No time to blog today

My mom forwarded this cool picture to me this morning.

Dream cabinet

OK, here’s a fun fantasy exercise while we wait patiently for the never-ending primary process to play itself out. Who would be your ideal picks for the top cabinet posts in the next presidential administration. Here are some of my choices:

President Barack Obama
Vice President Bill Richardson
Secretary of State Chris Dodd
Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel
Attorney General John Edwards
Secretary of Education
Secretary of Health and Human Services
Secretary of Energy
Secretary of Homeland Security Joe Biden
Secretary of Interior Clint Eastwood
Secretary of Veterans Affairs
Secretary of Commerce
Secretary of Treasury
Secretary of Agriculture
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
Secretary of Labor
Secretary of Environment Al Gore (New cabinet level position)

And Hillary Clinton will return to the Senate and challenge Harry Reid for the job of Majority Leader.
I’ll try to fill in the blanks over time. Any suggestions?

Embedded music

Jed over at Boots and Sabers has been highlighting different musical artists each day and having readers post their favorite songs. It’s kind of fun to see what other people pick as their favorite music by acts that are familiar to most everyone. It’s also interesting to see which group or individual gets highlighted each day.
Here are the groups they’ve featured so far in order:

The Rolling Stones
Aerosmith
Led Zepplin
U2
Lynyrd Skynyrd
AC/DC
Motley Crue
Jim Croce
Queen
Bruce Springsteen
Guns n Roses
The Clash

The exercise is apparently limited to the availability of songs Jed can find on the SeeqPod web site. This cool site lets you search for songs that you can then embed on your blog. Here is my first attempt:



I want to dedicate this one to Aretha Franklin!

Delegate math update

For those who may still be unconvinced of the futility of Hillary Clinton’s continuing bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, MSNBC has helpfully run the numbers again:

Obama leads among pledged delegates 1408-1251; Clinton leads among superdelegates, 255-218. Added together, Obama's overall delegate lead is 120, 1626-1506. Now, what's left? There are still 10 pledged delegates NBC News hasn’t allocated from contests already held. In addition, there are 566 delegates at stake in the remaining contests. On the supers front, there are 321 folks who haven't picked sides (76 of whom have yet to be named; they'll get named at state convention meetings held between now and the end of June). OK, now, let's play the math game. If the remaining contests split up "as expected" meaning Clinton wins her base states (PA, KY, WV etc.) and Obama wins his base states (NC, OR, MT etc.) and the two split Indiana down the middle, the two campaigns will likely split those 566 delegates right down the middle 283-283 (margin of error +/- 5 delegates). This means Obama would need 34% of the uncommitted superdelegates to hit the magic 2024 number, while Clinton would need 72% of the uncommitted Supers to hit 2024.  

And splitting the remaining delegates down the middle is probably an overly optimistic scenario for Hillary right now. But even if that does happen, she has to somehow persuade an overwhelming majority of the Super delegates (72 percent) to overturn the will of the Democratic primary voters and support her at the convention. Ain’t gonna happen.

In the meantime, the Jeremiah Wright controversy is starting to fade as the pack-dog press has turned its attention to chasing a sex scandal in the Detroit Mayor’s office; Obama has increased his poll lead in North Carolina to 20 points; and his fundraising efforts continue to outpace Hillary and is leaving John McCain in the dust.

Conservatives for Obama

Andrew Bracevich, a professor of history and international relations at Boston University, makes the conservative case for Barack Obama.

Conservatives who think that a McCain presidency would restore a sense of realism and prudence to U.S. foreign policy are setting themselves up for disappointment. On this score, we should take the senator at his word: his commitment to continuing the most disastrous of President Bush’s misadventures is irrevocable. McCain is determined to remain in Iraq as long as it takes. He is the candidate of the War Party. The election of John McCain would provide a new lease on life to American militarism, while perpetuating the U.S. penchant for global interventionism marketed under the guise of liberation.

The essential point is this: conservatives intent on voting in November for a candidate who shares their views might as well plan on spending Election Day at home. The Republican Party of Bush, Cheney, and McCain no longer accommodates such a candidate.

So why consider Obama? For one reason only: because this liberal Democrat has promised to end the U.S. combat role in Iraq. Contained within that promise, if fulfilled, lies some modest prospect of a conservative revival.