Diary of a Content Black Woman

EAST CLEVELAND, Ohio (AP) — A Cleveland Clinic official says Democratic U.S. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones of Ohio has died.

Clinic spokeswoman Eileen Sheil says Tubbs Jones died at 6:12 p.m. Wednesday after suffering a brain hemorrhage caused by an aneurysm that burst and left her with limited brain function.

The 58-year-old Tubbs Jones was the first black woman to represent Ohio in Congress and a strong critic of the Iraq war. She suffered the hemorrhage while driving her car in her east side district Tuesday evening.

Tubbs Jones, a Democrat who has represented Ohio’s 11th District since 1999 and was chairwoman of the House’s ethics committee, suffered the aneurysm Tuesday night while driving near her hometown of Cleveland.

Tubbs Jones was scheduled to attend the Democratic National Convention next week as a superdelegate.

“Tuesday’s condition followed a full day of activity, including planning for an upcoming forum on electoral reform, scheduled for September 4, 2008 at Cleveland State University,” according to a statement released earlier Wednesday from her office. She was admitted to Huron Hospital.

Tubbs Jones was among the five black members who claimed committee chairmanships when the Democrats ascended to the majority in 2007.

The ethics chairmanship might be filled by Gene Green of Texas, the second-ranking Democrat on the panel.

A longtime ally of Speaker Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., and a robust fundraiser for the party, Tubbs Jones was tapped for the ethics chairmanship instead of Alan B. Mollohan of West Virginia, who was the senior Democrat on the panel but had come under fire for questionable personal financial dealings.

Tubbs Jones also was a member of the powerful Ways and Means Committee, which writes tax, trade and health care policy. She got the seat in 2003 by publicly protesting that the panel had no African-American woman.

It was unclear who might be given Tubbs Jones’ seat on Ways and Means.

She was expected to win re-election easily in November over Republican Thomas Pekarek.

The leadership aide said no plans have been made yet for memorial services.

This story comes courtesy of CQPolitics.com and the Associated Press.

BREAKING NEWS :

U.S. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-Ohio) dies after being hospitalized for an aneurysms suffered.

EAST CLEVELAND, Ohio (AP) — U.S. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones was in a hospital Wednesday.

Tubbs Jones, 59, was taken to the Cleveland Clinic's Huron Hospital in East Cleveland late Tuesday, said hospital spokeswoman Joyce Persuad.

Cleveland television stations reported Wednesday that the congresswoman was taken to the hospital after police found her in a car along a road in Cleveland Heights. Police Chief Martin Lentz did not immediately return a message seeking comment Wednesday.

Nicole Williams, Tubbs Jones' press secretary in Washington, declined to comment on the congresswoman's condition.

Tubbs Jones was first elected in 1998, becoming the first black woman to represent Ohio in Congress.

She is set to be a superdelegate at next week's Democratic National Convention in Denver. Williams would not comment on whether the congresswoman's hospitalization would interfere with that plan.

She was one of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's biggest boosters during the primaries, then threw her support to Sen. Barack Obama in June.

Judge Rules Detroit Mayor Didn't Violate Bond

DETROIT (AP) — Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick's third trip to court in a week turned into a victory Tuesday when a judge threw out prosecutors' claim that a visit with his sister violated the terms of his bail in an assault case.

Judge Ronald Giles agreed with the mayor's attorneys that a no-contact order didn't include Ayanna Kilpatrick, who is listed as a witness in the assault case.

"I don't see the issue," the judge said. "I really don't. There isn't an issue."

After the hearing, defense attorney Dan Webb denounced the prosecution claim as "truly ridiculous" and a product of "hysteria."

"You've got prosecutors and media overreacting to everything this man does," Webb said.

Last week, Giles had sent the mayor to jail overnight in a separate perjury case after learning he had traveled to Windsor, Ontario, in July without notifying authorities, a condition of his release on bail.

Kilpatrick was released Friday.

That same day, the mayor was charged with assaulting two investigators who were trying to deliver a subpoena at his sister's house in July in the perjury case.

The state attorney general's office said in a court filing that the mayor had been ordered to have no contact with witnesses in the assault case.

