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updated 6/8/2008 11:52:49 AM ET 2008-06-08T15:52:49

MR. TIM RUSSERT:  Our issues this Sunday:  It is over, as Barack Obama proclaims victory.

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D-IL):  I will be the Democratic nominee for the president of the United States of America.

MR. RUSSERT:  And Hillary Clinton finally concedes.

SEN. HILLARY CLINTON (D-NY):  Today, as I suspend my campaign, I congratulate him on the victory he has won.

MR. RUSSERT:  How did this freshman U.S. senator from Illinois beat the former first lady and the former president?  Will she, should she be picked as the vice presidential running mate?  And what will the Obama vs. McCain campaign be like?  Insights and analysis from the NBC News political team: Ron Allen, NBC News correspondent covering the Clinton campaign; Lee Cowan, NBC News correspondent covering the Obama campaign; David Gregory, NBC News White House correspondent and host of MSNBC's "Race for the White House"; Andrea Mitchell, who covers all things politics for NBC News and MSNBC; Kelly O'Donnell, NBC News correspondent covering the McCain campaign; and Chuck Todd, political director for NBC News.

And in our "Meet the Press Minute," 40 years ago this week, after winning the California primary, Robert Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles.  On March 17th, 1968, the day after he announced his candidacy, he appeared on MEET THE PRESS and talked about his campaign.

But first, we have an official presumptive nominee of the Democratic Party for president of the United States, Barack Obama.  And we are joined by the NBC News political dream team.

Welcome all, together at last.

MS. KELLY O'DONNELL:  Nice to be home.

MR. RUSSERT:  From all across the country right at this table, here we are.

MS. O'DONNELL:  This is the first time...(unintelligible).

MR. RUSSERT:  Let's start.  Here was Hillary Clinton yesterday at the National Building Museum in Washington.

SEN. CLINTON:  Life is too short, time is too precious and the stakes are too high to dwell on what might have been.  We have to work together for what still can be, and that is why I will work my heart out to make sure that Senator Obama is our next president.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  David Gregory, did she do what she had to do?

MR. DAVID GREGORY:  I think so.  I think it was a gracious speech.  She conceded, she said that she's prepared to lock arms with Barack Obama.  "Yes, we can," she told her supporters, parroting his campaign theme.  It was a time when she definitively said, "This is over.  I congratulate him.  He's done something historic.  We've done something historic as well, but it's time to give the ground." The question that she's faced all week compared to how she ended the campaign earlier in the week on Tuesday was whether a graceful exit was still possible.  She hit all the right notes yesterday after meeting with Barack Obama this week, so now we'll see.

MR. RUSSERT:  Andrea Mitchell, on Tuesday the tone was much different, including the introduction of Senator Clinton.  Let's watch.

MR. TERRY McAULIFFE:  Are you ready for the next president of the United States of America?

SEN. CLINTON:  This has been a long campaign, and I will be making no decisions tonight.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  What happened between Tuesday and Saturday?

MS. ANDREA MITCHELL:  Charlie Rangel.  Pressure from her own biggest supporters.  It was Charlie Rangel who first catapulted her into contention for the Senate.

MR. RUSSERT:  The Democratic congressman from Harlem.

MS. MITCHELL:  The Democratic congressman from Harlem, her biggest supporter, who said, "How can we, as members, deal with this?  He is the nominee, you have to accept it." And there was such anger among some of her supporters. They didn't understand her mindset, which was, "I just won South Dakota.  I have all of these votes.  I have to thank my supporters.  I have to pull them along with me." She thought she had time, that she could take a week or longer.  She had no intention of giving the speech Saturday until her own Democrats came to her and said, "Enough already.  We can't live with this, we have to get off the fence." There was a lot of pressure, and she finally did come to it.  And it is a question as to whether people will remember the lack of grace on Tuesday--her own supporters said people don't understand her emotional connection and that she needed time--or the speech on Saturday, which I think was a perfect coming together of everything she needed to do.

MR. RUSSERT:  Ron Allen, what was going on inside that Clinton campaign on Tuesday night and then what we saw on Saturday?

MR. RON ALLEN:  I think a lot of emotion.  I think it did take some time to get from Tuesday to yesterday.  It was a very--I think it was a very painful thing for Senator Clinton to do.  I think it was a very difficult thing for her to do to give this speech.  And I know that in the room yesterday, for her supporters, we looked them in the eye, you could see that they really never believed that they were going to be at this moment.  They really--and I think Senator Clinton also, in her heart, she still believes that she should be the nominee.  And I think she really believes that she is the stronger candidate and, and, ultimately, she still wants to be president of the United States.

MR. RUSSERT:  Lee Cowan, the Obama campaign.  I read that Senator Obama watched the address live on the Internet.  What was the response from the Obama campaign watching Senator Clinton yesterday?

MR. LEE COWAN:  I think it was, "Finally.  She actually said it." I think on Tuesday night there was a sense that she had stolen the spotlight a little bit when she came out and didn't concede.  I think a lot of people could sense that he was a bit taken aback by that.  It's one thing to be able to come out and claim victory, but it's another thing to have your rival actually recognize that you've, you've taken victory.  I think he'd much rather have had that on Tuesday as opposed to having it Saturday night.  So I think he wanted to step back, he wanted to let her have the spotlight, but I think he thought, "Finally now, we can move on and start focusing on John McCain instead."

MR. RUSSERT:  Kelly, John McCain has spent the week reaching out to Senator Clinton, praising her, condemning the media for the way they treated her, trying to embrace some of the constituencies that are important to Senator Clinton--women, blue collar workers, Hispanics.  What did the McCain campaign watch and how did they react yesterday as opposed to Tuesday?

MS. O'DONNELL:  Well, I think they viewed the span between Tuesday and Saturday as helpful to them.  If there was still a sense among Hillary Clinton's supporters that they had somehow been wronged or disappointed, that's an opportunity for John McCain to embrace Hillary Clinton as he did. Now, throughout the campaign, we saw him much less contentious when it ever came to Hillary Clinton.  He would always save his fire for Obama.  So he's been preparing for this because they knew all along her voters could potentially be their voters.  So it was certainly a warm embrace over and over in these last several days.  And so the delay for her to finally concede, they saw as an opportunity.

MR. RUSSERT:  Chuck, when we look at some of the comments made, I thought this one from Geoff Garin who became the top strategist for the Clinton campaign, and I'll share it with you and our viewers.  "Asked why the campaign could never crack the superdelegates, who had started out predisposed towards her candidacy, Geoff Garin, one of the top strategists" for Senator Clinton "said, `I think it's a mystery and an irony, and an irony in the sense that Hillary was seen as inevitable when it didn't matter and Obama was seen as inevitable when it did.'"

The Clinton campaign always believed that those superdelegates would come around to them in the end.  But when Obama had a lead amongst elected delegates, those supers were not disposed to "overturn" that decision.

MR. CHUCK TODD:  You know, the biggest myth of this campaign was that somehow the Clintons controlled the apparatus.  They didn't.  And, and, you know, I look back and I think that the, the two moments before the campaign even started were clues as to how difficult this was going to be for them.  One was the election of Howard Dean as DNC chair, and the other was Democrats winning control of Congress in 2006 and the ascension of Nancy Pelosi as one of the leaders.  Here they had two of the sort of three cogs of the Democratic leadership, in Nancy Pelosi and Howard Dean, who were waiting for there to be a crack in this inevitability armor of, of the Clintons.  And once there was, it's as if they were just waiting.  And it wouldn't have mattered if it was Barack Obama, Mark Warner, had he run, or John Edwards.  Whoever ended up filling the vacuum of the anti-Clinton, they were going to rush to them.  And I think that that's something the Clinton campaign never appreciated.  I think they thought that it was sheer will they would get those superdelegates with them.  They would get whatever rulings they needed, whatever primary calendar they wanted.  But every step of the way, nothing went their way on process in the inside, and I think that shocks a lot of us today that they lost the inside game.  It's one thing to lose the outside game, votes and all that stuff, but they lost the inside game.

MR. RUSSERT:  David, it's amazing when you look back at this, in December of last year, right before the Iowa caucuses, Hillary Clinton was ahead in the polls 2-to-1, ahead in money 2-to-1, had all the structure, all the inevitability going for her, and this--and as he describes himself, this "skinny black kid with big ears from the south side of Chicago" has beaten Bill and Hillary Clinton.  It's an extraordinary, historic story, the first African-American nominee of a major political party.

MR. GREGORY:  It is, it is stunning.  It's stunning both from a historical point of view and a political point of view from where he came in this race. And his own sense of stick-to-itiveness in this campaign before Iowa when he kept trailing and he was under a great deal of pressure to play a different sort of game and to go after her more directly and start frontally assaulting her politically.  And, and he held off from doing it, and he took a lot of flack from that in the press and even from his own advisers, but he stuck to a particular game plan.  And then he was so successful in Iowa and this enthusiasm continued to build.  And I'd say about these superdelegates, as well, I think it's striking.  I think there was a tipping point at some point, and we'll look back and say this race was over a long time ago because the superdelegates reached a point where they said, "We are not going to overturn the will of the voters and somehow deny the first African-American candidate for the presidency at this level the nomination based on another argument that's a subjective argument about whether he's fit, actually, to beat the Republican.  That was, that was a striking turnaround.  And I don't think there are a lot of profiles in courage, by the way, among these superdelegates.  I mean, Congressman Lewis from Georgia did switch and, and went with Obama.  Other than that, this was a real mass that was waiting for some, some real direction.

MR. RUSSERT:  Lee Cowan, Senator Obama met with his staff in Chicago at the end of the week and, through a closed door, you could hear him say that "if we had lost Iowa, it would have been over." That caucus in Iowa, January 3rd, when he won and Hillary Clinton came in third, really did catapult his candidacy.

