During a Obama campaign conference call with reporters yesterday, Senator Claire McCaskill said it would be “inappropriate and awkard and wrong for any of us to tell Senator Clinton when it is time for the race to be over.”
She said the decision is Clinton’s alone.
Here’s the complete conference call (McCaskill’s comments are around -18:00):
Also featured on the call was Senator John Kerry, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano, and Obama campaign manager David Plouffe.
Here is the Clinton campaign’s conference call also from Wednesday:
Obama is scheduled to speak here in the Reynolds Coliseum on the campus of North Carolina State University tonight around 9:00. They’ve set up his podium on one end of the basketball court. Around half-court is the riser set-up for TV networks. The back court is filled with dozens of tables for up laptop reporters.
TUESDAY, MAY 6 - ELECTION DAY!
Clinton is running commercials on North Carolina TV featuring poet and author Maya Angelou. In the ad, Angelou, who is black, says she believes she has found “the best person to be President of the United States.”
If Barack Obama wins the North Carolina primary Tuesday, it will not be a small feat historically. The headline of the local paper tells the story: “Race Still Influences Voters, Poll Finds”. The article gives some context:
Racial issues have shaped North Carolina politics since the Reconstruction era. In 1880, The New York Times detailed county-by-county violations of white Democrats keeping black Republicans from voting. In Wilmington in 1898, whites rioted and forced blacks from their homes after a local election, the only known political coup in U.S. history.
In more recent years, former Gov. Terry Sanford lost the Tar Heel Democratic presidential primary in 1972 to Alabama Gov. George Wallace, a segregationist who made his name fighting school integration.
And then there was the Harvey Gantt/Jesse Helms U.S. Senate race of 1990. Helms, the Republican incumbent, was in a close race with Gantt, Charlotte’s first black mayor, until airing a last-minute ad that showed a pair of white hands crumpling a rejection letter and blaming the job loss on affirmative action.
On the current TV ads (see below):
In the Democratic gubernatorial race, state treasurer Richard Moore linked Lt. Gov. Bev Perdue to the Ku Klux Klan in advertisements.
The N.C. Republican party aired commercials tying both Perdue and Moore to the Rev. Wright despite requests from McCain and the national Republican establishment to hold its fire.
“Although both parties claim they don’t, they have racial overtones,” Bacot said of the ads.
From the mouths of North Carolina voters:
Greg Gallagher, 52, a construction worker who lives in Pamlico County, was so uncomfortable hearing about Obama’s pastor that he worries about the candidate himself.
“The more I know, the less I like him,” said Gallagher, who is white. “You listen to this guy — it’s not going to pull people together. It’ll break them apart.”
Bev Barksdale, 48, a bartender in Oriental who worries most about health care, said she e-mailed Clinton last week advising the senator that black voters in Eastern North Carolina will come out for Obama.
“I said, ‘You need to come further east.’ In the counties, people are uninformed, uneducated and black,” said Barksdale, who is white. “I’m not a racist, but I think a lot of black people are coming out to vote because of the race issue.”
Like Gallagher, she would vote for McCain or not at all before casting a ballot for Obama. She said he has too little experience, and she doesn’t think he’s willing to pledge allegiance to the flag.
“That is huge to me,” she said. (Obama has led the pledge in the U.S. Senate.)
In Kinston, Daniel Adams, a 30-year-old scientist, recently switched his registration from Republican to Democrat (”It’s like someone who’s just finished AA,” he said jokingly.)
A native of Eastern North Carolina who has lived and worked abroad, Adams has grown used to — if frustrated by — the racism he hears from extended family. They always vote white, he said.
“I think race always plays into decisions, especially with politics, especially in the South,” said Adams, who is white. He wanted to break that mold. And so for the longest time, Adams liked Obama’s idealism.
“I once thought he could change the country,” said Adams.
But he has lost some faith in Obama now, wondering how the man could sit for 20 years in Wright’s pews. Adams will vote for Clinton in the primary.