Prosecutors said Kilpatrick violated that condition because he and Ayanna Kilpatrick were together Saturday at the home of their mother, U.S. Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, D-Mich.

For more of the story visit the Associated Press.

DETROIT (AP) — Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was jailed Thursday for a bond violation in his perjury case, his pleas for leniency rejected by a judge who made it clear the mayor would get no special treatment.

Kilpatrick, charged with perjury and other felonies over his testimony in a civil trial, apologized and acknowledged that he made a mistake when he visited Windsor, Ontario, minutes away from Detroit, for city business last month. But District Judge Ronald Giles was not moved, saying he needed to treat the mayor like any other defendant.

"What matters to me ... is how the court overall is perceived and how if it was not Kwame Kilpatrick sitting in that seat, if it was John Six-Pack sitting in that seat, what would I do? And that answer is simple," Giles said.

For more visit the Associated Press.

LOGAN, W.Va. (AP) — Another defendant has pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the suspected torture of a young woman held captive in West Virginia last summer.

Bobby Brewster, 25, pleaded guilty in Logan County Circuit Court on Tuesday to second-degree sexual assault, malicious assault and conspiracy to commit kidnapping or holding hostage. He was sentenced to at least 13 and as many as 40 years in prison, said Logan County Assistant Prosecutor Robert Ilderton.

In exchange for the plea, charges of kidnapping and assault during the commission of a felony were dismissed, Ilderton said.

Brewster was arrested in September along with five others. A seventh person was charged later.

Authorities say Charleston resident Megan Williams was held for days in a trailer where she was forced to eat animal feces, sexually assaulted and stabbed. She was rescued Sept. 8 after an anonymous caller alerted authorities.

All the other defendants have pleaded guilty to various charges except Danny Combs, whose trial is scheduled to begin in early September. Brewster agreed to testify against Combs as part of this week's plea agreement, which was offered only after consulting with Williams and her family, Ilderton said.

For the remainder of this story, visit the Associated Press.

By JILL ZEMAN

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — It's a happy Mother's Day for an Arkansas woman — she's pregnant with her 18th child.

Michelle Duggar, 41, is due on New Year's Day, and the latest addition will join seven sisters and 10 brothers. There are two sets of twins.

"We've had three in January, three in December. Those two months are a busy time for us," she said, laughing.

The Duggars' oldest child, Josh, is 20, and the youngest, Jennifer, is nine months old.

The fast-growing family lives in Tontitown in northwest Arkansas in a 7,000-square-foot home. All the children — whose names start with the letter J — are home-schooled.

Duggar has been been pregnant for more than 11 years of her life, and the family is in the process of filming another series for Discovery Health.

The new show looks at life inside the Duggar home, where chores — or "jurisdictions" — are assigned to each child. One episode of the new show involves a "jurisdiction swap," where the boys do chores traditionally assigned to the girls, and vice versa, Duggar said.

"The girls swapped jurisdictions, changing tires, working in the garages, mowing the grass," she said. "The boys got to cook supper from start to finish, clean the bathrooms," among other chores.

Duggar said she's six weeks along and the pregnancy is going well. She and her husband, Jim Bob Duggar, said they'll keep having children as long as God wills it.

"The success in a family is first off, a love for God, and secondly, treating each other like you want to be treated," Jim Bob Duggar said. "Our goal is for each one of our children to be best friends, and everybody working together to serve each other makes that happen."

Story comes courtesy of the Associated Press.

By TOM HAYS and DAVID B. CARUSO

NEW YORK (AP) — The Rev. Al Sharpton was arrested at the Brooklyn Bridge on Wednesday as he and hundreds of demonstrators blocked traffic to protest the acquittal of three detectives in the 50-bullet shooting of an unarmed black man on his wedding day.

Sharpton, two survivors of the shooting and the slain man's fiancee were among about a dozen people arrested on disorderly conduct charges near the base of the bridge. Police led away demonstrators at several other bridges and tunnels in the city.

The protests were part of a coordinated campaign to urge federal authorities to investigate the November 2006 shooting of Sean Bell. Three officers were acquitted of state charges last month.

