By your logic, every nominee ever has "bullied" their way to the title early.  This is how the system works.  Once a candidate has a clear majority and the other candidates have all dropped out, then we call that candidate the "presumptive nominee," and they start their general election campaign.  Happens every four years.  The only difference this year is that when, say, John Kerry clinched the nomination, every one of Howard Dean's supporters, and John Edwards, and Al Sharpton's, and everyone else's, were able to accept reality - ie. that the race was over.

Obama's calling himself the nominee because he won.  He's not bullying anyone into saying so.  He's not the nominee just according to him.  It's according to the Democratic Party, the Democratic voters, and, yes, even Hillary Clinton.

Sure, technically, the superdelegates can betray the will of the voters and switch their votes to Clinton, or Kucinich, or Lindsay Lohan.  But they're not going to.  Let me repeat that.  They're not going to.  They're not going to.

Obama won.  He didn't bully; he didn't cheat; he didn't try to change the rules in the middle of the game (although one candidate did).  He used that oldest of dirty tricks - he played by the rules, and got more votes, according to the system that everyone - including Hillary Clinton, including Harold Ickes and the rest of Clinton's team - agreed to adhere to before this all started.  He won.  Fair and square.  Clinton put up a good fight, and she ran a strong campaign, and got lots of support, but she lost.  Again, fair and square.

If you want to keep this delusional fight going, like one of those Japanese soldiers who thought WWII was still going on in 1970, well, you have my sympathy.  But the rest of us - people who care about the future of this country - are uniting behind the nominee, to defeat John McCain in November.  I hope you can put your bitterness behind you and do the same.

All the people who have been banned from the site in the past year, and this asshole's still here?  Come on, MyDD!

I think that's the main difference between Clinton and Obama's approaches.  Obama admits that his is an intermediate step, and that the real solution can't be done overnight.  Whereas Clinton wants to try and get there all at once.

His plan is like one degree away from Clinton's.  Also, did you hear in his speech where he said that Clinton would be instrumental in getting us universal health care?  I think that's his olive brach to her - giving her a second chance at health care czar.

So, let me see if I have this straight.  A black man in this country, who can't hail a cab in New York, who can't drive through a white neighborhood without worrying about being pulled over, who can't go on a job interview without wondering if he's getting a fair shake, who can't turn on the TV without seeing himself caricatured - he has no right to complain, because, in your estimation, racism is all over.

But a rich white lady?  If anyone dares not to vote for her, after a campaign in which she's insulted the voters (or maybe that's just because I'm in one of those "latte-sipping" states that "doesn't count"), attacked fellow Democrats (Bill Richardson is only the most prominent), used Republican talking points ("He's not a muslim as far as I know, wink, nudge), and even Republican ideas (gas tax holiday?  Seriously, Hillary?), and said, essentially that African-American voters don't really count -- if we pick anything from the long, long list of reasons not to vote for Clinton, well, it's obviously because we're sexist.

Because prejudice against any one else in America?  Total bullshit - it's all in your head.  But prejudice against a white multimillionaire who's reaping the harvest of a shitty, dishonest campaign?  Poor, poor victimized Hillary!  It's clearly sexism!  Sexism everywhere!!!

You're trying really hard to make the Wright thing stick.  I think it's because it's the only piece of ammo Obama's detractors have, so they have to keep firing that slingshot over, and over, and over.

"according to the metric of the moment"

By the "metric of the moment," are you talking about the rules that every candidate agreed to follow before primary season started, and that the Clinton campaign is now trying to change after the fact?  Despite that Ickes and other members of Clinton's team helped set those rules in the first place?  That metric?  Because that "moment" stretches back to 2007, or really to when the modern primary system was set up in the late 80s.  That's a long-ass moment.

Also, in response to the update.  The nomination isn't being decided by the superdelegates.  If Obama has the lead in pledged delegates, and the supers reinforce the will of the voters, they're not deciding anything.  If they decided to buck the will of the voters, then they're deciding the election.  As it is, our nominee is the candidate the voters preferred, and the one who ran the stronger, smarter campaign.  And crying unfair about the rules Clinton agreed to and her people helped set up doesn't change that.  It just, as you said, hurts her reputation post-2008.

Funny how, when she thought she'd wrap it up on Super Tuesday, there was no talk of "every vote being cast."  It was, "give me the crown, now!"

> Do you honestly think our country's treatment of Native Americans has nothing to do with racism?

Right.  That's exactly what I said.

Obama's speech was first and foremost about black-white relations.  We've been racist towards Native Americans, Jews, Asians, Latinos, Irish, Italians, and pretty much every people under the sun.  Are we not allowed to discuss the rift between black and white America without acknowledging every single bit of racism that's ever happened?  Because that would be a loooong speech.

You're also missing my larger point, which is, if you're absolutely desperate to find fault with Obama, you'll find it anywhere.  I still don't see how this makes Clinton's response to scandal less bad, or how it makes her a better candidate.  Obama tackled the issue head on - apparently he's a bad person for not also tackling related side issues, and every other problem in America while he's at it.  

But I have yet, going back to 1992, to see Clinton even attempt an honest answer to criticism when there was the chance to sidestep the question.  This is a woman who voted for the Iraq War, but wouldn't have done it again, but doesn't regret it, but believes it was wrong, but it was the right thing to do at the time, but she didn't have all the information, but she wasn't clueless, but had she known, she would have done things differently, or she would have, and please like me like me like me...  You're telling me that's going to fly in November and Obama isn't?  Come on.

Okay, Wright says something, and Obama acts a certain way.  Then Wright says something [i]worse[/i], and Obama acts a different way.  You're right!  The guy's [i]crazy[/i]!