MR. COWAN:  Oh it did, and it was, it was a, it was a, I think, a testament to their organization on how they were able to get out; and then also a testament, I think, to their plan past Iowa, what they were going to do--not only what worked there, they think is going to work well in some other states and it ended up doing.  They didn't change their campaign a whole lot after Iowa.  I mean, they kept to the same strategy of working on those caucus states, getting those, those, those supporters and volunteers out to these states en masse.  The organization of this campaign, I think, is something that's going to go down in history.  I think people haven't seen anything, anything like this for quite some time.

MR. RUSSERT:  To that point, Ron Allen, Hillary Clinton said, "This will be all over on February 5th."

MR. ALLEN:  Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT:  The race would be over.  And if you look at the calendar now between February 5 and February 19th, Barack Obama won 11 primaries, caucuses in a row, netted a gain of 120 elected delegates, which is almost exactly the margin he won amongst elected delegates.

MR. ALLEN:  Right.

MR. RUSSERT:  Does the Clinton campaign now acknowledge that they blew it in terms of organization and allocation of resources?

MR. ALLEN:  I think that one big thing they did wrong was to underestimate their opponent.  And that's something you should never do in politics, and they, they did.  And, as Lee pointed out in Iowa, I think that the most important thing about that was that Barack Obama won.  And I think up to that point the question was, can he win in places like Iowa?  Can he, can he actually--will the country embrace this candidacy, this person of color?  And I think by winning there, he really just--the floodgates opened and particularly a lot of people in the African-American community I think, at that point, really came around and said, "OK, this actually just might happen, so let's get on board." And then on to South Carolina and onward and that--just a crescendo of things.  And I think, at that point, the Clintons were somewhat overwhelmed.  You know, they, they were taken aback by this. They never thought that that was going to happen.

You remember at, at the start of this, Senator Clinton was even leading in the polls amongst some African-American voters, and, and that completely flipped around.  And not to say that that was the only thing that put Obama over the top, but again, I think just the notion that he could win, once that was established, the superdelegates, everyone else, it just took off from there.

MR. RUSSERT:  James Carville, who ran Bill Clinton's campaign in 1992, said in December, "Obama is an extraordinary talent, a stallion.  And right now he's in the stable.  If he breaks out of that stable in Iowa, it could be all over."

MS. MITCHELL:  And, in fact, when we were focused on her comeback in New Hampshire, the real story was that, behind the scenes, they were coming up with this plan for Super Tuesday that the Clintons didn't have.  The Clintons were focused on the big states.  They thought--they kept, till the last minute, still say, "Well, the big states we can win." But the point was that he was getting as many delegates--he got more delegates out of Idaho as she got out of New Jersey.

MR. ALLEN:  Mm-hmm.

MS. MITCHELL:  And so they had figured out how to gain the congressional districts, which ones would produce an odd number so that they could pick up an extra delegate.  They had this mathematical formula down.  It was field work.  And now when they say, "Well, they'll merge some of the field operations," they'll pick off one or two, they already have made contact with a couple in Ohio, a top operative, for instance, from the Clinton, from the Strickland team, governor of Ohio.  But the field operation that Barack Obama put out there was so far better than anything that the Clintons had.

MR. ALLEN:  I think they, they really were the machine, and I think the, the campaigns almost changed roles.  And I think that's something that, that we perhaps don't focus on--enough on about Obama's campaign, the nuts and bolts of it, the politics of it...

MS. MITCHELL:  Exactly.

MR. ALLEN:  ...the, the groundwork of it.  We talk about the speeches and the phenomenon and all that.

MR. RUSSERT:  In a 2008 campaign, I was watching a rally in South Carolina with--everybody had given their e-mail and their cell phone number as they walked in.

MR. RUSSERT:  Once they're there, the emcee said, "All right, hold up your cell phones and send messages now to five people.  Text five people....

MS. MITCHELL:  And it captured it.

MR. RUSSERT:  ...that you think should be part of this organization."

MS. MITCHELL:  And that becomes their e-mail fundraising base.

MR. COWAN:  And that was part of it, I think, is this, this campaign is--these are 20 and 30-somethings that were driving his campaign.  Very smart 20 or 30-somethings, but...

MS. MITCHELL:  Interesting that he watched her on the Internet.

MR. TODD:  Exactly.

MR. COWAN:  Yep.

MS. MITCHELL:  That told you so much, because Hillary Clinton...

MR. RUSSERT:  He was at the golf course, Andrea.

MS. MITCHELL:  But that's the point.  First of all, he was...

MR. COWAN:  But--that's right.

MS. MITCHELL:  He--she would not have had that sense of watching it on the Internet.

MR. RUSSERT:  Exactly.

MR. TODD:  It's one eye...

MS. MITCHELL:  It's a different generation.

MR. RUSSERT:  Exactly.

MR. TODD:  This is one eye toward the general election.  When the McCain campaign delivered the letter with the town hall challenge from Senator McCain, from campaign manager Rick David to the Obama campaign, Bill Burton, their spokesman, said, "Why didn't you e-mail it?  You didn't have to--you didn't have to hand deliver it."

MR. RUSSERT:  There's nothing wrong with snail mail.

MR. TODD:  No, but it is that generational divide.

MR. RUSSERT:  Don't forget, don't forget, don't forget...

MR. RUSSERT:  ...Hillary Clinton announced on the Internet.

MR. GREGORY:  Right.

MR. RUSSERT:  "Let's chat.  Let's have a conversation." The--I tell you, the intensity of this campaign, even Upper Deck baseball cards is involved in this campaign.  Here's how they captured yesterday.  There's Hillary Clinton embracing Barack Obama.  Looks a lot like Jason Varitek of the Boston Red Sox, we won't go there.

MR. GREGORY:  Yeah, exactly.

MR. RUSSERT:  But how the world has changed.  Remember back in March, Hillary Clinton was talking about perhaps she might be willing to take Barack Obama on her ticket.  Let's watch.

SEN. CLINTON:  This is a moment of historic celebration for America, but you got to make a choice.  A lot of people wish they didn't have to.  I've had people say, "I wish I could vote for both of you." Well, that might be possible some day.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  David Broder, now that the roles have reversed, wrote this the other day in The Washington Post.  "Obama still has great gifts and substantial assets.  So the first imperative at this point is to stop retreating and regain the initiative--starting with a clear assertion of his absolute right to choose his own running mate and not be pressured into a decision by the Clintons or their friends.

"As it was for Ronald Reagan at the Republican National Convention in 1980, who had the wisdom to reject the plot to install former President Jerry Ford as his vice presidential nominee, this is the big-time decision that could define a leader and lead to a victory."

The Associated Press has put out a story with pros and cons, and we've taken the liberty of interweaving some comments the campaigns made during the course of this.  Here's the first pro.  Hillary Clinton:  "She helps with white, working class voters." And remember the comment where she said Senator Obama was elitist because he said "bitter, small-town people, gripping to their guns and to their religion." John McCain would do this:  "McCain envisions a November victory built in part around attracting large numbers of the millions of voters who turned away from Senator Barack Obama's promise of change during the primary campaign.  Buoyed by polls showing a quarter or more of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton supporters planning to back McCain, his advisers have already started wooing the white working class voters and women who made up the bedrock of her coalition.  They plan to echo and expand Clinton's critiques of Obama:  that he's out of touch with middle America, and too unseasoned to be president." Now the con, of course, is this.  "She undermines your core message." Remember this radio ad back in January from the Obama campaign?  Let's watch.

NARRATOR:  (From campaign radio ad) Hillary Clinton, she'll say anything, and change nothing.  It's time to turn the page.  Paid for by Obama for America.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Lee Cowan, how does the Obama campaign overcome the core message, "It's time to turn the page on the Clintons and the Bushes." For the last seven presidential elections, a Bush or a Clinton has been on the national ballot.  How do they do that and select Hillary Clinton as VP?

MR. COWAN:  I don't, I don't think they can.  I think that they see a role for the Clintons, obviously, for both of them.  But I think they see them much more effectively being used out in the field, having Hillary Clinton go out there and talk about health care.  Have Bill Clinton help out a lot with those middle class white voters.  I think that's the role that, that they see the Clintons playing, not something that they want to share the ticket with, necessarily.

MR. RUSSERT:  How about this?  Associated Press says this in terms of a pro. "She has enough experience and political heft," as demonstrated by this ad. Remember this one.

NARRATOR:  (From Clinton political ad) It's 3 AM, and your children are safe and asleep.  But there's a phone in the White House, and it's ringing.  Who do you want answering the phone?

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  The con, according to AP, however, is "You two don't seem to like each other very much." Remember this from January.

SEN. CLINTON:  I don't think I'm that bad.

SEN. OBAMA:  You're likable enough, Hillary, no doubt about it.

SEN. CLINTON:  You know--thank you so much, Barack.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Ron Allen.

MR. ALLEN:  I had a thought.  Remember the meeting at Dianne Feinstein's house the other day?

MR. RUSSERT:  Friday night.

MR. ALLEN:  Secret meeting.  The, the story went Barack said, "Oh, we're leaving," and they were laughing and all that.  But some--we really don't know what happened.  It might have been that she was "throwing the kitchen sink at me," then "The buffet's coming." Remember that line?  That could have been transposed onto that particular event.  And who knows what went on that--and that's one of the biggest mysteries in my mind, is what is their personal relationship?  Do, do they get along?  And the other way I look at it, it's sort of like, you know, in our own world if, if you were looking for a promotion to a job, and some guy who's 15 years younger than you came along, who you'd mentored, and, and got the job and everybody rallied around him, how would you feel?

MR. GREGORY:  But they didn't mentor him.

MR. ALLEN:  And if, if that's...