Sharpton, shooting survivors Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman, and Bell's fiancee, Nicole Paultre Bell, lined up and peacefully put their hands behind their backs as police put plastic handcuffs on them. Sharpton and Bell were placed in a police vehicle.

The civil rights leader is seeking a federal civil rights probe into Bell's shooting outside a Queens nightclub. The case raised questions about police use of deadly force in minority neighborhoods.

Sharpton had promised recently to "close this city down" with civil disobedience.

Bell was black, as are his friends Benefield and Guzman; the three officers acquitted in the case are Hispanic, black and white.

U.S. attorney spokesman Robert Nardoza said the case was under review, but he declined to comment further.

This story comes courtesy of the Associated Press in which reporters Bonnie Ghosh and Ted Shaffrey contributed to this report.

By STEPHEN OHLEMACHER

WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Barack Obama climbed within 200 delegates of clinching the Democratic presidential nomination based on a split decision in Tuesday's primaries.

Obama won most of the delegates at stake in the two contests, picking up at least 97 delegates in the North Carolina and Indiana primaries, according to an analysis of election returns by The Associated Press. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton won at least 86 delegates, with four still to be awarded.

Each state had two delegates outstanding. Results were delayed because both states have counties split into multiple congressional districts, and election workers were still assigning those votes to the proper districts on Wednesday.

Like other Democratic contests, North Carolina and Indiana awarded delegates proportionally, based on statewide results as well as votes in individual congressional districts.

In the overall race for the nomination, Obama led with 1,846.5 delegates, including separately chosen party and elected officials known as superdelegates. Clinton had 1,696.

That leaves Obama just 178.5 delegates shy of the 2,025 needed to secure the Democratic nomination.

There are 217 delegates at stake in the final six contests: West Virginia, Kentucky, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Montana and South Dakota. Obama, however, won't win enough of those delegates to claim the nomination because of the proportional method used by the Democrats to award them.

That leaves the nomination in the hands of about 265 superdelegates who have yet to be claimed. Superdelegates are the party and elected officials who will automatically attend the national convention and can support whomever they choose, regardless of what happens in the primaries and caucuses.

For the remainder of this story, visit the Associated Press.

By ERRIN HAINES

ATLANTA (AP) — The estranged husband of evangelist Juanita Bynum says in a new book that she has tried to use a highly publicized physical altercation to revive her own flagging ministry.

The self-published book by minister Thomas Weeks III includes chapters with titles such as "I Would Rather Push You Now Than Punch You Later" and "She Wanted to Be Oprah at Any Cost" and says it was Weeks who suffered physical and emotional abuse in the relationship.

In the 153-page "What Love Taught Me," Weeks says the Aug. 21 dispute was nothing more than a continuation of the "heated fellowship" the two ministers engaged in during their marriage. The scuffle between the two in a hotel parking lot landed Weeks in jail on charges he pushed, choked and beat Bynum, and he ultimately pleaded guilty to assaulting her. He is serving three years of probation.

Weeks claims his wife instigated the parking lot incident and used it to paint herself as a poster girl for domestic violence and to boost her ministry.

"Ultimately, she had to have a plot and a plan to destroy my credibility, to leak issues that were in the process of being resolved ... so that she could get out of the marriage almost blameless," he wrote.

Weeks said he wrote the book in the days after his arrest. Within days, Bynum announced her intentions to become "the new face of domestic violence" and last week, she appeared in a two-part episode of "Divorce Court" offering advice to a couple dealing with alleged abuse in their marriage — moves Weeks said were indicative of her desire for more secular fame.

"She needed a way out of the marriage so that she could keep her following, possibly grow her following ... develop a cause that can support her without preaching and promote her secular career, while ending her marriage," Weeks wrote. "Juanita was tired of preaching. She was tired of the conference circuit. She was more bored."

For the remainder of this story, visit the Associated Press.

DETROIT (AP) - Text messages from the pager of his former top aide appear to show the evolution of flirty and sexually explicit exchanges involving Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick to professions of love and eventually promises of marriage.