SUNDAY, MAY 4
Entering the final 48 hours before the important North Carolina and Indiana primaries on Tuesday.
Here is the negative ad being run by the North Carolina Republican Party. It is officially attacking the Democratic candidates for governor, but the real target seems to be Barack Obama. The ad is running now. It seems like the NCGOP would prefer if Hillary Clinton won the Democratic primary.
Three days before Election Day, there were already lines today outside of polling places in North Carolina.
North Carolina has what they call “One-Stop Early Voting”, meaning a resident who is qualified to register to vote may register In-Person and vote at a One-Stop Site in the person’s county of residence during the One-Stop Absentee Voting period. The One-Stop Voting period extends from 19 to 3 days before Election Day. Today was the last day before Tuesday’s actual Election Day.
In Greensboro today, lines spilled outside of the polling place located in a recreation center in a park. The park was scheduled to be the site of a rally and barbeque featuring Hip-Hop artist and actor Mos Def, an Obama supporter, but organizers informed us that Mos Def missed his flight and was unable to attend. But that didn’t stop throngs of college students from still coming out to vote today.
FRIDAY, MAY 2
We’re heading to North Carolina for the days leading up to the important Democratic primary this Tuesday between Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
If you can’t beat ‘em, get ‘em to join. That may be the thinking over at the American Federation of Teachers.
Long the vocal opponents of the charter school movement, the teachers’ union AFT Local 420 will announce Tuesday that they are embracing one such school: the Construction Careers Center high school, whose teachers will be joining the union as part of an agreement quietly reached last month.
AFT Local 420 will represent the roughly 30 teachers and aides working at Construction Careers, whose charter is sponsored by St. Louis Public Schools.
The Construction Careers Center, located at 1224 Grattan, just east of Lafayette Square and west of Soulard, was established as the first charter high school in the country focused on preparing students for jobs in the construction industry and has an 88 percent employment rate for its graduates. Teachers at the school make an average annual salary of around $42,000.
The controversial $800 million tax credit for a Canadian airplane manufacturer has been killed this morning in the Senate Governmental Accountability and Fiscal Oversight Committee.
The so-called “Bombardier” deal, named after the Canadian airplane manufacturer who would benefit from this tax credit, the largest in state history, was killed in committee this morning by a vote of 5-2, with Senators Jeff Smith (D-4), Rita Days (D-14), Wes Shoemeyer (D-18), Brad Lager (R-12), and Rob Mayer (R-25) voting against it.
UPDATE #2 ON MAY 1ST: A slimmed down version of the deal passed the senate today. In this audio, from Jason Rosenbaum from the Columbia Tribune, Senator Charlie Shields explains the differences:
Jefferson City — Missouri senators advanced a mega project tax credit plan today allowing the state to work to bring an airplane assembly plant to the Kansas City Region. The measure, House Bill 2393, handled by Senate Majority Floor Leader Charlie Shields, R-St. Joseph, and co-handled by Sen. Luann Ridgeway, R-Clay Co., could trigger a Montreal-based company to invest $400 million into building a passenger jet assembly plant at the Kansas City International Airport.
“We want Missouri to be open for business that brings great paying jobs to our residents,” Shields said. “This is a phenomenal deal for taxpayers, because we have safeguards in place to make sure the company creates jobs before any tax dollars are issued through tax credits.”
The company, Bombardier, has confirmed it is considering a site at Kansas City International Airport to invest $400 million to build a passenger jet assembly plant that, when at full capacity, would employ approximately 2,100 workers paying an average wage of $63,000 annually. These jobs could spur thousands more indirect jobs in the region and state.
The company, which also owns Learjet, would invest a total of $3.2 billion in research, development and structure for the project, but is seeking assistance from Kansas City and the state.
The bill clarifies what the Missouri Department of Economic Development can offer in state assistance through existing programs including the Enhanced Enterprise Zone and Quality Jobs Act programs, capping tax credit investments to $240 million dollars over an 8 year period. The state programs would be coupled with local resources in Kansas City to help bring this aerospace economic development and investment to Missouri.
