Photograph of Clinton, holding the hands of Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones and Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland and celebrating in Ohio, by Mark Duncan/AP Fresh off her big night of wins in Ohio and Texas, Hillary Clinton spoke on CBS's Early Show and mentioned the words "dream ticket" in relation to the heated Democratic presidential race. Harry Smith told Clinton, "We talked to a lot of people in Ohio who said there really isn't that......

The Wisconsin, Washington and Hawaii primaries have been going on today, and while John McCain is expected to further solidify his presumptive nomination, the Democratic race is tight as ever, with a Gallup pole now showing Clinton closing the gap on Obama after his string of eight straight victories. What’s passing for campaign news at the moment is a teapot tempest stirred up by the Clinton team, accusing Obama of plagiarizing Governor Deval Patrick......

After Hillary Clinton's started airing a commercial in Wisconsin questioning why Barack Obama declined to appear in another debate, Obama came back with his own ad. The voiceover says:After eighteen debates, with two more coming, Hillary says Barack Obama is ducking debates? It's the same old politics, the phony charges, and false attacks. On health care, even Bill Clinton's own labor secretary [Robert Reich] even says Obama covers "more people" than Hillary and does......

The prominent Democratic party donor and California fugitive Norman Hsu's connection to New York City's New School is examined in the NY Times today. Hsu donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to national Democrats like Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, to governors like Eliot Spitzer of NY and Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania, and NYC politicians like City Council members Christine Quinn and John Liu and City Comptroller William Thompson. Hsu, who had been wanted......

The Kid From Brooklyn sees famine, war, and despair in the world's future. " I've got foresight," he says, but even he could never have predicted his own popularity. Michael Caracciolo started his website TheKidFromBrooklyn.com to entertain friends and family, uploading videos of himself ranting wildly about whatever he happened to feel passionately about that moment, whether it be border control, the President, or even Starbucks. It's led to television appearances, a memoir about his......

Reach out and touch someone - and get fired for it, possibly even if you didn't do the reaching out and touching. The nutty voicemail message left for Bernard Spitzer, father of Governor Spitzer, is reassuring everyone that it's just politics as usual in Albany. The elder Spitzer's lawyers believe that the call was made by GOP consultant Roger Stone, who was recently hired at $20,000/month by NY State Republican (he was consulting with Spitzer's......

You may have many opinions of Senator Charles Schumer. A man who gives weekly press conferences by way of making the rounds on Sunday morning news shows, someone who will "put a bullet betweens the president's eyes," the senior Senator of New York, orchestrator of the Senate's shift back to the Democrats, husband of a recent Department of Transportation commissioner, imaginer of middle class couple the Baileys, cereal hog. But defender of hedge funds' and......

While former Mayor Rudy Giuliani is interested in running for President, what with visiting NH this past weekend, it's unclear how the GOP feels about him. The Post reports that the NY State GOP has Giuliani's big 2008 rival, Senator John McCain, to appear at a fund-raiser in Manhattan. One Giuliani supporter says, "It's a slight," but the NYS GOP claims that the party just needs a lot of money (it's broke) and all the......

Governor Spitzer has nominated Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Theodore T. Jones to a position on the NY State Court of Appeals, the state's highest court. You may remember Jones's name from such incidents as the Transit Strike of 2005. Jones is the one who fined the TWU $2.5 million and sentenced TWU president Roger Toussaint to 10 days in jail. Jones would be the lone black jurist on the Court of Appeals, since Pataki did......

And by listen, we mean "listen to the expected news that Hillary Clinton will run for president in 2008." The NY Times reports that Hillary Clinton has been meeting with "top New York Democratic officials" to explain her 2008 plans and ask for their support when that happens. According to anonymous sources, Clinton has met with Representative Charles Rangel and State Democratic Party chair Herman D. Farrel Jr., and may meet with Governor-elect Eliot......

The polls in New York close in a half hour, so the media won't be reporting returns until then. But it's still exciting and heartbreaking to watch the other states' elections returns. For starters, Bob Casey ousting Rick Santorum for a Senate seat in Pennsylvania? That's exciting. Heartbreaking would be reports of bugs and intimidation at the polls. NBC also projects that Bob Menendez will win re-election in NJ (with only 3% reporting, though).......

If it's October and it's a midterm election year and it's your second (and final) mayoral term and you're very rich and may be considering higher office, what do you do? Well, if you're Mayor Bloomberg, you stump for other candidates! The NY Sun notes that Hizzoner has "intensified" his very helpful fund-raising, even appearing in TV commercials. Who would have thought three years ago that Bloomberg would be helping out Connecticut Representative Christopher Shays,......

READINGS: Nostalgics from the Clinton era, unite! Head down to the 17th St. Barnes & Noble tonight to hear the dulcet (okay, maybe not) voices of Paul Begala and James Carville, together in their new book, Take It Back: Our Party, Our Country, Our Future. According to the Washington Post, "the book is most convincing when it is most elitist -- a kind of 'why can't anyone play this game' attack on the Democratic Party's......

While the Senate race this fall is kind of boring, in that Senator Hillary Clinton is pretty much assured re-election, one thing that is exciting is the insanity of the Republican party. The two Republican candidates, John Spencer and K.T. McFarland, debated on NY1 last night and it was balls out nuts. Spencer won the Republican party's nomination, but McFarland is hoping to sway some people during the primary (September 12) with digs like this:"You......

So if you've been watching the marathon today you know where Bloomberg is (shaking hands at the finish line of course) physically, but how is he doing in the polls? According to a new ">NY1/Newsday poll he's doing very, very well. Not only does the poll have Bloomie trouncing Ferrer by a 32-point margin (along with having an approval rating of 67%) but it even has him kicking ass in hypothetical match-ups against Giuliani, Dinkins,......

Fernando Ferrer's overstatement about his NYC public education (a master's at Baruch, after years of Catholic schooling) has lead to Mayor Bloomberg's campaign to issue press releases and certain tabloids, as Gawker points out, to enjoy creating insane covers and some serious questioning about blogging as candidates. It turns out that Mayor Mike doesn't write his own posts either! Shocking! Ferrer was asked about the offending post while with Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean, who......

According to WNBC Channel 4, the skinny kid from Brooklyn, Anthony Weiner, will concede the primary election to Fernando Ferrer at noon. That disappointed sigh is not from the Weiner campaign but from Mayor Bloomberg's campaign workers who wanted Weiner and Ferrer to battle it out for the next few days. This, though, is a nice sign of unity for the city's Democratic Party.......

It's getting hot in the city's Democratic Party. The NY Times reports that City Council Speaker Gifford Miller's election team has a memo outlining ways to attack other possible Democratic mayoral hopefuls. In a nutshell, former Bronx Borough Prez Fernando Ferrer hasn't been doing anything for NYC lately and Congressman Anthony Weiner is ineffectual and has a weak record. When asked by the Times if he would attack Miller, Weiner said, "I come from Brooklyn......

Erica Payne, Political Strategist...

New York's Brooklyn-born Senior Senator, Chuck Schumer, has decided he will not be running for Governor in 2006 when George Pataki leaves office. He will instead put his efforts into the Democratic Party's effort to win back the Senate from the Republicans. It was widely speculated during the elections earlier this month that Schumer had his eye on the Governor's mansion, something he did not confirm or deny while campaigning. This seems to open the......