But for the married mayor and the now-divorced Christine Beatty, the outcome of their secret relationship referred to in the excerpts has been embarrassment, felony charges and possible prison time for both.

Beatty, the mayor's former chief of staff, also has been out of a job for more than two months after she resigned following the publication in January of some text message excerpts.

In an 18-page document released Tuesday, many of the messages - which all were sent from or received on Beatty's pager - refer to being in love.

According to a Sept. 23, 2002 text message from Beatty to the mayor, she wrote: "I love you so much man! Thank you for showing what it's like to be head over heels in love."

The document was ordered released Tuesday morning by Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Robert J. Colombo Jr. It was recovered from the computer of Michael Stefani, an attorney who represented three police officers in whistle-blowers' lawsuits that were settled last year for $8.4 million.

The document also reveals discussions about a potential reorganization of the police department's internal affairs unit without the knowledge of then-Police Chief Jerry Oliver.

Several top police officials, including current Police Chief Ella Bully-Cummings, who was an assistant chief at the time, were aware of the plot that involved the firing of internal affairs chief Gary Brown, according to the excerpts released over the objections of attorneys representing Kilpatrick, Beatty and the city.

Brown was one of the three officers who filed the whistle-blowers' suits against Kilpatrick and the city.

A prosecutor's report issued last month said Kilpatrick and Beatty attempted to keep Brown's firing a secret.

In his motion, Stefani said the text messages between Kilpatrick and Beatty "clearly demonstrates that Brown was fired."

For the remainder of this story please visit, WXYZ News. You have to see these text messages to believe it. It is so embarrassing. Here is an example of one exchange:

APRIL 27, 2003

Beatty to Mayor“No response needed to this, but when held me in your arms and looked me in my eyes and said I was your woman. All was right with the world. I love you.”

Mayor to Beatty“Damn! Thank you.”

Beatty to Mayor“Can you promise me that I will always be that?”

Mayor to Beatty
“You were my girl for as long as I can remember. I was too you and stupid to know. I promise for the rest of my life you will be my girl.”

DETROIT (AP) - Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who is facing charges stemming from a text-messaging sex scandal, says he is "being punished by my God."

The Detroit News reports Kilpatrick addressed a mostly male crowd of several hundred people on Saturday at Fellowship Chapel Church in Detroit.

Kilpatrick told the crowd: "I'm not being whupped by the devil, I am being punished by my God. I know that my disobedience put me in the situation I am in."

His address was part of a Detroit Manpower Movement event aimed at getting more black men involved in mentoring programs, neighborhood patrols and other volunteer efforts.

The mayor and his former chief of staff face perjury and other charges stemming from their testimony during a whistle-blowers' trial last summer.

But for the grace of God, there go I. No one - NO ONE - is perfect. He indeed may be being punished by God, however, the "punishment" he so claims to be enduring by God, is probably more of an issue of cause and effect. In addition to the "punishment" being endured by both he, Beatty and their respective family and friends, he doesn't seem to have as much as of a problem in making the City of Detroit suffer more than they have to.

Kilpatrick needs to resign.

This is not an issue of judging for the actions of he and Beatty. This is an issue of their actions that led to a $9 million pay out by the City of Detroit due to their lying during the trial that led to the judgment which is further hindering a city that cannot afford being hindered any longer.

Kilpatrick, if you want to start with making a mends and being redeemed, be humble and contrite and make your resignation effective immediately.

In the end, the citizens of Detroit could always have a re-call election. If California can get rid of a governor, Detroit can certainly get rid of a mayor.

Information comes courtesy of: The Detroit News, http://www.detnews.com and the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Barack Obama, second to none in the race for campaign cash, raised more than $40 million in March and boosted his vast network of donors to nearly 1.3 million, the campaign announced Thursday.

The amount is less than the record $55 million he raised in February, but still a sizable amount that sustains his place as the fundraising leader among all presidential candidates. The money gives him a substantial financial advantage over Democratic rival Hillary Rodham Clinton as they compete for votes heading into the April 22 Pennsylvania primary.

Clinton is expected to have raised about $20 million in March, but her campaign has not announced any totals. Details of their March fundraising will be made public in official reports filed with the Federal Election Commission April 20.

