Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

Senior politicians want to be loved but, if they cannot be loved, they usually make do with being respected, or feared, or held in some kind of esteem, high or low. What they cannot abide, and (perhaps) cannot survive, is . Perhaps in Pennsylvania "Deer Hunter" country, their iMacs are not yet configured for YouTube - but this is the gaffe that keeps on damaging the Clinton campaign.

It puts revelations like in the shade.

But they won't give up - oh no. This line - chilling to many Democrats - from an LA Times profile of Harold Ickes (who once worked for Jesse Jackson), sums up what ruthlessness really means and how the Denver Convention might look:

"Unhappy about the way Jackson was being treated at the '88 convention, Ickes hatched plans that included a threat to hand out 1,700 plastic whistles to Jackson supporters so they could disrupt the proceedings. Some of his ideas unnerved even Jackson; Ickes remembers him saying, "Ickes, you want to get me run out of white man's America."

The whole piece is .

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Apologies for my incompetence with the Bath Chronicle link - I can’t find it at all now but

On weightier matters to the (chuck them out of the G8) which (perhaps even more so than Iraq) may come to be one of the major features of the foreign policy debate in the general election. The Senator's big foreign affairs speech was covered mainly for its efforts to separate the candidate from the Bush White House but the Russia stuff alarms some Europeans terribly. More importantly it might just be unrealistic in a world where Russian help - on Iran etc - is needed.

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I think I am bound to accept that guns are a bit of a red herring when it comes to low-level violence in western societies, but I still believe there's a case to be made that suburban American is far gentler than its UK equivalent. Bedd Gelert's reference to the city of Bath in England is interesting. Of course, the UK has areas of privilege and less crime - and the lovely city of Bath is one of them - and yet look at the today.

And there is from earlier in the year.

By the way, Bath is of course very safe for tourists and for most of its inhabitants as well (I don't want to be accused of dissing the city I grew up in!) but every part of the UK appears to suffer from this nastiness.

I see, meanwhile, that one of America's foremost commentators on the right sees England's problems as than the odd city centre stabbing might suggest.

Back in the US, a fair bit of what low-level nastiness there is can be found among Democrats at the moment - and here is on where we are and what the historical precedents (such as they are) suggest about what will happen.

And does not look like terribly good news for the party either - though I wonder whether people rather overstate the strength of their Clinton-Obama allegiances at the moment, in order to psych the opposition, as it were.

Do go to Bath!

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Sorry to be a touch intermittent with the posting this week - quick pre-Pennsylvania holiday in

I find mystifying - and, I have to report, so do other Brits I have met here on the slopes. Talking to a chap originally from south London but living now in New Jersey, we agreed (before seeing this piece) that one of the great pleasures of living in the US is that the underlying sense of low-level violence and nastiness so much in evidence in big English cities - and in small market towns as well - just does not exist here, or to be more precise does not exist outside certain areas. Most Americans can avoid it. In the UK, you cannot.

I note that the number of handguns in circulation is one of the reasons the US scores relatively badly in the assessment: but, if you look at the in the DC case, there is certainly a case to be made that the kind of crime that affects the UK so badly - burglaries where someone is in their home - is simply less common in the US. Have the Jane's people got it wrong?

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Passportgate. You saw the word here first. Sorry.

This from the Associated Press:

"Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has told Sen Hillary Rodham Clinton that her passport file was breached in 2007. In a statement from her Senate office, Clinton said she had been contacted by Rice. The State Department plans to brief Clinton's staff Friday about the unauthorized breach.

"The development came just hours after the State Department fired two contract employees and disciplined a third for inappropriately examining the passport file of Clinton's Democratic rival, Sen Barack Obama."

UPDATE:

This is a summary of , with even McCain gettting in on the act. No wonder so many Americans steer clear of passports...

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You may think the big news is the Obama passport breach or the preacher problem, but is being explored while he is touring foreign climes - and not necessarily to his advantage.

The passport furore may or may not turn out to be suspicious: but didn't Bill Clinton suffer a similar breach that turned out to be political? is where the story was first broken.

And the Washington Times has another - a suggestion that the McCain campaign might face its own Ralph Nader.

Just as the Democrats seem to be organising their trainwreck with impeccable skill and judgement, the Republicans decide to join in!

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Here is the answer to the Democrats' Michigan and Florida difficulties: turn to ! I am serious: these people conduct fair elections for organisations in the UK and no-one (I think) has ever questioned their impartiality or efficiency.

