From the New York Post:
Barack Obama reached a fund-raising milestone yesterday with the 1 millionth donor to his campaign - an eye-popping number that has him on the road to a record in political moneymaking. "He has more donors now than the Democratic National Committee had in the 2000 election," said Anthony Corrado, a political-science expert at Colby College in Maine. " ... Michael Malbin, of the Campaign Finance Institute, said other candidates had reached the million-donor mark in past elections, but it was "remarkable to have done it so early."
From the New York Times:
Senator Barack Obama on Wednesday accepted the endorsement of Representative John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat and longtime African-American political leader, who switched his support from the presidential candidacy of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. "John Lewis is an American hero and a giant of the civil rights movement," Mr. Obama said in a statement issued after he arrived here for a campaign stop. "I am deeply honored to have his support." ... In a statement on Wednesday, the congressman confirmed his switch to Mr. Obama. "I think the candidacy of Senator Obama represents the beginning of a new movement in American political history that began in the hearts and minds of the people of this nation," he said. "And I want to be on the side of the people."
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:
Obama continued campaigning in Ohio after their debate Tuesday night at Cleveland State University. McCain, the likely GOP nominee, used a campaign stop in Tyler, Texas, to jump on a comment Obama made about the Iraq war during the debate. Obama, who opposes the war, said he would withdraw U.S. troops and take further action in Iraq if al-Qaida is forming a base in Iraq. "I have some news. Al-Qaida is in Iraq. Its called al-Qaida in Iraq," McCain told a crowd, At a rally at Ohio State University, Obama told more than 8,000 cheering supporters he had heard about McCain's comment. ..."But I have some news for John McCain. There was no such thing as al-Qaida in Iraq until George Bush and John McCain decided to invade Iraq," Obama said, drawing his largest cheer of the day. "I've been paying attention, John McCain," Obama continued. "That's the news. " ... Obama said McCain followed Bush into a misguided war and that instead of starting a war in Iraq in 2003, the president should have sought out terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan. "I respect John McCain, but he's tied to the policies of the past," Obama said. "We're about policies of the future."
From the Associated Press:
Early voting in urban areas being targeted by Barack Obama has swelled to record numbers in Texas... ... Voters have flooded early balloting locations in places like grocery stores, Kmarts and recreation centers across the state, overwhelming county election officials unaccustomed to handling such turnout. Some 512,000 people in the state's 15 largest counties have already cast votes in the Democratic contest, more than four times the level of turnout seen in 2004. ... "Texas is on the leading edge of early voting in this country - they have a lot more locations available and are more creative about putting them in places where people actually go," said Paul Gronke, a political scientist at Oregon's Reed College who studies early voting. ... "Early voting is easy voting. I wanted to get it out of the way so that if something comes up on election day, I'm set and ready to go," said Robin Schneider, 47, after casting her ballot outside an HEB grocery store in Austin. "I definitely want to show up at my polling place Tuesday night for the caucus, but that's after work. So this gets the voting part out of the way."
Barack Obama is closing in on Hillary Clinton's once-16-percentage-point lead in Pennsylvania, which votes April 22, according to a Quinnipiac University poll. Two weeks ago, Clinton led in the survey by 52 percent to 36 percent. The latest poll indicates that her lead was 49 percent to 43 percent. Voters younger than 45 have gone in two weeks from favoring Clinton by 11 percentage points to preferring Obama by 17 points.
From the Columbus Dispatch:
The wind chill was in single digits when Joseph and Zenza Laws arrived outside St. John Arena around 4:30 a.m. yesterday after riding the bus all night from Chicago. Already, about 10 people were ahead of them in line. By the time the doors opened four hours later, the crowd to see Sen. Barack Obama stretched a couple of hundred yards across the parking lot to the bridge over the Olentangy River. ... "It's history in the making, and I wanted to be part of it," said Mr. Laws, 53, a parks supervisor in Chicago whose son works in the Obama campaign. ... Ersell Jeffers, 74, of Columbus, waited in line 11/2 hours: "I was so excited I didn't know I was cold until I got inside." Not since taking a day off work in 1961 to watch John F. Kennedy's inauguration has Jeffers been more excited about a political candidate. ..."I think these kinds of crowds in primary season, this kind of passion and intensity is just unheard of in recent times," said Herb Asher, a Democratic political scientist at Ohio State University. "His message of a new kind of politics and the eloquent way in which he delivers that message is really something new for a lot of voters" ... Bethelchem Mengstu, a junior biology major at Ohio State, said younger voters feel a connection with Obama. "He makes us feel like we can make a difference," she said at yesterday's rally.
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