MR. GREGORY:  They didn't, they didn't mentor him at any point, they just had to deal with him bursting out on the scene.

I think for Barack Obama, look, this is his party now.  The Clintons are always going to have to be managed--right?--because they are formidable couple, including a former president and now a nominee who, who, who had a very successful campaign.  So this is a difficult choice for Barack Obama. What is his political brand, and how is he going to deal with this force within the party?  This will be an exercise in great judgment for him.  And yes, he's beaten her, and that's significant, but it's not over yet.  Because the way he handles this selection or, or lack of selection of her will be seen as very, very important.  He has to get them to fall into line, to work towards his ends.  Now, if that's best served being inside the administration, that's one route.  If it's having her in the Senate and championing health care, that's another route.  But they are going to have to be managed, and Barack Obama's got to walk a very difficult path here to get them under his wing now, which might be difficult for them.

MS. MITCHELL:  In fact, I think that the meeting--the reason for the meeting was partly to tamp down all of that speculation and to clear the brush so that she could have her moment yesterday and be surrounded by her supporters and embrace him.  And...

MR. RUSSERT:  But it was Senator Clinton, Andrea, with the New York congressional delegation on Tuesday who said she'd be open to the vice presidency.

MS. MITCHELL:  And, in fact, she is open to the vice presidency.  She wants it.  She clearly wants it.  And what the choreography of the meeting at Dianne Feinstein's was to say, "This is going to be my decision." Now, you can look at the, the clues.  He chooses Jim Johnson to head the team doing the vetting, not a fan of Hillary Clinton.  I mean, there are all sorts of other kind of inside games going on there.  But if it comes down to he has to make a decision and sees where the numbers are, I could imagine a scenario where he would choose her, and yesterday's speech was an audition.  And look at the crowd and look at the composition of that crowd.  And by coincidence, actually, not by planning, it was held right at the end of the Race for the Cure, that you had thousands of women who had just been running and walking to try to raise money to cure breast cancer, and a lot of the people in that crowd were wearing the T-shirts and the hats.  It was a ready-made crowd just four blocks away.

MR. RUSSERT:  Chuck, isn't, isn't this the bottom line?  In August, Barack Obama will look at the electoral college map, look at the polling data, see how he's doing with white women and Hispanics, blue-collar workers, and make a tough, hard-headed, cold-hearted decision as to whether or not he needs to put Hillary Clinton on the ticket?

MR. TODD:  I think that's right.  I mean, it, it is going to come down to the map.  I think what's interesting is I found out yesterday that a top Clinton aide has been reading a lot of Kennedy--a lot of Johnson and Bobby Kennedy biographies to learn what was that rivalry like.  And this person said to me it is very similar, the LBJ/Bobby Kennedy.  He's reading this stuff, and he's sitting there saying, "Wow, there's a lot of similarities here about how both of the principals did everything they could to keep their aides from bad-mouthing the other." Lots of, lots of odd interplay there.  But for this to work, there is another secret meeting that needs to take place, and that's between Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.  And I'm told that Bill Clinton is not over this yet.  Hillary Clinton is over this, to a point.  Bill Clinton believes that he was turned into a racist and believes the Obama campaign did it to him, believes that the Obama campaign has tarnished his legacy in the '90s.  That "turn the page" stuff is a way of saying the '90s were a failure, not a success.  The bitterness in Clinton world is in that Harlem office where President Clinton resides.

MS. MITCHELL:  And some people...

MR. RUSSERT:  We're, we're going to...

MS. MITCHELL:  Tim, some people felt that he looked like he had been crying yesterday.

MR. RUSSERT:  Yeah.  Yeah.  I think...

MS. MITCHELL:  Some people close to him.

MR. RUSSERT:  We're going to get to Bill Clinton in just a second, because there's some things he did say and we want to put them into perspective and focus.

But you do raise the issue, Chuck Todd, of what would it be like if Hillary Clinton was the vice president with Bill Clinton as an adviser to her? Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former national security adviser to, to President Jimmy Carter, was on "Morning Joe" the other day and talked about how he envisioned Hillary Clinton as the vice president.  Let's watch.

DR. ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI:  If she was vice president, there's at least a high risk that it will be a dysfunctional presidency because in the executive office of the president, across the street from the White House, there would be a government in exile and also a government in waiting.  And that wouldn't create a very good atmosphere.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  "A government in waiting."

MR. GREGORY:  Yeah, you know, and one of the things you said, and I think correctly, was that Obama will make a tactical, hard-headed decision about the landscape of the electoral college by August.  But I also think he's going to think about how he governs and with whom he governs.  Let's bear in mind that the role of the vice president now is so much more powerful.  And he's run a campaign where one of the edicts sent down the line was "no drama." There could be a lot of drama with Hillary Clinton as your VP and the former President Bill Clinton around.  And I think that's something that he may really want to have to deal with.

MR. RUSSERT:  Now, the--another pro, according to the AP for Hillary Clinton, "She puts a battler on your team." She knows how to fight and how to engage, how to attack.  Here's Hillary Clinton here during the primary.

(Videotape, March 6, 2008):

SEN. CLINTON:  I think it's imperative that each of us be able to demonstrate we can cross the commander in chief threshold, and I believe that I've done that.  Certainly Senator McCain has done that.  And, and you'll have to ask Senator Obama with respect to his candidacy.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Ouch.  Commander in chief.  AP said the con is "Battlers can overdo it." Here's an example.

(Videotape, January 21, 2008)

SEN. CLINTON:  I was fighting against those ideas when you were practicing law and representing your contributor, Rezko, in his slum landlord business in inner-city Chicago.

SEN. OBAMA:  No, no, no, no, no.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  See how those Democrats love one another, Ron Allen.

MR. ALLEN:  You know, when you hear that stuff, it sounds impossible.  But when you walk into an arena with thousands of people screaming for Hillary Clinton, you, you think it is possible, as a real practical matter.  And I think that she's a much different person at the start of this campaign that, than now.  And there really are people out there who I think are "Hillary Clinton Democrats." And most--the most important thing, of course, for the Democrats is to win.  And, and that's what Barack Obama's, Barack Obama's going to have to look at.  And, you know, 18 million voters, if we can find all 18 million, is 18 million voters.  And there's a lot of emotion, a lot of passion, and they're going to need that to, to get them over the top because it's probably going to be a close election.

MR. COWAN:  And the more involved that she is, I think, doesn't it take away the "I told you so" argument that, you know, if he doesn't end up winning some of the big states, the more involved she is, the less chance there is for her to point fingers and say, "See, I told you that perhaps..."

MS. MITCHELL:  Well, I think whether she's on the ticket or not, you're going to see her out there campaigning as much as he would want her to be, in targeted areas, because she now has to validate the fact that she is not a sore loser.

MR. RUSSERT:  Bill Clinton, as Chuck Todd brought up, here's how the AP handles that.  Pro of putting Hillary on the ticket, you get Bill Clinton. Con, you get Bill Clinton.  And as recently as last week, Bill Clinton was saying that Senator Obama had others "sliming" his wife.  This is some of the compilation of just a few of the things Bill Clinton said during the course of this race.

FMR. PRES. BILL CLINTON:  (January 7, 2008, Hanover, NH) This whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I've ever seen.

(January 26, 2008, Columbia, SC) Jesse Jackson won South Carolina twice.

(April 22, 2008, Pittsburgh, PA) You always follow me around and play these little games.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  What happens now, Chuck Todd?  One suggestion yesterday, the Bill Clinton redemption tour where he goes to Appalachia and goes town to town and says, "I know Barack Obama, and he is in a position to help you economically.  You have to overcome some of the cultural, race concerns you have and embrace his candidacy."

MR. TODD:  Well, look, I do think that the Hillary Clinton campaign did find finally a way to use Bill Clinton.  And frankly, Gore and Kerry now must look back and say, "Why did we send him to African-American urban areas?  We should have sent him to these rural areas.  The guy is pretty good at this and, and--when he's in Bubba mode, and when Bubba's talking to Bubba." The problem is, as we found out during this campaign because we can't help ourselves in following the guy around, he's a constant newsmaker of the wrong kind.  So wherever you send him, we're--we in the media are going to gravitate to him. He is a former president, it's not like any other surrogate.  And he is going to not be able to help himself talk about his own legacy in the '90s.  And all of a sudden he'll redo trade deals or redo stances that Obama will have.  And I think that that's the risk that the Obama campaign doesn't want to take. That said, he does need to figure out how to reach out.  There is the, the, the bitterness between President Clinton and, and the Obama campaign.  And so, therefore, Barack Obama is, is, is very, very...(unintelligible).

MR. RUSSERT:  I remember reading those polls, Ron Allen, that you pointed out to in South Carolina where Senator Clinton was ahead amongst African-American voters.  Then came some of the comments that Bill Clinton made.  I went to Cleveland, Ohio, to do the debate with Clinton and Obama, and a big, black security guard came up to me and said, "You see Bill Clinton, you tell him thanks for making us 90-10 for Obama," and I just, "Whoa, I don't--not in the business of transmitting messages, sir, but I appreciate your comment."

Lee Cowan, how bad is the blood between Barack Obama's campaign and Bill Clinton?

MR. COWAN:  Well, I don't think--they don't talk about it a lot.  I think it's, it's fair to say.  I mean, I think that they, they sort of let Bill be Bill.  And I think now, obviously, they're going to have to face it and have to figure out exactly how they're going to, how they're going use him.  I think the danger, like, like Chuck said, is how far do you let him go off the leash and--if you can put a leash on, on Bill Clinton and all.

MR. RUSSERT:  They announced the other night that Bill...

MR. GREGORY:  The Clinton campaign couldn't do it.

MR. COWAN:  Right, exactly.

