Reporters know more about Obama's itinerary than is safe to say; we know who he's meeting with -- Olmert, Abas, Abdullah, Sarkozy, Merkel and Brown -- and we know when, but the campaign has asked us to keep the times and dates a secret for security reasons, and we've collectively obliged.

I received a phone call yesterday from a reporter at the Scotsman who wanted to know why the Obama campaign was obsessed with Germany and wanted Obama's signature event to take place at the Brandenburg Gate. Shades of a Franco-German axis among Obama's advisers? Not really, I said. It's more that Germany's press had the good fortune to break the story of Obama's expected itinerary and the resulting controversy that developed. (Obama will speak elsewhere in Berlin.) No, there will be plenty of attention devoted to the Anglo-American friendship. I doubt Obama will say much about Europe, per se.

Here's what the Obama campaign wants to get out of the trip:

# Lots of good images; Obama meeting with commanders; Obama meeting with different types of people; crowds spontaneously forming outside Obama events -- these all look presidential and serious and convey gravity.

# A foothold toward the goal of wrestling the Iraq issue back from John McCain. Obama's identity inseparable from his 2002 judgment on Iraq, and yet half the country agrees with John McCain.

# By osmosis, the idea, planted in the heads of independent voters, that Obama is a president who will make you feel proud to be an American again; attention Obama is sure to receive will be a reproach to Bush and McCain... a president, an American, who can be a model for the world.

And here's what Obamaskeptics will be looking for:

Krauthammerian signs of hubris and messianic fervor. (Most of Obama's events will be small and pooled press; the Obama campaign is aware of the need for their guy to seem, at once, humble and humbled.)

Gaffes or opportunities to exploit his relative lack of experience.

And here's what political analysts will be looking for:

# Does this trip help Obama connect to common concerns? His affluent, educated audience will applaud his diplomatic endeavor and his efforts to restore America's image in the world. In 2004, that message would be alienating to other voters; in 2008, it may well help him. What do voters think?

# How Obama handles the pressure and scrutiny of the world stage.

# Obviously, what he says about Iraq and what leaders of other countries say to him about Iraq and the Middle East.

# How the Obama campaign handles efforts by the White House and the McCain campaign to undercut him.

"[I]n case you’ve been missing it, Mitt has been doing such a great job lately on my behalf, I said only half in jest, he’s doing a better job for me than he did for himself. And in case you missed it, as short a time ago as this morning, Mitt has been on the shows, not only defending, but standing up for the things that we believe in, are important to the future of the country. And I think you may know that Cindy and I and Mitt and Ann had the chance to spend some time together. And I knew Mitt, and I knew what an outstanding individual he is and what a wonderful family person, but I hadn’t had the chance to get to know Ann, who we all know is battling a disease and she is a woman of courage and beauty and grace. Scott [Romney,I thank you for being here and I thank you for the entire Romney family."

Not mentioned in this morning's New York Times piece on Barack Obama's foreign policy team is Ben Rhodes.

Rhodes, 30, is Obama's principle foreign policy speechwriter. He does a large share of the staff work and writes Obama's foreign policy talking points, turning ideas into words. Rhodes isn't simply a background ghostwriter; Obama calls him an "adviser" -- a distinct title from "writer" -- and lets him speak directly on foreign policy matters. Rhodes and foreign policy chief Denis McDonough worked with Obama to write a now-famous blog post justifying his vote for the FISA compromise.

Rhodes was an author of the 9/11 commission report and was a special assistant to Lee Hamilton, one of the 9/11 Commission co-chairs, at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He is a contributor to the Partnership for Secure America. He also worked on the Iraq Study Group, leading the New York Sun to call him a "wunderkind."

HRC2012.com was bought by the Markham Group on June 8, according to whois.com

Greg Hale of the Markham Group served as a key advance aide to Sen. Clinton, organizing political events for the campaign. The Markham website calls him the "lead consultant for advance and visual messaging." Partners Paul Neaville and Robert McClarty (the son of former White House chief of staff Thomas "Mack" McClarty) also worked on Clinton's advance team. According to whois.com, the site was registered by Todd Wilder, a longtime Democratic operative from Florida.

A picture of Clinton pops up when the company's website is called up.

