This is not going to be much of a diary, but it is one that I promised the community.  Even though this is a day later than the deadline I imposed on this, I still want to issue this full-throated apology and thank you.  I want to thank Senator Hillary Clinton for her endorsement of Senator Barack Obama for President of the United States.  Furthermore, I want to personally apologize to Ms. Clinton and her supporters for doubting her and believing that she would split the party.  I fully welcome them and their ideas.  Ms. Clinton has contributed greatly to the party and to the ideas Democrats hold dear.  I believe she does deserve a large voice in the party's future direction.  Now, I am really looking forward to the general election.

First the good news.  Obama is back on top of Clinton by 9 points in the daily tracker, according to Rasmussen.

Obama now leads Clinton by 50 - 41, which comes close to his peak last week.  Since Rasmussen averages over 4 days, last Thursday's numbers have fallen off - so these numbers include all of the post 'bittergate' polling.

Obama now also is only three points behind McCain, 47-43.  And his favorability ratings are improving.

The bad news and my 1/500 of a sawbuck after the break.

OK, so we are a little bit obsessed over the daily tracking polls of both Rasmussen and Gallup here at the DailyKos.  But hey, if we weren't watching polls, us young venomous lambs might be out in the streets doing God knows what to all of the mature Serious People out there in the Real World.

So today brings another interesting tid-bit.  According to Rasmussen, Sen. Obama now leads Sen. McCain in head-to-head tracking for the first time in over a month.

More politically-geeky poll stuff after the flip.

In several comments, I have asked the question: "Do Americans really want to have their preacher's sermons become part of the national political discourse?"  I'm not sure that they do.  Catholics would be in a heap of hot-water over the whole molestation scandal (The Pope has repeatedly blamed homosexuality).  Conservative religious members could have their preachers calls to bring about the end of abortion with violence used against them.

And John McCain could have the statements of his preachers parsed.  Apparently, Sam Stein over at Huffpo is doing just that.

After threatening to pursue Super Delegates as a way of catching up with the freight train that is the Obama campaign, Hillary has reversed course and has called for both candidates to not pursue Super Delegates now.  The reason is pretty clear: at the beginning of the month, Hillary had a 71 Super Delegate lead.  That has been reduced to 59, including 3 who have switched from Hillary to Obama.

The Huffington Post has an article that gives the tale of the tape from Thomas B. Edsall.  My analysis follows.

Media matters and several sites have BillO saying this quote:

I don't want to go on a lynching party against Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how the woman really feels. If that's how she really feels -- that America is a bad country or a flawed nation, whatever -- then that's legit. We'll track it down.

So, let me get this straight, Bill, if there is evidence (as determined by you, I guess) that she believes America is a bad country - then are are you seriously going to lead a lynching party?  Really?

I hereby declare that my support for Barack Obama is conditional.  It is conditional on principles that I personally hold dear.  I have given money, donated time and attended rallies.  I have chatted up co-workers, relatives and complete strangers.  I have done more for Barack Obama than I have done for Howard Dean, which was the first campaign where I got involved.  Join me after the break so that I can tell you why I wouldn’t support a Barack Obama candidacy.

Barack Obama gave a speech after the Potomac Primaries in Wisconsin.  It is on the front page right now.  One of the significant changes of tone in that speech is he started to train his guns on McCain; Obama presuming that he was the now the front runner.  At the time, I wondered if that was a good idea with such big states as Texas and Ohio coming up.  Hillary's ploy has been to say that all the 'little states' don't count and only states like Texas and Ohio do.  This has the counter-weight of pumping up those two states - making them feel important.  I'm wondering if that has led to a back-lash.  Join me over the fold to find the bad news as to why I think so...

The non-farm payrolls dropped 17,000 in January - the first job bleeding in 4 years.  This on top of an already weak December job report.

Follow me over the break for more details.

UPDATE:  New thread can be found here.

The debate started about 10:30am ET.
Watch on C-Span2 here:
Live blog Mothership by lgcap is found here.
Live blog #2 by gchaucer2 is found here.
Live blog #3 by greenchiledem is found here.
Live blog #4 by Remembering Jello is found here.
This is live blog #5...