The Obama campaign said it attracted more than 218,000 first-time donors in March.

"Many of our contributors are volunteering for the campaign, making our campaign the largest grass-roots army in recent political history," campaign manager David Plouffe said.

Obama has been the candidate most successful at blending high dollar donors with small contributions by deft use of the Internet. He has had the highest number of donors contributing $200 or less.

"We knew that he was going to outraise us," Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson said. "He has outraised us over the last several months."

Wolfson said the campaign will have the resources they need to compete and be successful in the upcoming primaries. He pointed to Clinton's base of support from online fundraising, saying she had raised about $1 million online on March 31.

Obama's announcement comes as both Democrats return to a popular financial wellhead, raising money in California to help finance a heavy stretch of spending in April. With their race for the Democratic nomination showing no signs of ending, tapping donors for more cash has new urgency.

Obama has scheduled fundraisers at the homes of four different financial backers Sunday afternoon and evening in northern California. Clinton attended one fundraiser Wednesday in Silicon Valley, and had three planned for Thursday — in San Francisco, Pasadena and Los Angeles.

Most of the events are for donors giving the $2,300 maximum allowed by law.

Obama raised a record $55 million in February; Clinton raised $34.5 million.

Clinton entered March with $11.5 million to spend in the primary compared to $30.5 million for Obama. Moreover, Clinton owed $8.7 million to several campaign vendors at the end of February. A spot check by The Associated Press of several vendors found many were paid last month, after the March 4 primaries in Ohio and Texas. The cost of those two contests, together with efforts to reduce campaign debt, have kept fundraising a priority for her campaign.

For the remainder of this story, visit the Associated Press.

Is this merely another argument for why prayer should be put back in schools?

By RUSS BYNUM

WAYCROSS, Ga. (AP) — A group of children ages 8 to 10 apparently were mad at their teacher because she had scolded one of them for standing on a chair, authorities say.

That led the third-graders, as many as nine boys and girls, to plot an attack on the teacher at Center Elementary School in south Georgia.

Police Chief Tony Tanner said the students apparently planned to knock the teacher unconscious with a glass paperweight, bind her with handcuffs and duct tape and then stab her with a broken steak knife.

The scheme involved a division of roles, Tanner said. One child's job was to cover windows so no one could see outside, and another was supposed to clean up after the attack.

"We're not sure at this point in the investigation how many of the students actually knew the intent was to hurt the teacher," Tanner said.

School officials had alerted police Friday after a pupil tipped off a teacher that a girl had taken a weapon to school.

Tanner said the teacher told detectives the children weren't known as troublemakers.

"You can't dismiss it," Tanner said. "But because they are kids, they may have thought this was like a cartoon — we do whatever and then she stands up and she's OK. That's a hard call."

The purported target teaches third-grade students with learning disabilities, including attention deficit disorder, delayed development and hyperactivity, friends and parents said.

For the remainder of this story visit the Associated Press.

NEW YORK (AP) — Yahoo Inc. on Monday launched a site for women between ages 25 and 54, calling it a key demographic underserved by current Yahoo properties.

The site, Shine, is aimed largely at giving the struggling Internet company additional opportunities to sell advertising targeted to the key decision-maker in many households. Yahoo said advertisers in consumer-packaged goods, retail and pharmaceuticals have requested more ways to reach those consumers.

Amy Iorio, vice president for Yahoo Lifestyles, said internal research also shows women are looking for a site to combine various content and communications tools.

"These women were sort of caretakers for everybody in their lives," she said. "They didn't feel like there was a place that was looking at the whole them — as a parent, as a spouse, as a daughter. They were looking for one place that gave them everything."

Yahoo is entering a market already served by Glam Media Inc. and iVillage, a unit of General Electric Co.'s NBC Universal. It is Yahoo's first site aimed at a single demographic, although other Yahoo sites like Finance and Sports already draw specific audiences.

This story comes courtesy of the Associated Press.

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — Politically, for Senator Barack Obama, it is a Good Friday indeed. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation's only Hispanic governor, is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president, calling him a "once-in-a-lifetime leader" who can unite the nation and restore America's international leadership.

