Right Here, Bozo!*

* reference to memorable television moment

Rachel Maddow wasted her time on China-gate last night. Christine O'Donnell said she had seen classified documents that proved China was trying to take over the United States. But concerned citizens were more outraged by claims that her father had been Bozo The Clown. Her campaign was swamped by fans of Bozo, who challenged the claim. After spending all day consulting with family members, the campaign finally admitted that her father was a substitute Bozo the Clown in Philadelphia. Well, that didn't play well either since Phialdelphia is in the TV market of Delware and Bozo's Philadelphia fans disputed even this claim. Stay tuned. If your campaign is mired in a debate over Bozo the Clown you have troubles.

Christine O'Donnell ran his first ad, which proudly proclaimed she was not a witch but she was "you". This triggered phony polls on the internet whether she was "you". You had to click whether you had sex, dabbled in witchcraft or mastrubated.

Tick, Tick, Tick. This may not become a major political scandal this year but foreign funding of this year's Republican races will be sooner, not later. Lee Fang at Think Progress details the foreign money pouring into the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber pledged to spend over $70 million this year in attack ads against the Democrats. That money comes out of its general account,which also solicits foreign funding. The Chamber claimed only after being caught out on this that they have internal controls in place. But the international presence in the Chamber is impressive, including state-owned oil companies from Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the Dubai National Oil Company as well as Russia government owned businesses like the VTB Bank. Dozens of Indian businesses are members including the State Bank of India. One key point of contention is the Democrats' efforts to close tax-loopholes for businesses that out-source jobs and of course the effort by the Administration to move to cleaner energy sources. What's interesting is that the Chamber commissioned former Ambassador Frank Lavin, who served as the McCain-Palin Asia campaign director to appear on television to say the Democrats were bad for business. Oh and of course, Fox News contributed $1 million to the Chambers efforts to run attack ads on television. The irony is rich with the right wrapping themselves in the American flag when they are solely own by foreign interests.

Bob Herbert wrote a nice description of the Tan Man. He's "now a coddled, gilded flunky of the nation's big-time corporate elite." In other words, he is a denizen of Stoogeland.

The Mike Hanna wannabe Karl Rove is now seen as the leader of the Republican party this year. He always envied the machine of William McKinley and seeks to replicate the days when J.P. Morgan and the rest of the robber barons owned the Republican Party and most of America. His first three billionaire donors to America CrossRoads were the primary backers of the Swiftboat campaign against John Kerry. Rove has told corporations they no longer have to be afraid because of the Citizens United case to come into the political races full-bore. Maybe this time also, but soon people will begin to demand some disclosure on these donors and maybe making their private residences public might help them reconsider next time.

Will The Gays Save America? I'm not being facetious. Gays have won court case after court case to reveal the funders behind anti-gay referenda in this country. Even Fat Tony Scalia chided anti-gay activists that the price of democracy is being willing to express one's opinion openly. Now with the blizzard of anonymous donors pouring money into non-profit front groups, it's a matter of time before similar suits are brought against this practice. Citizens United allowed unlimited political contributions from both American and foreign corporations but they didn't rule on whether they had to be transparent. Democratic efforts in Congress to push the DISCLOSE Acct have failed and will continue to fail. But using the Gay precedent, a law case might have success.

But in the meantime,Americans for Apple Pie, as President Obama calls these groups,are outspending Democrats 9-10 to 1, not the 7 to 1 as the Washington Post wrote. But the anonymity seems to be evaporating with the onset of Republican triumphalism. Jack Abramoff's partner, faux Christian Ralph Reed proclaimed that the triumphirate--banks, oil interests and health insurance companies--have come through for these non-profits. So it's not going to be hard to discover the sources for these vast sums of money.

"We're Lost but We're Making Good Time"--Yogi Berra. Nate Silver tried to analyze the vast differences between the NBC poll, which was good news for the Democrats, and the Gallup poll, which was sightly good news on the surface but a disaster beneath the tabs. Gallup had a 18% difference between Republicans and Democrats in a low-turnout election and 13% in a high-turnout election. Either one would be a disaster. Nate the Great made the argument that an overall average of polls is still reliable and he still says Democrats lose the House. The Washington Post poll still sees Democrats lagging behind but Obama hitting a 50% approval rating. My best hunch is that the House comes down to 24 races right now, and the Republicans would have to take 10 out of 12 contested Senate seats to win control.

As of last night electoral-vote. com had the House race at 204 democrats-190 republicans and 41 tied. The Senate was 50-48 and 2 tied. A contributor to the DailyKos tallied up Silver,Sabato, Cook and Rothenberg and claimed the average was a Democratic loss of 35.18 seats, not enough to take the House. This tracks with several political scientists, who have made thousands of computer projections, and came up with the Democrats keeping control with just one seat.

For a mid-term, this is making another record--roughly $5 billion will have been spent. I hope that actually is reflected in a large turnout.

Meanwhile, the death of liberal support for President Obama appears to be exaggerated. IPSOS/Reuters puts liberal support at 91%,Washington Post about 75% and others around 81%. Also, support for Obama from blacks--Chris Matthews is pumping the theme it's falling--remains about 91% also.

But Michael Gerson, who is a real fan of President Obama (not), suggests this morning that Obama is losing his religious supporters because of his sharp turn to the left. The former Bush employee chides Obama for using the Faith-Based Initiative program to educate the religious about healthcare reform. Like the Bush Faith-Based initiative never pushed the Administration line. Of course, Gerson doesn't mention the wall-to-wall 24/7 hate rhetoric coming from fundamentalists and evangelicals saying that Obama worships Satan and is the anti-Christ and a Muslim to boot. To be in such an echo chamber, you would have to move to the catacombs if you still supported Obama. Gerson pointed to the biggest drops being among Mormons and evangelicals. Gee, who is the most public Mormon in America--Obama supporter Glenn Beck.

Watch Rep. Issa as he's moderating his tone about how the Government Oversight Committee will work if the Republicans win the House. He is acting as the voice of reason but he slips now and again. Issa in talking about investigating Obama's birth certificate told Chris Matthews,"Well, I remember when there were doubts about the legitimacy of the Bush presidency and I said move on." Now let's roll back that comment. Bush was elected by one vote on the Supreme Court so there was natural concern about this. Barack Obama won with the largest popular vote in American History and a significant electoral vote. How can you even compare? Issa also had said that the Obama Administration offering Joe Sestak a position (non-paying by the way) so he wouldn't run against Arlen Specter was an impeachable offense. He has said on two normal networks he will pursue this issue further but downplayed his comments. Don't be fooled--he is gearing up to hire 60 lawyers to investigate the Obama Administration.

The same "moderate" tone is coming from Tan Man, who spoke at AEI about how he would run the House. David Broder, who I believe is brain dead, repeats the Boehner line that the House could have civil debate on the issues and there can be compromise. Has anyone watched the last 20 months? Even little Cantor has weighed in about how the Republicans became corrupt, lazy and abused their power the last time they were in the House. Why do you think these people can act any differently since now they would only be holding to corporations, not the people?

Little Billy Kristol and various neo-conservative organizations are sending around a petition saying they are for 2/3rds of what the Tea Baggers stand for, but are concerned that the mantra of less government might threaten defense spending. Pat Buchanan is coming at it from another perspective highlighting the conflict between the Tea Party and the War Party. This should be a good fight to watch.