After Hollywood mogul David Geffen, a former major supporter of the Clintons, was quoted making some rather sharp remarks about them by some dried-up old hag in the New York Times, Hillary's spokesman Howard Wolfson lashed back - at Obama, whom Geffen is backing now. It went downhill fast from there, as John Hinderaker relates at Power Line:

Many worse things have been said about the Clintons, but, for whatever reason, Hillary was unwilling to take it in stride. Her communications director, writing on her campaign web site's blog, made this heated response:

While Senator Obama was denouncing slash and burn politics yesterday, his campaign's finance chair was viciously and personally attacking Senator Clinton and her husband.

If Senator Obama is indeed sincere about his repeated claims to change the tone of our politics, he should immediately denounce these remarks, remove Mr. Geffen from his campaign and return his money.

While Democrats should engage in a vigorous debate on the issues, there is no place in our party or our politics for the kind of personal insults made by Senator Obama's principal fundraiser.

Most interesting to me was this reply from Obama's campaign:

We aren't going to get in the middle of a disagreement between the Clintons and someone who was once one of their biggest supporters. It is ironic that the Clintons had no problem with David Geffen when was raising them $18 million and sleeping at their invitation in the Lincoln bedroom. It is also ironic that Senator Clinton lavished praise on Monday and is fully willing to accept today the support of South Carolina State Sen. Robert Ford, who said if Barack Obama were to win the nomination, he would drag down the rest of the Democratic Party because he's black.

So: Barack Obama is playing the race card against Hillary Clinton! The fireworks continued as Clinton's spokesman updated his blog entry as follows:

Read it all at the link above. As Hinderaker notes, those who have speculated that Obama is only angling for the VP nomination under Hillary may have to recalibrate after this.

Ah, yes! Hillary slaps Obama for what the money-man he took from her said, then Obama practically accuses her of racism for not slapping down Robert Ford. And it's still only February, nearly a full year before the primaries . . . pass the popcorn, and fasten your selt belts: it's going to be a bumpy ride!