Richardson, who dropped out of the Democratic race in January, is to appear with Obama on Friday at a campaign event in Portland, Ore., The Associated Press has learned.

The governor's endorsement comes as Obama leads among delegates selected at primaries and caucuses but with national public opinion polling showing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton pulling ahead of him amid controversy over statements by his former pastor.

Richardson has been relentlessly wooed by Obama and Clinton for his endorsement. As a Democratic superdelegate, the governor plays a part in the tight race for nominating votes and could bring other superdelegates to Obama's side. He also has been mentioned as a potential running mate for either candidate.

No primaries are scheduled until Pennsylvania's on April 22, a gap in time Obama hopes to use for such announcements to assert that he is the front-runner for the nomination.

"I believe he is the kind of once-in-a-lifetime leader that can bring our nation together and restore America's moral leadership in the world," Richardson said in a statement obtained by the AP. "As a presidential candidate, I know full well Sen. Obama's unique moral ability to inspire the American people to confront our urgent challenges at home and abroad in a spirit of bipartisanship and reconciliation."

Story comes courtesy of the Associated Press.

By JENNIFER LOVEN
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Five years after launching the invasion of Iraq, President Bush strongly signaled Wednesday that he won't order troop withdrawals beyond those already planned because he refuses to "jeopardize the hard-fought gains" of the past year.

As anti-war activists demonstrated around downtown Washington, the president spoke at the Pentagon to mark the anniversary of a war that has cost nearly 4,000 U.S. lives and roughly $500 billion. The president's address was part of a series of events the White House planned around the anniversary and next month's report from the top U.S. figures in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker. That report will be the basis for Bush's first troop-level decision in seven months.

"The battle in Iraq has been longer and harder and more costly than we anticipated," Bush said.

But, he added, before an audience of Pentagon brass, soldiers and diplomats: "The battle in Iraq is noble, it is necessary, and it is just. And with your courage, the battle in Iraq will end in victory."

For the remainder of this story, visit the Washington Post.

By CHARLES BABINGTON

CHICAGO (AP) — Democrat Barack Obama expressed frustration Wednesday that racial issues keep rising to the top of his presidential battle with Hillary Rodham Clinton, but he said the great majority of voters will base their decisions on substantive issues.

At a news conference in Chicago, Obama said he feels his primary victories in an array of states have proven he can draw support from all races and regions, and that he is not overly reliant on black support.

"We keep on thinking we've dispelled this," he said. "And it keeps on getting raised once again."

He said critics suggest "maybe he hasn't proven that he can win white blue-collar workers."

"And we won that in Virginia, and we won it in Wisconsin," he said.

In each new primary, he said, "we seem to have to prove this stuff all over." Given his wins, he said, "at this point, we should have put to rest this notion that somehow I am a candidate that's just focused on one demographic."

In handily winning the Mississippi primary on Tuesday, Obama took about 90 percent of the black vote and 30 percent of the white vote, according to exit polls. Similar results in other Deep South states have raised questions of whether Obama's strong black support is nudging some white Democrats into Clinton's column.

There was some evidence of that in exit polls in Ohio, which Clinton won. Analysts say a similar pattern could emerge in Pennsylvania, the next primary, on April 22.

Obama said he did not think the Clinton campaign was deliberately stirring racial divisions. He said, however, "I do think that the Clinton campaign has talked more during the course of the last few months about what groups are supporting her and what groups are supporting me, and trying to make the case that the reason she should be the nominee is there are a set of voters that Obama might not get. That seems to track certain racial demographics. And I disagree with that."

Obama said some voters might favor or disfavor him because he is black, just as some might favor or disfavor Clinton because she is female.

However, he said, "the overwhelming majority of Americans are going to make these decisions based on who they think will be the best president. I have absolute confidence that if I'm doing my job, if I'm delivering my message, then there are very few voters out there that I can't win."

"If I'm not winning them over," he said, "then it's my fault."

The Illinois senator opened the event flanked by nine retired military officers who said he is fully capable of being commander in chief, a response to Clinton's suggestions that he is unready and untested.

