The Democratic race could well come down to the first contested convention in years.Lessons on how to prevail.
Rule #1: Control the Convention Mechanism. If you set the rules, decide who votes, organize the event and control what is said, it's almost impossible to lose. Rule #2: Watch the Platform. Party platforms were once the most important statement of the presidential campaign. No more. Rule #3: It's All About Delegates. Delegates are political junkies. This is their moment in the spotlight. Don't take them for granted. Make every effort to attend to their every legitimate (and legal) need. Rule #4: Have a Strategy to Win. Whatever combination of endorsements, announcements, policy statements and stagecraft you can engineer to create a sense of momentum going into the convention, do it. Rule #5: Focus on Staging. Conventions are elaborate made-for-TV productions. We live in a culture of the visual. Every moment and every event should be scripted.
There used to be an organization for people who believed in a truly limited government — limited taxes, limited spending, limited interference in individual lives and limited intervention in foreign affairs. That organization was known as the Republican Party. But the only one of those beliefs that still motivates the G.O.P. establishment is limited taxes. In 2008, people who still hold all of them joined the Ron Paul Revolution.
But now the revolution is ebbing. Congressman Paul's new campaign finance report shows that he's raised nearly $35 million, including more than any other Republican candidate in the fourth quarter of 2007, and he's inspired remarkable passion among the kind of diehards who hold up campaign signs on highway overpasses and post irate comments on obscure blogs. But the presidency isn't decided on YouTube or Technorati. Paul didn't win any Republican primaries, and he recently conceded that "victory in the conventional sense is not available."
Of course, nothing in Paul's world is ever done in the conventional sense, so he has refused to drop out of the race and endorse the presumptive G.O.P. nominee, Senator John McCain. Instead he argues that all Republicans should have "the right to vote for someone that stands for traditional Republican principles." And he's got a point.
Watch the newly released video of agents firing at Riley: The video, which was provided to Riley's legal defense team, was subsequently acquired by Ridley Report and posted to Youtube.
VLOGZ.TVMARCH 26 2008 WATCH VIDEO Saddam Hussein's intelligence agency secretly financed a trip to Iraq for three U.S. lawmakers during the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion
At the time, the Bush administration was trying to persuade Congress to authorize military action against Iraq.
The lawmakers are not named in the indictment but the dates correspond to a trip by Democratic Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington, David Bonior of Michigan and Mike Thompson of California. None was charged and Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said investigators ''have no information whatsoever'' any of them knew the trip was underwritten by Saddam.
Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign said she "misspoke" when saying last week she had landed under sniper fire during a trip to Bosnia as first lady in March 1996. She later characterized the episode as a "misstatement" and a "minor blip."
The Obama campaign suggested the statement was a deliberate exaggeration by Clinton, who often cites the goodwill trip with her daughter and several celebrities as an example of her foreign policy experience.
During a speech last Monday on Iraq, she said of the Bosnia trip: "I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base."
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