On the Obama pastor controversy, thanks to all those who have contributed: apologies again for the technical issues. Steve C makes an interesting point about timing (suggesting that if this had been happening early in the primaries, he would be toast) - I wonder whether the actual timing though is not rather wonderful for him, way ahead of the general election and coming just before a primary he is going to lose anyway?

Edward S claims: "It is an illusion to suggest that conflicting interests can generally be transcended. One ends up trying to be all things for all people. It's a recipe for indecisiveness - the risk: 'a mind so open that one's brain falls out'."

Well, let's see what happens now with Obama: if anyone can do it he can. Liz, meanwhile, makes a point that I am sure others will have sympathy with: I heard someone suggest on the airwaves the other day that if the Rev Wright's comments had been made calmly by an academic (white, perhaps) they would have been considered a reasonable contribution to open debate. The fact that he is shouting in the clips, and swaying about, does not do him any favours. Luc Zagbo wants the candidate to be allowed to move on: well, that might well happen if he gets through this period. But I do not think that questioning him is the same as seeking white dominance, as you put it.

Ghazamfar Khan raises the issue of bigotry more generally. Well, we live in a highly religious age, so I see no way round it - it seems to be to be (sadly) more than an invention of the mainstream media. As Harriet makes clear, many individuals in many churches are guilty of bigotry but we tend to accept that they do not speak for the whole church.

David Ginsburg asks about religion and the answer is yes, it matters; as someone once said: "You don't have to be a saint to run for president but you have to be a pilgrim." To venture into dangerous waters, I must say I simply do not understand, though, why Obama ever had need of a "spiritual advisor" or whatever he called Mr Wright. You can address ethics and morality without turning to the church: I suggest any of the works of the wonderful .

Alasdair Bovaird raises an interesting issue about how to cover moments like this in the race: I must say, if he had made this speech without needing to, as it were, I would agree with you - but given the discussion among his team and the tactical effort they were making to see off a potential calamity, I think it is reasonable to frame it in those terms. Having said that, I wish I had added a line about the risk he was taking and the unusual richness and complexity of the actual speech.

Jon asks about Rush Limbaugh. He matters, but not as much as he thinks, I would venture to suggest. With no candidate he can support, this might be a post-Rush election.

Richard Berry is right; this blog is impartial in the sense that I have no preference for any candidate or any policy. But impartiality in the modern world means more, I think, than simply presenting "information" with no commentary, or analysis, or humour. This medium is also more sophisticated than radio and TV and, if you are reading this, you are seeking it out and probably reading it alongside all manner of alternative views: you do not expect the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ to be biased, and we should not be, but nor do you want us to be dull... And Martin - I predicted a McCain victory months ago, long before you!

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I see Rush Limbaugh - but the Obama speech has gone down well with most educated Americans, even those who think he is wrong. Howard Kurtz .

One thought in addition: a colleague of mine returned from teaching journalism in Bahrain last week. When the subject turned to American politics, his translator said: "Is it true that Barack Obama is Jewish?" Apparently it is something to do with "Barack" sounding like the Israeli name Barak. I am sure Geraldine Ferraro would claim this is yet another advantage to add to all the others he has...

As for the Bush speech on Iraq: the real issue now is whether the US can maintain sufficient troop numbers into the future, in other words whether America can do what the president claims it is ready to do. The end of is fascinating.

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Apologies for coming rather late to the turbulent priest issue but the Obama speech allows me to catch up. Here is . Can he do it? More to the point how could he possibly have imagined he could avoid these matters - ?

Jeremiah meanwhile is . I can well understand that the black folk memory of America is hugely different to the white version but is this what black people really think? Is that what they were thinking five days after 9/11? Fascinating if it is true. Amazing that the ambitious Barack Obama could not break with this talk for fear of alienating a key constituency. And rather depressing for Americans keen on future harmony.

As for the big race between Him and Her, Richard Lake links us to the suggestion that Mrs Clinton might like to become Senate Majority Leader - I must say the idea of stepping into Harry Reid's shoes as opposed to George Bush's just does not seem to me to be likely to fire up the Clinton imagination.

Judge Drudge makes a trenchant point about Obama which may well turn out to be true: that he has fallen to earth. His judgement is as flawed as hers. In fact at the risk of upsetting everyone on the Democratic side, I wonder whether the conventional wisdom (which I fully accepted) that the Democrats were choosing between two titans is rather flawed? Their inability to knock each other out speaks of a certain weakness, does it not?

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Two things are interesting about Keith Olbermann's . American viewers who haven't seen it might be amused/gratified/horrified but British viewers will be amazed, I should imagine, that it could be allowed: the rules on broadcasting impartiality in the UK ban such comment even on cable.