Ridgeway said Missouri’s plan requires Bombardier to repay tax credits issued by the state.
“We protect taxpayers by not allowing any tax credits to be issued until the company has created jobs. Plus, we would collect royalties on the company’s product, meaning taxpayers recoup the money issued through the tax credits. Ultimately, between the company’s repayment and the new revenue generated from thousands of new jobs, that state and taxpayers would get a net increase of more than $200 million dollars.”
The assembly plant would produce a new, fuel efficient, less costly, 110-plus seat commercial aircraft. It will be the first new commercial aircraft assembly facility in America since 1968.
The bill now returns to the House for final approval to become law. To track the legislation visit www.senate.mo.gov and do a “keyword” search for HB2393.
Facing a lawsuit that could have her name removed from the ballot, state Senate candidate Connie Johnson held a press conference this morning which she used to attack her two opponents and pledge that her name would be cleared of charges that she has not lived in the district she is seeking to represent.
UPDATED: Reporters from the Post-Dispatch, KMOX, and KTVI Channel 2 probed Johnson about why she believes she did nothing wrong by moving out of her legislative district and renting out her home.
Here is Johnson’s complete statement:
Thank you all for coming out this morning.
I have called this press conference because I, like most Americans, am tired of the politics of hit and run. I like most Americans am weary of the politics of distraction and dishonesty. And I like most Americans, believe that elected officials have a responsibility to serve their constituents—not themselves.
From the moment I entered this race my opponents have in one fashion or another panicked. Rodney Hubbard panicked and was able to convince his Right wing Republican Billionaire to kick in 50 more contributions—-1/3 of his total and Robin Wright Jones panicked and filed a frivolous lawsuit in order to bring some light and attention to her struggling year old campaign for this Senate Seat.
For the record I am flattered by their fear and I appreciate their recognition of the impact of my candidacy. However, for the record, I am deeply concerned about their tactics and where these tactics take us as a community and as members of the Democratic Party.
Ten months ago I told the St. Louis Post Dispatch that I would not be part of events that would facilitate the elimination of an African American Senate Seat. Ten months ago I said: “As a statesman I have to look at the big picture and the big picture is the importance of preserving history and having African American representation in the 5th Senatorial district.”
As fate or providence would have it, four days before filing closed, the only white Candidate in contention decided not to run. There was now no danger of our community losing representation. So, I had a decision to make—do I now run for this Senate Seat? Do I run for a seat that has been historically, from Jet Banks to Paula Carter, located in the heart of North Saint Louis?
My decision was an easy one—-of course I would run.
I would run because now I would be able to lay my head down at night knowing that not only would my Community be able to ensure African American Representation, but they would now have the choice of the most qualified, principled and credentialed African American Representation.
My decision to run was founded upon a love of community and a passion to ensure equal representation for all. These belief sets are also shared by the Democratic Party.
My opponents however have pounced upon my filing and attempted to use it as a means of distraction from the serious issues that confront our communities.
Downtown St Louis for the past 6 years under the direction and leadership of realtor Robin Wright Jones and the 63rd district, is in the middle of a real estate crisis—unfilled lofts, bankrupt developers, and a huge muddy empty hole in the middle of Ball park village. I have often wondered as Minority Whip, why Ms Wright Jones was missing so many important votes. I now see that she was quite busy—manufacturing stories and crafting frivolous lawsuits.
My other opponent is busy as well—missing votes, currying favor for the opposition and gathering right wing Republican cash.
Unfortunately, in the world of politics from Baraak Obama to Hillary Clinton, money does represent the bulk of the fuel that goes in to a political campaign. Operating on this political theory, my opponents hope that you will be so distracted by their lies and complaints about when I filed or where I live that their actions will hurt my fundraising efforts.
