Remember this my friends . . . as told by Huffington Post.  Talk about foreshadowing . . .

Democratic candidates gathered in Iowa today for their final debate before the January caucuses. The overall feeling of the debate was cordial considering the recent heightened spats between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s respective campaigns.

The atmosphere tensed up briefly when Obama was asked what new foreign policies he could offer with a staff of so many ex-Clinton advisers.

Read the exchange from AP:

Hillary Clinton laughed out loud, and said with a smile on her face, “I’m looking forward to hearing that.”

Obama, also smiling, waited for the laughter to die down before saying, “Hillary, I’m looking forward to you advising me as well.

Watch it . . . love it.

Like, you even have to find and count all the votes when you lose them. Or I guess, that’s just too hard.

A brilliant analysis by Timothy Egan. In short, it notes the hell smart people, especially writers, go through when somebody as incoherent as Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber rise to stardom.

One of the best takeaways:

Here’s Palin’s response, after Matt Lauer asked her when she knew the election was lost:

“I had great faith that, you know, perhaps when that voter entered that voting booth and closed that curtain that what would kick in for them was, perhaps, a bold step that would have to be taken in casting a vote for us, but having to put a lot of faith in that commitment we tried to articulate that we were the true change agent that would progress this nation.”

I have no idea what she said in that thicket of words.

Neither did I, and now I know that I am not alone.

Second best takeaway:

Joe, a k a Samuel J. Wurzelbacher, was no good as a citizen, having failed to pay his full share of taxes, no good as a plumber, not being fully credentialed, and not even any good as a faux American icon. Who could forget poor John McCain at his most befuddled, calling out for his working-class surrogate on a day when Joe stiffed him.

Readers know my feelings about Joe the Plumber. Egan sums it up artfully, to say the least.

Prediction here.

Senator John Ensign of Nevada, in his final days as chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said Republicans intend to spend $3 million or more in Georgia, where they have dispatched hordes of staffers, party officials and volunteers. More than 100 lawyers are assisting the party in watching the crucial recount in Minnesota. (link)

One hundred lawyers, that’s like an entire small law firm. Jesus Christ!

Andrew Sullivan and Glenn Loury agree with my commentary on Obama’s fighting style.

The rise of Obama into the White House is an amazing image to behold. A black man is now going to be President. It has an emotional effect on so many people of color, particularly black people.

And yet, it is worth thinking about whether America’s acceptance of blackness is really as complete as the election of Barack Obama suggests.

Part of Obama’s success and rise is rooted in the fact that he is not “really black,” but biracial. By biracial I mean that his parents were not both black.

Throughout the campaign you would often see images of his white mother and white grandparents. There were not really that many photos put forward by the campaign of his African father and relatives. In fairness to Obama, the white side of his family is the one that stayed around to raise him, but my point is still worth considering.

The real question is whether or not a black man or woman could become President without half of their family being white.

I feel that when white people look at biracial people, they say to themselves, well they’re half like me. Another cruder way of seeing it is “I was always potentially a wild night out on the town by my Mom from being born biracial myself.”

I guess my point, and call me pessimistic, is that a black person without white people as a major part of their family background, could not have won the Presidency in 2008.

Hopefully, I’m wrong though.

In any event, we’ve still come a long way with the Obamas.

For me, the most amazing transformational part of the Obamas in the White House, is Michelle Obama, as I’ll discuss in a future post.

The Onion

And as an avid Obama supporter I now also must hate Nate Walsh . . . wherever he is.

COLUMBIA, SC—In a nationally televised speech Friday, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama altered his vision of a unified America to exclude Dayton, OH loser Nate Walsh.

According to Obama, the 32-year-old Walsh, who has lived with his parents intermittently since receiving his associate’s degree in 2001 and still does not have a credit card in his own name, no longer figures into the senator’s long-term plan of rallying Americans from all walks of life around a common, higher purpose.

“People of South Carolina, people of the world, this is our time, this is our moment,” Obama said before 72,000 supporters at the University of South Carolina’s Williams-Brice Stadium. “That is, unless you live in apartment 3L at 1254 Holden St., you watched Money Train on TBS last night at 3 a.m., and your name is Nate Walsh.” (the Onion)

I should read the onion more it seems, that’s pretty good.

This seems like a response to viral video that went around saying you cost Obama the election.