I thought Osama Obama claimed to be from Il. It now appears he is from La La land.

AP article: "But even though they have much smaller populations, the leadoff Democratic primary states of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina would not be harmed under Obama's plan. Iowa would get an additional $119,824; Nevada would get $86,222 more; and South Carolina would receive $175,027 extra."

Wow. When you look at the actual amount of money involved you realize that the premise that Obama is somehow buying votes is nothing more than horseshit.

but wait, there's more...

Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt points out that Obama doesn't determine which states have higher risk and therefore would get more money. Those calculations are made by the Department of Homeland Security, which won't reveal its methods or say just what makes Iowa more vulnerable than, say, New Hampshire.

New Hampshire would have had a drop in funding if Obama's proposal was simply based on risk. But Obama has a provision to ensure that states with an international border would stay at the .45 percent minimum, and New Hampshire's 58-mile dividing line with Canada qualifies it to keep the same amount that it would get in the current Senate bill.

In all, 34 states would get more money under Obama's amendment. That comes largely at the expense of eight smaller population states and the District of Columbia, which would lose more than $1.8 million each under the formula.

I like Obama's plan. Under Republican rule it was just politics as usual.

One [trend] is the way that the newest federal pie, Homeland Security funding, has been divvied. The likeliest terror targets are blue coastal cities -- New York, Seattle, Los Angeles (where al-Qaida was stopped from striking in 1999) and underprotected seaports generally. But that's not where the money's gone. A stock formula allocates 40 percent of funding equally to each state. So Wyoming, Dick Cheney's off-and-on home state and about as tempting a target as Baffin Island, gets seven times as much funding per capita as New York. When Homeland Security responded to criticism by trying to place a little more money where it's actually needed, Republican lawmakers snarled about favoring "Democratic cities."

WHO said he was "buying votes?" What he is doing is taking the work towards reallocation which Schumer and Clinton, in particular, have been working on for YEARS, and making sure no one in Iowa, NH, Nevada or SC can say "Obama's plan would CUT OUR FUNDS!"

Now, you may believe the fact these states are the first four primary/caucus states in the race for the Democratic nomination is purely coincidental.

I don't.

But keep on practicing your skills at setting up straw men and parsing and spinning. If the Democrats nominate Obama, those skills will be in heavy demand.