MR. RUSSERT:  They announced the other night that Bill Clinton was going back to his Harlem office to re-engage on work on his foundation, and may be out of politics.

MS. O'DONNELL:  That's...

MS. MITCHELL:  Well, they announced that...

MS. O'DONNELL:  I think if you look at how Hillary Clinton performed in the Senate, she was not overshadowed by her husband there.  She was a woman standing on her own, building relationships across the aisle.  So if you're looking for how would she govern, that's one model.  And if you send the former president back to do the good works that many people said he didn't get credit for during this cycle, maybe you offset that image a bit.

MR. COWAN:  And how effective was that in the...

MS. MITCHELL:  They, they announced that, that he was going back to the office specifically because of concerns that he was really clouding her message.  And that--but there is resentment.  You, you asked Lee about the feelings in the Obama camp towards Bill Clinton.  There's a lot of resentment that Chuck was touching on among the Bill Clinton team, and they do feel, and I think he does feel, that Obama always was able to stand above the crowd, but that people working for him were putting the stuff out and "sliming" Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton.  They really feel that very strongly, and so there is a lot to overcome there.

MR. ALLEN:  Yes.

MR. RUSSERT:  But if there's going to be a Hillary Clinton vice presidential candidacy, and there is a vetting process, the Obama campaign seems to be pretty clear that Bill Clinton would be part of that process...

MS. MITCHELL:  Which means...

MR. RUSSERT:  ...whether contributions to his foundation, his presidential library, whether or not he'd still be able to give speeches around the world.

MR. GREGORY:  Right.  And, you know, in 2000 when Bush ran against Gore and Clinton would do something, Bush's line was "The shadow returns." And he would joke with Clinton about that, and Clinton had a good laugh, he--the two of them, Bush and Clinton, had a good laugh at Al Gore's expense.  But that's the same issue here, that Bill Clinton is still the shadow that returns.  Now, for Hillary Clinton he was essential.  Without him, Hillary Clinton would not have had the, the establishment support, the money and, and the heft to really launch her own presidential campaign.  But then there was also downsides.  But look, Bill Clinton, I think, is a receding figure in Democratic politics. Barack Obama is a huge force.  He is a phenomenon.  He is creating so much enthusiasm within the Democratic Party.  Bill Clinton is a major, major star in that party, but his role is changing.  And I think we're really going to be--we're going to watch the beginning of that change how--whatever role he plays here.

MR. RUSSERT:  We're going to take a quick break, we're going to come back and talk about Obama vs. McCain.  That's the reality.  Our NBC News political dream team is with us.  We'll be right back.

MR. RUSSERT:  And we'll be back with more of our NBC News political team.  An in-depth look at this race after this station break.

MR. RUSSERT:  And we are back.  It's all about the electoral college map. And, Chuck Todd, let's take a look at it; you helped put this together. Barack Obama, dark blue states, ones that you think are safe Obama seats--states.  California, Connecticut, Delaware, D.C., Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont.

The light blue lean Obama:  Maine, New Jersey, Minnesota, Oregon, Washington. Put those together, he has 200 of the necessary electoral votes.  He needs 271.

Here's John McCain.  The deep red:  Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, Wyoming.

The lighter red lean McCain:  Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota.  Put those together, 200 electoral votes.

Now let's look at these toss-up states.  There they are in yellow.  Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Wisconsin.  That's 138 electoral votes still out there.  But, you know, if you put together those leaners that we talked about and the toss-ups, here's the map, there are 26 states in play.  The light red, the light blue and the yellow:  269 electoral votes.  This race is wide open.

MR. TODD:  It's a giant electoral map.  It's as big as ever.  And, you know, we're, we're all watching this.  There's a lot of us that sit there, and they, they remember the 2000 election, the 2004, and so we're automatically assuming, "Boy, this is going to be another one-state swing, where we'll be able to do what John Kerry loves to do.  "If you just filled up the, the Buckeye stadium, you know, with enough people to switch their vote, I'd have one Ohio in the electoral college."

But you look at the bigger landscape, and you realize there is potential--landslide potential for either one of them where they could sweep those toss-ups and win a bunch of leaners.  And that's why, if you're wondering what a McCain landslide would look like, well, it would mean he would carry Minnesota, Oregon and New Jersey.  If you're wondering what an Obama landslide would look like, it would include him carrying a lot of states like Indiana, Missouri, a couple of states in the South.  So that's why it's fun to put the whole thing out there.

The likelihood that we would have a third straight presidential election that was decided by one state, it's, it's unprecedented.  It's what we dream about, but it is unprecedented.  And the likelihood of an electoral landslide is much greater.

MR. RUSSERT:  I'm going to make you crazy.  If, if Barack Obama wins the same states that Al Gore won...

MS. O'DONNELL:  Right.

MR. RUSSERT:  ...or the same states John Kerry won--Gore won New Hampshire--New Mexico and Iowa.  Kerry didn't win those.  Kerry won New Hampshire, Gore didn't win those--win that one.  If Obama wins those three states, New Mexico, Iowa, New Hampshire, it's 269-to-269.

MR. TODD:  And then we have to figure out--and then we figure--and then we remember, North Dakota's House delegation is worth just as much as Florida's House delegation.  And that's one vote for McCain and one vote for Obama.

MR. RUSSERT:  Kelly, what is the McCann--McCain campaign thinking when they look at that electoral college map?

MS. O'DONNELL:  Well, the word that comes to mind is they say, "It's doable." They know the history they're running against with the barrier-breaking candidacy of Obama.  They know about the enthusiasm gap where he fills arenas, 20,000 people at times, even more.  But they say, if you look at the nitty-gritty of map, they see opportunity.  New Hampshire is where his candidacy was resurrected.  He spends a lot of time there.  We will be going back there, following him, even this week.  So he sees that as potential.  New Mexico, narrowly won by Republicans in the last two contests, a neighboring state for him.  He believes he's stronger among Hispanic-Americans, especially because of his immigration stance, which nearly killed him in the Republican Party.  So they think it's possible.  And even though they know there's going to be a big bump for Obama, they think, in the state contests, if you drill down, they've been studying this, he is within a few points.  And they think there is potential there.  That's why they're on the air with advertising in a number of those states, and they think they have enough money to stay on the air to try to avoid Obama being able to define McCain early, which has sometimes, you know, spelled disaster for candidates who were behind at the beginning.

MR. RUSSERT:  And, traditionally, the Democrat wins Pennsylvania and Michigan and Wisconsin, but they're always very close, all within a few points of each other.

MR. GREGORY:  And, you know, I think independent voters are going to be so interesting to watch in this cycle because you've got two candidates who have demonstrated success among independent voters, notably John McCain.  And we know that in the '06 congressional election cycle, Democrats really made inroads among those independent voters, many of them disaffected Republicans who will still be disaffected going into this election.  And that's the contest here.  For Barack Obama, he's got to appeal among independents, but he's also got a lot of question marks over his head.  And for John McCain, how close is he to Bush in the mind of the independent?  That group of voters becomes important, and you've got two candidates here, really, in a, in a unique ability to go after them.

MR. ALLEN:  I look...

MR. RUSSERT:  When you look at the states that are toss-ups, everyone, it's interesting--Virginia, Chuck, Colorado--those are states that Democrats didn't think they could compete in.  Obama's campaign, Lee Cowan, they think they have a real chance, don't they?

MR. COWAN:  They do.  And not only that, I think there are some states that they think are probably perhaps too red to ever really go blue, but they're still going to campaign there in the hopes that perhaps that distracts John McCain a little bit of having to spend money in some of those states.  I mean, this is going to be a 50-state strategy.  The Obama campaign says they certainly have the money, depending on what they do to go with the 50-state strategy.  And if they do campaign harder in some of these very red states, that may mean that John McCain has to sort of make sure that he doesn't lose those.

MR. RUSSERT:  Might, that is, the 50 states become 26 pretty quickly.

MR. COWAN:  Well, probably, that's true.

MR. RUSSERT:  But, nonetheless, it will force him to spend money where he doesn't want to spend money.

MR. COWAN:  Right.

MR. ALLEN:  I was just going to say that I think a landslide one way or the other is more likely than not because it's such a unique set of candidates that you have.  When you see John McCain and, and Barack Obama standing next to each other, there's a 25 or so huge difference in age.  It's a generational thing.  Obama's trying to change the entire electorate with all these people that he's brought in.  And, and that's why we're--it's a question of war and peace, it's a question of do we stay in Iraq or do we not stay in Iraq?  And so the issues are clear, the candidates are clear, and that's why I think it's more likely than not that there'll be a--the electorate will go one way or the other.

MR. RUSSERT:  There clearly are big differences on big issues:  the war in Iraq, Iran, health care.  Issue after issue.

MR. ALLEN:  Right.

MR. RUSSERT:  But the contrast that you point out, Ron, is very, very striking.  Here is Barack Obama Tuesday night in St.  Paul, where the Republicans will hold their convention in August, proclaiming victory.  Let's watch.

SEN. OBAMA:  Because you decided that change must come to Washington, because you believed that this year must be different than all the rest, because, because you chose to listen not to your doubts or your fears, but to your greatest hopes and highest aspirations, tonight we mark the end of one historic journey with the beginning of another.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  That same night John McCain gave a speech, and this was the backdrop, as he stood in front of the wall rather than people, and even by loyal Republican standards did not measure in a way that they had hoped. McCain's people readily admit that's not what they do.  That's not what he does.  He then called for a series of town meetings where Obama and McCain would travel around the country in the same plane.  That's what Barry Goldwater had recommended--suggested to John Kennedy back in 1963 before Senator--President Kennedy was shot.

Andrea Mitchell, this contrast that Ron Allen talked about couldn't be more striking, but can't McCain take advantage of it by saying, "I'm not an orator. I'm a comfortable shoe that you can trust, who's been around, who will do the right thing."

