And, here it comes ...

From FoxNews.com:

Were you watching at 6:25 when Democratic strategist Bob Beckel dropped a bomb on us? He said he’d heard through his political pipeline that a big shoe was about to drop on the Obama campaign. It has something to do with Michelle Obama. Beckel wouldn’t say anything more other than this explosive story may happen tomorrow. Do you think the GOP has something up its sleeve that could blow up Obama’s campaign? If so, when do you think they’ll unleash it?

Democrat strategist (and Obama supporter) Bob Beckel confirmed that 'a mighty big shoe' was set to drop on Michelle Obama as early as tomorrow. He said it was 'significantly' bigger than her thesis paper. (Video HERE via Hot Air)

Is it the long-rumored 'whitey' video, or some entirely new revelation? It sounds like we'll find out soon ...

Here's my upfront analysis: If it is the 'whitey' video, and the GOP unleashes it now, they're morons.

There were rumors circulating this morning that, following the primary results tonight, Hillary was prepared to announced that Obama had secured the nomination and that she was suspending her campaign (rumors that Terry McAuliffe quickly denied).

However, simply suspending her campaign doesn't mean that Obama is the nominee.

He won't officially be the nominee until the superdelegates cast their votes in Denver in August. And, if Obama's blasted with these new revelations, she can simply woo the fleeing superdelegates to her side and then McCain faces someone who may, frankly, actually present a challenge.

From a political standpoint, the GOP would be much better off waiting until the day after the Democrat convention when Obama has sewn up the nomination.

Obama: "There's no tape but, if there was ..."

Another interesting bit of news from Larry Johnson over at No Quarter USA on the Michelle Obama 'whitey' tape.

The Obama campaign is telling reporters from major news organizations that the videotape of Michelle Obama railing against “whitey” at a panel alongside Nation of Islam maximum leader Louis Farrakhan is nothing but a “scurrilous lie,” according to one of those reporters who called for an answer.

But at the same time the Obama campaign has disseminated either a doctored or concocted transcript of the supposedly nonexistent videotape. Major Obama donors went to the campaign demanding explanations after the posting of my story on No Quarter about the contents of the videotape confirmed to me by several reliable sources, all Republicans with access to knowledge but who do not know each other.

So the campaign created a would-be transcript of the video it says doesn’t exist. In the Obama campaign produced transcript Michelle says "why’d he" instead of "whitey." Very clever. Then the campaign sent this transcript to key Obamaton bloggers to circulate. And the campaign sent it to the donors to prevent them from having a nervous breakdown.

And, No Quarter's story about what seems to be a 'disseminated transcript' checks out. Obamaniac blogs this morning are all publishing what appear to be the campaign 'talking points' that first hit the web on the Booman Tribune, and covered by National Review Online.

A really interesting theory about the alleged Michelle Obama tape, which could explain a lot, from the liberal blog Booman Tribune. Michelle, offering a speech critical of President Bush, offers a refrain of "why'd he" — the words "why did he" mushed together — that sounds like "whitey" on the tape.

Apparently, if the tape ever comes to light, her words will sound something like:

Whitey cut folks off Medicaid?
Whitey let New Orleans drown?
Whitey do nothing about Jena?
Whitey put us in Iraq for no reason?*

...when the intended message is,

Why'd he cut folks off Medicaid?
Why'd he let New Orleans drown?
Why'd he do nothing about Jena?
Why'd he put us in Iraq for no reason?

Or so we will be told. The irony is, if the latter interpretation is accurate, we still have a potential first lady accusing her husband's predecessor of "letting" New Orleans drown.

In other words, the Obama campaign is basically, "Listen, there's no tape. It didn't happen. But, if it did, here's the transcript of what she really said. You're just hearing it as 'whitey' because you're typical white people. Nothing racist goes on at Trinity United. It's a black thing, you wouldn't understand ..."

Unfortunately, that doesn't fit with what has been reported over at MyTownTalks.com as the actual transcript:

"Once again, the white man keeps us down. What’s up with Whitey? Why’d he attack Iraq? Why’d he let Katrina happen? Why’d he leave millions of children behind? This is the legacy the white man gives us."

In order to buy the Booman Tribune's 'spin', we'd have to hear that as 'Once again, the [why'd] man keeps us down. What's up with [why'd he]? Why'd he attack Iraq? Why'd he let Katrina happen? Why'd he leave millions of children behind? This is the legacy the [why'd] man gives us."

Part of their spin fits. It could be that she's actually saying 'Why'd he ... ?' rather than 'whitey' in a few of those sentences. There are a few, however, where it clearly doesn't work.

Amazing. Truly, truly amazing.

More on Michelle Obama's 'whitey' video.

Larry Johnson over at No Quarter USA has posted that he's found out what exactly is on that 'whitey' video we'd mentioned last week.

He writes:

"I learned over the weekend why the Republicans who have seen the tape of Michelle Obama ranting about 'whitey' describe it as 'STUNNING.' It features Michelle Obama and Louis Farrakhan. They are sitting on a panel at Jeremiah Wright’s Church when Michelle makes her intemperate remarks. Whoops!! When that image comes out it will enter the politcal ads hall of fame. It will be right up there with the little girl plucking daisy petals in the famous 1964 ad LBJ used against Barry Goldwater.

"Barack may have quit his church but his religious problems are not over."

No Quarter USA also points out that, on FoxNews over the weekend, it would seem that Roger Stone, a political consultant and opposition researcher who works for the Republican National Committee, seemed to have confirmed the existence of the tape over the weekend, even suggesting that at least one major news outlet already has their hands on it.

Stone said:

This has little to do with the general election and a lot to do with why Hillary Clinton is staying in the race. Look, there is already a buzz in Washington at least seven news organizations have contacted me, wanting to know how to get their hands on this tape, giving me more information than I had after I had spoken to each one of them. I now believe the tape exists and I believe a network has it. If this pans to out to be true based on Michelle Obama’s previous comment that this is the first time she had been proud of her country which I think shows an attitude it is problematic.

Michelle saying those things all on her own would've been bad enough. Saying them while seated alongside Louis Farrakhan ... ? Wow.

If Barack gets the nomination, expect this to get really ugly.

Intellectually Honest: Democrats not all that Democratic. Redux.

Last week, I posted about how the Democrat nominating process works and their different classes of delegates and superdelegates and how even among the 'regular' delegates the votes weighed differently depending on how faithfully Democrat a particular district had been.

This past weekend, I was shocked (alright, not really all that shocked) as I watched the Democrat National Committee vote not only to count Michigan and Florida's delegates as only 'half-votes.'

But, the DNC went beyond that. In the case of Michigan, the DNC determined that they cold, as a panel, divine and decide the intent of the voter and correctly determine who it is that you might have voted for. They can, indeed, give hundreds of thousands of votes (and their corresponding delegates) to you, whether you were on the ballot or not, and whether the voters actually intended to vote for you or not.

Simply amazing.