Well, I am here this morning to say enough. We as Democrats have a responsibility to address our serious issues—-not manufacture, because we need money, political opportunities at the expense of the truth and at the expense of our constituents.
To this end I will have had my Attorney file the necessary motions that will put an end to this frivolous lawsuit filed by my desperate opponent.
Mark my words—I will be vindicated—these lies will not stand and I will be on the ballot in August.
More than 100, mostly African-American and largely Democratic, supporters of Republican Lieutenant Governor Peter Kinder came out last night to support his re-election bid.
The host committee included several well-known St. Louis African-American Republicans, including James Buford and Jerry Hunter. But it also featured the names of several prominent black Democrats, including St. Louis Argus Publisher Eddie Hasan, developer Tony Thompson, attorney Rufus Tate, and Sal Martinez, among others.
There were also several Democrats in attendance, including Alderman Freeman Bosley, Sr.; Tom Shepard, chief of staff for Aldermanic President Lewis Reed; former State Rep. Betty Thompson; and former alderman and Anheuser-Busch executive Wayman Smith.
In this exclusive video, Smith jokingly compared the African-American turnout at Kinder’s fundraiser to those Barack Obama regularly draws.
In his speech and in an interview with PubDef (check back later for video), Kinder talked about the importance of Missouri’s rural and suburban legislators recognizing that the St. Louis region is the “economic engine of the state.”
“As the economy here goes, so goes the economy of the State of Missouri,” said Kinder.
Kinder highlighted his support of historic tax credits, which helped fuel development downtown, and the new Land Assemblage Tax Credit, which he hopes will spur similar development activity in blighted areas of the city, particularly north St. Louis.
Kinder will likely face Democrat Sam Page in the general election in November.
A state Senate candidate is seeking to get the name of one of her challengers removed from the ballot.
State Rep. Robin Wright-Jones filed a petition yesterday in the St. Louis City Circuit Court against State Rep. Connie Johnson, claiming that she does not reside in the district in which both are running for state senate.
According to the petition, Wright-Jones “has reason to believe that [Johnson] does not reside at said Tara address, but rather resides at 5848 Maple Avenue, St. Louis, Missouri which is outside the 5th District.”
In addition, the petition outlines several pieces of evidence Wright-Jones says prove Johnson does not live in the 5th District.
The morning after her win in the Pennsylvania primary over Barack Obama, The New York Times, Hillary Clinton’s hometown newspaper, slammed her campaign for it’s negative and divisive tactics.
The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.
Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.
If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race. It is true that Senator Barack Obama outspent her 2-to-1. But Mrs. Clinton and her advisers should mainly blame themselves, because, as the political operatives say, they went heavily negative and ended up squandering a good part of what was once a 20-point lead.
On the eve of this crucial primary, Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,” the narrator intoned.
If that was supposed to bolster Mrs. Clinton’s argument that she is the better prepared to be president in a dangerous world, she sent the opposite message on Tuesday morning by declaring in an interview on ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president: “We would be able to totally obliterate them.”
By staying on the attack and not engaging Mr. Obama on the substance of issues like terrorism, the economy and how to organize an orderly exit from Iraq, Mrs. Clinton does more than just turn off voters who don’t like negative campaigning. She undercuts the rationale for her candidacy that led this page and others to support her: that she is more qualified, right now, to be president than Mr. Obama.
Mr. Obama is not blameless when it comes to the negative and vapid nature of this campaign. He is increasingly rising to Mrs. Clinton’s bait, undercutting his own claims that he is offering a higher more inclusive form of politics. When she criticized his comments about “bitter” voters, Mr. Obama mocked her as an Annie Oakley wannabe. All that does is remind Americans who are on the fence about his relative youth and inexperience.
No matter what the high-priced political operatives (from both camps) may think, it is not a disadvantage that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton share many of the same essential values and sensible policy prescriptions. It is their strength, and they are doing their best to make voters forget it. And if they think that only Democrats are paying attention to this spectacle, they’re wrong.
