Hillary Clinton's campaign has struggled recently to present a credible way that she could win the Democratic presidential nomination, considering that Barack Obama leads her in the earned delegate count, the popular vote, and has pulled nearly even with her in the number of super-delegates who have committed themselves to his nomination.  Most observers say that only a miracle could bring her even to Barack Obama in the popular vote.

Now, Hillary Clinton's closest surrogates seem to be abandoning her efforts, effectively telling the news media that there is virtually now way that she can win.

(CNN) -- Two prominent supporters of Hillary Clinton suggested Thursday the New York senator needs to best rival Barack Obama in the total popular vote to have any chance at winning her party's presidential nomination.

In separate media interviews, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine and Pennsylvania Rep. Jack Murtha both indicated they believed Clinton will be unable to convince enough superdelegates to support her if she finishes second to Obama in both the pledged delegate count and the popular vote.

Speaking on CNBC, Corzine suggested it won't be enough for Clinton to argue she deserves the nomination because she has won more crucial swing states than Obama -- a talking point the senator's campaign has long argued.

"I think it would be a very hard argument to make," Corzine said of that position. "I'm a very aggressive supporter of Senator Clinton, but I think you need at least a popular vote."

Corzine also suggested he himself may cast his superdelegate vote for Obama should Clinton fail to win the popular vote, though the New Jersey governor insisted he thought Clinton would come out on top in that count if the Florida and Michigan contests were counted.

Murtha echoed Corzine's sentiments in an interview later Thursday, saying, "Clinton has to win Pennsylvania...She has to be ahead in the popular vote to have any chance at all of getting this nomination."  CNN

On a day that was supposed have Barack Obama front and center, we get news that Pennsylvania Rep. and superdelegate Jack Murtha has endorsed Hillary Clinton for President.

Murtha, who represents the 12th district of Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh, was an early and sometimes inflammatory critic of the Iraq war. As a retired Marine Corps colonel and the first combat veteran of Vietnam elected to serve in Congress, Murtha's voice on Clinton's behalf could prove especially valuable in both inoculating her from anti-war criticism and bolstering her claim that she is the most qualified to serve as commander-in-chief. That message is the backbone of Clinton's appearances this week.

I just finished Lee Iacocca's new book, Where Have all the Leaders Gone?.  While some of his views are off the mark, likely a product of his long association with the corporatocracy, most of what he writes is dead on.  

To illustrate his main point, one must look no further than the recent capitulation by Congress on the Iraq war funding bill.  The followers in Congress effectively snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory on this one.  After demonstrating the fact that Bush would get no more money to support his epic failure, they proved that a stubborn fool could prevail over more thoughtful individuals who lack the courage of their convictions.  While it is understandable that, considering the considerable effort in time and money that they risked to get to Congress, members of Congress would desire to be re-elected, I believe that many of them are misguided in their means of accomplishing this goal.

Like this should be a surprise.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer already is talking with key Republicans in Congress about striking a new agreement if President Bush follows through on his promised veto of an Iraq war spending bill that includes timelines for withdrawing U.S. troops.

During a visit to New Hampshire on Sunday, Hoyer said he had little hope that the president will sign the measure, and doubts Democrats could muster the votes to override a veto.

Speaking to reporters with U.S. Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H., Hoyer insisted, however, that any new measure hold the Iraqi government accountable for taking over its national security and quelling sectarian violence.

"If there are no consequences, then the government has no incentive to follow those objectives," Hoyer said.

Hoyer said he has already spoken with House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Minority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., about potential solutions after a veto.

Last week, Hoyer was badmouthing the 'short leash' solution which would force Republicans to vote for two months of funding every two months and break their will.  Now he's talking about caving to Bush and cutting out the progressives in a weaker Iraq bill that lets Bush do anything he wants.

This is not acceptable.  Hoyer's contact information is here.  Ask him to send a two month funding bill to Bush.

Congressional approval ratings overall are falling, back to a pre-election level, 28 approval and 64 percent disapproval.  Since Gallup didn't ask why approval ratings are falling, it's difficult to know what's going on.  There are a couple of hints - Democrats are the group responsible for much of the fall in approval ratings, so it makes sense to focus on the issues that Democrats care about when trying to understand what's going on.

In late February, pollsters noticed a disconnect between Pelosi's personal approval ratings and that of Congress as a whole.

Of those who self-identified as ideologically liberal in today's poll, the job approval rating for Congress was 49-46. Again, some of that could be left-over residue of anger at the 12-year reign of House Republicans. But it does reveal that the first seven weeks has not produced a sea change of popularity among liberals and their support for Congress.

But ideological liberals HAVE thrown their lot with Pelosi as an individual, giving her a 68-19 approve/disapprove rating among the group.