Retired Air Force Gen. Tony McPeak praised Obama for opposing a "dumb war" in Iraq. He said Obama has the steady temperament a leader needs, and called him "No-Shock Barack, No-Drama Obama."

At the 45-minute session with reporters at the Chicago Museum of History, Obama couched his criticisms of Clinton in fairly gentle terms.

He gently mocked her suggestion that he cannot win large states that will be key battlegrounds in November. He noted he won the Democratic primaries in Wisconsin, Missouri, Colorado, Iowa and Virginia, all of which should be fiercely contested this fall against Republican John McCain.

As for Clinton's victories in California and New York, Obama said, any Democratic nominee, including himself, should win those states handily.

This story comes courtesy of the Associated Press.

NEW YORK (AP) — Gov. Eliot Spitzer has told senior advisers that he had been involved in a prostitution ring, The New York Times reported Monday, citing an anonymous top administration official.

Spitzer, who is married with three daughters, was scheduled to make an announcement Monday afternoon. Spitzer officials wouldn't immediately comment on the story.

The Times reported that a person with knowledge of the governor's role believes the governor is identified as a client in court papers. Four people allegedly connected to a high-end prostitution ring called Emperors Club VIP were arrested last week.

The Web site of the Emperors Club VIP displays photographs of scantily clad women with their faces hidden, along with hourly rates depending on whether the prostitutes were rated with one diamond, the lowest ranking, or seven diamonds, the highest. The most highly ranked prostitutes cost $5,500 an hour, prosecutors said.

Spitzer, 48, built his political legacy on rooting out corruption, including several headline-making battles with Wall Street while serving as attorney general. He stormed into the governor's office in 2006 with a historic share of the vote, vowing to continue his no-nonsense approach to fixing one of the nation's worst governments.

Time magazine had named him "Crusader of the Year" when he was attorney general and the tabloids proclaimed him "Eliot Ness."

But his stint as governor has been marred by several problems, including an unpopular plan to grant driver's licenses to illegal immigrants and a plot by his aides to smear Spitzer's main Republican nemesis.

Spitzer had been expected to testify to the state Public Integrity Commission he had created to answer for his role in the scandal, in which his aides were accused of misusing state police to compile travel records to embarrass Senate Republican leader Joseph Bruno.

Spitzer had served two terms as attorney general where he pursued criminal and civil cases and cracked down on misconduct and conflicts of interests on Wall Street and in corporate America. He had previously been a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office, handling organized crime and white-collar crime cases.

His cases as state attorney general included a few criminal prosecutions of prostitution rings and into tourism involving prostitutes.

In 2004, he was part of an investigation of an escort service in New York City that resulted in the arrest of 18 people on charges of promoting prostitution and related charges.

Associated Press Writer Mike Gormley contributed to this report from Albany, N.Y.

I keep reminding myself that this part of the campaign represents the rough and tumble portion of politics. It's no cake walk.

During a speech yesterday, Michelle Obama shared that this was the first time she felt "really proud" of her country. Please see the video for context.


Now the media, by way of the struggling campaigns of Senator John McCain and Senator Hillary Clinton, want to go after the Obamas on petty B.S. because they can't get their message to resonate with the voters.

I take no offense in what Michelle Obama said and neither should America.

If you are white, would you have liked to have been born as an African American female in middle America in 1963?

Some of the blogs and website commenters behave like America doesn't have a racist past just because for the first time a Black man has a chance to become president.

Grow up!

When it comes to race relations and fairness concerning Black people, America has a credibility problem. Like Michelle, I too am extremely proud of this country. I began to speak of my pride right after Senator Barack Obama won the Iowa Causes as well as the last 8 contests.

America is demonstrating that the racist undertones that once permeated our society are proving to all but have dissipated completely. This is exciting and makes me proud because I wasn't sure if America had arrived at this point.

Of course I want Obama to win on the issues and his merit. But let's face it, if you are a Black American and were born in 1963 or before and sometime after, you have seen and experienced the unfairness brought on by racist attitudes one way or another.

