At the beginning of the year, a lot of prominent liberal bloggers and activists noted the passing of Maria Leavey, an amazing Democratic force who helped push our message in DC and throughout Democratic and media institutions.  You can read her obituary here in the Washington Post.  Matt Stoller offers a fantastic memorial post here at MyDD.

In all of Maria’s work, there is a unique Iowa connection which, probably because of my age, I never truly got to know about or understand until now.  Kay Henderson over at her Radio Iowa blog tells us that for almost ten years, Leavey worked for Senator Tom Harkin.  She truly was a champion for liberal causes, just like Harkin still is today.  I hope that DC and the Democratic establishment never forget what kind of a force Leavey was and I know that DC will likely feel quite empty without her presence.

Hotline dishes some info about the Edwards campaign.

The highlights:

Advisers Nick Baldick and Caroline McCauly and other Edwards staffers may have more overall NH experience than any other team.

Jennifer O’Malley, who was Edwards’s IA field director in ’03-’04, will serve as his state director this cycle. O’Malley is engaged to Patrick Dillon, who is slated to become Gov. Chet Culver’s chief of staff. Dillon was Culver’s manager and worked on Edwards’s ’03-’04 field and press staffs in IA.

In South Carolina, John Moylan is running the show again, and ex-party executive director Lachlan McIntosh is recruiting field, political and communication staff. Edwards’s communications team is in fighting shape.

Finally, money. We can’t say for sure, because nobody who knows will tell us, but aside from a little bit of cut-in from Sen. Joe Biden’s courtship of the trial bar, the signals emanating from Edwards’s universe suggest he’s on track to beat expectations in the first quarter.

When candidates are attacked unfairly, it makes me much, much more supportive of them.  By the end of the 2004 campaign Dean was like a god to me, thanks to all the ridiculous smears peddled by the other campaigns and usually repeated verbatim by the media.  This time around, it looks like Obama is heading down that track.

In addition to the factually wrong smear from the previous post here, Obama is getting attacked for not being black enough (because he hasn’t suffered the drawbacks of slavery, having instead benefited from his father’s privileged life as a Kenyan goat farmer).  Or for apparently not being black at all.  Or for changing names and combining characters in his first book, after he said he was doing exactly that in the introduction to said book.

The main thrusts of these articles are all insulting, but it’s the tone of the last two and the throwaway lines that bother me the most.  One example:

And then there’s his support for ethanol, which, strangely enough, comes mainly from corn-rich Iowa — site of the first presidential caucus, if I’m not mistaken.

Or it could be that he’s from Illinois, which is 2nd in overall corn production in the country.  These people don’t know a damn thing about the guy and still feel qualified to attack him.  Well fuck em, it only makes me like him more.

IowaPolitics.com has the press release from the Clinton campaign.

The Clinton presidential campaign announced today that veteran Iowa operative JoDee Winterhof will run its state operation. Winterhof, a fourth-generation Iowan, served as Sen. Tom Harkin’s chief-of-staff from 1999-2003, and worked on his presidential and senatorial campaigns…

In addition to her work for Senator Harkin and other campaigns in Iowa, Winterhof served as the first Political Director of America Coming Together (ACT) during the 2004 election cycle, executing the largest progressive voter mobilization in history. She will take a leave as a principal at Grassroots Solutions, a firm that specializes in grassroots advocacy, political field consulting, training, and targeting.

Before that, Winterhof was the National Project Director for The White House Project, a non-partisan public education campaign working to see women at the highest levels of leadership in the country and served in the political operation of EMILY’s List.  Additionally, she served as a political appointee in the Clinton-Gore administration at the National Women’s Business Council.

Here’s a story (not really, it’s total trash) hopefully everyone will forget before too long.  Apparently, someone in “somebody’s” campaign is spreading a lie that Barack Obama was at one point a Muslim. 

Here are a few points to think about.

1) Barack Obama has always been a Christian.

2) Who cares?

Apparently the problems with the Republican Party of Iowa will be solved by reimbursing mileage at a higher rate and giving the central committee members expense accounts.  I can only suspect that this is reverse psychology aimed at the Democrats, because the Republicans can’t really be that myopic… can they?

House Democrats in the Iowa House have approved a minimum wage increase. The bill, House File 1, raises Iowa’s minimum wage by $2.10 per hour and will be the first increase in nearly a decade.

The Boston Globe says Kerry will not run again in 2008.

As you can see, there is now a calendar on the left side of the page.  If anyone officially from the campaigns wants to get in touch with me about being able to put events up on it, it would make my life a lot easier.  🙂

In response to this:  Clinton actually did buy ads in Iowa – check out Political Forecast right now.  This site just doesn’t have any ads.  Crazy, I know.  There isn’t like a blanket policy against advertisements, I just haven’t set any up yet.  I can eat a $15/month fee from soapblox though, and I don’t want to mess up the aesthetic of the site.  🙂

He took that picture to bed with him every night?  Who approved that line?

This is pretty much the steroids/Mars part of the state of the union, where Bush brings up a bunch of shit that no one cares about.  Seriously, Baby Einstein?  It’s also kind of sad that they could only get a benchwarmer for their little immigration blah blah.

Quartet?  What the hell is that?  Considering Bush was a cheerleader in college, I am guessing he played the viola.

Pelosi is on a mission to show off that she is not decrepit like Dick Cheney.  She has shot out of her seat every time, while Dick Cheney looks like he could use a cane.

Wow she looks constipated.  Here is a song about her.

“They are against almost every principle of civilization.”  Yeah, remember that time where Osama Bin Laden put out that video tape decrying agriculture and the city-state?  I am pretty sure bartering is outlawed in the Koran too.

Chuck Grassley just got his first erection in ten years with that renewable fuel goal.  Archer Daniels Midland finally got their money’s worth with him.

John Kerry is sitting next to Ron Wyden, who I strongly suspect is a homosexual.  If Kerry got a gay marriage I think he might be able to rise above 3% in the polls.  Ted Kennedy is sitting next to Barack Obama, which is also interesting.