MS. MITCHELL:  Yeah.  He has to make age his friend, not a deficit.  And he has to try to work the experience.  Now, experience didn't work for Hillary Clinton as the mantra.  Change was a much more compelling message, according to any measure that we've looked at in this campaign year, but he--if he can find enough ways to undermine Obama's authenticity or experience on big issues.

Now, when you look at the very first speech he gave after getting the nomination, becoming the presumptive nominee, the AIPAC speech to the pro-Israel group, there are issues there.  He, he was not exact or precise in the language that he used when he talked about Jerusalem being undivided. There, there are codes in foreign policy, and by talking about Jerusalem remaining undivided, he seemed to be walling off--no pun intended--any Palestinian hope for a negotiated solution, which in every negotiation going back years, has included some way of dividing Jerusalem among the parties.

MR. RUSSERT:  If the Republicans understand the issues--the economy, gasoline over $4 a gallon and going up, the war in Iraq, eight years of George Bush cutting against them--they do have to undermine whether or not Barack Obama has the capacity to sit in the Oval Office.  I think that's the undercurrent of this commercial by John McCain that is being run in battleground states. Let's watch a part of it.

SEN. JOHN McCAIN (R-AZ):  I hate war, and I know how terrible its costs are. I'm running for president to keep the country I love safe.  I'm John McCain, and I approve this message.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Chuck Todd, clear--couldn't be more striking.  He's going out there saying, "I can protect you.  I can keep you safe."

MR. TODD:  You know, it's funny.  Now that the--next week, Obama's starting this economic tour.  Next week, John McCain is going to focus on the economy. Both of them got their nominations because of their stances in national security.  OK, Barack Obama would be nothing without Iraq.  He would not be the nominee of the Democratic Party.  John McCain would not be the nominee of the Republican Party without Iraq.  And now these two guys want to--both of them want to have this national security debate, and the country's begging them to have a debate about the economy.

And what I'm wondering is, we're seeing--and look, you see John McCain trying very much to keep this about national security, because he believes that's his trump card.  He believes that's the one time where age matters and experience matters.  But the first candidate that figures out how to talk to working class voters about the economy and feel their pain is going to be the one that eventually wins this election.  And neither one of them are good at it yet. Barack Obama's not good at this yet, and neither is John McCain.

MS. MITCHELL:  He's not--you could...

MR. TODD:  And, and, you know, the funny thing is, if we thought this was going to be an economy election 18 months ago, there'd be different nominees today.

MS. MITCHELL:  But you could argue, though, that the gas tax in Indiana was a critical moment for him, because he closed in Indiana because people rejected the, the gimmick aspect of the gas tax holiday and accepted his version of it. So he may have a way of talking about the economy.  That was one instance where he did.

MR. TODD:  He's got to give them something.

MS. MITCHELL:  But you're absolutely right.

MR. TODD:  He's got to give them something.  He still doesn't know how to give people this idea that they might get something.

MS. O'DONNELL:  But, Tim, the message of that spot was, "I hate war." The McCain campaign knows that it is considered to be the candidate who is most associated with continuing the war.  So you're hearing John McCain talk in a new way about the war in Iraq, trying to say to those voters, "It's not that I want to keep fighting.  If anyone knows about the, the pain of war, it's me. And I would be the better candidate to get us out in a responsible way." He is really trying to address that anti-war sentiment in the country.

MR. RUSSERT:  Should we stay?  Should we go?  Should we talk with our enemies or not?  This is a big difference on these issues.

MR. ALLEN:  I think foreign policy--and I love foreign policy--is going to be really crucial for Barack Obama.  And the, the speech about Israel that Andrea mentioned also jumped out at me, about this notion of Jerusalem being divided or undivided.  Obama has, has gotten where he is, in large part, by opposition to the war.  There's not been a lot of debate about specific things.  Yes, will we talk to dictators or not.  But what are we going to do in Iraq?  What happens when you remove these troops one month at a time?  What do you do in Israel?  What do you do in Iran?  In, in very specific terms, I'm sure that's where John McCain feels like he can make a lot of ground.

MR. RUSSERT:  Unanswered questions.  We have to go.  Before we do, once again, Upper Deck baseball cards, trying to capture the history of this race. Here's Barack Obama, number 42, the Dodgers, that's Jackie Robinson.  John McCain trying to block that plate and hold on.

MR. GREGORY:  Yogi Berra.

MR. RUSSERT:  Which, which leads me to Robert F. Kennedy.  We're going to talk about him in our "Meet the Press Minute."  But look at this.  He gave a speech to the Voice of America all around the world 40 years ago.  And despite what was going on in the country, particularly in Alabama, Bobby Kennedy said this:  Things are "moving so fast in race relations a Negro could be president in 40 years." This is in 1968, we're now in 2008.  "`There's no question about it,' the attorney general said.  `In the next 40 years a Negro can achieve the same position that my brother has.' ...  Kennedy said that prejudice exists and probably will continue to ...  `But we have tried to make progress and we are making progress.  We are not going to accept the status quo.'" Extraordinarily prescient, which leads us to our "Meet the Press Minute."

Just after midnight on June 5, 1968, Robert F. Kennedy proclaimed victory in the California primary.

SEN. ROBERT F. KENNEDY (D-NY):  Now it's on to Chicago, and let's win there.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  But Robert Kennedy never made it to Chicago.  Moments after that speech, he was shot in a kitchen corridor of the Ambassador Hotel and died the next day.

He appeared on MEET THE PRESS March 17th, 1968, the day after he announced his candidacy for the presidency of the United States.

MR. LAWRENCE SPIVAK:  Our guest today on MEET THE PRESS is Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York, who yesterday declared his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for the presidency of the United States.

SEN. KENNEDY:  I intend to talk about what I feel needs to be done for this country to heal the deep divisions that exist between races, between age groups, and on the war in Southeast Asia.  I think that we're more divided now than perhaps we've been in 100 years.

I'm going to have a very, very rough road ahead of me.  I have five months even before the convention comes.  I have to go to all of the states.  I have to go to the very--various primaries.  I have to present myself and my policies and my programs not just in opposition to President Johnson, but what I think can be done for this country and for the rest of the world and for mankind, because we are the leader.  I have to present that to the rest of the American people.  Then they will judge and the Democratic Party will judge.  I don't think I'm asking for a free ride.  I don't think I'm asking for an easy road.

(End videotape)

MR. RUSSERT:  Robert Kennedy's brother John was killed in 1963, also by an assassin's bullet.  Their youngest brother, Ted, is the senior senator from the state of Massachusetts and is bravely battling brain cancer.  And we'll be right back.

MR. RUSSERT:  And my thanks to the NBC News political dream team.  You had an easy Sunday in the cushy studio, now back out on the road, all right?

That's all for today.  We'll be back next week at our regular time.  If it's Sunday, it's MEET THE PRESS.

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updated 7/18/2008 2:55:23 PM ET 2008-07-18T18:55:23

I have no reason to feel unsafe in my neighborhood, but I appear to be surrounded by dozens of people convicted of everything from theft and sex crimes to public drunkenness and speeding.

Not that I think of my slice of Los Angeles as Wisteria Lane. But the sight of a map pinpointing exactly where these lawbreakers live — or once lived — can rattle your sense of what a safe neighborhood is.

I got some insight into the criminal quotient in my neighborhood on several Web sites that turn government data into interactive guides of criminal activity.

For home buyers, these sites can be a tempting tool to discern whether a neighborhood is rife with crime, or a great place to raise the kids. But how accurate are the pictures they portray?

One site that debuted Friday is

Created by the folks behind, the new site crunches monthly government data down to the state and county level, says Bryce Lane, president and chief operating officer of

"What we're really good at is establishing connections across all these different data sets, linking it back to a particular person," Lane said, acknowledging, however, that some data might be missing. The company also doesn't tap into federal crime data.

The Neighborhood Watch feature lets you focus your search by address or ZIP code. You can also search by a person's name or specific home address, and there's a separate search with a detailed map of registered sex offenders.

Punch in the details and the site generates a map showing small squares that represent each person who resides — or previously resided — in the area and was convicted of a crime at some point. In some cases, the site will turn up people who were arrested, but never convicted.

Click on an individual square and you can get the exact address for the person and a description of their violation, among other details.

The results can be eye-opening.

But as I dug deeper into the results I found that many people are listed for traffic violations, or a crime they committed decades ago, maybe in another state. offers a more current snapshot of crime.

In some of the metro areas, such as Los Angeles, the site links to the police department's Web site, where users can generate neighborhood maps overlaid with crime data less than a week old.

Some sites take a wider approach, showing crime trends but not specific locations. taps Census data down to the each tract of land. It also works in FBI crime data at a county level. (The site plans to add city-level crime statistics in a few weeks.)

Like the other sites, PolicyMap lets you drill down to the neighborhood level surrounding a specific address. The map, uses a color system to show the degree to which a certain crime has occurred in the area.

PolicyMap also provides other community characteristics. You can see the percentage of campaign contributions that went to senators Barack Obama or John McCain, as well as the area's ethnic composition, or even the percent of all home loans that were subprime.

But some of the data are old. The most recent FBI crime data on the site, for example, is from 2006.

Dowell Myers, a professor of urban planning and demography at the University of Southern California, says the wealth of data provided on sites like these can distort what's happening in a given community.

"It amounts to a rumor that's constructed out of real data, but presented in a way as though it represents a level of threat, that's how people read it," Myers said. "And whether it actually represents risk to the buyer is totally uncertain."

Some home buyers may take them to heart as they go about their house hunting, in some cases steering them away, Myers says.

"This kind of information, which might have questionable value or really only marginal value, could put a real chill on the housing market in some neighborhoods, just because people can afford to be really picky right now," he says.

