From TPM Reader JW …

In response to Kurtz’s citation of GP (and as an avid Obama supporter), I have to lay a good deal of the blame for not making the basic, easily understandable, factually accurate assertion that Hillary’s plan WON’T SAVE ANYONE ANY MONEY squarely at the feet of the Obama campaign and its surrogates. I flipped around several cable news stations yesterday, and heard at least a half dozen different “Obama supporters” lambaste Hillary’s plan on the basis of its disingenuousness (including Clinton’s “double dipping” with the windfall profits tax that will never be signed into law by this Administration), it’s “gimmickry,” its short-term only impact, and its INSUFFICIENT help to the common man (i.e. “only $0.30 a day”). Only AFTER laying out all those (admittedly valid) rationales did I ever hear an Obama surrogate, if they still had time to do so, make the point that a tax reduction would not be passed on to the consumer at the pump. It seems to me like this should have been the FIRST thing the Obama camp hit, from day one, with supportive emphasis on all the rest of the absolutely on-target reasons that this is a shameless, and ineffectual, pander by Clinton. I applaud my candidate for hitting back hard on this ridiculous “idea,” but I wish they would have realized earlier how to hammer on it more effectively. Perhaps then the MSM talking heads would have focused on that, rather than the dearth of credible economists who support the plan.

Late Update: TPM Reader DG responds …

JW is exaggerating. I saw an Obama ad on the TPM Election Central website that made exactly the point JW is hitting on, that the consumer won’t benefit from the tax holiday. Maybe Obama surrogates could play that up more on TV, but the point isn’t being ignored entirely by the campaign.

I think I’m with JW on this one though. Yes, the point is out there somewhere in the back and forth. But most of what I’m hearing from the Obama campaign is some version of it’s not responsible and it’s not even very much money. Both are true. But ‘it won’t save you any money’ is much more straightforward and has the added advantage, according to virtually every economist, of being true.

From TPM Reader AB …

It’s interesting that you’re batting around this topic today. Because I just got off the phone with my Dad, who’s an 80 y.o. died-in-the-wool Democratic and would vote for Hillary in a second (but as a former upstate Scranton, Pa. area first generation Polish immigrant probably won’t ever vote for Obama.

I was complaining about what it’s costing to fill the gas tank, and he started on about how Hillary and McCain want to do something about it by “getting rid of that tax” while “the black guy” is against that.

I said, simply and in terms he could understand:

“If the government knocks off those 18 cents a gallon, what do you think the oil companies are going do? They’re going to raise the price of gas by 18 cents and you’ll be paying exactly the same amount. Until September when even McCain and Hillary say they’ll put the tax back on, and you’ll end up paying even more than before. It’s not gas tax relief for you, it’s a give-away to the oil companies”.

I think that really struck him as something he never actually considered, because he switched to the old “well, we’ve got to get all of those politicians out of the oil companies’ back pockets, . . . ”

I really don’t understand why the Obama campaign isn’t slamming this message hard.

Ask Hillary and McCain how they know the oil companies won’t raise their prices, and ask them and the press to try to get the oil companies on record promising not to do so. They can’t do it. They have no answer. That’s the response.

Terry McAuliffe is on a roll today, telling MSNBC:

“She loves to sit, throw ’em back. So to me this is nothin’ new. We all hear about the story that she and John McCain actually had a shot contest, I think in the Ukraine or somewhere around the world. And she actually beat John McCain in a shot contest. She’s a girl from Illinois who likes to throw ’em down with the rest of us.”

Watch the video here.

I don’t have to tell you there are primaries tonight in Indiana and North Carolina. But remember that we’ll be bringing you live election results starting tonight at 6 PM Eastern when most of the polls close in Indiana.

It’s always hard not to be in charge of your headlines.

This is now live on the front page of The Politico …

In Ben Smith’s defense this seems like a very weird headline for the post they appear to be referring to.

(ed.note: Thanks to TPM Reader SM for the catch.)

From the AP …

About 12 Indiana nuns were turned away Tuesday from a polling place by a fellow bride of Christ because they didn’t have state or federal identification bearing a photograph.

Sister Julie McGuire said she was forced to turn away her fellow sisters at Saint Mary’s Convent in South Bend, across the street from the University of Notre Dame, because they had been told earlier that they would need such an ID to vote.

The nuns, all in their 80s or 90s, didn’t get one but came to the precinct anyway.

“One came down this morning, and she was 98, and she said, ‘I don’t want to go do that,'” Sister McGuire said. Some showed up with outdated passports. None of them drives.

They weren’t given provisional ballots because it would be impossible to get them to a motor vehicle branch and back in the 10-day time frame allotted by the law, Sister McGuire said. “You have to remember that some of these ladies don’t walk well. They’re in wheelchairs or on walkers or electric carts.”

As you know, Staten Island Rep. Vito Fossella (R-NY) was arrested last Wednesday night for drunk driving with a blood alcohol level over twice the legal limit.

But now it seems that the arrest is landing him in an even bigger scandal.

Some color commentary from the NYDN …

A hammered Vito Fossella and a stumbling drinking buddy were asked to leave a Washington bar hours before the Staten Island congressman was busted for drunken driving, witnesses said Monday.

…

Employees at the Logan Tavern said Brian, whose last name they did not know, passed out at the bar after arriving with Fossella.

Fossella roused his pal, who made it to the men’s room, where he passed out again in a chair outside the bathroom door. Tavern staff woke Brian, who returned to the main room and promptly belly-flopped onto a table, Hahn said.

“The table’s base was broken,” Hahn said. “They offered to pay for it, but we said, ‘That’s all right, just leave.'”

Hahn said he helped the men to the street and flagged down a cab for them. It’s unclear if the two men got into the cab or walked off, possibly to Fossella’s car.

The epidemic of faux populism continues. Here’s RNC Chairman Mike Duncan this afternoon defending the McCain gas tax holiday:

The polls start closing in two hours. Find out what the final polls say, what to expect tonight and even the little noticed trend that could determine the outcome of the race …

High-res version at Veracifier.com.

New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez’s office has sent over a statement from the senator, a key Hillary surrogate, clarifying his remarks about Clinton’s gas tax holiday this morning on MSNBC:

“I should have elaborated more in my on-air response — the point I was making was that the everyday pains that average Americans are feeling aren’t always taken into account by an economist sitting behind a desk looking at numbers. Of course economists are important to public policy, but I was trying to point out that they aren’t the only voices that matter. Cold macroeconomic calculus can glaze over the realities of human suffering, so there needs to be a balance between crunching numbers and understanding the everyday experiences of Americans in order to make good public policy.”

Here’s the video of his remarks.