The longer I live in the US, the more I wonder (this is me, not the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ!) whether it is rather more grown-up to allow Keith O and Fox News and all the other essentially partial voices to fight it out in the public square. I certainly don’t buy the idea that there is no such thing as impartiality - and there is still a hunger for broadcasting that strives for it -but there is room for Keith O as well!

Meanwhile, fascinating that the war in Iraq from US television. Keith O and the rest are great fun, but you need more.

His outburst reminds me that Sally Bedell Smith's none too flattering book about the Clintons, For the Love of Politics, is now out in paperback in the US; with a truly frightening photo on the front and an afterword whose central message might be summed up thus: "Told you so!" The book contains the line - which got me into hot water when I repeated it on the airwaves - that Hillary "tends to reminds men of their first wives". But it is worth reading for the wider context as well.

Meanwhile, those of us living in DC are preparing either to sleep safer in our beds or to endure a modern day Wild West, depending on your point of view, when the Supreme Court this week. It's a case of truly historic proportions. To British eyes, the case for more guns not fewer is a hard one to make but do a calm and persuasive job. I am fascinated by the fact, as it appears to be, that burglaries while a householder is in a home are far, far fewer in number in the US than they are in the UK. Guns - the argument goes - make innocent people safer.

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Faced with the reality that nothing much is now going to change: that both Clinton and Obama will have realistic claims (well, alright: self-styled realistic claims) to be the nominee come 10 June and the formal end of the primary season, it comes down to mental toughness tempered by calculations about the all-important judgement of history. The AP has an interesting take on - but could not hear - the two having on the Senate floor this week.

The fact is that objective analysis does not necessarily end the matter, among even fair-minded people. No-one is fairer than Ron Brownstein, and yet he seems genuinely conflicted: "If Obama runs well, he seems more likely than Clinton to assemble a big majority and trigger a Democratic sweep - not only by attracting independents and crossover Republicans but also by increasing turnout among African-Americans and young people. But if Obama stumbles, he could face a greater danger of fracturing the traditional Democratic coalition by losing seniors and blue-collar whites to McCain, principally on security issues. Clinton's reach across the electorate may not be as long, but her grip on her voters could be firmer."

The full piece is and well worth a look - the Pew finding that 30% of poorer white Democrats might ditch the party and go for McCain if Obama were the nominee is particularly eye-catching. Racism or educationism?

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In the matter of : judgement on the behaviour of the Scotsman is handed down by my distinguished colleague Nick Robinson, the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Political Editor:

"Would Westminster's rules have allowed what the Scotsman did? You bet. As their reporter says, you can't retrospectively make something 'off the record'. On the other hand, would I expect a Westminster reporter to treat a contact that way? No, because if they did, they'd soon have no contacts. The relationship between a journalist and their sources is not about hard and fast rules. It's about some level of trust based on a shared understanding of the terms of trade. I supect the reporter in this case weighed up the the size of the story (big) plus the likelihood of needing that contact again (nil) against the cost of being accused of breaking the rules (low). I also suspect that most politicians would say: 'If you don't want something reported don't say it or, if you do, make sure you've agreed the rules first.'"

So there. In case David Axelrod is reading, though, I repeat that I would not have used it...

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I agree with Owen Glaze and Ryan B up to a point (by the way, did you see of the Pennsylvania situation?) but the exit polls from Mississippi suggest, do they not, that people who have made up their minds more recently have tended to be for Hillary - suggesting momentum for her.

She certainly has to win Pennsylvania. But if, as Owen suggests, the majority of Democrats have not voted for her - even after a win there - she is finished. Short of Kevin Burns and his "obscene manipulation" (great phrase). Nathan L is right about the fundamental miscalculation of the Clinton camp - if that is what it turns out to be - with regard to fighting for all states. They never thought it would be necessary. Now they have an office in Puerto Rico!

Spencer and Doug, we are looking at the Texas issue - you are right we must certainly report the (new) full result on 29 March.

Jon Gardner asks why I have not reported Geraldine Ferraro's : here is the . I note that (towards the end) she acknowledges that she would not have been a vice-presidential candidate were it not for her sex. But she also has this tiresome arch way of blaming "men" for doing Hillary Clinton down. And she , as they say. Obama would never make such a suggestion about "whites" or "Latinos" - and if he did, he'd be doomed. Perhaps Men (post Eliot Spitzer?) are too easy a target for self-pitying politicians in need of excuses. Anyway, she has stepped down and can now devote more time to Fox News.

And Minimoog - I shared your surprise!

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For the Democrats post-Mississippi it all boils down to this does it not...? Forget Pennsylvania. Don't even bother reading about it. Yawn at the result (she wins: 55%-45%).

