Even though she hadn't yet heard the news that Barack Obama won 13 states in yesterday's primary, his 86-year-old grandmother -- Sarah Hussein Obama -- appeared to be thrilled at her home in Kogelo, Kenya on Tuesday.
CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) - Here's to better luck this time.
Vice President Dick Cheney is returning this weekend to the South Texas ranch where he accidentally shot a hunting companion two years ago. Anne Armstrong said Cheney was expected to arrive Friday at the Armstrong's 50,000-acre ranch.
"We have a wonderful quail crop, and he is a fabulous shot," said Armstrong, a former U.S. ambassador to Great Britain and adviser to Republican presidents.
It's Cheney's first trip back to the ranch since the Feb. 11, 2006, hunting mishap that sparked a worldwide frenzy of scrutiny and jokes at the vice president's expense.
Cheney shot Austin attorney Harry Whittington in the torso, neck and face when he pulled the trigger on his 28-gauge shotgun. The vice president later called it "one of the worst days of my life" and said, "The image of him falling is something I'll never ever be able to get out of my mind."
Congressman Ron Paul has signed on as a cosponsor of legislation that would prohibit the Secretary of Veterans Affairs from collecting certain debts owed to the United States by members of the Armed Forces and veterans who die as a result of an injury incurred or aggravated on active duty in a combat zone.
Yesterday's primary voting laid bare a profound racial and ethnic divide among Democratic voters, with African Americans overwhelmingly preferring Sen. Barack Obama and Latinos largely favoring Sen. Hillary Clinton.
The results of preliminary exit polls in nine key states indicate that Obama attracted the support of two-thirds to nine-tenths of black voters, except in Clinton's home state of New York. That pattern suggests that the first-term Illinois senator's strong appeal among African Americans -- first on display in the South Carolina primary last month -- is more widespread. It also means that Clinton is not the automatic heir to the wide popularity her husband enjoyed among black voters as president.
Yesterday's contests, however, featured several states, including California, with large Hispanic populations, and they selected Clinton by smaller but consistent margins.
The divergent choices by minority voters reflect broad issues of loyalty and identity, observers said, rather than specific differences in the candidates' stances on issues. "There is so little distance between the policies, it comes down to personality, style and name recognition," said Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, based in Los Angeles.
So, did the “Obama Girl” actually vote for Barack Obama on Tuesday?
Actually, no.
Last summer, the music video “I Got a Crush on Obama” was a Web hit, splashing a seductive performance by a 26-year-old model named Amber Lee Ettinger across millions of screens and prompting deep thoughts about candidates and sex appeal, the YouTube generation of voters, viral marketing and so forth.
“I didn’t get a chance to vote today because I’m not registered to vote in New York,” she said.
So where is Obama Girl registered to vote?
“New Jersey.”
Um, but didn’t New Jersey also hold a primary?
True. The problem, she explained, was that she was sick in New York City and was unable to get back across the Hudson River to the polls in Jersey City.
On the NBC Today Show, liberal radio host Rachel Maddow, conservative pundit Pat Buchanan, and Democratic strategist Paul Begala discussed the importance of “change” in the upcoming election. Voters want a “clean break from Bush,” argued Maddow. Begala added that McCain does not represent that type of change:
BEGALA: If McCain wins, he’s running for a third term for Bush. He wants to make Bush’s Iraq war permanent, Bush’s economic program permanent.
Buchanan concluded the segment by arguing that McCain “will make Cheney look like Gandhi.” Watch it:
WASHINGTON (AP) – After his triumph in Iowa and third-place finish in New Hampshire, Mike Huckabee showed up Wednesday night for another Colbert bump.
An earlier bump pushed Huckabee to the front of the Republican presidential pack, the candidate assured TV comic Stephen Colbert.
"The only reason I'm the front-runner now is because of the Colbert bump," a mostly straight-faced Huckabee told the host of "The Colbert Report" on Comedy Central. "If it were not for that I would not be sitting in this chair, I would be probably somewhere serving hamburgers at a drive-in restaurant."
Colbert, who abandoned his own 2008 presidential bid after the South Carolina Democratic Party voted to keep him off its primary ballot, said he was still willing to be Huckabee's running mate, as
Huckabee apparently had promised earlier. Colbert said his "foreign policy" experience — trips to Sandals resorts in Jamaica, the Bahamas — would help answer Huckabee critics that the
former Arkansas governor lacked such.
Just in case, though, Colbert then gave Huckabee a chance to take back his running mate promise publicly.
"Stephen, please, be my running mate," Huckabee said.
"Yes, a thousand times yes," was Colbert's answer.
