Since Barack Obama’s wins this week in the District of Columbia and the states Virginia and Maryland, Hillary Clinton lags behind in the polls.  It is estimated that Barack Obama has 1,215 delegates, while Hillary Clinton’s delegates come to 1,190.  Earlier, Hillary Clinton was leading the polls. in these polls the superdelegates- democratic party leaders and official entitled to private votes- were always counted in.

The almost 800 superdelegates were clearly in favor of Hillary and ensured her the lead so far, but now she lost the leading position to Obama even with the superdelegates’ votes counted in.

To receive the Democratic nomination for the ultimate battle against the Republican nominee, a Democratic candidate has to reach 2,025  delegates. The Democratic’s  struggle is not over yet- in fact it is more exciting than ever before. Although Hillary has had quite a rough weekend- her campaign manager was fired and she lost against Barack Obama in three states- she continues the campaign energetic as always.

At the eve of the second pre-elections for American presidency in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton held an emotional speech.  Being among an audience of mostly women, Hillary Clinton seemed to feel very tired and sad about the state of the country. She convinced the audience that she wanted to make the United States a better place. She stressed that it was not just a political effort, but that she had put her whole heart into her campaign and into her plans for America, would she be elected President in 2008.

In the video below Hillary Clinton is answering a question from an elderly woman: “How do you do it? How do you keep up … and who does your hair?”

The Clinton’s are now campaigning in Iowa. Things are not always running smoothly, as Mr. Clinton causes some divided emotions. At the one hand, Bill plays an increasingly important role in his wife’s campaign, or so it seems, while at the other hand he is attracting a lot of attention to himself, something that some say could harm the campaign of Hillary Clinton.

Advisors of the Clintons say that Bill Clinton’s presence in Hillary’s campaign has grown because of several reasons: the first is that Bill believes that winning or losing in Iowa is crucial to the rest of the bid for presidency and that the New Hampshire primary is a determining factor in this. The second is that Bill has become quite competitive and is anxious to succeed.

Bill Clinton is not very keen on a certain kind of publicity, expecially publicity in which Barack Obama is being portrayed as the one that will bring change in the American political arena while the rest of the Democratic candidates- including Hillary- are being portrayed as the older generation of Democrats.

Last week Bill Clinton prepared a speech on behalf of his wife in which the word “change” was strikinlgy apparent. Whether this will do Hillary any good, however, is not certain, since Bill, in that same speech, also stated that he was against the war in Iraq from the beginning, a statement that is more than contested.

Some sources say that Bill Clinton’s approach to Hillary’s campaign might not be the most effective one. Although Bill is a very strong element in Hillary’s bid for the presidency, he might also become too strong, something that strategists have been warning him for from the beginning.

Source: Drudge Report

At the Iowa Democratic Party Jefferson Jackson dinner Saturday night in Iowa, it became clear that Barack Obama has gained strenght over the last few days. He held a stunning, forceful and passionate speech, which caused even Edwards’ campaign manager to sing loudly: “Fired up! Ready to go! Fired up! Ready to go!”, Obama’s new campaign catch phrase.

He advocated that the 2008 presidential elections will differ significantly from the last elections, proclaiming that “Telling Americans what they think they want to hear instead of telling the American people what they need to hear just won’t do it.” This phrase was also a remark of attack directed to Hillary Clinton, who is repeatedly being accused of not being clear on where she stands with regard to many of the important issues.

Iowa traditionally is the most important state where presidential nominees can make their mark and take a lead in the elections. In january the Iowa caucus will be held, an occasion at which it has more than often been decided who will be the party’s chosen presidential candidate.

Read more about the Iowa Democratic Party Jefferson Jackson dinner at Time.com

The central topic at the Democratic Debate in Philadelphia this week was the issue of Iran. While all the Democratic candidates seem to agree on the issue of Iraq, when it comes to Iran, one of them stands alone.

Senator Hillary Clinton is the only Democratic candidate who voted for the Kyl-Lieberman amendment last month. This amendment designates, among other things, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization.

In the debate Clinton was heavily criticized by her opponents, in particular by John Edwards, who made a strong performance at the debate, trying to establish himself as The Alternative to Clinton. Referring to the vote for military action in Iraq in 2002, he said: “A lot of us on this stage have learned our lessons the hard way: That you give this president an inch, and he’ll take a mile”.

