WASHINGTON, D.C. — Agents for Sen. Hillary Clinton, trying desperately to keep alive her presidential campaign, are privately telling Democrats that she is so "tight" with a dollar that she would not continue her contest against Sen. Barack Obama if she did not have a chance to win. That was a reference to Clinton pulling $11 millio...

What makes this presidential election different from all other presidential elections? And different from what we expected when the year began? First, neither party's presumptive nominee was chosen by massive support from primary voters, as John Kerry was in 2004, George W. Bush in 2000 or Bill Clinton in 1992. That may not seem obvious in the case...

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA. — As his delegate lead over New York Sen. Hillary Clinton expands with every news cycle, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama remains the overwhelming favorite to win the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. But Obama and his legions of zealous supporters would be well-advised to keep the champagne on ice and uncorked. Why? Bec...

Power, money, sex, politics. Hillary Clinton is the ex-wife at the table where her ex-husband sits with his new wife. They've come together for the sake of the children to iron out as amiably as they can the specifics of separation. Hillary's the lady in distress. As odd woman out, she must show strength without the help she has grown accustomed to...

Let me get this straight. It's perfectly fair for Barack Obama and his cohorts to repeatedly disparage President Bush's foreign policy as "cowboy diplomacy" but unspeakably horrific for Bush to analogize the Democrats' approach to foreign policy to appeasing Hitler? When Obama compared Hillary Clinton's threats against Iran to President B...

It would be an act of terminal insanity for Barack Obama to name Hillary Clinton as his vice presidential candidate. It would not help him get elected, it would drag all the Clinton controversies into the general election, and having her down the hall in the West Wing would be a recipe for disaster, dissension and civil war. Other than that, it's a...

WASHINGTON — Readers of this column will recall that from time to time in covering an election cycle, I have referred to a voting bloc that political analysts of more delicate sensibilities would rather not mention, to wit, the moron vote. It is a constituency composed of politically ignorant citizens who nonetheless feel very intensely about...

This year, John McCain is going to have to do what he failed to do in 2000: Beat George W. Bush. But wait, isn't McCain going to be running against Barack Obama or (possibly) Hillary Clinton this year? Yes, but only in one sense. In another sense, McCain's burden this year is as much about convincing voters that he is not a continuation of the Bush...

Three years ago, Republican Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin did an interview with National Public Radio, which for a conservative like Ryan must have been like an expedition behind enemy lines. Ryan did a good job explaining on the program why his home state — where President Bush lost by a narrow margin to Sen. John Kerry in 2004 — had bee...

In the last presidential election, leftist special interest groups and socialist billionaires like George Soros waged war with an unprecedented tsunami of negative TV attacks on the Republican incumbent, suggesting he was a draft dodger that knowingly lied us into war. Adding fuel to the fire, Hollywood uncorked nasty — and equally distorted ...