Nothing will be decided now until 10 June (the last legal day of the primary season). If Hillary wins the popular vote (and all the big states) and Barack wins the delegate count (and more states though smaller), it goes to court and to the streets of Denver. It probably does anyway. I hope I still fit my flak jacket - haven't tried it on since Bosnia.

Meanwhile, American readers will be amused, I suspect, to read of the in its efforts to create model citizens. I see Times readers have already come up with for the pledge of British allegiance.

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On the I have to admit I am not sure whether the British rules (Chad Moser wonders about them) are entirely clear-cut with regard to off-the-record comments. I shall ask my esteemed colleage Nick Robinson, the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Political Editor, and he will inform us.

Several people make the point that the Scotsman had no hope of building a relationship with the Obama campaign - this surely has an impact on how you behave as a journalist. Ralph's story is great and reminds me of one I was told by John Major, the former British prime minister: he was with Boris Yeltsin, then Russian president, at the Kremlin. Russia was going down the tubes and Major asked Yeltsin what, in a word, his opinion was of Russia's future. "Good," he says. Major is nonplussed (it seems to be a ridiculous answer and an attempt to palm him off with nonsense in front of his officials), so he says: "And what's the longer version of that?" Yeltsin, without pausing, replies: "Not good!"

The story is on the record by the way - I have heard Major repeat it at public functions.

As for Eliot Spitzer, it is not about sex, it is about trust. And if is to believed, he may well have a criminal case to answer (not something that a British or French politician would have to deal with). That is why he has to go: plus the obvious . I imagine the 3am calls tonight coming FROM her to him.

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Eliot Spitzer is out of the VP running then - though I guess he was never really in. If he stays on though, hangs around embarrassing his friends and delighting his enemies like the Democrats' own version of Republican Senator Larry Craig, he could provide a difficult choice for the woman he backs in the presidential contest.

Mrs Clinton will surely be asked before long whether he should go: and she or her people are surely on the phone to the governor now, informing him that this is a question she does not want to answer. He has to go: for the sake of her campaign, if for no other reason.

Meanwhile, on the subject of less than wonderful news for Mrs Clinton, in the British press. The question: as Northern Ireland's peace deal was being thrashed out, was she watching basket-weaving displays (or whatever the Ulster equivalent is), or was she locking horns with the players as she suggests? David Trimble ought to know and has no reason to diminish her role.

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To continue the discussion about the Scotsman and Sam Power, here is

I see, meanwhile, that Bill Clinton is talking about a Hillary/Barack ticket as an "unstoppable force" -

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For LibertynJustice and anyone else interested, this is Sam Powers being grilled in the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ style (and coming out of it rather well I thought).

Bedd Gelert raises an interesting question about the behaviour of the Scotsman newspaper. I must say, I would not have passed the comments on - I would have used them for sure, but not in a way that led back to her.

Would I have been right?

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On the Hillary/Monster issue I would only note that in English law libels are at their most egregious - and thus most serious and costly - when they are true but not provable to the high standards necessary for a complete defence.

Plainly the poster of of the infamous Clinton 3am ad is in the Sam Power camp... as is .

Meanwhile, I see Ron Paul is - or at least re-tooling or re-whatever it is you do when you lose.

I met him and found him a little prickly but dead straight - and many Americans thought he was dead right too. I would be interested in hearing where his backers are going to place their votes in November...

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Is Ben Cameron actually another person writing under a pseudonym... ?

I ask having just seen this from Karl Rove: "A long Democratic battle doesn't automatically help the Republicans. In fact, it hurts the Republicans in certain ways. Mr McCain becomes less interesting to the media. Stories about him move off page one and grow smaller. TV coverage becomes spotty and short. There are not yet big and deep and unbridgeable differences between the two Democrats and there is plenty of time to heal most wounds (except, perhaps among the young if Mrs Clinton were to win). Continuing to build a profile and lay the predicate for the short fall campaign against either Democrat becomes the challenge for Mr McCain while the Democrats battle it out."

This is .

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I agree with Art! I heard a British journalist in DC the other day moaning on about voter turnout and trying to make the point that the British process was still better because more people take part - nonsense! Stand in the lines that'll form in Wyoming soon and Mississippi next week if you want to see real participation in democracy.

Rob's point about Margaret Thatcher reminds me that the American idea that a woman might make a weak leader is downright weird. The world's toughest political leaders have often been women: from Queen Boadicea to Indira Gandhi.

Ben Cameron makes an observation which goes against conventional wisdom and I am certainly going to try it out on a senior Democrat when I next see one - perhaps the duel is a fiendishly clever Democratic Party plot to keep McCain out of the headlines.

