The News Hole

Countdown Friday: Primary Numbers

2008-05-10T00:59:00Z

Primary Numbers: As the Super-Delegate tide turns for Obama...It is the kind of illogical inevitability that made Joseph Heller coin the term "Catch-22." Slate dot com, quoting campaign finance law, reminding all, that Senator Clinton has to pay virtually every bit of the 11-million dollars she's loaned to her campaign, before the convention in August, or she loses it forever. The New York Times reporting today that the likelihood is increasing that Senator Clinton will loan her campaign still more of her own money. Our fifth story on the Countdown: In order to pay off her debt to herself... she needs to keep her campaign running. But in order to keep her campaign running... she needs to spend more money.... that she does not have... thus increasing her campaign debt... debt she owes... to herself.

...(read more)

Countdown Thursday: Exit Signs?

2008-05-09T00:59:00Z

Still Not Over: While Senator Clinton has today made a jaw-dropping racially-divisive rationalization to continue her lame-duck candidacy... in its self-destructiveness and delusion, a comment worthy of Richard Nixon's final days... While her campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe has insisted this will continue to -- and be resolved by -- June... In our fifth story: if the candidate is usually the last to know, the chairman might be the runner-up.

...(read more)

Countdown Monday: Primary Primer

2008-05-06T00:48:00Z

The Biggest Prize: On the eve of the 97th different make or break day in the Democratic primary, with the latest pronouncement that nearly half of all the remaining pledged delegates are up for grabs in Indiana and North Carolina, with all of it spiced up only by a new high in hyperbole about how your future literally depends on voting for Senator Clinton, tomorrow already feels like.... Groundhog Day....(read more)

Countdown Friday: Guam and Beyond

2008-05-03T00:59:00Z

Gas Pains: A gallon of gas -- regular, un-leaded -- goes for about four dollars and nineteen cents... on the American territory of Guam. If this fact somehow seems irrelevant to you, consider that this afternoon, just four days before the Democratic nominating battle is re-joined in North Carolina and Indiana...The price of a gallon of gas in Guam was one of the issues for Senators Clinton and Obama.Considering Guam is caucusing today -- Saturday, their time. Eight pledged delegates, with half-a-vote each. Five Super-delegates. Our fifth story on the Countdown: Both Senators doing radio interviews by phone to Guam today. Senator Clinton specifically pushing her gas plans. Senator Obama emphasizing that he was from a Pacific Island himself. Senator Clinton restraining from saying "so am I."

...(read more)

Countdown Thursday: Super Switch

2008-05-02T00:59:00Z

Dude, You're Getting a Delegate: If Bill Richardson became "Judas" and Fox News became "fair" and Richard Mellon Scaife became a "deathbed conversion"... what will Senator Clinton's campaign call Joe Andrew? Let's start with the most influential politician you probably had never heard of. In our fifth story on the Countdown: not just a Super-Delegate switched from Clinton to Barack Obama on the premise that he is the better candidate, and the divisions have served only to aide John McCain... But a man, appointed National Chairman of the Democratic National Committee nine years ago... by President Clinton. In fact the name-calling has begun. Mr. Andrew, of Indiana, who joins us in a moment... Immediately found his right to say he was from Indiana, challenged by Senator Clinton's Communications Director, and her foremost supporter in the Hoosier State, Senator Evan Bayh. No, I'm not kidding.

...(read more)

Obamas Tonight

2008-05-01T17:16:00Z

Tune in tonight at 8p ET for our interview with Barack and Michelle Obama (their first together in more than a year). Meredith Vieira conducted the interview for the Today Show, but they were only able to air some of the sit down. Tonight, we'll air an unaired extended portion that you won't see anywhere else....(read more)

Countdown Wednesday: Hanging Tough

2008-05-01T00:59:00Z

Running on Empty: In a campaign whose race for the super-delegates is reportedly, secretly, over...In a campaign -- the subtext of which -- has been complaint and even metaphorical martyrdom...They are words that would have sent supporters of Senator Clinton into a paroxysm of rage. That the nation needed a president quote "that has testicular fortitude." Our fifth story on the Countdown: that there is no rage and that there are no death threats tonight, explicable thusly: the gonadial reference was made by a labor leader, as he endorsed Senator Clinton, intending it as a compliment to her fortitude.

...(read more)

The Shanks

2008-05-01T00:39:00Z

In our third story on the Countdown tonight, we heard from Jim Shank. His wife, Deborah, was grievously injured in a tractor-trailer crash in 2000, leaving her brain damaged and in need of 24 hour care. When Jim managed to win his wife a settlement from the tractor-trailer company, her former employer, Walmart, successfully sued the Shanks for the lot, claiming that their healthcare plan mandated reimbursement if there was a settlement. It was only after Countdown - and...(read more)

Lincoln Douglas Debate Fox News Style

2008-04-30T01:59:00Z

We covered this in our No.1 story tonight...and we are not above making our own stupid mistakes...but here is the Lincoln Douglas Debate Fox News Style. [ ]...(read more)

Countdown Tuesday: Wright Response

2008-04-30T00:59:00Z

In The Line of Firings: If that was, as we postulated here yesterday, a second chance at a first impression... It was a second first impression where the adjectives and the analogies were delivered in car-load lots. Our fifth story on the Countdown: after Reverend Jeremiah Wright's nationally televised train-wreck yesterday... Obama, in his own words today... Said he was: outraged, saddened, angry, shocked, surprised, and disappointed... At the: inexcusable, divisive, destructive, ridiculous, outrageous, and appalling... Caricature, spectacle, exploitation, performance, and rants.

...(read more)