memeorandum: Obama Says Nomination ‘Within Reach’ (New York Times)

9:15 AM ET, May 21, 2008

Top Items:

Another split decision in Democratic race — (CNN) — Despite Hillary Clinton's landslide victory in Kentucky, Barack Obama has won a majority of pledged delegates in the race for the Democratic nomination. — Clinton won Kentucky by more than 30 points, but Obama's share of the state's 51 delegates …

New York Times:

Obama Says Nomination ‘Within Reach’ — DES MOINES — Senator Barack Obama took a big step toward becoming the Democratic presidential nominee on Tuesday, amassing enough additional delegates to claim an all but insurmountable advantage in his race against Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Discussion: Newshoggers.com, The Swamp, The Caucus, Fox News, Washington Post, The Carpetbagger Report, Salon, Guardian Unlimited, DownWithTyranny! and Elections

Alessandra Stanley / New York Times:

Clinton Fades Even in a Victory — While Senator Barack Obama gingerly commended his rival's “perseverance,” the shrinking candidacy of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton all but vanished from the television set on Tuesday, sidelined by bigger news. — Even her victory speech in Kentucky …

Discussion: Taegan Goddard's … and BAGnewsNotes

Patrick Healy / New York Times:

Clinton Sees Many Reasons to Stay In — Rebuffing associates who have suggested that she end her candidacy, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has made it clear to her camp in recent days that she will stay in the race until June because she believes she can still be the nominee — and …

Discussion: The Caucus, The Carpetbagger Report, BuzzFlash.org, MSNBC and Gristmill

Chris Cillizza / The Fix:
Problems for the Obama Juggernaut?

Discussion: Comments from Left Field, Sound Politics and The Democratic Daily

Washington Post:
Clinton Wins Her Faithful in Ky., But Obama Gains Whites in Ore.

Discussion: Hot Air and PoliGazette

Alan Fram / Associated Press:
Exit poll: Whites back Clinton strongly in KY

Discussion: Open Left, Marc Ambinder, Pam's House Blend, The Daily Dish, The Reaction and MSNBC

Andrew Malcolm / Top of the Ticket:

Money shocker! Hillary Clinton's campaign debt soars to $31 million — No wonder Sen. Hillary Clinton was so late filing her required campaign financial reports Tuesday night. Her political team didn't want the shocking news in it to overshadow her lopsided thumping of Sen. Barack Obama in Kentucky.

Discussion: Political Machine, Political Byline and Wizbang

John Cole / Balloon Juice:

AWESOME NEW CLINTONIAN BULLS**T- BREAKING FAST — Lisa Caputo, one of the Clinton hacks on MSNBC tonight, just claimed (fraudulently) that Hillary had the popular vote but was behind in the delegate math, and that this felt like “Al Gore in 2000 when it had to go to the Supreme Court.”

Discussion: TalkLeft, The Campaign Spot, Donklephant, FiveThirtyEight.com, Daily Kos, Bang the Drum and Irish Trojan in Tennessee

Ed OKeefe / Political Punch:
Obama Takes In More Than $31 Million in April

Discussion: The Other McCain, AMERICAblog, Donklephant and Gallup

Allison Benedikt / Runnin' Scared:
My lady parts do not ache for Hillary Clinton.

Discussion: Spin Cycle, The Trail, Prairie Weather, Daily Kos, Top of the Ticket, The Huffington Post, MSNBC and Sister Toldjah

Sara Just / Political Radar:
McCain Has Record Fundraising Month

Discussion: MSNBC, The Fix, Political Byline, CNN, Comments from Left Field, MyDD, Ben Smith's Blogs, Donklephant, Taegan Goddard's … and TPM Election Central

Attaturk / Firedoglake:

More than just financing Bush Wars... The Chinese are apparently taking a supervisory role in overseeing their investment. … Ms. Manning are you forgetting who the President and Vice-President are? Sadly, it's par for the course. — This occurred during the period …

Discussion: Newshoggers.com

Justin Rood / ABCNEWS:

Report: U.S. Soldiers Did ‘Dirty Work’ for Chinese Interrogators — Alleges Guantanamo Personnel Softened Up Detainees at Request of Chinese Intelligence — U.S. military personnel at Guantanamo Bay allegedly softened up detainees at the request of Chinese intelligence officials who had come …

Jason Ryan / ABCNEWS:
Former Detainee Describes ‘Water Treatment’

Discussion: Think Progress

Michael Goldfarb / Weekly Standard Blog:

We've Been Had — This was Obama's rally in Oregon over the weekend, which saw 75,000 people gather on the waterfront, on a sunny summer day, to hear the great one speak. Or did they? The headline in the New York Times was “Obama Draws Huge Crowd in Oregon.” So they must have been there to see Obama, right?

Discussion: Pitchfork

Robert Knight / NewsBusters.org:

Free Concert by Popular Band Preceded Obama's Big Rally — From CNN to the New York Times, the media hyped Barack Obama's Portland, Oregon rally on Sunday, some comparing him to a rock star. — Unmentioned in national reporting was the fact that Obama was preceded by a rare …

Discussion: protein wisdom, Don Surber, Comments from Left Field, The Campaign Spot, Dohiyi Mir, TBogg, Southern Beale, QandO, Political Byline, Lonewacko, Macsmind, Whiskey Fire, Swampland, NO QUARTER and The Democratic Daily

Hugh Hewitt / Townhall.com:
Obama's Decemberists — Turns out that Obama's opening act …

Discussion: Reason Magazine

Sam Stein / The Huffington Post:

Chuck Hagel Takes On McCain, Repeatedly Praises Obama — Chuck Hagel is quickly becoming Barack Obama's answer to Joe Lieberman. — The Republican Senator from Nebraska was a political thorn in McCain's side on Tuesday night, repeatedly lavishing praise on the presumptive Democratic candidate …

Discussion: The Swamp, Political Punch, Comments from Left Field, The Trail, The American Conservative, Crooks and Liars and The Political Carnival

Gizmodo:

Flying RC Penis Disrupts Garry Kasparov Speech — We had to double check that this wasn't a story about Second Life, but rather is an actual event in actual meatspace occurring this past weekend in Moscow. As former chess champion Garry Kasparov was giving a speech to unite opposition political forces …

Joseph Lieberman / Wall Street Journal:

Democrats and Our Enemies — How did the Democratic Party get here? How did the party of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy drift so far from the foreign policy and national security principles and policies that were at the core of its identity and its purpose?

Discussion: Jules Crittenden, Commentary and The New Republic

Matthew Yglesias:
Zellification — I speculated maybe a week or two ago …

Discussion: The New Republic

Maureen Dowd / New York Times:

The Last Debate — “What do you want? Please, Sweetie, would you just tell me what you want?” — “Don't Sweetie me, Twiggy. You know what I want.” — “Besides that, Hillary. Seriously, you don't want your delusion to put John McCain in the White House. Or maybe you do. You have no shot.

Discussion: Whiskey Fire

Ginn / DBKP:

UK PC Criminal: 15-Yr-Old Youth Who Called Scientology a Cult — If there's any doubt that the enforcement of political correctness in the U.K. is turning ordinary citizens into criminals, a 15-yr-old youth was issued a criminal summons after he had written on a sign that Scientology was a cult.

Discussion: The Impolitic, Gawker and Boing Boing