At, Lane contends that his service can help educate and inform people about those living around them.

In a survey of home buyers last year by the National Association of Realtors, 65 percent of respondents said that the quality of a neighborhood was the most important criteria in selecting a home. That was ahead of convenience to job location and affordability. The survey did not specifically ask about crime.

But to what degree does having access to all this information answer whether a neighborhood is safe or not?

Some buyers, like Roseanne Coyle of Ontario, Calif., go by their guts.

"I've driven past those (houses) I was interested in at different times to see what it's like around there," said Coyle, 40, a vocational teacher and mother of two teens who has ramped up her home search this summer.

"We pay attention to (details like) are there bars on windows," she says, noting the only crime-related Web sites she's checked are state sites listing registered sex offenders.

Perhaps, the perception of safety hinges as much on a neighborhood's look — manicured lawns and nice cars in driveways. Or on what it doesn't have: graffiti, homeless people, unkempt lawns.

Crime statistics won't show you that, but they don't make you feel safer, either.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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updated 9/3/2008 8:29:47 PM ET 2008-09-04T00:29:47

If Hurricane Katrina was one big lesson in government bungling, Gustav has been an open-book test of whether the politicians learned anything from the disaster.

And so far, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Mayor Ray Nagin are getting high marks.

In the days leading up to Gustav, Jindal and Nagin persuaded a sometimes complacent populace to get out well ahead of the storm. They didn't mince words; they didn't hedge bets. In the end, they were credited with overseeing the exodus of 2 million people in one of the biggest and smoothest evacuations in U.S. history.

That take-charge attitude in a crisis could bring political rewards, especially for Jindal, a 37-year-old Republican once mentioned as a potential running mate for John McCain.

"You've got a governor who took charge," said Jim Duffy, a Louisiana native and national political consultant who has worked for several Louisiana Democrats. "It helps him a great deal. He already had a reputation of being this wunderkind."

Rising star in GOP
Marc Rotterman, a GOP media strategist based in North Carolina, said: "Bobby Jindal is a rising star in the Republican Party. He's handled himself very well under very stressful conditions in regards to Hurricane Gustav. The contrast to his predecessor is startling."

"I think it's too early to talk about the presidency," Rotterdam added, "but if he wants to be, he'll be a player for the next several decades."

There are still plenty of things that could go wrong and cause public opinion to turn against the governor and the mayor.

For example, nearly 1.2 million homes and businesses across Louisiana are without electricity, and officials said it could take a month to restore power to everyone. Also, many evacuees are furious they had to wait at least two days before being allowed to return. Some may refuse to leave if another hurricane menaces Louisiana in the coming weeks.

But so far, the contrast with Katrina has been spectacular.

Nagin was bitterly criticized for not ordering New Orleans evacuated until the day before Katrina hit, and for what some saw as erratic leadership as the city slipped into anarchy. Katrina also proved to be the political ruin of Democratic Gov. Kathleen Blanco, who decided not to seek re-election after she was widely seen as weak, indecisive and incapable of working with the Bush administration during the crisis.

Mandatory evacuations
This time, authorities began moving people out of harm's way on the Saturday before Gustav's Monday morning arrival. Jindal and Nagin issued mandatory evacuation orders covering the entire Louisiana coast, including all of New Orleans, a city of roughly 300,000. Jindal activated 3,000 National Guardsmen to provide security and help move people out.

In another lesson learned from Katrina, state, local and federal authorities evacuated hospitals and nursing homes and put the poor, the ill and the elderly on buses and trains out of town.

Nagin also declared a dusk-to-dawn curfew and loudly warned that anyone caught stealing or breaking into homes would go straight to the notorious state prison at Angola, not local jails.

In the end, Gustav struck only a glancing blow to New Orleans, and the levees held. Gustav was blamed for a mere 16 deaths in the U.S. — compared with 1,600 along the Gulf Coast during Katrina — and authorities said one reason is that authorities moved people out of the danger zone.

"This was excellent. On a 1 to 10, I give it 9. What they learned they learned from Katrina, that's why this one has run so well," said LeRoy Hartley, a defense attorney who waited out both storms in his elegant home on high ground a few blocks from the French Quarter.

Jindal, a former federal administrator under President Bush, came across as calm, organized and decisive. In his appearances in the days before and after the storm, he showed a thorough understanding of the logistics of emergency response. Nagin, too, appeared resolute.

"Nagin was out of control last time, and he was much more in control this time," said former Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer, like Jindal a Republican.

Politics left out of it
What might have benefited the politicians the most was leaving politics out of it — at least during the storm — since personality and political differences clearly added to the deadly bungling in 2005.

Nagin and Jindal were said to have a distant relationship before Gustav; some political observers suspect Jindal did not want to be associated with the Katrina fiasco. But that apparently did not prevent the two men from maintaining a working relationship during Gustav. In fact, an aide to Jindal worked out of the mayor's office during the storm to speed communication.

"There was a sense of nonpartisan working together this time, where politics wasn't in the middle of it," said Ron Faucheux, a Louisiana native and longtime political consultant. Voters "want people to hunker down and do their jobs. Performance is good politics."

Nagin is prevented by term limits from running again. And outside of New Orleans, which re-elected him despite Katrina, many in Louisiana have not forgiven him for the devastation of the city.

Duffy said he does not see any statewide political future for Nagin. But the mayor's handling of the latest crisis could at least enhance his political standing in New Orleans and help him get things done as mayor of this city, which is still struggling to rebuild.

As for the governor, Duffy and other observers said they suspect it was Jindal who made the decisions to move faster. Jindal executed the contract for buses to remove the evacuees, and wasted no time in calling out the Guard.

"Jindal will and should receive a large share of the credit for a job well done. This guy, when he gets his mind made up to get it done right, he gets it done right," Roemer said.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Discussion comments


text:
Video: Tom DeLay responds
updated 9/28/2005 9:33:46 PM ET 2005-09-29T01:33:46

A Texas grand jury indicted House majority leader Tom DeLay Wednesday on charges of conspiracy in a campaign finance scheme, forcing the Republican to temporarily leave his post.

DeLay dismissed the charges, saying he is innocent.  But how much will this hurt the Republican Party?

MSNBC-TV's Chris Matthews talked to DeLay in an exclusive interview.

CHRIS MATTHEWS, HARDBALL HOST: A difficult day.  The charge from the prosecutor down there, which the grand jury acted on, was that a bunch of people got together, including you, and sent a bunch of corporate checks up to the RNC in Washington.  That's corporate contributions, illegal to use in Texas legislative races.

In exchange, you said, now send that same money down.  You earmarked it for these legislative races, thereby circumventing the spirit of the law, which is no corporate contributions. Is that a fair estimate of the charge?

REP. TOM DELAY (R-TX), MAJORITY LEADER: I don't know.  It is not in the indictment.  I don't know what he's charging me with.

MATTHEWS: Well, I'm reading it from it.

DELAY: You did not read that from it.

DELAY: And what you just gave us...

MATTHEWS: "Texans for a Republican Majority did tender cause to be delivered and delivered to the Republican National Committee a check in the amount of $190,000, the check being for the same bank..."

DELAY: Wait.  Wait.  Chris, Chris, that's TRMPAC.  That's not me.

MATTHEWS: OK.  So, that's it.

DELAY: TRMPAC is a separate entity.  I had no fiduciary responsibilities.  I had no managerial responsibilities.  I had nothing to do with the day-to-day operation.  I was simply, along with four other elected officials, on an advisory board.  They used my name as headliners for fund-raisers.

DELAY: And I had no idea what they were doing.

MATTHEWS: So, if corporate money was laundered through the Republican National Committee, you had nothing to do with it?

DELAY: That's exactly right.  But that's not what they did.  And they did it all within the law.  They did what they did — and I know what they did now.

DELAY: They did it completely within the law.  The Democrat parties and the Republican parties do the same thing over and over again.  You take soft money.  Those were the days of soft and hard money.

DELAY: You take soft money and use it for legal stuff.  If you have more than you need, you send it to one of your friends.  It's like your brother-in-law sending you money to pay your rent.  And then you send back hard money that can be used in the races.  It is not a quid pro quo.  In fact, the amount of money you're talking about is different.

Well, let me ask you this.  Let me ask — because Tom Davis is going to be on this show.  And the argument we're getting from other people is that there's nothing wrong with you urging some corp or anybody that your former PAC — putting the PAC you're on the board of — to give, say, give a bunch of money to the RNC.  They need money.  It's a good Republican
cause, and then calling up the Republican National Committee and say, why don't you give some money to these legislative candidates?  We'd like them to win down there.

That's legal.

DELAY: Yes.  It's totally legal.

MATTHEWS: So, what is illegal here?

DELAY: Everything TRMPAC did — and I insisted on — to even be on their board of advisers.

Now, TRMPAC was my idea.  I wanted the Texas House to be a Republican majority.  And I went down there and worked with them to do that.  We were successful.  From that, we redistricted Texas.  And the Republican Party better represented the values of the people of Texas, because we gained five seats.

MATTHEWS: You're a Texan.  Texas law says corporations can't give to legislative candidates.

DELAY: That's true.

MATTHEWS: If anybody, not you or anybody — just, if anybody sends money, says, give the corporate maybe to the RNC or the DNC and, by the way, send some of that money back and pay for these races down there, that would maybe be legal.  Would that break the spirit of the law, which is no corporate contributions?

DELAY: No, it wouldn't, because, in Texas, you can raise corporate and union money for administrative purposes, to pay your rent, to pay your salaries and that kind of stuff.

You just can't take that money and put it in somebody else's campaign.  Everything TRMPAC did, they did it with lawyers' blessings and accountants' blessing.  This is not anything to do with money laundering.

