All three candidates have hit speed bumps. When they start crusing again, up comes another one.

What’s up for McCain? According to the New York Times…

Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign is in a
troubled stretch, hindered by resignations of staff members, a lagging
effort to build a national campaign organization and questions over
whether he has taken full advantage of Democratic turmoil to present a
case for his candidacy, Republicans say.

In interviews, some party leaders said they were worried about signs
of disorder in his campaign, and if the focus in the last several weeks
on the prominent role of lobbyists in Mr. McCain’s inner circle might
undercut the heart of his general election message: that he is a
reformer taking on special interests in Washington.

“The core image of John McCain is as a reformer in Washington — and
the more dominant the story is about the lobbying teams around him, the
more you put that into question,” said Terry Nelson, who was Mr.
McCain’s campaign manager until he left in a shake-up last fall. “If
the Obama campaign can truly change him from being seen as a reformer
to just being another Washington politician, it could be very damaging
over the course of the campaign.”

But Obama has his own problems to deal with, and they’re not all about Hillary Clinton. Here’s the bottom line, accordint to Michael Barone at NRO.

As (pollsters) Hart and Alex Horowitz note in their
analysis of reactions to Obama, “When asked to recount any two memories
of the total presidential campaign so far, seven of the 12 participants
cite Rev. Wright by name. So far, clips of Rev. Wright clearly are the
one ‘key defining moment’ of this campaign.”

Most reporters are liberals, whose circles of friends and
acquaintances have included people with views not dissimilar to those
of Wright or William Ayers, the unrepentant Weather Underground bomber
with whom Obama served on a nonprofit board and at whose house his
state Senate candidacy was launched. Such reporters don’t find these
views utterly repugnant or particularly noteworthy. But most American
voters do. And they wonder whether a candidate who associates with such
people agrees with them — or disbelieve him when he says he doesn’t.

Though most in the press won’t admit it, that’s a problem — for the
Obama candidacy and for the whole Democratic party once it nominates
him.

So is Hillary Clinton just a byword? Hardly. She made a very weird comment today.

Sen. Barack Obama gives Hillary Clinton the benefit of
the doubt that she had no hidden meaning when she invoked the
assassination of Bobby Kennedy as an explanation for remaining in the
Democratic presidential race.

What?!

Clinton’s remarks to the editorial board at the Argus
Leader in South Dakota Friday struck some nerves partly because it came
in the wake of Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy’s health problems and
because of longstanding concerns about Obama’s security.

What did she say?

“People have been trying to push me out of this ever
since Iowa,” Clinton said Friday. “I find it curious because it is
unprecedented in history. I don’t understand it.

“You know, my husband didn’t wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he
won the California primary sometime in the middle of June. Right?” she
added later in the conversation.

Right. Okay so far. 

 ”We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California. You know, I just– I don’t understand it.”

What?! She really said that?! What was she thinking?!

That’s going to come back on her, and Rev. Wright is going to come back on Obama. And McCain has a lot of party problems.

But not this weekend. He’s having a barbecue, and the media have turned it into a bash.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., is hosting three prominent
Republicans at his Arizona ranch — former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt
Romney, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal —
prompting many to ask: Is his guest list really a list of potential
running mates?

Actually, they’re focusing in more closely than that.

To some, the most intriguing guest is Louisiana’s 36-year-old Indian-American Gov. Jindal.

Who’s Bobby Jindal?