At the time of the Iraq-vote, both Edwards and Clinton voted for the resolution. Edwards later apologized for the vote, but Clinton has always refused to apologize, which initially caused unrest among the Democrats. Clinton defended her refusal by saying: “If the most important thing to any of you is choosing someone who did not cast that vote or has said his vote was a mistake, then there are others to choose from.”

With that unrest appearing to be put to rest, Clinton has now opened up another Pandora’s box with her vote for the sanctions against Iran. Her campaign released a statement last week saying: “We must use all the tools at our disposal to address the serious challenge posed by Iran, including diplomacy, economic pressure, and sanctions.[…]The Bush Administration should use this opportunity to finally engage in robust diplomacy to achieve our objective of ending Iran’s nuclear weapons program, while also averting military action. That is the policy I support.”

Of the major candidates, Barack Obama is the only one that hasn’t voted for the war on Iraq. He couldn’t have, because he was a state lawmaker in Illinois at the time, but he continually reminds voters that he was against the war in Iraq from the start. On the new sanctions against Iran, Obama said: “It is important to have tough sanctions on Iran, particularly on the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, which supports terrorism. But these sanctions must not be linked to any attempt to keep our troops in Iraq, or to take military action against Iran.”

In the Philadelphia debate, the Iranian issue was used against Clinton as a way to slap on a Bush mask. Whatever the effect, with both Obama and Edwards going for the same bone of The Alternative for Clinton, the latter might actually still come out the strongest.

Running for the Democrat presidential candidacy costs money, let alone running for the highest office itself.

But focusing on how much the key Democrat presidential nominees can earn is a distraction. In fact, the non-Hillaries are worth far more than Mrs. Clinton alone.

US primary campaigns are notorious for all the razzmatazz you can imagine. The politics itself is almost overshadowed by the endless round of conventions and hard-hitting advertising: at times, the campaigns look more like traveling circuses than sober attempts to name a potential leader of the free world.

After that, it gets worse. According to the BBC, George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign is estimated to have run to $273 million; John Kerry raised $249 million. The next Democratic candidate is going to need even more.

So even at this early stage, it’s all about the money. It stands to reason that the party nominee who can score the most dollars now will have a higher chance at the primaries. The Democrats certainly aren’t going to want to back a lame duck from the start, and financial contributions in 2007 must indicate the relative levels of popularity each will enjoy when crunch time comes next year.

The Washington Post today reports the approximate funding the four main candidates have raised over the last three months:

• Hillary Clinton: $17 million
• Barack Obama: $17 million
• John Edwards: $7 million
• Bill Richardson: $5.2 million

So between the bunch, and knowing that Hillary and Barack haven’t yet disclosed the exact totals for the quarter (they’ll have to by October 15), that’s a cool $46.2 million: $17 million for Hillary and $29.2 million for the other three.

But with eight Democrat candidates standing (let’s not forget Dodd, Biden, Gravel and Kucinich, however tempting it might be), isn’t there something of a distortion here?

Let’s play devil’s advocate for a moment. Perhaps the main thing going for seven of them is the simple fact that they’re not Hillary. Tot up the known funding totals so far for this magnificent seven (derived from opensecrets.org) and the figures speak clearly. Between them, they’d gathered $115 million by quarter two - $52 million above Mrs. Clinton’s equivalent total, or about 83% more.

What does that tell us? It tells us that - assuming anti-Hillary voters would support anyone who wasn’t married to an ex-president - the ‘I’m not Hillary’ ticket is worth almost twice as much. The problem is that it’s currently diluted between the seven others, so the cash is simply not as effective.

But as far as the current campaigns go, there can be only one. So what happens to all the spare cash the unsuccessful candidates have raised? Are they going to pool it for the long-term good of the party? I doubt it. No, even though the anti-Hillary nominees are worth 83% more, they may not to be able to capitalize on it.

Democratic as well as Republican presidential nominees face a lot of stress while campaigning. Not only do they have to get up really early every day, they also have to take care of their public appearances and money.

Making sure that the press pictures her well is one of many energy absorbing tasks of Hillary Clinton and her consortium. The Clinton campaign is said to even challenge the Bush administration when it comes to attracting positive press releases by manipulation/ control. Hillary mainly controls press release by distancing herself from the press, making it very hard for journalists to talk to her personally.

A bigger headache than press release, however, is the control of the fundraising. Who donates the campaign money? This is something that some presidential nominees have been worrying about, since some campaigns are already hurt by fundraisers who, after their donations that undoubtedly trigger political thrill seekers to investigate, are charged with criminal activities that range from possession of cocaine to money laundering.