DELAY: This has everything to do with indicting me, so I have to step aside momentarily for...

MATTHEWS: That could be the motive.  But let me ask you.  He does,  in fact, in the indictment here he brought before the grand jury identified Todd Baxter, Dwayne Bohac, Glenda Dawson, Dan Flynn, Rick Green, Jack Stick and Larry Taylor as recipients of this corporate money as it went through Washington back....

DELAY: And I know very few of those people.

MATTHEWS: But they're legislative candidates.

DELAY: They're actually state reps now.

MATTHEWS: Right.  They were elected.

DELAY: We won.

MATTHEWS: Well, you won. These candidates benefited from money that came from the RNC.  The RNC benefited from corporate money coming from Texas.

DELAY: That's right.

MATTHEWS: Isn't that just a laundering process?

DELAY: No.  Democrats do it.  Republicans do it, have done it for years.  Lawyers — it has been tested in the courts.

MATTHEWS: Oh, I see.

DELAY: Lawyers have been doing this for — I mean, have said we can do this forever and ever and ever.

MATTHEWS: Could this be a partisan prosecutor who has found a law and found a way to read it that has not been read before?

DELAY: Oh, definitely.  He is trying to rewrite the law.

He is criminalizing election — the election code.  That's what he's doing.  But he's done this over and over again.  He did it against his Democrat enemies early on.  He did it against Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison.  By the way, he's had his head handed to him every time.  But that's not his modus operandi.

He did to me what he did to them.  You drag this out as long as you can do it, so that the press make you seem like you're indicted.  I have actually been indicted for two years, if you read the press on this investigation.

MATTHEWS: Right.  But, in this case, forced you to relinquish your leadership.

DELAY: Never talking to me.  Never talking to me.  Never asking me to testify, never doing anything for two years.

And then, on the last day of his fourth or sixth grand jury, he indicts me.  Why?  Because his goal was to make me step down as majority leader.

MATTHEWS: Does he have a witness or somebody or a piece of paper that suggests there was a quid pro quo with the RNC here?

MATTHEWS: You don't think he has anything like that?

DELAY: No, absolutely not.  He has nothing.  I'm telling you, he has

MATTHEWS: What do you think he showed the grand jury to convince them to indict?

DELAY: You don't have to — what do I know?  You know, grand juries, it's all one-sided.  It is all what he presents to the grand jury, how he spins, how he presents it.  Everybody says you can indict a ham sandwich with a grand jury.

MATTHEWS: Yes, I have heard that term.

DELAY: This is a ham sandwich indictment without the ham.

MATTHEWS: Let's play practicality here.

MATTHEWS: Because innocent until proven guilty.  That's the American system.

DELAY: Not anymore.

MATTHEWS: Well, let me ask you... You set up the House system whereby a leadership
person who is indicted has to relinquish their leadership post.

DELAY: True.

MATTHEWS: So, that is not exactly innocent until proven guilty under your own party standard.

DELAY: By the way, the Democrats haven't.

MATTHEWS: Yes, but you've been tougher.

DELAY: Yes.

MATTHEWS: OK, let me ask you this.  Can you get a trial before the next election?  Can you clear yourself?

DELAY: I hope so.  We have speedy trial in Texas.  And I have a very good lawyer that represented Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison against Ronnie Earle and handed his head to him back then.  He didn't learn anything and here we are again.

MATTHEWS: Do you think this prosecutor, Mr. Ronnie Earle, who is a Democrat — we pointed that out in the beginning of this show — who has gone after you, can he delay this trial until after the election next year and beat you?

DELAY: He'll try.  That's the way.

MATTHEWS: So justice delayed will be justice denied here?

DELAY: Absolutely.  I have already been punished, because I have had to step down from

DELAY: And that's all he wants.

MATTHEWS: Well, you won by 10 points because you were so generous to the other Republicans in your state, because you gave them some of your Republican territory.   Everybody — do you regret doing that now that you have a smaller margin?

DELAY: Not at all.

MATTHEWS: OK.  You have a margin of about five points.  If it switches, you lose.  Do you think this indictment, just by itself, no evidence, just the indictment, could cost you the election?

DELAY: No, because what we're hearing from my district right now, as we speak, it is overwhelming.

MATTHEWS: Do they think this is sleazy, this indictment?

DELAY: Yes.  They finally get it. You know, this has been going on for 10 years.  I got my first ethics charges in 1993, then again in 1995.  Then they filed a racketeering suit against me.  And then they filed two more sets of ethics charges, all dismissed, all dismissed, but time, so that they dragged me through the mud.  They can't get me on via the election.  And so they're trying to get me by making me step down...

MATTHEWS: Are they using the old trick of throwing everything they can against the wall and seeing what sticks?

DELAY: Oh, yes.  And they have announced it.  I mean, the DCCC...

MATTHEWS: Here's your toughest charge.  Mr. Leader, your toughest charge tonight — and everybody is still going to keep calling you Mr. Leader, I'm sure.

The toughest charge, they coordinated an attack on you.  Who did the prosecutor, Ronnie Earle, coordinate with to nail you today in that grand jury?

DELAY: Oh, Democrat leaders.

MATTHEWS: In the state or up here?

DELAY: Both.

MATTHEWS: Who is involved up here?

DELAY: You need to ask him that question.

MATTHEWS: No, but you have said that there's a coordinated attack on you involving the leadership of the House on the Democratic side now.  Is Pelosi involved?

DELAY: Yes.  Video: Delay indicted

MATTHEWS: What's her role in this?

DELAY: I don't know.  Ask her.  But they announced it.  It is on their Web site that they were going to come after me.  And they — and it is in all their fund-raising mails, of how they're going to...

MATTHEWS: Oh, I know you're a target of all the fund-raising.  You're like Ted Kennedy from the other side.  They go after you.

DELAY: I'm not complaining.  I'm just saying, this is what they're doing.  I guarantee you, people like Martin Frost, Lloyd Doggett...

MATTHEWS: They're still mad at you, aren't they?

DELAY: Pete Laney, the former speaker of the...

MATTHEWS: These are the losers in your campaign to rebuild the Republican Party of Texas.

DELAY: That's exactly — exactly right.

MATTHEWS: And those guys are those guys who all lost their seats because you managed to win the redistricting in the Texas legislature, because you managed to get so many Republicans elected in the legislature.  They're all out to get you.

DELAY: That is right.

MATTHEWS: And this is part of it.

DELAY: This is the punishment for winning the Texas House and redistricting Texas.

MATTHEWS: Do you think there were meetings involving Nancy Pelosi or anyone else in the House leadership or these guys you mentioned who lost their seats and put together this charge against you; they cooked it up?

DELAY: Yes, I think so, but I...

MATTHEWS: It wasn't just his eager beaver prosecutors helping Ronnie Earle?  It was people from outside who involved themselves in this?

DELAY: I think so.  yes.

MATTHEWS: Is Ronnie Earle a straight prosecutor?

DELAY: Absolutely not.  He doesn't even go to his office.  He only goes to his office to hold press conferences.

MATTHEWS: What, is he a no-show?

DELAY: Yes.

MATTHEWS: Is that legal, to be a no-show in Texas?

DELAY: I guess it is.  He does it.  He's done it almost his entire

MATTHEWS: Well, how does he get reelected?

DELAY: He's a political animal.

MATTHEWS: So, he's good at the electoral process, but not the process
of prosecuting?

DELAY: Absolutely.

MATTHEWS: And you believe that this is a political vendetta?

DELAY: Oh, I know it is.

MATTHEWS: A coordinated vendetta by the House Democratic leadership here in Washington?

DELAY: And Democrat leadership in Texas and Ronnie Earle and, absolutely.

MATTHEWS: Do you believe that there was a heads-up to people like Nancy Pelosi before this thing today?

DELAY: Yes.

MATTHEWS: Do you believe that Nancy Pelosi and all the Democrats are keeping quiet today in order to let the focus be completely on you?

DELAY: And you're probably one of them.   The DCCC yesterday afternoon was shopping this story.  Nobody had this story.

MATTHEWS: But we didn't know about it.  We didn't know about it.

DELAY: And they were shopping this story.  So, they knew about it.

MATTHEWS: Well, they skipped us.

DELAY: Well...

MATTHEWS: Let me ask you this about this.  Do you believe that Nancy Pelosi is part of a coordinated attempt to fry you and then to step back and let the frying go on without any Democratic partisanship being evident?  We had a guest on today, Sheila Jackson Lee.  All of a sudden, she wasn't available.  We're wondering what's going on here.  Are they telling the people to pull back and make it look like it's nonpartisan?

DELAY: I don't know about that.

MATTHEWS: Well, that would be very coordinated.

DELAY: Yes.  But...

MATTHEWS: But you stick to your argument here tonight that this is a coordinated attack by the national Democrats and the state Democrats, including the guys you beat, knocked out of their seats, to get even with Tom DeLay?

DELAY: Absolutely.  It's on their Web site.

MATTHEWS: Can you still be the Hammer without the gavel?

MATTHEWS: Can you still be the Hammer without the gavel?

DELAY: I'm still a member of the House and I'm still aggressive.  And we have got a great agenda.  We're looking for to fix gas prices.  We're looking retirement security, fiscal responsibility, all these kinds of things.

We're focused.

And, in fact, what the Democrats don't understand is, what they have
done today is so unified the Republicans, at a time when we were kind of
falling apart and fighting with each other, that we are now so focused on our
agenda, we're going to drive it home and defeat the Democrats by accomplishing
our agenda.

MATTHEWS: There will be no Republicans out there trimming you tonight, you don't think?  They won't be saying off camera or off record, without their names being used, this guy ought to go?  You're not going to read that tomorrow morning in the paper?
DELAY: I don't know.  I don't know.  I know what I saw in that room when that caucus, the incredible support that I got.