After seven years of George W. Bush’s failed with-us-or-against-us presidency, all American voters deserve to hear a nuanced debate — right now and through the general campaign — about how each candidate will combat terrorism, protect civil liberties, address the housing crisis and end the war in Iraq.
It is getting to be time for the superdelegates to do what the Democrats had in mind when they created superdelegates: settle a bloody race that cannot be won at the ballot box. Mrs. Clinton once had a big lead among the party elders, but has been steadily losing it, in large part because of her negative campaign. If she is ever to have a hope of persuading these most loyal of Democrats to come back to her side, let alone win over the larger body of voters, she has to call off the dogs.
Yesterday’s earthquake may have actually been the tremors felt after the collapse of one of the city’s biggest developers.
Steve Patterson of the Urban Review St. Louis blog was the first to report that employees of Pyramid Companies, owned by developer John Steffen, were given their final paychecks yesterday.
Employees were, I’m told, given final paychecks and told to cash them quickly.
Pyramid owns several high-profile properties downtown, including the Arcade Building on Olive Street, Dorsa Lofts on Washington Avenue, and the Jefferson Arms on Tucker Boulevard. But the Post-Dispatchreports today that Pyramid’s largest project (which through a controversial decision by city leaders also weighs on the City of St. Louis’ credit rating), the $400 million Mercantile Exchange, which includes the former St. Louis Centre mall, will move forward without Pyramid.
“We have taken over management of the partnership,” said Amos Harris, president of Brady Capital, local partners of Connecticut-based Spinnaker Real Estate Partners LLC.
Spinnaker was Steffen’s equity partner on St. Louis Centre and the former Dillard’s building, both key components of the larger six-block Mercantile Exchange project. Steffen was in charge of the daily decision-making.
Spinnaker recently increased its investment by 50 percent to roughly $16 million. As costs continued to increase, Harris said, “we took over.”
Steffen’s financial troubles have long been rumored in the city’s political circles. Steffen has been a regular contributor to key city officials, including Mayor Francis Slay, and is rumored to have financially backed two local newspapers, the St. Louis Argus and the now defunct Arch City Chronicle. But it was the Board of Estimate and Apportionment’s 2006 decision to have the city essentially co-sign Steffen’s $14.5 million loan application to finance his St. Louis Centre project that most invited the ire of bloggers and public policy watchers.
Comptroller Darlene Green, one of the three members of the Board of E&A, warned against the Steffen deal, but was outvoted by then-Aldermanic President Jim Shrewbury and Mayor Slay.
According to CNN, it was a magnitude-5.2 earthquake, centered 131 miles east of St. Louis, that shook my bed last night.
The quake struck at 4:36 a.m.,according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The epicenter of the earthquake was about three miles below ground, six miles northwest of Mount Carmel, Illinois, and 38 miles north-northwest of Evansville, Indiana, according to the USGS.
UPDATE: Gov. Matt Blunt this morning issued a statement saying, “At this time there have been no reports of deaths or injuries. Our first concern is always the safety of Missourians and we will continue to assess any impact the earthquake may have had on critical infrastructure.”
Blunt says the Department of Public Safety, including the State Emergency Management Agency, the State Highway Patrol and State Fire Marshall, all are coordinating with local officials to provide any state assistance if needed.
UPDATE 2: Sitting here in a meeting, we just felt another tremor!
Steffen’s financial troubles have long been rumored in the city’s political circles. Steffen has been a regular contributor to key city officials, including Mayor Francis Slay, and is rumored to have financially backed two local newspapers, the St. Louis Argus and the now defunct Arch City Chronicle. But it was the Board of Estimate and Apportionment’s 2006 decision to have the city essentially co-sign Steffen’s $14.5 million loan application to 
The epicenter of the earthquake was about three miles below ground, six miles northwest of Mount Carmel, Illinois, and 38 miles north-northwest of Evansville, Indiana, according to the USGS.
