Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign web site
is the fastest place to donate online; Barack Obama’s is the slowest.
And while both Democratic candidates currently lead in 2008 U.S.
presidential campaign fundraising overall, Obama’s poor web site
performance could be his Achilles heel over time….Obama’s online donation process was ten times slower than Clinton’s.

The silence coming from Clinton and Obama is particularly deafening. Obama has written eloquently about his own struggle with drugs, but has not addressed the tragic effect the war on drugs is having on African American communities…There’s a talking point Hillary and Obama should adopt. It’s both the right thing and the smart thing. Because of disenfranchisement statues, large numbers of black men who were convicted of drug crimes are ineligible to vote, even those who have fully paid their debt to society. A 2000 study found that 1.4 million African American men — 13 percent of the total black male population — were unable to vote in the 2000 election because of state laws barring felons access to the polls. In Florida, one in three black men is permanently disqualified from voting. Think that might have made a difference in the 2000 race? Our short-sighted drug laws have become the 21st Century manifestation of Jim Crow.

Shouldn’t this be an issue Democratic presidential candidates deem worthy of their attention?

The Obama campaign hints it has raised more than $20 million. That comes to more than $222,000 a day, more than $13,888 each hour of a 16-hour day.

Mitchell:

he may be as high as $25 million, all of which he can spend on the primary campaign. And as you know, of that $26 million that [HRC’s] raised, she won’t say how much of that is primary campaign dollars. Some of it may be money that she can’t spend unless she wins the nomination” (”Hardball,” MSNBC, 4/2).

Kos’ analysis:

If Obama outraises Hillary in the quarter in primary dollars, it will be HUGE news…If Obama outraises Hillary, and does so with a larger number of individual donors, he knocks off one of Hillary’s biggest selling points. It would be game changing.

Today’s NYT piece on the Obama fund raising machine noted Obama’s 2004 dependence on 300 donors:

nearly half of the more than $5 million that Mr. Obama raised in the primary came from just 300 donors.

because it seems to include an unusual number of ideologically motivated young people, many of whom have never worked a caucus before. Their typical field organizer offer, which is the lowest of the candidates reviewed here, is $2,000 per month. Because Senator Obama is so magnetic, they are having no trouble filling positions, but the low salary may not be enough to entice experienced operatives.

Obama hasn’t uploaded a new video to YouTube for five days.
Clinton hasn’t put up a new one in four days.
Edwards has been unseen for a week.
Many — too many — of the videos they’re putting up are from TV appearances or from loud rallies.

If you want to use this medium as a conversation, people, then you have to converse. As any blogger can tell you, if you don’t blog regularly, you won’t be read (or watched) regularly. This is like starting a TV show and then making us guess when you’re going to put out the next episode.

You’re not the Sopranos, folks. You need to get on a regular schedule of talking with us or we won’t be listening.

Clinton and Obama supporters, speaking on condition of anonymity, said both might have been trying to avoid offending socially conservative Democrats, particularly churchgoing African-Americans, who share Pace’s views.

Steve Sanders, a gay Democrat who sat on the party’s platform committee in 2000, said Clinton and Obama are engaged in a delicate balancing act. “Hillary and Barack have made very public overtures to religious Americans. They are trying to figure out how progressive Democrats can also make appeals to Americans of faith. It’s a work in progress.”

Andy has more extensive thoughts at towleroad:

It’s a pretty simple question, don’t you think?

John Edwards, so far, has been the most light on his feet on this issue. Asked by Wolf Blitzer on The Situation Room whether he agrees with Pace’s comments, Edwards replied, “I don’t share that view.”

We certainly deserve better answers from our candidates, and should demand them.

The Wednesday page-one story is not really a story. That Obama’s stock broker bought $50,000 of stock in two companies whose investors included some of his large political donors raises no conflict of interest issue, even if Obama knew about the transaction….Dirt-digging researchers on the staffs of one of the other major Democratic candidates – either Edwards or Clinton – came up with this stuff, and leaked it to Christopher Drew. Your assignment: Figure out, on the basis of Drew’s past coverage of Clinton and Edwards, which candidate was more likely to do the leaking because he or she believed that Drew would take it and try to get it high prominence in the paper.

James in the comment section has taken up Reich’s challenge and doesn’t think Team HRC was responsible:

I don’t think it was Hil. Drew had a few pieces scrutinizing Bill Clinton fund raising. Then again who would have expected Rupert Murdoch’s apparent change of heart re: Ms. Clinton. I would have expected more stories from Drew during Hil’s senate campaigns.
(?)
He did have a few pieces on one of the submarine rescues, Bernie Kerick, the US spy plane mid-air collision with the Chinese fighter, another “whitewater” non-piece on Howard Dean, food contamination, several on Katrina, and on possible voting fraud - particularly in Florida. Not much there.

(If YouTube views are the new currency, will campaigns employ YouTube monkeys to bulk up their numbers? Further, how long will it be until we accustomed to these web stunts? Were bloggers, or whatever existed before bloggers [water cooler conversations?] all atwitter over the first political TV ads? And is anyone paying attention besides a small number of political and online junkies?)

Back to Micah’s post:

Is “Vote Different” really the work of an amateur, a civilian if you will? Or is it a shrewd move by someone who wants to stir up trouble between the Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama campaigns?… the minute-long mash-up of Apple’s famous “1984″ ad and some Hillary speeches has been viewed more than 100,000 times since being posted two days ago by someone using the handle “ParkRidge47.” One tip-off that this is not the work of a rank amateur is how well the video integrates not just Hillary’s speeches into the rectangular TV boxes shown in the spot, but the placement of Obama’s circular campaign logo on the woman runner’s shirt…

Trying to decipher the man or woman behind the video, alias ParkRidge47, Micah points out in the comments section that:

Hillary Clinton was born in Park Ridge, Illinois, in 1947.

Hence, ParkRidge47 is not an accidental nom-de-guerre.

“We’re very fortunate in this country to have such a deep and talented field for the Democratic nomination for president. Sen. Hillary Clinton is a woman of tremendous leadership, a great leader for the party and the nation,” he said, after planting a magnolia tree on the north lawn of City Hall with local politicians and schoolchildren. “Everything has its time and its place.”

I’m sure Hillary was well received. But it was Obama’s day. They did not march from Selma to Montgomery for the rights of women to vote…Whoever told Hillary to go to Selma today should be fired.