MATTHEWS: Is Roy Blunt a good guy?

DELAY: And the unification of the other Republicans.  Roy Blunt is a great guy.  He's very capable.

MATTHEWS: Is he a DeLay guy?

DELAY: He is a Roy Blunt guy.

MATTHEWS: Hey, thank you.  You have got a lot of nerve coming on.

Watch 'Hardball' each night at 5 and 7 p.m. ET on MSNBC.

© 2013 Reprints

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Leaders Of The OECS Come Together Via Videoconferencing

This Country’s Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves will be among leaders of the OECS member states, who will come together today via a video conference, to focus on inescapable matters that require decisions.

The agenda for the discussions were not disclosed, however it is likely that the leaders will discuss some of the decisions reached at the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) summit in Guyana last week.

OECS Director General Dr. Didacus Jules said in a release, that this will be the first time the leaders will be meeting by video conference and given the fact that there are a couple of new Heads of State.

Mr. Jules added that the regular meeting in November will be a face-to-face meeting where all the ceremonial procedures for the welcoming of new Heads of Government will take place.


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    We are in this together—streamlining your technologies to get paid on time and in full.


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NCPA - National Center for Policy Analysis

Obama's Jobs Plan: Permanent Tax Hikes on Job Creators

September 22, 2011

President Obama has revealed that the increased spending and temporary tax cuts that his American Jobs Act entails will be offset solely with tax hikes, and not one penny of spending reductions.  In the end, the tax hikes would be permanent while the jobs policies temporary; thus, the proposal is really a tax hike plan rather than a jobs plan, says Curtis Dubay, a senior tax policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation.

  • Almost all of the $447 billion in increased revenue called for by President Obama would come from raising taxes on job creators -- the same job creators President Obama wants to hire more workers to reduce the unemployment rate.
  • The plan would raise taxes on job creators by capping the deductions that families and businesses earning more than $250,000 a year could claim.
  • It would reduce the deductions of these families and businesses to the amount they could claim had they only earned enough to qualify for the 28 percent tax bracket instead of the higher tax brackets (33 percent and 35 percent) they face now.
  • This tax hike would be on top of the 3.8 percent surtax on investment income that these same families and businesses will pay beginning in 2013 and the higher marginal income tax rates they will pay if the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of 2012.

Unfortunately, President Obama will not consider policies that would actually create jobs by reducing the high level of uncertainty that persists in the economy today.  This would include doing things such as:

  • Fundamental revenue-neutral tax reform that repairs the tax base and lowers marginal tax rates to improve the incentives for income production.
  • Reducing the crushing amount of regulations coming from various federal government agencies.
  • Repealing health reform and its onerous regulations and taxes.
  • Repealing the Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation.
  • Stopping incessant calls for higher taxes.

Source: Curtis Dubay, "Obama's Jobs Plan: Permanent Tax Hikes on Job Creators," Heritage Foundation, September 15, 2011.

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"Soviet Anti-Alcohol Propaganda."

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World's Tallest Man Marries.

Bao Xishun, who at 7 foot 9 in (2.36 m) is the world's tallest man just got married!

The world’s tallest man has married a woman who is more than 2 feet shorter than him, a Chinese newspaper reported Wednesday.

Bao Xishun, a 7-foot-9 herdsman from Inner Mongolia, married 5-foot-6 saleswoman Xia Shujian several days ago, the Beijing New reported.

Link - via Spluch

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My gf is more than a foot shorter than me, even that presents subtle difficulties. Well, I guess Xia likes being on top a lot.
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Pig Candy.

150_pigcandy4.jpg* Buy good quality, thick-sliced bacon.
* Prepare the brown sugar and cayenne pepper topping.
* Arrange bacon on a broiler pan.
* Cook for 20 minutes at 300-350Â°F.
* Turn bacon, apply topping, and cook another 20-30 minutes or until done.

Link -via J-Walk Blog

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Yexel's Toy Museum: The Ultimate Toy Collection

Yexel of Las Pinas, the Philippines, is a hardcore toy collector. He has so many toys and statues of superheroes and other cartoon characters that he practically had to build his house around his collection!

Here's an interview with the guy at Mechazilla (complete with a photo of "Yexel's Toy Museum", of course): Link - Thanks Celeste!

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Thanks for the link! Just wanted to say that the thumbnail pics are linking correctly now. I had a CSS fubar earlier that was causing some broken image lightboxes when people tried to click the thumbs. Now they just go straight to the Flickr pics so you can see everything in detail.
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Aw all his pictures are missing, besides the thumbnails. Id like to get a good look at those Justice League busts and the Captain America shield. Lifesize Astroboy, very cool.
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Great Moments in Presidential Debt

Properly managing one's finances seems like it should be a prerequisite for running a country. But these U.S. leaders could have used more dead presidents in their wallets.

Prior to becoming president, Harry Truman's ventures in private business earned him more trouble than profit. He lost several thousand dollars investing in a fruitless zinc mine, and even more money funding a short-lived haberdashery in Kansas City. Eventually he began to view politics as a more stable career than business. Even as a senator, Truman was forced to borrow money and live more modestly, as he sent much of his income home to support his farm in Missouri.

Upon leaving the White House in 1953, Truman refused to exploit his former office as a stepping stone into the business world. This left him with just a small plot of land off which to live. He hoped that his memoirs would bring in extra cash, but between paying the ghostwriters and the taxes, Truman netted just $37,000 from the book. His insolvency grew so pathetic that President Eisenhower passed the Former Presidents Act in 1958, which created a pension for Truman. The former president made use of every last bit of it, leading an active life until his death at the age of 88.

During the 1700s, tobacco rarely turned a consistent profit. So Thomas Jefferson, like many plantation owners of his time, lived in perpetual debt. Eager to look the part of a Virginia gentleman, Jefferson borrowed money for expensive clothes, furniture, and wine. He continued to indulge in this lifestyle through his presidency and into retirement. Jefferson's beloved country estate of Monticello was especially draining on his finances. Its high ceilings and large windows led to excessive heating costs, and its flat roof and cavernous skylights leaked with every rainfall. by the time Jefferson was in his late seventies, the neglected bills had piled up and doubled with interest.

To lessen his financial woes, Jefferson started selling off the things he loved. He sold his entire collection of books to a Congressional library and even hatched a plot to give away a large parcel of land in a statewide lottery. When news of the lottery (and its purpose) reached his former colleagues, generous donations poured in. Despite these efforts, Jefferson died in debt. Two decades later, his grandson finally paid off the founding father's tab.

In 1881, former president Ulysses S. Grant settled into his retirement with what seemed like a prudent investment in his son's Wall Street firm, Grant & Ward. But when the younger Grant's partner, Ferdinand Ward, absconded to Canada with all the money, Grant found himself short $150,000.

Grant considered it a matter of personal honor to pay back the debt in full and rejected any financial assistance. He sold off much of his land, but it wasn't enough to cover his losses. To generate more income, the former general wrote a series of articles about his Civil War exploits, which the ever-humble Grant doubted anyone would read. Surprisingly, the articles were a huge success, and Grant's longtime friend Mark Twain convinced him to pen his personal memoirs. Completed just before his death in 1885, Grant's autobiography became one of the best-selling books of its time -earning more than half a million dollars.

The article above, written by Brian McMahon, is reprinted with permission from the Scatterbrained section of the May-June 2011 issue of mental_floss magazine. Get a subscription to mental_floss and never miss an issue!

Be sure to visit mental_floss' website and blog for more fun stuff!

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Zombies vs Trick-Or-Treaters

Fantastic Four The Thing

I know the feeling. Come Halloween, I am not sure which I feel more connected to- my brain or my candy. Fine, fine, you're right. Take the brain but leave me my Rolos and Caramel Apple Pops.

-Via Tastefully Offensive

Love Halloween and cosplay? Check out our Halloween Blog!

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Neatorama Posts Tagged "fleischer studios"
Retro Valentine's Day Cards From Fleischer Studios

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Well Fed: Paleo Recipes for People Who Love to Eat

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Preparing quality food is among the most caring things we can do for ourselves and the people we love. That's why Well Fed: Paleo Recipes For People Who Love To Eat is packed with recipes for food that you can eat every day, along with easy tips to make sure it takes as little time as possible to get healthy, delicious food into your well-deserving mouth. If you count meals and snacks, we feed ourselves about 28 times each week. All of the Well Fed recipes -- made with zero grains, legumes, soy, sugar, dairy, or alcohol -- were created so you can enjoy your food every time.

The two essential tricks for happy, healthy eating are being prepared and avoiding boredom. Well Fed explains how to get in the habit of a Weekly Cookup so that you have ready-to-go food for snacks and meals every day. It will also show you how to make Hot Plates, a mix-and-match approach to combining basic ingredients with spices and seasonings to take your taste buds on a world tour. The recipes are as simple as possible, without compromising taste, and they've been tested extensively to minimize work and maximize flavor.

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  • Well Fed: Paleo Recipes for People Who Love to Ea

Product Information   Specifications for Well Fed: Paleo Recipes for People Who Love to Eat Below:

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[Serf] John of Damascus, St (c. 676 - 749) [Serf]
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  Home: Literature: Works by Author: John of Damascus, St (c. 676 - 749) Bookmark and Share

* Barlaam and Ioasaph by St John of Damascus
"It is not known where or when this story was written, but it is believed to have been translated into Greek (possibly from a Georgian original) sometime in the 11th Century A.D. Although the ultimate author is usually referred to as "John the Monk", it has been traditionally ascribed to St. John of Damascus."
Note: by part

URL: http://www.omacl.org/Barlaam/         Link Verified by NetSERF: 07 November 2006
Total Clicks: 5,784         Last Click: 19 November 2017
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