The woman who wanted to be president stepped up to a podium too tall, turned the microphones down and began by addressing the man who defeated her: ‘‘Mr. President-elect.’’

With her words on Monday, Hillary Rodham Clinton, who in the Senate emerged from the long shadow of her husband, stepped into a supporting role for another man, this one her former rival.

And while it’s hard to see the position of secretary of state as anything but the highest honor, Clinton appeared somber as Obama introduced her and the rest of his foreign policy team.

‘‘Her face was very set, she looked very serious,’’ said Maxine Fiel, a behavioral analyst and body language expert in New York. ‘‘She didn’t look extremely relaxed or happy or appreciative. In fact, she looked very grim.’’

Wow. A sexist dig and a body language expert in the opening paragraphs. Hard to imagine why papers are dumping the AP, isn’t it?

Despite the overarching purpose of Kos’s site in the past few months, which is to attack Hillary Clinton at every possible opportunity, I’d like to imagine that we on the left might want to build a coalition of voters that can actually win an election in November. While it serves the purpose of attacking Clinton, does constantly asserting that the white voters of Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and Kentucky are racist help our electoral chances this fall? One might imagine that Democrats would be interested in re-energizing the working poor of this region, asking them to consider to stop voting against their own economic interests by offering them a hopeful vision, rather than repeating absurd stereotypes about them.

And I don’t mean to go all Bill O’Reilly here, but I think a fair amount of skepticism about Al Jazeera’s reporting about the United States is warranted. After all, Dave Marash, the respected journalist who recently quit Al-Jazeera cited a troublingly similar example of anti-American bias in the network’s reporting:

It got to the point where I feel that in a globe where Al Jazeera sets a very, very high reporting standard, and a very, very high standard for both numerical and qualitative and authentic staffing, that the United States was becoming a serious exception to their role, and a place where the journalism did not measure up to the standards that were set almost everywhere else by Al Jazeera English’s very fine reporting.

It was enough for them to show poor people living in wretched conditions in a prosperous American city and decry it. Then they went to South Carolina and found a town that—I know this is going to shock you, Brent—had very rich people and, on the other side of the railroad tracks, very poor people. And the wretchedness of the poor people’s living conditions was enumerated.

That’s essentially exactly what happened in this piece and in kos’s analysis: concluding from a tiny sample of people that Kentucky is entirely populated by racists who refused to vote for Barack Obama.

Finally, while comments certainly don’t define a blog, given the relentless nature of the race argument advanced on Daily Kos, it’s hard not see these comments as troubling signs of the divisive strategy to de-legitimize Clinton victories:

Scary video - after seeing this I can understand why Obama didn’t waste resources on this state. There are some people you’re never going to win over.

“I’m not a racist or nothin’” said the toothless woman in the video, “My bootstraps just keep slippin’ through my daggummed manwhichie fingers”.

Let’s leave the absurd leaps in logic and embarrassing stereotyping to the other side and focus on building coalitions to do what Democrats are supposed to do: help, not demonize, the poor.

However, Clinton has stated that she would campaign hard for Obama if she does not receive the party’s nomination. This is the more important news.

“I’m going to do everything I can to make sure that anyone who supported me … understand what a grave error it would be not to vote for Senator McCain,” she said, then corrected herself, “[for] Senator Obama, and against Senator McCain.”

Note: Hillary is expected to easily win the Kentucky primary tomorrow, while Obama is expected to win the Oregon primary.

Freudenthal endorsed Obama a month ago, saying that Obama’s intelligence and command of Western issues impressed him.

I would really like to hear what both Clinton and Freudenthal have to say on this issue. Which candidate really is better for the west?

We have six relatively small primaries left: West Virginia (May13th), Kentucky (May 20th), Oregon (May 20th), Puerto Rico (June 1st), South Dakota (June 3rd), and Montana (June 3rd). Clinton should win West Virginia and Kentucky; Obama should win Oregon. There is limited polling information in terms of the primaries in Puerto Rico, Montana, and South Dakota.

So what will change after the final primaries on June 3rd? Not much in terms of delegates. Party leaders, however, will feel even more pressure to tell Clinton to drop out. Unless there is a major turn of events, North Carolina and the strong showing by Obama in Indiana put him in place to be our nominee.

Do I think the nomination process will go until the convention? I doubt it. Clinton will have essentially run out of options come the post-primary world. What super delegate is going to pledge against the candidate with the most pledged delegates won and the winner of the popular vote? Not many.

Reconciliation needs to begin as soon as possible - Clinton’s people need to be greeted with open arms and Clinton encouraging them to back Obama full heartedly. I know this probably won’t happen till after the Montana and South Dakota primaries, I just hope it happens, period.

We must be the party of unity. “After months of bickering and tough campaigning, the party still came together to defeat the bane of America’s future: McCain.” How powerful of an image would that be?

It is my hope that this hope of mine becomes more than just a simple hope.

For example,

Who claimed Hillary Clinton has a secret 20-year plan to become president?

Who said Hillary Clinton is “making the run for the best actress nomination”?

Who said Hillary Clinton is “literally willing to do anything to win”?