And, um, no one's allowed to talk about slavery, ever, without also mentioning the plight of native americans?  Despite that being completely off-topic?  I guess next time Obama wants to talk about one of America's problems, he'd best make sure to include every bad thing that's ever happened in the speech, otherwise he's being "dishonest."

Come on.  You're really grasping at straws to find something wrong with the guy.

Also, who was the most experienced President of the 20th century, going in?  Richard Nixon.  And among the least experienced in American history, at least in terms of Washington experience?  The two Roosevelts, and Abraham Lincoln.

I agree, but remember Obama was just coming off the Rev. Wright Returns thing - he basically had the worst two weeks of his campaign, and still won the day handily.

Clinton supporters keep repeating this nonsense over and over, as if saying it enough times makes it true.  Just answer me this: if Clinton runs such a great campaign, how come she blew a huge lead and lost to Obama?

As for the so-called media bias, let's examine a scandal from each candidate:

Reverend Wright: The media was all over this, so Obama responded forcefully and directly, with a landmark speech and an honest discussion about race in America.

Snipergate: Clinton stuck to her story.  Then she changed her story.  Then she said she couldn't remember.  Then she said she was tired.

If you were the media, how would you cover those two responses?  And if you were the Democrats, who would you want responding to Swift Boat '08, in whatever form it takes?  The media's favorable to Obama because he's better at presenting himself to the media.  That's a huge skill for a campaigner, and a huge asset for the nominee.

Finally, a big cause for concern isn't just who's going to beat McCain by how much (because, even if we do slavishly follow the polls, both candidates are beating McBush handily at the moment), but who's going to make a better President.  Do we want a president who's going to lash out at Democrats who disagree with her (Richardson)?  Who can't defend their own decisions (Iraq)?  Who cry foul when they lose fair and square?

Let's face it - Clinton's a smart, talented, ambitious woman who ran an uneven, undisciplined campaign, and would continue to do so in November.  Except she's not going to, because she lost.  Obama ran the better campaign, he was the better candidate, he played by the rules whether he agreed with them or not, and he won.  He won.  He's going to be the nominee, and you live in fantasyland if you think the Democratic Party is going to overturn the will of the voters because of, frankly, a pretty flimsy case that she'd do better in November.

And while I'm thinking about it, one more analysis of that case.  Clinton's argument seems to boil down to "I'll win Florida."  I'm not eager to put all our eggs in that particular basket again.  Obama, meanwhile, is leading in Ohio, Iowa and Colorado, is tied in Virginia, and is within 5% in South Carolina.  South freakin' Carolina!  If Clinton's campaign is all about Florida, McCain has to defend one state.  Obama's going to hit him everywhere.  If McCain has to defend the Carolinas, that's time and money he's not spending trying to flip Pennsylvania or hold onto Ohio.  It's just plain smart strategy.  Plus, campaigning in 50 states is going to help downticket races.  You think having Clinton on the ballot would have helped state and local candidates in the "latte-drinking" states that "don't count"?  Every state counts, damn it.

Obama [i]has[/i] closed the deal.  His lead in pledged delegates is officially insurmountable.  He leads in superdelegates.  Clinton's run a strong campaign, and it's certainly incredibly close, but she lost.  Increasing her lead?  I wasn't aware that she had a lead in anything that actually matters.  She only has a popular vote lead depending on her own version of which states "count" and which ones don't.  It's like the Patriots crowing that they had more offensive yards in the Superbowl.  So what.  The Giants won the game.  Likewise, Obama's the nominee, and let's face the facts, he deserves to be.

Clinton started out with a big lead - besides being the presumed nominee from the get-go, she had 100 more superdelegates going into Super Tuesday - people who basically made up their mind before the campaign started.  And she blew it.  

If she were really that great a canddiate, she would have slammed the door on Obama back in February.  But the fact is, he ran a better campaign.  He campaigned in every state and didn't dismiss half the country as not counting.  He rarely went negative - certainly not to the degree that Clinton and her proxies did.  And his campaign was more professional, more organized, and more disciplined, and we have every reason to believe his campaign against McCain, and his tenure in the White House, will be the same.

As for Clinton's late "momentum", it tends to come in the form of, "Obama wins landslide in North Carolina; Clinton underperforms and barely wins Indiana; Clinton claims victory for the night."  Yes, Obama has problems in the Appalachians.  But he's also going to pick up Colorado, Ohio, Iowa, Virginia - hell, even the Carolinas are within striking distance.  Clinton's whole November strategy is getting Kerry + Florida.  I think we all remember how well things went last time we put all our eggs in that basket.

Enough with planning on losing in 30-some states.  The 50-state strategy is going to have several positive effects:

1) Unexpected swing states.  Head over to Electoral-Vote and look at the latest O vs. McBush map.  Virginia's tied.  Virginia!  South Carolina's within 3%.  South Carolina!  And that's before the boost Obama will get when he's officially the nominee and can put 100% of his attention on McCain.

2) Putting McCain on defense.  Aside from the states that are surprisingly up-for-grabs, there are states that are surprisingly close.  Texas has a single-digit margin, for Pete's sake.  And every campaign stop that McCain has to make to shore up support in Texas, or Florida, or North Carolina, is a day where he's not trying to flip Pennsylvania or New Jersey.

3) Coattails.  The past 3 special elections?  3 Dem pickups in 3 deeply red states.  So what if Obama isn't going to win Louisiana or Montana.  How many Democrats are going to get a boost if they get to do an event with him?  If he appears in their TV spots?  If the local paper's wall-to-wall coverage of Democrats the week he's in town?

He won't just be making the perfunctory visits Nixon did back in the day, either.  He's got an organization in all 50 states, so he'll have an advance presence, and a professional setup at whatever campaign stop he does.  He may not win all 50 states, but I think he'll make a difference in all 50.