And moderate voters who tilted away from Bush, the Iraq war and congressional Republicans last fall -- who've yet to fully embrace the new Congress as a whole -- are in some cases are voicing a more than 2-to-1 approval of Madame Speaker.

Ideological moderates approve of her job performance 55-26, while self-identified independents support her work 45-34 so far.

There are several structural disadvantages Democrats are facing in Congress.  One is the media environment, which is tilted against them.  Two is a pollster/consultant class that is constantly telling moderate members to hedge their bets and mumble around the edges instead of simply opposing Bush and the Iraq war.  

But some of the slide in approval is self-inflicted.  The communications strategy for the caucus as a whole has been absolutely horrific.  Progressives aren't talking to activists and focus on cable news, while Rahm Emanuel, who is in charge of communications for the Democratic caucus as a whole, can't create a coherent storyline about the debates in Congress.  The non-binding resolutions were not effective in communicating intent.

Much of this is natural.  Iraq is a disaster, and there is nothing good here.  There is no light at the end of a tunnel.  There is no solution.  There is only the recognition that our country went horribly awry the last six years, and we must pay the price for it through sacrifice and a renewed dedication to humility and human rights.

If the supplemental bill passes the House, I expect this slide to reverse itself.  Ultimately, though, this Congress can only succeed if it is willing to go beyond the traditional boundaries of discourse and punish Bush for what he has wrought.

In the Progressive Convulsions Start, I outlined what I perceive as the growing frustration that progressive leaders and Democrats at large have with Congressional inaction on Iraq.  Whether it is 'liberal thinkers' calling progressives 'children', or Carl Levin talking of military options against Syria, or the immediate negative reaction to Russ Feingold's attempt to defund the war, there's a simmering anger within the public at large.  Consider that last night, Harry Reid, out of deference to Senate tradition, said on Charlie Rose that he will not consider using Congress's power of the purse to end the war (for a war he unlike most Democratic Senators doesn't regret authorizing).  His approval ratings in the netroots are slipping dramatically, and he is much less popular in his home state than his counterpart, John Ensign.

The progressive caucus, which represents a group of people who have been neutered since 1994, is waking up a bit out of its slumber.  Here's Congressman Jerry Nadler in the New York Times validating what Raw Story reported last week:

"Nothing is going to happen unless we use the power of the purse," said Representative Jerrold Nadler of New York. "It's time to draw a line in the sand."

I agree with Chris's point about framing this as a 'fully funded withdrawal', though the communications question is not the issue that is genuinely crippling us as a movement. At this point, the problem is the tremendous disconnect between the outside public and the machinations going on in Congress.  It's very difficult to find out who thinks what, because no one's cards are on the table.  It's hard to organize against the war because it's difficult to figure out how to put pressure against the right people on the supplemental coming this month.

As Chris has noted, this is dangerous for the Democratic Party.  There's an interesting dynamic playing out here, one you can see in Barack Obama's high approval ratings with liberal Democrats and independent voters in New Hampshire versus Hillary Clinton's high approval ratings among conservative Democrats.  Obama, who is more and more staking out progressive territory (not boldly, but he is going there), is appealing to a group of independent voters that are increasingly sympathetic to liberalism.  This makes sense.  Conservatism has died, intellectually speaking.  After watching New Orleans in tatters, Iraq in flames, and a government engulfed in corruption, the Republican brand is gone.  And yet the Democratic brand, while slightly improved, is not sparkling with dynamism.  

Independent voters, looking at the landscape, get that government needs to be there for them in emergencies, but they are also unwilling to associate themselves with an old Democratic brand.  Given a real choice of a party committed to liberal values, though, they will.  In 2006, prior to Lamont's victory in the primary, for instance, 30,000 voters joined the Democratic Party.    Poverty, global warming, corruption, corporate misbehavior, imperalism - these are all themes that resonate more than the Reaganite/Rambo antitax crusade of the last 40 years.

This energy could be captured by the progressive movement, or it could be captured by another set of actors.  In 1992, young voters spiked participation rates in the election, only to drop down to historically low levels in 1994.  Right now, the disconnect between progressives in Congress and those outside is stark.  Anti-escalation measures are passing all over the country - this war is hated, but there is almost no awareness of how the debate is shaping up within the Democratic Party in Congress.  The centrists are in control of the debate, which is their prerogative (and why Rahm Emanuel, who is in charge of House messaging, has allowed the bad framing to continue).  If the outside energy cannot work through the primary process within the Democratic Party, it will work through Naderite type candidates or a populist anti-war anti-trade anti-immigrant Perotista.

