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The presidential campaign guilt by association hunting season is now open and it's time for Hillary Clinton to step up to the plate and close the mad pastor gap. Barack Obama's favorite crazy uncle, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., senior pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago (the Obama family church), is back in the news as tapes of some of his tough-minded (i.e., black seperatist railing against "rich white people") sermons make the rounds. Last year and now, the Obama folks have said that Obama disavows some of what Wright has said but that's clearly not enough -- he will have to denounce, reject and eject Wright from his existence. (UPDATE: Obama responsed with this in Huffington Post.)

John McCain has not one but two mad pastors tugging at his elbow -- Rev. John Hagee who doesn't think much of Catholicism ("the great whore") and dreams of a war with Iran while Rev. Rod Parsley in Ohio believes America was founded to destroy Islam. McCain has said he disagrees with their more extreme positions.

As far as we know, and on the basis of what we don't know, we have to assume that Clinton doesn't have a mad pastor in her closet.

Calculating Flip Flop
Hillary may be busy catching her breath after spinning herself into the ground over her latest rationale about why the Michigan delegates should be counted for her -- in a fake primary in which she was the only one on the ballot in January. She told NPR yesterday that it was fair because in reality, she claims, Obama was running, disguised as a rogue candidate called "uncommitted" that she was proud to beat. Funny, in October she told New Hampshire Public Radio that Michigan didn't count- its votes nor its delegates because the Democratic Party had stripped the state of its delegates for breaking rules by moving the primary up to Jan. 15. She said then it was no big deal that she was still on the ballot while Obama, John Edwards and others pulled their name off the ballot. Befiting a veteran politician, Clinton of course sees no hypocritical contradiction between then and now. But then she was the inevitable front runner. Today, not so much as she's looking for delegates everywhere -- even those that don't exist (at least yet).

Pennsylvania Fix
In my daily link, here's the latest collection of moves and counter moves in the SuperNova primary.