Clinton wins big in Kentucky

CNN is reporting with 99% of the votes counted Sen. Clinton has defeated Sen Obama 65% to 30%.

“Tonight we have achieved an important victory,” Clinton said in Louisville.

“It’s not just Kentucky bluegrass that’s music to my ears. It’s the sound of your overwhelming vote of confidence even in the face of some pretty tough odds.”

Clinton beat Obama across all age groups, income groups and education levels in Kentucky.

Eighty-nine percent of Tuesday’s voters in Kentucky were white, according to the exit polls. Among them, Clinton won 72-22 percent. Nine percent of the voters were African-American and they overwhelmingly broke for Obama, 87-7 percent.

The exit polls from Kentucky also suggest a deep division among Democrats.

Two-thirds of Clinton’s supporters there said they would vote Republican or not vote at all rather than for Obama, according to the polls.

Forty-one percent of Clinton supporters said they’d cast their vote for John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, and 23 percent said they would not vote at all.

Just 33 percent said they would back Obama in the general election, according to the polls.

Those numbers are even worse for Obama than in West Virginia one week ago, where 36 percent of Clinton voters said they would back him in the fall.

The Obama camp needs to be paying attention.

UPDATE:  Jerome Armstrong, at MyDD, points out that Sen. Clinton not only won KY tonight, but also North Carolina:

SUSA does poll both Obama and Clinton in North Carolina today. Obama loses by double-digits, while Clinton defeats McCain:

North Carolina

Clinton 49
McCain 43

McCain 51
Obama 43

Going strictly by the latest poll shows Clinton leading by a 310-228 EV count over McCain, while the presumptive nominee, Obama, trails McCain by a 285-253 EV margin.

This is what makes Clinton supporters crazy — the thought that the strongest general election candidate might not be on the ticket.

In Memoriam – Hamilton Jordan

CNN just reported that Hamilton Jordan, a key advisor and former Chief of Staff to President Jimmy Carter, has died.

Jordan was born in Charlotte, N.C., in 1944 and raised in Albany, Georgia. He attended the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia and graduated with an A.B. in Political Science in 1967. After being disqualified from military service due to leg problems, he worked as a civilian volunteer in Vietnam during the war there, assisting refugees.

Jordan was a key advisor and strategist for Jimmy Carter during the 1976 presidential campaign and during Carter’s administration, serving as White House Chief of Staff in 1979-1980.

In 1986, he ran for the Democratic nomination for one of Georgia’s seats in the United States Senate. He lost the primary to Representative Wyche Fowler, who went on to win the general election.

Jordan had survived a personal struggle with two kinds of cancer after his service to Carter. He and his wife, a pediatric oncology nurse, founded a camp for children with cancer – Camp Sunshine Retreat – in Georgia. He was an honorary board member of the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation. He is survived by three children Hamilton, Kathleen, and Alex.

Jordan died on May 20, 2008 due to complications of his cancer.

sexism

Sen. Hillary Clinton, in an interview with Lois Romano of the Washington Post, addresses the sexism in this contest that many of us have complained about for months.

“It’s been deeply offensive to millions of women,” Clinton said. “I believe this campaign has been a groundbreaker in a lot of ways. But it certainly has been challenging given some of the attitudes in the press, and I regret that, because I think it’s been really not worthy of the seriousness of the campaign and the historical nature of the two candidacies we have here.”

“The manifestation of some of the sexism that has gone on in this campaign is somehow more respectable, or at least more accepted, and . . . there should be equal rejection of the sexism and the racism when it raises its ugly head,” she said. “It does seem as though the press at least is not as bothered by the incredible vitriol that has been engendered by the comments by people who are nothing but misogynists.”

Grey, at Taylor Marsh, offeres the following:

The sexism has been pervasive and blatant, though rarely taken seriously, a great miscalculation on the part of the Obama campaign. Should he become the nominee, there won’t be enough good will left for him to even begin to repair the rift, and he should not operate under the illusion that women, as well as many of their male allies, will “get over it” and fall in line. The repeated, insistent calls for Sen. Clinton to abandon the race aren’t helping and are, in fact, rankling her supporters:

“I’m real tired of the pundits telling me the race is over — telling America what it should think,” said Dorinda Perkins, 63, a lab technician. “I do not want her to quit.”

“I love her because she’s a helluva fighter. She’s tenacious and I like that,” said Pat Parker, a night-shift worker at Hardee’s in Bowling Green. “She cares for everybody, for people like me. . . . I’ll tell you, she’s been treated pretty shabby.”

I have said before, if Obama becomes the nominee he will have a lot of work to do in just trying to win over the base of the Democratic party — women.

Kennedy has brain tumor

This is very sad news. Doctors have determined that Sen. Ten Kennedy has a cancerous brain tumor, which caused the seizure he suffered on Saturday. The Associated Press reports:

The Massachusetts Democrat as a malignant glioma in the left parietal-lobe, according to doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital, where Kennedy, 76, has been undergoing tests since Saturday after having a seizure at his Cape Cod home.

The usual course of treatment includes combinations of radiation and chemotherapy, but Kennedy’s treatment will be decided after more tests.

“He has had no further seizures, remains in good overall condition, and is up and walking around the hospital,” said a joint statement issued by Dr. Lee Schwamm, vice chairman of the Department of Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Dr. Larry Ronan, Kennedy’s primary care physician.

The doctors said Kennedy will remain in the hospital “for the next couple of days according to routine protocol.” [...]

Malignant gliomas are a type of brain cancer diagnosed in about 9,000 Americans a year — and the most common type among adults. It’s a starting diagnosis: How well patients fare depends on what specific tumor type is determined by further testing.

Average survival can range from less than a year for very advanced and aggressive types — such as glioblastomas — or to about five years for different types that are slower growing.

Surgery can be an option for some types, especially to reduce symptoms as a tumor enlarges and puts pressure on the rest of the brain. Many gliomas infiltrate normal brain tissue instead of forming a solid mass, making it hard to remove much of the tumor.

This is such difficult news to hear. As I have mentioned in the past, my interest in politics was sparked by John F. Kennedy’s campaign for the White House in 1960. I was seven years old at the time, and even though my parents were registered Republicans — and my mother worked for the local Republican Party — she encouraged my interest in the race.

I was also a Bobby Kennedy fan, following his campaign in 1968, and was devastated when an assassins bullet changed the course of history forever.

Ted Kennedy has been a champion of liberal causes for the more than four decades he has served in the U.S. Senate. Very often taking the lead on issues important to women. We need his voice in the Senate.

The Kennedy family is known for its strong faith. Please send positive thoughts to the Senator and his family during this difficult time.