So what outside groups need is, as Congressman Nadler said, a 'line in the sand'.  That line is Murtha's plan.  If members of Congress are not going to protect the troops and are not going to work to end the war, that's a voting issue for the public.  We can't though vote on the war within the primary system if we don't know who stands where.  So Murtha's plan should be brought to a vote, and voted down so the public can know where their representatives stand.  Is Ellen Tauscher really that bad?  Well where does she stand on the Murtha plan?  Or Henry Cuellar, a whip in the Democratic caucus?  Or any other members?  We don't know, because they don't have to make the choice publicly.

They should.  Progressives should demand a vote on the Murtha plan.  Winning the vote is not the important goal - ending the war, which can only happen with an organized public putting pressure on Congress, the media and the new President, is the goal.  But we need something to organize around.  We need that line in the sand.

On January 12, my congressman, Jerrold Nadler (NY-8), introduced H.R. 455, the Protect the Troops and Bring Them Home Act of 2007, a simple bill that limits the use of funding in Iraq for force protection, troop withdrawal and Iraq reconstruction. We spoke with Congressman Nadler's office last week and verified that he is still quite actively promoting this legislation.

Although the bill is not currently the most well-known of the numerous congressional war proposals, H.R. 455 has a number of attributes that make it a distinctive and politically viable option for bringing the Iraq conflict to a reasonable conclusion...

Markos did another leadership poll, and while Pelosi and Dean slipped about 5-10 points, they still retain approval ratings in the 80s.  Blog readers like them both, immensely.  Harry Reid though took a big tumble.  Here are his numbers today.

In November, though there was no 'Don't know' option in the poll, Reid had a robust 80-19 approve/disapprove.  

The poll in November pushed leaners, of course, but even assuming that we push all the undecideds to the pro-Reid camp, his approvals went down by 16 points and his disapprovals went up by 15.  And that's assuming some very generous parameters.  It's more likely that Reid has dropped by around 30-40 points in the overall estimation of the netroots, which brings him into line with progressive bloggers in Nevada (who don't really like him all that much).  The large number of undecideds suggest that Reid doesn't necessarily have long to act forcefully before he will have a net negative approval rating online.

Could it have anything to do with what Digby points out:

You'll have to excuse me if I'm too cynical here, but I just can't wrap my mind around the fact that Harry Reid and Chuck Shumer aren't aware of all this. Which means that all this tip-toeing around Joe Lieberman is a very fancy kabuki dance. Which also means we really have to question whether they mean to pass any legislation at all.

I don't know how you can read this any other way. We pesky anti-Iraq war liberals are happy to blame him for everything and so we aren't looking at this closely enough. And Lieberman is likely very happy to play the independent maverick and doesn't mind being the Democratic Martyr of Iraq.

But I have to say that I'm just a teensy bit disappointed in the Democrats. This is a war we're talking about not some tax cut legislation. They don't have to do anything that unctuous creep tells them to do. He is holding nothing over their heads and yet everyone is pretending that they are worried about appeasing Old Joe and so they can't actually get anything done on Iraq.

You can't help but wonder if Lieberman and the Senate Dems aren't working the same side after all.

Atrios notes this quite frequently.  The public hates George Bush.  They hate this war.  If you stand up to George Bush and/or this war, the public will love you.  If you don't, the public will hate you or find you useless.

Apparently, the blog reading netroots is no different.  I'm glad to see this happening, since it shows that blog readers are not mindlessly tribal in loving Democrats.  Blog readers are at least tracking the public in attitudes on Iraq, and are willing to show explicit disapproval of leaders who betray them.

That's blog readers.  But what about bloggers themselves or other leaders of the netroots?  In all honesty, I think we're a bit confused.  To date, I have seen no organized attempt to hold Democrats accountable the way we did Joe Lieberman in 2006.  That's not to say it won't happen, but it isn't yet happening.  When I argue for primaries, I'm often mocked for making 'threats' even though it's clear that working through the primary process is the way that the public is heard.  

The leaders of the netroots have not stepped up yet on Iraq, and we need to figure out a strategy to do so.  We need your help.  One of our problems is that we can't find or agree on a bright line to draw, so we can't make good arguments for why members of Congress should be challenged in the electoral realm.  We could argue for withdrawal, but even Hillary Clinton has a withdrawal plan, and I have no idea how to trust her.  So that's out.  We could discuss defunding, but I'm not sure what the contours are.  Maybe the Murtha plan?  

What do we get behind?  I kind of like the Murtha plan, because we can begin to ask members of Congress whether they support allowing Bush to send troops to Iraq underequipped or whether they support the troops.

This hasn't caught fire, but it could.  The dissatisfaction with Reid, which hasn't happened because of any overt campaign but more of a general murmuring, suggests that there's an organizing opportunity.