So, to be proud that America has evolved with an attitude of openness and fairness is not an insult; it's a compliment!

UPDATE - Michelle Obama Clarifies 'proud' Remark

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The wife of Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama sought Wednesday to clarify her comment that for the first time she's really proud of her country.

On Monday, Michelle Obama told an audience in Milwaukee that "For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country. Not just because Barack is doing well, but I think people are hungry for change." Cindy McCain, wife of Republican presidential contender John McCain, later sought to capitalize on the remark, saying "I have, and always will be, proud of my country."

Asked by WJAR-TV if she would like to clarify her comment, Obama replied that she has been struck by the number of people going to rallies and watching debates, as well as record voter turnouts.

"What I was clearly talking about was that I'm proud in how Americans are engaging in the political process," she said.

"For the first time in my lifetime, I'm seeing people rolling up their sleeves in a way that I haven't seen and really trying to figure this out — and that's the source of pride that I was talking about," she added.

When asked if she had always been proud of her country, she replied "absolutely" and said she and her husband would not be where they are now if not for the opportunities of America.

For the remainder of this clarification, please visit the Associated Press.

America, don't fall for the "swift boat attacks."

Let's stay focused on getting the best leader for our country. For if this is all they have got and feel this is all they can resort too, then you know Obama is just steps from the White House.

Obama '08!

NILES, Ohio (AP) — Sen. Barack Obama said Monday that he doesn't think it's a big deal that he borrowed lines from his friend Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, although he probably should have given him credit.

Patrick said during his gubernatorial campaign a year and a half ago that words matter, like "I have a dream" and "all men are created equal."

Obama used the same lines Saturday night in Wisconsin. Obama said that Patrick suggested he use the lines to respond to Hillary Rodham Clinton's suggestion that Obama is more of a talker than a doer.

Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson accused Obama of plagiarizing Patrick, and that's particularly troubling since Obama's appeal is based in large part on his rhetorical skills.

"It raises questions about the premise of his candidacy," Wolfson told reporters in a conference call. (Give me a break!)

Obama, D-Ill., says that's going too far.

"Now hold on a second. Let's see — I've written two books, wrote most of my speeches," Obama told reporters at a news conference after touring a titanium plant.

"I'm happy to give Deval credit, as I give credit to a lot people for spurring all kinds of ideas," he said. "But I think that it is fair to say that everything that we've been doing in generating excitement and the interest that people have in the election is based on the core belief in me that we need change in America."

Asked whether he wished he would have given him credit given the criticism he's facing, Obama responded: "I was on the stump, and he had suggested that we use these lines. I thought they were good lines. I'm sure I should have — didn't this time."

"I really don't think this is too big of a deal," he said. He said he's noticed Clinton using his phrases sometimes, like "it's time to turn the page" and "fired up, ready to go."

ABC News' Senior National Correspondent, Jake Tapper, recently posted this on his blog.

"In a conference call just now the Clinton campaign would not guarantee that Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, has never used someone else's rhetoric without crediting them.

"I asked Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson and Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass, if they could assure the public that neither Clinton nor McGovern has ever done what Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, did when he used the rhetoric of Gov. Deval Patrick without footnoting him.

"They would not.

"In fact, Wolfson seemed to say it wouldn't be as big a deal if it were discovered that Clinton had 'lifted' such language.

'Sen. Clinton is not running on the strength of her rhetoric,' Wolfson said."

The old me would have really gotten angry by this, but I understand that this is the game of politics. Those for Clinton want to continue to emphasize the Obama is short on solutions when in actuality it is their rhetoric that fails to acknowledge that Obama has great detailed solutions on a host of positions on his web site. He has also been quite detailed in his speeches.

Then there are surrogats on the Clinton campaign who insist on whinning about how the press is giving Obama a pass. Grow up and campaign and be the best you.

Resorting to pettiness is nothing more than a sign of a desperate campaign. If Clinton was able to effectively communicate the spirit and substance of her message, this type of whinning would not be necessary.

If it is o.k. with Governor Deval Patrick, it sure is alright with me.

Alright, Clinton. What's next? We know your arsenol is full.

A portion of this story is courtesy of the Associated Press.