I see my Obama as post-Pennsylvania running-mate idea has not exactly received universal approbation. I am not advocating it guys, just reporting its likelihood!!

Meanwhile why, oh why, do (all of them as cool as an English ham sandwich on a wet day in Bognor Regis) continue to think that they can be like Barack? Forgetaboutit.

Start by buying trousers that reach as far as your shoes but don't expect to reach Obama cool any time soon...

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This from "A group of prominent Democrats was being formed secretly to go to Clinton to ask her to bow out for the sake of party solidarity. Now, neither candidate, counting their current super-delegates and potential unpledged delegates, can win a majority of delegates even after the Pennsylvania primary April 22. It is hard to imagine either bowing out. That raises the possibility of carnage in Denver with the super-delegates and the disputed Michigan and Florida delegations in play."

This is

Seems to me the opening is there after Pennsylvania for Barack Obama to be offered the vice-presidency and the moral high ground.

Are we sure he won't take it?

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This election enters the territory now where people look back on it for their whole lives. Bathed in the warm Texas breeze, I stood in the line for a caucus here in San Antonio and chatted to people who simply cannot remember anything like it. In fact, several had no idea about the caucus system - it had never occurred to them to take part before. Now they are in a queue of hundreds of people - some carrying small children, some elderly people sitting on chairs they had brought with them.

It was not always good humoured, I have to say - there was real tension over who had the right to get it started and open the door and do the counting etc - but it was still a rather wonderful sight.

The Obama rally was less wonderful - largely because nobody knew what was going on. It was held outdoors in the rather lovely Spanish-style centre of San Antonio - you could have been in old Malaga or Cordoba - but we waited and waited for the candidate to appear and it got colder and colder and there was . He won Vermont! Not a high spot... (sorry Vermont).

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Is this fight going on - as Clinton strategist Mark Penn has promised - all the way to the Convention?

The Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ has just heard from a very senior Clinton source that they are expecting to win three out of four contests (Obama gets Vermont and that's it). There's no way of verifying that expectation - and it's worth pointing out that the caucuses in Texas have not even opened as I write this.

But plainly there are hopes rising in her camp that this is not the execution night that her opponents had planned for her.

Meanwhile anyone thinking that the press gets privileged access to all of this history-in-the-making should take a look at ...

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HOUSTON, TEXAS: A not hugely attended rally in Houston caps it off - the smaller numbers perhaps because it was late at night in the centre of the city.

Obama rambled a bit then caught the mood fantastically with his story about how he came upon the slogan "fired up and ready to go".

"Let's go out and change the world" were the last words he spoke…

So the big day arrives and this is the

And this from one who knows:

"Obama can lose everything on Tuesday and still win the nomination," wrote Democratic pollster Mark Mellman. "Clinton could win all four states and still lose the nomination. But a politically consequential victory for Clinton requires wins in both Texas and Ohio."

The full article is

How apt that this vertiginous roller coaster ride ends - to mix metaphors - with a cliffhanger...

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SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: The event over, the candidate has answered reporters' questions and it seems to be - I have been attending these events off and on for some time now - that the atmosphere is sharper than it was.

I noticed as the local reporters were doing their stand-ups in the crowd, as Obama pressed the flesh, that phrases like "questions being asked" etc were floating around the room. And at the presser, the first question was about NAFTA and the contacts that Obama had or did not have with the Canadian government (he is accused of giving the Canadians winks and nods regarding his desire to see NAFTA re-negotiated) - and the second was about Tony Rezko! He kept his cool but he is, in these final moments, on the defensive...

is not entirely hostile but asks searching questions.

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SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: In an Obama event with veterans in San Antonio and the bandwagon looks to be rolling on at a steady lick. As always the challenge for the Obama people is to provide space enough to hold everyone who wants to come (and to accommodate the press - who'd have thought Dana Millbank of the Washington Post would be turning up in San Antonio even a month or so ago? - or indeed the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ?).

appears to be the last word on what Hillary's bottom line really is.

Meanwhile anyone regarding themselves as a "new reader" when it comes to Tony Rezko would do well to look at - not new but a good intro to why he matters and what the links with Obama really are.

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So the battle lines are drawn and the sense of what happens next captured in this which sees all the pressure on Mrs Clinton to perform above expectations or quit the scene. I am in San Antonio Texas, bathed by warm breezes and trying to avoid having to broadcast from the Alamo (I will fail!)

Bear in mind nothing anyone has predicted so far in this election has turned out to be the case. She wins both?

Meanwhile Texas is fascinated as well by another piece of political news - and I see the .

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