I thought this was a mostly dull debate, and under the circumstances that’s good for Obama. Overall, though, this is a good format for Hillary Clinton and she, as usual, did well on the health care debate whereas I thought he was more impressive on the diplomatic and foreign policy issues. Everyone seems to agree that her effort to press the bogus plagiarism issue didn’t work out well.

Bottom line, if she was still the front-runner, this would have counted as a clear Clinton win — Obama had some good moments, but her ability to rattle off policy details on the fly really comes through whereas Obama needs to pause to think. But she’s not the front-runner anymore, and it’s hard to see anything she did to make up lost ground.

On Sunday, CBS’s 60 Minutes will air its long-awaited report on the Bush administration’s political persecution of Alabama’s incarcerated former governor Don Siegelman. In the piece, former GOP operative Jill Simpson alleges that Karl Rove personally told her to find evidence that Siegelman was cheating on his wife:

According to the CBS statement, Simpson says Rove approached her at a 2001 meeting, when Siegelman was still governor.

“Karl Rove asked you to take pictures of Siegelman?” reporter Scott Pelley asks.

“Yes,” Simpson replies.

“In a compromising sexual position with one of his aides,” Pelley says.

“Yes, if I could,” she responds.

Rove refused to speak with 60 Minutes for the piece.

Okay . . . argue about the debate here. I’m going to restrain myself from putting up any more random posts. Some analysis when it’s done.

It’s interesting, but over time Barack Obama has come to have a much more sophisticatedly outlined notion of how he’ll bring about change. We used to get some pretty vague talk about bringing people together. That’s still in there, but now he’s laying out a much more concrete vision in which organization and mobilization of the public allow us to overcome the special interest stranglehold in Washington.

Today, Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) campaign manager Rick Davis sent an e-mail to supporters attacking the New York Times’s bombshell story on McCain’s ties to lobbyists. Davis claims that “objective observers” view it as a “sleazy smear attack from a liberal newspaper.” One of the “objective” sources he cites? McCain’s attorney Bob Bennett. Davis writes:

Objective observers are viewing this article exactly as they should – as a sleazy smear attack from a liberal newspaper against the conservative Republican frontrunner. … Washington attorney Bob Bennett, who was the Democrat counsel during the Keating investigation, said, “This is a real hit job.”

Bennett is far from an “objective observer.” In fact, Bennett is currently being paid by McCain to help beat back the New York Times story. In December, Washington Post media critic Howard Kurtz reported that McCain hired Bennett “to deal with the matter” of the Times’s investigation.

Davis made a similar reference on Fox and Friends this morning. He identified Bennett as only “the counsel for the Keating investigation,” yet cites him saying that it “was total bunk that there was anything inappropriate by John McCain’s actions” in the scandal. Davis never mentions that Bennett is now employed McCain. Watch it:

Now it’s true that as an investigator in the Keating scandal, Bennett has been on the record saying McCain was less culpable than his Senate colleagues. But Davis is referencing comments Bennett made in the context of a scandal he is being paid to squelch.

That’s not “straight talk.” That’s dishonest.

ABC/WaPost has Clinton and Obama tied in Texas with Clinton’s lead in Ohio at a substantial-but-shrinking 50-43. Given the general tendency of Obama to gain over time, this means Clinton really has to kick his ass in tonight’s debate.

Meanwhile, years ago I was an intern at Rolling Stone alongside much-more-adept intern Conor Bezane. He, in turn, stuck more closely to the music-themed-journalism concept and works at MTV News where he’s got a story on Obama’s creative class mobilization that quotes yours truly.

Bill O’Reilly’s blog reports that former White House Press Secretary Tony Snow will join Bill O’Reilly’s radio show as his “permanent fill-in host“:

We’re pleased to announce that former White House Press Secretary Tony Snow will be joining the Factor as Bill’s permanent fill-in host for the Radio Factor!

You can hear Tony on the Radio Factor on Fridays, starting tomorrow, Friday, February 21.

Welcome to the Factor, Tony! We’re all excited to have you on board.

In October, O’Reilly told Snow that if CNN hired Snow as a competitor, “it’s going to get bloody.”