Mo Elleithee, a Clinton spokesman, said that Clinton officially associates herself with three websites: hillpac.com, for her political action committee, hillaryclinton.com, for her presidential campaign and now her '12 Senate re-election campaign, and a separate site dedicated to retiring her presidential debt.

In 2006, HillaryClinton.com was used as the principle Senate re-election site, so it's not clear why a separate 2012 site would be required.

If Obama loses in November, Clinton would have to pick between running for re-election and running for president.

Clinton advisers say that she is committed to helping elect Obama and, at the same time, wants to keep her options open. But Elleithee said he knew nothing about the HRC2012.com site.

This morning, on MSNBC's Morning Joe, he wouldn't say.

Obama's team is heavily peopled by a younger generation of Democratic foreign policy gurus who came of age reading books like Samantha Power's "A Problem from Hell" and assimilating its message about American credibility in the world.

The McCain response to all this -- John doesn't need daily talking points -- is a reflection on Obama's learning curve, although McCain is also very clearly learning as he is going, too. (One political analyst likened Obama's trip as an example of a runner who starts to train for a marathon three days before it begins.)

One wonders whether the 300 > 20 > 2 > Obama equation will work in the Oval Office.

There had been debate about whether the DNC would set up an IE because Obama has railed against so-called independent groups spending in an election.

The AP reports that Jonathan Prince, a veteran of extra-party efforts like these and a former deputy campaign manager for John Edwards, plans to spend at least $18 million outside the coordination limits.

Confirmed

Sen. Chris Dodd

Almost certainly being vetted (based on my and other's reporting)

Gov. Tim Kaine
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius
Sen. Evan Bayh

Unknown

Sen. Chuck Hagel
Sen. Hillary Clinton
Sen. Claire McCaskill
Ex-Sen. Sam Nunn
Ex-Sen. Tom Daschle
Ex-Sen. John Edwards

Not being vetted

Sen. Jack Reed
Sen. Joe Biden (yet)
Ex-Rep. Dick Gephardt
Sen. Jim Webb
Ex-Gen. Colin Powell

Jaime Sneider argues that:

"With a burn rate of $42 million a month, Obama's campaign can just barely sustain its current levels of spending. And what's leftover may not be adequate to run the kind of campaign he needs to win. Just consider despite all the money he's raised, Obama has been outspent on television by 3 to 1 in the last two months. All the stagecraft and theatrics has come with a hefty cost."

Yes, the Obama campaign has a lot of money to raise -- about $50 million per month over the next three months. But the Obama campaign announced its intention to opt out of the primaries on June 19; there is absolutely no reason to think that his donors are maxed out for the general election, or that they won't give when they are asked. Truth is -- Obama needs primary money now, not general election money. He may not raise $200 million, and it'll cost him time and resources to raise $84 million -- the equivalent of what he'd get from the government -- but the reality is that Obama will be able to raise pretty much whatever he needs. The length and scope of the Democratic primaries dwarfed that of the McCain campaign, and June was the first (mostly) primary-free month. So it's almost absurd to compare the Obama campaign's primary burn rate -- which, incidentally, is a percentage, not an aboslute figure -- to McCain's for June. The McCain campaign started advertising a month before Obama, so it's not a surprise that he's been outspent on television. The campaign spent money on security consulting before the Secret Service was brought aboard, and before they began to protect the entire family. Campaign headquarters also requires security. These expenses aren't unusual. Sending 15 paid staffers to Texas is "flushing money down the toilet?" No. It's about organizing volunteers for New Mexico and other border states, and about helping Democratic candidates down the ballot. 2,000 field staff? Honestly, Republicans have reason to fear that number. Note that the Obama campaign will pay for most of its field staff directly, which is not normally how this happens. In 2004, most GOP field operatives came from the RNC; most Democratic field operatives were paid by the DNC.

The Obama campaign intends to run the equivalent of 18 major Senate race campaigns. Expensive? Yes. Unprecedented. Yes. Centrally controlled? Yes. Risky? Yes. Leaving nothing to chance? Yes.

And why not? Probably a half hour or less of coding. Even if toys like these don't pick up any votes, they contribute to the idea that the Obama campaign has immersed itself in the modern consumer experience.

Communications director Jill Hazelbaker calls Obama's trip to Iraq and Afghanistan the "first of its kind campaign rally overseas."

So far, the Obama campaign has kept quiet ... and probably will let the trip speak for itself rather than get into a tit-for-tat just now.