The Friday Political Thread

The short version:

– Hillary Clinton stayed in front of the Democratic field and won the endorsement of Wesley Clark, the NATO commander during her husband's administration.

– The U.S. Senate finally held a vote on Iraq, pulling troops… sorry, condemning MoveOn.org for running an ad about General David Petraeus, just as America's Crazy Grandpa hoped they would. Hillary Clinton and Chris Dodd voted against it, while Barack Obama and Joe Biden found somewhere else to be. MoveOn claims they've raised about a million bucks since the controversy started.

– 10,000 people marched in Louisiana to protest the railroading of six black men who beat up a white kid.

– Rep. Jerry Weller, announcing his retirement from congress,* pushed a reporter down the stairs. Or maybe his aide did. Come on, like it matters?

Everybody Hates Republicans (Except McCain): Judging by the way they whacked at Hillary Clinton's milquetoaste reaction to Gen. David Petraeus, Republicans are convinced both that she'll be their general election foe and that her high unfavorablity numbers will make her beatable. A problem with this: With one exception, Republicans' favorability numbers are hurtling down the mineshaft.

Check out this week's Gallup poll, which includes the trend lines of GOP candidate favorability ratings from January to today. In January frontrunner Rudy Giuliani was still basking in his 9/11 aura with 62 percent of people saying they liked him and only 20 percent saying they didn't. That's dropped to 52 and 38 percent. In April Fred Thompson's favorable numbers were 65 and 24. Five months of bumbling and dithering later he's at 39 and 38 percent. Mitt Romney's fall has been the farthest, from 65 and 18 percent favorable/unfavorable to 38 and 35 percent.

The only candidate's who's grown a little more popular? John McCain. He'd been suffering all year, bottoming out at a 42/41 favorable/unfavorable rating in August, but a great month of Iraq news has bumped him back up to 53/34. People like an underdog and people like a guy who sticks to his guns, and McCain's been loudly convincing people that he fits both descriptions.

This answers a couple of long-running campaign questions. Will Rudy's 9/11 halo fade? Yes. Did Fred Thompson's dithering pre-campaign hurt him? Yes. Can America learn to love Mitt Romney? Nope.

Below the fold…

– Ryan Sager wonders what the hell Rudy Giuliani meant when he said stuff like the MoveOn ad "shouldn't be allowed." He gets an answer from the campaign.

– Whenever Patrick Toomey needs to be convinced that Congressional pork is a problem, he visits the International Peace Garden.

*fixed a typo