OverClinton.com

Jim Vandehei and Mike Allen de-mythologize the notion that the contest is a "dramatic cliffhanger."

... [T]he only way she wins is if Democratic superdelegates are ready to risk a backlash of historic proportions from the party’s most reliable constituency.

The AP reports today that former senator Lincoln Chafee in his new book criticizes Hillary Clinton and other Democrats who voted for the Iraq war, calling them "Bush enablers" who were duped by the administration. Chafee, the only Republican senator to vote against the war, writes in Against The Tide: How a Compliant Congress Empowered a Reckless President:

Being wrong about sending Americans to kill and be killed, maim and be maimed, is not like making a punctuation mistake in a highway bill.... They argue that the president duped them into war, but getting duped does not exactly recommend their leadership. Helping a rogue president start an unnecessary war should be a career-ending lapse of judgment, in my view.

Drew Westen, professor of psychology and psychiatry at Emory University, and author of The Political Brain warns in The New Republic that the intra-party tussling for the Democratic presidential nomination is allowing John McCain to define himself

... with little resistance (and an occasional assist from the Clinton campaign) as the natural choice for commander-in-chief and as a straight-talker--a particularly strong brand in an election that may turn out to be much like the 1976 election, when Jimmy Carter reassured a nation weary of the dishonesty of the Nixon years, "I will never lie to you."

Walt Uhler has an interesting piece at his site, Walter-C-Uhler.com, analyzing "Hillary's wink and a nod to 'racially sensitive' voters" in Pennsylvania. Uhler quotes the Philadelphia Inquirer's report that "eighteen percent of white Ohio voters said race was an important factor in their decision, and of that group, three in four voted for Clinton," according to exit polls. "Let's dispense with the political correctness," Uhler writes, "and call these people what they really are - racists.... The Clinton campaign knows this, which explains why they have employed the wink and a nod that pigeonholes Obama as merely a black candidate in marginally pro-Democratic Pennsylvania. If she can't prevail on the issues, perhaps a bit of subtle racial innuendo can put her over the top."

Penn and Teller ... uh, I mean Wolfson get more Roveian by the day. After weeks of the so-called "kitchen sink" strategy -- a homey euphemism for prolonged and concerted negative attacks on Obama's electability -- today Ben Smith reports that the dynamic duo allege that Obama is going "shockingly negative." (!) This is apparently in reaction to a Chicago Tribune report that the Obama campaign is preparing a "a full assault on Sen. Hillary Clinton over ethics and transparency."

Margaret Carlson has an excellent analysis of the trouble women who support Hillary have "being consistent." "Listen to Geraldine Ferraro charge that Senator Barack Obama wouldn't be able to step onto the same podium as Hillary Clinton if he were white, when Ferraro wouldn't have been a vice presidential candidate in 1984 if she were a man," Carlson suggests.

In a March 13 interview with NPR's Steve Inskeep, Hillary Clinton argued that the Michigan Democratic primary results should count, even though Obama's name did not appear on the ballot. She justified that position with the claim that Obama's absence on the ballot

...was his choice. There was no rule or requirement that he take his name off the ballot. His supporters ran a very aggressive campaign to try to get people to vote uncommitted."

In fact, all of the Democratic primary candidates had signed an agreement...

Over at ConsortiumNews.com Robert Parry compares the Clinton so-called "kitchen sink" strategy to that of Bush Republicans who "routinely turn truth inside out" in Clinton's Up-Is-Down World.

LA Weekly's Marc Cooper echoes Parry's analysis, describing how Hillary Clinton Wins, Republican Style.

Geraldine Ferraro was elected to congress from New York's 9th district in 1978, but first appeared on the national scene in 1984 when Democratic presidential nominee Walter Mondale picked her as his running mate. In Maureen Dowd's words, she "helped Walter Mondale lose 49 states" in what was a landslide victory for Ronald Reagan.

Hillary's claim to be uniquely qualified to be commander in chief rests in part on her characterizations of foreign policy and national security experience as first lady.

As the AP's Nancy Benac wrote recently, few will argue that she played an active role in her husband's administration. She set up an office in the West Wing and accompanied Bill on trips to 80 countries.

This hardly qualifies as "crisis management," however, suggested former Clinton assistant secretary of state and current Obama supporter Susan Rice.