Read all about who’s campaign was harmed by which fund raiser at the blog www.politico.com

The campaigning period for the 2008 presidential elections has hardly started but the media in the United States already work at full speed to keep track of every movement of the presidential candidates. The top issue coming to the fore again and again is of course the Iraq war and the candidates’ opinions on the War Strategy. Another issue is the health care problem in the United States, although Democrats are found to be tackling this issue far more often than Republicans are.

Although, besides covering O.J. Simpson and his robbery and earlier this month Britney Spears and her Las Vegas performance, the United States press and media is already very much occupied with the campaigns and the upcoming elections, the rest of the (Western) world does not seem to be very interested in the presidential candidates yet. Major newspapers and opinion-makers such as the French Le Monde, the German Der Spiegel or the British BBC or The Guardian do not dedicate any attention at all to the developments in the U.S. campaigning period.

Perhaps it’s just too early, or perhaps there are bigger things happening in the world these days than the premature speeches of U.S. presidential candidates. It will be interesting to see when the international press starts to become involved in the coverage of the (run-up to) the US 2008 elections and what they will have to say about the candidates, their ideas and campaigns.

Emotions in U.S. politics are running high after General Petraeus testimony on Iraq earlier this week and President Bush’s speech after the release of the White House report on Iraq. Republicans as well as Democrats are divided in their reactions to the report’s results and the speech. Democrats who have been arguing for an immediate ending of the war in Iraq have been put into the extreme corner by Petraeus testimony and yesterdays’ speech by President Bush.

General Petraeus, commander in chief in Iraq, and Ryan Crocker, ambassador to Iraq, testified before Congress in expectation to the release of the White House report on progress in Iraq early this week. The report, that was released yesterday, shows a lack of progress towards peace and stability in Iraq, with progress in only 9 of 18 benchmarks set for the Iraqi government. Read the full report here.

In reaction to the report President Bush addressed the American citizens via a television speech. The president showed dissatisfaction with the lack of progress in Iraq. He announced that he will retire troops from Iraq, but that a fast retirement would be irresponsible and a possible disaster for the Iraqi people and the stability in the region. Mr. Bush plans to bring home 5.700 troops by Christmas.

Democrats favouring a fast retirement of troops are now vulnerable for accusations of being weak, something that causes the already existing divide within the Democratic party to deepen. Grassroots democrats are still pushing for a direct ending of the war, while the Democrat leadership fears a possible emergence of an image of weakness for the Democratic party, something that may have a significant influence on next year’s elections. However, although announcing the retirement of troops, President Bush did not offer a clear strategy towards ending the war, a weakness that might turn out to be a possibility for Democrats in Congress to push for their own strategy. Democrats do not have the majority to veto the President, but an alignment with Republican critics of the developments in Iraq might empower them enough to do reach a majority.

The democratic presidential candidates are now reacting to the Petraeus Report and to Bush’s speech, with Larry King having Barack Obama live in his late night show. Live from Iowa, in a reaction to the Petraeus report, Obama was very critical about the results of Bush’s strategy and he kept pleading for a different strategy in Iraq. He also stressed that, in opposition to his rival in the running up to the presidential elections Hillary Clinton, he has been opposing the War in Iraq since its beginning. Obama also praised fellow democrat Jack Reed, who earlier this week was responsible for the Democratic response to Bush’s speech. Read the full text of the speech here.

The war in Iraq, and especially the question of how to end the war, will be of major influence in the 2008 presidential elections. Let us hope that the fight for the presidency will not be determining the strategy in Iraq but that it will be the other way around. Whoever finds a possible strategy to end this horrific chaos and grow seeds for stability in Iraq and its neighbouring countries, deserves the presidency. The Bush era will end in January 2009 but Iraq will not, and this is becoming clearer every day as progress stagnates and violence stays alive in Iraq.

Sources:

www.uspolitics.einnews.com

www.ft.com (Financial Times)

www.cnn.com

Rebublicans Mitt Romney and John McCain are the biggest money spenders in the first two quarters of this year’s run up to the presidential elections. Mitt Romney spent more than $11 million on his campaign in the first quarter and more than $20 million so far in the second! Republican presidential candidate John McCain spent more than $8 million on his campaign in the first, and more than $13 million in the second quarter.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are the two biggest spenders on the Democrats’ side, being good for more than $41 million spent together so far in the first two quarters of 2007. Obama was the number 1 democrat spender in both the first and the second quarter. See for more details on presidential candidates’ campaign spending the Interactives at Yahoo.com