For some reason, one of the most bizarrely persistent myths on the left is that the specifics of the new health care reform law are actually popular. The myth was again brought up today by Ezra Klein: You saw this a lot during health-care reform, where the specifics of the law were popular but the [...]

In the end, if Obama truly wants to install Suleiman, he probably can. He’ll engineer one of those “make me do it” moments, where he just has to accept that the thing his administration has been working tirelessly to achieve is the best thing for Egypt. But the minute that happens, and the stories start leaking out about young demonstrators being “disappeared” by Suleiman’s thugs, he’ll have to explain to the social media generation how it was all worth it for “stability in the region.”

And this time, he won’t be able to blame it on the need for “60 votes.”

President Obama, like all presidents, often says he “wants” or is even “fighting” for something, but in fact puts no real effort into actually making it happen. It could be he doesn’t want to spend political capital because he thinks it is a lost cause, thinks it is fairly unimportant, or even doesn’t really want [...]

The proposed Korean “free trade” agreement would be a truly horrific blow to whatever is left of American manufacturing at a time when unemployment is rampant. But from a political standpoint, fighting for another so-called “free trade” agreement right now has got to represent some kind of death wish for the Democratic party. I don’t have any other way to explain it.

Well, we already knew he liked to hang out with fundraisers who make rape jokes. But we didn’t know he liked to make them himself. Now we do.

This Friday in New Hampshire, Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton will be together for a unity rally, which party members I spoke to are hoping will finally put the bad blood behind. From an email:

FRIDAY: Senators Clinton and Obama to Campaign Together in Town of Unity, New Hampshire

Candidates received 107 votes apiece in Granite State town

As The Washington Post reports, yesterday Barack Obama had a meeting with a number of labor leaders in the AFL-CIO, important in that some of their major affiliates (such as AFSCME) endorsed his rival Sen. Hillary Clinton during the primary.

As the piece puts it:

Several of the largest unions in the AFL-CIO supported Sen.

We had heard the rumors about Solis Doyle joining Team Obama for a while, but now it is official. I checked in with a friend, a super-delegate and former confidante of the Clintons. He echoed what this Huffington Post piece says, which is with her selection as chief of staff to the eventual vice president, Clinton’s chances of getting on the ticket now have pretty much been eliminated, as Solis Doyle

As I described in this recent post, I can certainly see why a Democratic woman would want to back John McCain’s presiential bid. Get your copy of a Handmaid’s Tale highlighted and ready!:

Washington – As an avid supporter of Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic primaries, Debra Bartoshevich is not alone in her frustration over Clinton’s defeat.

She’s not alone in refusing to support Barack Obama.

And she’s not entirely alone in saying

A couple of highly visible women who once strongly supported Hillary Clinton for president are now strongly backing Barack Obama:

Several of Hillary Clinton’s most influential female supporters, urged members of the pro-choice, pro-female candidate group, EMILY’S List to overcome their grief over Clinton’s loss and throw their support behind Barack Obama.