Upcoming diaries:

  6. TheMomCat

  7. MichiganGirl

  8. Moody Loner

  9. Volunteer needed

More after the break...

I just got done reading an article on TPM that gave a preview of what to expect on Superbowl Sunday by our good friends at Fox News.  In addition to their normal snide remarks and bad commentary during the game, we are also going to have to put up with their POLITICAL commentary.  Yes, you heard that right: The Official News Channel of the GOP is going to mix politics with the Great American Game.  Follow me for a rant after the break.

(I always wanted to use BREAKING in the title!)  Keith Olbermann plans on doing one of his 'Special Comments' tonight.  Subject: Dubya's dance on the Iran NIE.  Unfortunately, I am probably going to miss it.  If somebody puts a thread latter 'live blogging' it, that would be great.

Excerpt below the break...

Unbelievable.  It appears that 'Fox Lite' has decided to jump in with it's own 'Fair and Balanced' take on the Frosts' smear campaign.  And who is to blame for all of this?  Why the Democrats of course.  John Roberts 'Reports':

Some of the accusations [against the Frosts] may be exaggerated or false. But did the Democrats make a tactical error in holding up Graeme as their poster child?

A tactical error?  You gotta be kidding me.  A family that is helped by a government program decides to speak out for the same program - using their own words - and according to CNN - It's the Dems fault that they are smeared.

OK, I have to admit.  I am catching a little baseball fever now that the Rockies are in the playoffs.  I haven't been a big baseball fan since moving from Southern California and watching the Dodgers growing up.  But, hey, the Rockies were founded one year after I arrived in the Rockey Mountains, so in a sense, they are more 'my team' than the Broncos.  I liked Don Baylor way more than I like Clint Hurdle - so I really haven't been following them.  I also abandoned the Dodgers during they time they were owned by Murdoc.

However, today I decided to click on espn.com and bring up the cool little 'gamecast' so I can keep track of the game while working on the computer.  The front-page article was about the success of wildcard teams in the playoffs.  Please join me after the break for a key graf, right at the top of the article.

It seems that Rupert (who's real first name is Keith - go figure) wants to bring that 'Fair and Balanced' charm to the business world that he has so successfully brought to politics in general and foreign policy in particular.  According to this blurb, Rupert wants to make his 'news' empire  "more business-friendly."  Follow me after the break for my personal analysis of this latest turn in Faux 'News' empire...

UPDATE: mrbubs has a good take here.

I looked through the recent diaries to see if this has been covered.  In my opinion, this should be all over the MSM.  I found the article in at TIME.com, of all places.  Apparently, Brown claims that the response to Katrina was, wait for it, politically motivated.  Just when you thought it couldn't be any worse, it gets worse.  I'm really surprised this hasn't gotten more play here.  Follow me beyond the break for my thoughts on the matter...

When Dubya first slid into below 30% territory last May, many of us thought that he would be in Nixon territory on a permanent basis.  But we saw his numbers stabilize over the summer and then to our shock, he once again pulled a rabbit out of the hat and delivered Zarqawi.  This coincided with the 5th anniversary of 9/11 and a fall in oil prices and suddenly, his numbers were back in the forties again.  The MSM went ape, per usually and Tweety even imagined his numbers rising above 50% before Christmas.  But then the election happened, Iraq became explosive and everyone saw it as a Civil War (except the administration) the ISG report came out and said Dubya should declare victory and get the Hell out.  But like a good little Neo-Con puppet, Dubya would have none of it.  And then his numbers began to slide anew.  Now, they have finally reached where they were in May and have surpassed that low mark.

I have been asked by a couple people on this front page diary to make a diary out of a comment I made here.  The comment revolved around the pre-revolutionary history of America – when it was just a British Colony.  It deals with a common misconception about the mission of the Pilgrims and what happened when their Errand into the Wilderness failed.

The Pilgrims came to the New World not to escape Religious Persecution, as is commonly believed.  They came to carve out a new life in this wild, hostile land to create a land of religious purity.  Hence the name Puritans.  It was this religious purity that they were looking for in creating a new Utopia.  The believed that England was corrupted, hopelessly so.  So they came to the New World to create a model society in hopes that the Old World would look westward to establish this Utopia and model their corrupt societies after the shining new land.