Obama's been taking some hits from the McCain camp for suggesting (in an ABC interview) that the government can crack down on terrorists "within the constraints of our Constitution."  To my ear, it's difficult to imagine a less controversial statement than "if elected, I will obey the law," but according to the McCain camp, obeying the law is passé after 9-11 and reflects "an extremely dangerous and extremely naive approach toward terrorism."

So my question for McCain is this:  If upholding the Constitution is naive and dangerous, will you forgo the Oath of Office if elected?  The reason I ask is we have this pesky tradition of having our presidents swear to uphold the Constitution before they take office.  (In the pre-9-11 days, it was even a constitutional requirement, Article II, Section 1, Clause 8.)

Neil Cavuto, over at Fox News, has graciously decided to provide "Five Tips" for Senator Obama that will presumably help him in the election.  It was hard to tell at first if the entire article was snark, since the five tips boil down to, "stop being so smart and charismatic all the time."

But no, as far as I can tell, Cavuto is serious.  Or at least, he wants to appear to be serious, maybe in the desperate hopes Obama would take him up on some of his terrible advice.

So without further ado, five pieces of advice that Neil Cavuto thinks would help John McCain's Barack Obama's campaign.

Clinton's concession speech is coming and, as articulated by a wonderful article by Peter M. Sandman and Jody Lanard ("Risk Communication Talking Points for Hillary Clinton"):

The key question is whether she will concede in a way that helps her most fervent followers make the transition to Barack Obama or in a way that impedes that transition. That is, she will either mitigate or exacerbate many of her followers’ outrage at the victor – their mingled anger, resentment, and disappointment, and their resulting inclination to deny him their support.

To that end, I've compiled a scorecard for the speech.  Starting from a baseline of zero, the scorecard adds or subtracts points based on what she says.  A negative number indicates a divisive speech and a high number would indicate a unifying speech.  The same item can score multiple times by making multiple references to it.  I've included a few of the samples from the Sandman article where useful.

Based on your comments, I'll adjust the assigned values and add additional items that are missing.

We're just 823 762 623 542 diaries away from the record for most political diaries about teeth to be posted to one website in a twenty-four hour period!!  Join the movement!  Post a diary about teeth today!

Vice President Al Gore 2008

Maybe you're thinkin', "That's not fair!  They shouldn't ban someone just because the title is a little off!?"  To these people, let me break the good news: as far as I know, it's not true.  I just made it up. It's a little something I like to call, a bait-and-switch headline.  It's also the real topic of this diary, which could've been called, "BAIT-AND-SWITCH HEADLINES SUCK."

Today, Terry McAuliffe offered a new theory on the media reaction to Hillary Clinton's implied suggestion (whether intentional or inadvertent) that she should stay in the race because Obama might be assassinated in June:  It's Obama's fault.

"The Obama campaign ... tried to take these words out of context," Clinton campaign chairman Terence R. McAuliffe said on "Fox News Sunday." "She was making a point merely about the time line."

Let's remember how Obama "fanned the flames" of this Scandal.  Here are Obama's words on the subject.

"I have learned that when you are campaigning for as many months as Senator Clinton and I have been campaigning, sometimes you get careless in terms of the statements that you make, and I think that is what happened here," he said in an interview with Radio ISLA. "Senator Clinton says that she did not intend any offense by it, and I will take her at her word on that."

One thing I'll miss about Sen. Clinton dropping out of the race is the source of comedy provided by some of her supporters at MyDD.  I've highlighted some excerpts after the fold--as Triumph would add--for me to poop on.

Reported on the Hill:

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), one of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) most prominent Senate supporters, said Wednesday that she will ask the former first lady to detail her plans for the rest of the Democratic primary.

"I, as you know, have great fondness and great respect for Sen. Clinton and I’m very loyal to her," Feinstein said. "Having said that, I’d like to talk with her and [get] her view on the rest of the race and what the strategy is."

Apparently there's very little news going on in American politics today, so the Drudge Report ran a banner headline about strange "lights" over Arizona and Florida.  Have a look:

What could these be?  Startling additional photos after the jump.

Lets reflect on comments by Bill Clinton today:

Pennsylvania, if you say yes to Hillary Tuesday, you hide and watch: you're electing the next president.

[Cross-posted at Overbreadth]

FCC commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate, arguing in favor of content regulation of the internet, argued the following today:

"Child pornography is a multi-billion dollar segment of our economy,"

As someone who formerly worked in internet credit card processing, I don't buy it.

Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama have both praised Bush's abstinence-based approach to the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa because of the success story of Uganda. Watch this economist speak and see if you still believe the traditional wisdom.

The right wants to pretend McCain never said what he said or something. Is it fair game to poke fun at an inane statement about a million years in Iraq? (Hint: yes. The answer is yes. That’s the hint.)

This morning I awoke to several emails to the effect of:

Hey, you seem to be on Candid Camera!  Check out the Washington Post!

It seems a certain Peter Funt, host of Candid Camera (after his father, Allen Funt), wrote an op-ed that seems eerily similar to a diary entry that was front-paged here on Daily Kos.  You be the judge.

As reported by CBS.

A senior Clinton spokesman told reporters that Clinton did not mean to imply that she was not referring to what she allegedly said to Richardson about Obama.

Read the full story on how the Clinton campaign explains her non-statement with regard to whether she never didn't say that Obama couldn't win.  Or experience the Cookie monster version after the jump.

This post is about a pet peeve:  the Clinton campaign’s love affair with the phrase “raises serious questions.”

Need examples?  According to Clinton or her surrogates, the following raise serious questions about Obama:  Austan Goolsbee, General McPeak, references to Geraldine Ferraro, a 1996 voter questionnaire, even Pennsylvania polls.

Just once, I’d like a reporter to respond:

You’ve told us such and such raises serious questions.  What questions?  How are they serious?  And why all the serious questions from the ’solutions’ candidate?

According to the Reporter:

Los Angeles U.S. Attorney Thomas O’Brien disbanded his public integrity unit last Monday. Those 17 attorneys will be redistributed among the major fraud and organized crime sections.

Don't be nervous though.  This is good news for those who want to see public corruption prosecuted diligently.

"Our view is that it’s a significant enhancement of the public corruption unit," he said.

I understand where he's coming from.  I once watched a large press flatten my car, converting it from a destroyed automobile to a giant brick of steel, which was much more suitable for stacking and selling for scrap metal--a "significant enhancement" you might say.