I know it's a bit early and I hope that it's not inappropriate to ask this right now. I can't imagine what you are feeling. But I was curious about a few things and wanted to ask a few questions from you and get your feedback.

1.) Do you already have a second choice in mind with Edwards dropping out of the race?

2.) Would Edwards' endorsement of one of the remaining candidates influence your decision in any way?

3.) If Senator Edwards remains on the ballot, will you still vote for him despite him dropping out of the race today?

The Time's Mark Halperin is reporting the following on the Page blog:

A Liberal Lion(ess) of Her Own Defying the Nattering Nabobs of Negativism, Clinton scores the endorsement of symbolically and substantively potent superdelegate/California Representative Maxine Waters. http://thepage.time.com/2008/01/29/a-liberal-lion-of-her-own/

Before the Waters' announcement, I speculated that today's major endorsement would be Al Gore and provided my reasoning:

1.) Gore is the last major get right?
2.) Isn't Gore based on the West Coast? Current TV and his other projects?
3.) I know a lot of bloggers were surprised about how far reaching Clinton's environmental policies were, when she announced them. She also attended a few environmental forums that Obama didn't a few months ago. Could a Gore endorsement have been the reason why?
4.) What would the impact of Gore joining HRC in Florida asking for FL delegates to be counted in the Democratic primary? Can you imagine the impact on an emotional level that media event would bring? Perhaps that's why HRC has made counting FL votes such a key point in the last week or so?

So who do you think HRC's major endorsement will be later on today?

Just wanted to give people, particularly Clinton supporters the heads up about future interview with Hillary today on CNN's Situation Room and Sunday on This Week with George S.

I just saw a brief excerpt of an interview that Wolf Blitzer conducted with Hillary today on CNN. The full interview will air at 4 pm EST for the Situation Room. The focus of the interview is on Bhutto's death. Hillary called on the Musharef regime to allow an international group like Interpol etc to investigate who was responsible for Bhutto's death. She didn't believe that Musharef had any credibility at all to conduct an investigation of Bhutto's death on their own. She said that the investigation needs to be led by an international taskforce, not American and that it needs credibility. Hillary proposed that the investigation should look like the UN's investigation of the death of the Lebanon leader Hahari's (sic?).

Well today was a new beginning for Senator Clinton's campaign and I hope that it will be a new beginning for ALL of Hillary Clinton's online supporters as well.

First, it appears that Senator Clinton has begun a new campaign strategy with new remarks and a new emphasis on public service.
She started her "Every County Counts" today on the Hill-acopter. As both MSNBC and the NY Times notes, she even has some new lines in the speeches that she gives to crowds.

This diary is mainly FYI for those keeping score of what's happening in the advertising wars.

Well, the Associated Press has a new story out that says that the group Democratic Courage will air a negative ad against Hillary Clinton starting this week.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071204/ap_o n_el_pr/anti_clinton_ad_4;_ylt=AqYiIxo.n cDT3NCBuQdRFNGTbuRF

[more after the jump]

This spring I had a really difficult time as an undecided voter for whom I should support. At the beginning of the year, I wanted someone with executive experience given the various challenges that the next president will face when s/he enters office in January 2009. Needless to say, I became really concerned that the top tier candidates Clinton, Obama and Edwards only had legislative, not executive experience. After all, we haven't elected a legislator to become president since JFK in 1960. But then after reading books about presidential leadership including The Presidential difference: leadership style from FDR to Clinton by Fred Greenstein, I realized that it was a very superficial viewpoint to just look at say a vice president or governor b/c they had executive experience. So I decided to expand my views to include different measures in assessing each candidate on the Democratic side. One of the issues that Greenstein evaluates in the book "The Presidential Difference" is a president's management style.
http://www.amazon.com/Presidential-Diffe rence-Leadership-Style-George/dp/0691119 090/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/105-1735949-5102033? ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193363636&a mp;sr=8-1

This evening I attended a talk with Hillary Clinton's campaign manager Patti Solis-Doyle at George Washington University. Patti spoke for about 40 minutes about her biography, her work for the campaign and where she sees the campaign headed.

She first started her speech, discussing the lessons she has learned over the years. She weaved portions of her biography with the lessons learned.

First, she said that you must keep an open mind; opportunities arise when you keep your options open. She then described how she first began working with Hillary Clinton. In the early 90s, she lived in Chicago and was a scheduler for Mayor Daley's office. Someone that she knew in Daley's office began working with the 1992 Clinton campaign and suggested that Patti come to Arkansas and work with Bill Clinton.
 

Just wanted to give a heads up about a new Foreign Affairs article, "Security and Opportunity for the Twenty-first Century" written by HRC, that was released today.

http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20071101fa essay86601-p0/hillary-rodham-clinton/sec urity-and-opportunity-for-the-twenty-fir st-century.html

I believe that all the major candidates are writing an essay for the magazine. John McCain and HRC are featured in the November/December edition.

Hillary Clinton writes a comprehensive piece that outlines her foreign policy vision, principles that she would like her administration to follow as well as how to deal with the challenges presented by certain hotspots of the world. Here's how she describes the challenges that the next president must face:

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We must face up to an unprecedented array of challenges in the twenty-first century, threats from states, nonstate actors, and nature itself. The next president will be the first to inherit two wars, a long-term campaign against global terrorist networks, and growing tension with Iran as it seeks to acquire nuclear weapons. The United States will face a resurgent Russia whose future orientation is uncertain and a rapidly growing China that must be integrated into the international system. Moreover, the next administration will have to confront an unpredictable and dangerous situation in the Middle East that threatens Israel and could potentially bring down the global economy by disrupting oil supplies. Finally, the next president will have to address the looming long-term threats of climate change and a new wave of global health epidemics.
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