Hollywood, D.C.: A Once in a Lifetime Kinda Day

It’s a chilly morning in LA — would be very hard to get out of bed if I weren’t already lightheaded pondering the exhilirating hours and days of work and hobby ahead. With the help of rising-star political reporter Jeremy Oberstein, my team at LAist is prepared to whoop everybody’s ass at full coverage of today’s democratic debate which CNN has — as they will — already dubbed something like Clinton vs. Obama in Hollywood.

There will be liveblogging (it’s live here). Here’s a quick link to LAist’s election coverage. I’m early to the day job as my eyes will surely be all over the place later this afternoon coordinating this effort.

I never expected a crucial, world-be-watching, future-of-our-great-grandchildren impacting, in advance of 24-state primary election event to fall at my feet ANYTIME in my life. So I’m not taking this lightly. And there’s also the fact that I’ve had a feeling it would come to this great day for my man Obama since my pre-grad school days in much-chillier Chicago.

Oh, and after you vote Tuesday, join us at Seven Grand for cocktails (first round on LAist & Answer with Action). We’ll celebrate, democracy, Super Tuesday, and, uh, I’ll also be celebrating my birthday.

Here’s a look back at Obama’s first visit to LA on his presidential campaign, last February 20. One of a few clips I came out of the event with:

In Nevada, Obama Manages to Stay Ahead by ‘Losing’

obama wins delegates in  nevada but loses

After the past two presidential elections, the media should know better than to call a winner based purely on popular vote, especially in the national — electoral college scene and in states with weighted caucuses. According to both the Nation and the data at WaPo, Obama had 11 first place finished and 6 second place. The reverse for Clinton out of Nevada’s 16 counties and one independent city.

Will it matter in the end who gets 13 delegates and who gets 12? Most likely not, but apparently the delegates will not be officially tallied/ appropriated by the state democratic party until mid-April.

Either way, it appears Obama will remain a media underdog despite remaining in a statistical dead heat w/ Clinton.

Exciting.

(photo: Las Vegas Sun/Steve Marcus/Reuters)

Kucinich: Short Man Out

dennis kucinich and wife no las vegas msnbcSeems unfair and silly to see NBC and the Nevada Supreme Court shut Dennis Kucinich out of tonight’s debate in Las Vegas, in a last-minute appeal, no less.

Kucinich always has good things to say and is a refreshing voice with (in many cases) a healthy, progressive perspective. But as the trend has been — super-hot wife or not — dude is too short.

Perhaps this is another reason why you need Perot- or Bloomberg-like billions to get the media establishment accept you as a third-party candidate.

If you’re like me and don’t have cable — click here to watch a live stream (no ads even) of MSNBC’s debate online, moderated by Brian Williams. So far, pretty interesting.