The thing is that this quiz is almost laughable in character. Obviously, the intention of the quiz is to paint Obama as a Republican strategist, but the case is pretty weak when only 2 out of the 14 questions actually refer to Republican “strategists” - the quiz really just reasserts what the Obama campaign has said and is saying.

If anything, the quiz just serves as a megaphone for Obama’s rhetoric, while it fails to refute any of his claims.

I was shocked by the quiz, not so much because it is an odd attack on Obama, but simply just because of how odd it was, period. Just because you put Obama’s name next to a “Republican Playbook” graphic, doesn’t mean that I’m automatically going to assume the two are analogous. How dumb did the designer of this quiz think the people that visit Hillary’s site are?

I am an Obama supporter. I wrote as much months ago. When, as a supporter, I find myself increasingly frustrated with the bitter, divisive attacks on Hillary Clinton by progressive bloggers, maybe it’s time to reevaluate the strategy.

Essentially, the Kos position seems to be:

• Democratic candidates need to fight hard to win, unless they are Hillary Clinton.
• that the Democratic Party’s rules on nomination are AWESOME when it comes to Florida and Michigan, but EVIL when it comes to super delegates.
• that it’s perfectly acceptable to descend to the Faux News strategy of bleating the same idea repeatedly to drive one candidate out of the race.

If those of us on the Left or, even worse, Senator Obama, think that Hillary Clinton is being too tough on him in this primary season, then our chances are over in November. Come this summer, the nominee will be facing people who turned a decorated veteran into a war criminal and draft dodger against someone who was both of those things. It’s going to get much rougher than this.

Sometimes, in my more cynical moments, I think all of this is calculated to be able to blame Senator Clinton in the event that Democrats lose in 2008. That way, we won’t have to confront the institutional failures of our side one more time.

We’ve got two great candidates–both better than John McCain. Senator Obama can make this easy. He just needs to win out. We shouldn’t be trying to push one player off the field before the game’s over.

The media, for the most part, isn’t exactly a source of insight - Pennsylvania does illustrate that perfectly.

Okay, so the media was on Obama’s side and now it’s on Hillary’s side saying that she might be more electable than is.  Obama supporters are now in an outrage and are claiming that the media is an awful joke of a news source. However, last week no one was complaining when the media was building Pennsylvania as a do-or-die primary for Clinton, saying that her run for the presidency was on its last legs.

When is the media right and when is it wrong? Perhaps we can throw that question out and just say that the media’s perception is crap. We are then forced to make are own, intelligent decisions.

This is what I think makes the Clinton campaign more viable than the Obama campaign:

1. Clinton has been attacked her whole political career, what does the right-wing have left? She has proven, more than once, that she can take a hit.

2. Clinton brings out the reliable senior and blue collar demographics.

3. Obama is the guy that the far left is voting for, which scares other, more moderate voters.

4. Obama has responded with less resiliency to attacks. The GOP is only going to be more ugly come the general.

NOW, here is why I think Obama can beat McCain:

1. McGovern analogies are flimsy, because Obama has a massive grassroots movement behind him, which brings in millions upon millions of dollars - a war chest much larger than McCain’s.

2. Obama can take a hit, he just has to get better at it. As I already stated, the GOP is going to be vicious come the general; Obama better be, at this very moment, working on an attack strategy.

3. McCain is pitiful and his “senior moments” won’t inspire a country when placed next to Obama’s “Yes, we can!” moments.

4. When I envision an Obama/McCain debate, I think, “JFK/Nixon.”

5. America is tired of Bush (but not as tired as many of us may think - it’s going to be one long fight) and McCain is already being framed, by Obama, as Bush: Part II.

The short version: Clinton is every bit as charismatic and engaging as he was when running for office himself. From the outset, he received a very warm response from the crowd, which could probably be best described as partisan, but not necessarily pro-Clinton. He still possesses that rare gift that few public speakers master, the ability to seem to connect individually with members of a large crowd.

As for the speech itself, it was a solid effort, laden with information about what Hillary has accomplished and what she will do as President. It certainly inspired me to look more closely at the health care reform plans offered by Clinton and Obama, reminded me of HC’s long record of service to progressive causes, and forcefully critiqued the current administration.

What was missing, I think, was a call to action, the inspiring positive message that gets voters out and active in a campaign. There was a lot of applause Tuesday evening, but it was awkward applause, often following a true, but painful remark about the current state of the American economy, foreign policy, and social safety net. We’re were rarely applauding great ideas and hopeful messages, and to some extent, I think that has been the greatest misstep of the Clinton candidacy.

Bill Clinton and Al Gore were able to energize a nation that was feeling an economic pinch, not agree with them. The historical parallel is strikingly close: Clinton was running against a weak defender of a failed status quo, and ran by leading with a forward vision for the country, not a critique of the past. Though I was later disappointed by some elements of his Presidency, I remember feeling incredibly excited to hear Clinton speak, to shake his hand, because he had the energy and vision to things done. Yesterday, I found myself agreeing, but not inspired about what can be, and that might just summarize the whole Clinton campaign this year.

In a close race between two very similar candidates, we’ve seen and heard too little of the Hillary Clinton who is an inspired, dedicated leader, one who probably would work harder than any President in recent memory. That Hillary Clinton, leading the way forward, rather than pointing out the failures behind us, might well have been unstoppable.