PTW, you make a good point. I would ask whether the current discussion lives up to your standard. Is saying "Obama can't win" and "white working class voters won't vote for Obama" taking us beyond platitudes? I would say it is, but it is taking us to a place devoid of progressive insight. Hillary's argument that voting in a Democratic primary between her and Obama is a good indicator of future results in a general election between Obama and McCain is specious. That is, unless you concede that she and McCain are indistinguishable, and that Democratic and Republican voters always vote the same. Failing those premises, the argument can't stand.

There's no assurance that Hillary's chances are better than Obama's against McCain. At this stage in the contest, it's ridiculous to make strong claims one way or the other - the campaigns haven't been waged.

What is clear is that Hillary has weakened Obama's candidacy while he has made no attempt to weaken her candidacy in a general election. There's so much he could have said. He could have raised age-old suggestions about whether a woman is really suitable for the role of commander-in-chief. He could have talked about past Clinton scandals, dubious pardons brokered by Hillary's brothers, the damaging effect the Clintons had on Democratic fortunes in the 1990s - turning a large majority in Congress into a feeble minority - etc. He could have quoted Carl Bernstein's book. He could have talked around the clock about Hillary's truly appalling negatives in poll results, among the highest in history for any presidential candidate, if not the very highest, and getting worse. He could have talked about how she set back the cause of universal healthcare for decades by taking the "reform" process secret and pissing off everybody involved, especially leading Democrats. In view of her behavior, Obama's has been nothing less than saintly. Yet Clinton supporters attack him for "subtle cues" that supposedly suggest he doesn't hold her in high esteem even though his words say otherwise. It's been quite a show.

Storm, I'm not sure that will be ageism at work. Some people may vote against him on grounds that he's just too old to start a term in the White House, but I don't think it will be many. There are seniors who function at a high level and seniors who are less fortunate. Sooner or later, age takes its toll on everybody. The question is how much toll it has taken on McCain to date.

Any presidential candidate has to put his or her mental acuity on display along with character. A young candidate of limited mental powers should not be elected. Our current president is living proof! Neither should an old candidate of limited mental powers be elected. I think it remains unclear whether McCain's memory lapses and moments of confusion about important things - Shia/Sunni, League of Nations or League of Democracies, etc. - are significant impairments. The lapses have raised the question. Voters will be watching. If he seems less than sharp, many voters will conclude it's too risky to put the country's fate in his hands.

I'm with Kabuki. Age is a rational component, as he says. And mistakes are bound to happen. Kill me ten times over, but I like McCain. And I already feel sorry for him going into any debate.
Good post.

Thanks, girl from the Bronx.

There's another dimension to this campaign between Obama and Hillary that has nothing to do with race or gender. She brings up Rezko, Farrakhan, Ayers, Wright, etc. Obama has said nothing about Hillary's efforts to cultivate contacts with Palestinians, the memorandum favoring her indictment in the Whitewater investigation, the presidential pardons Hillary's brothers arranged for big-time criminals in exchange for large financial favors, the omissions from her current tax returns and the reporting of the Clinton Foundation, etc. Obama could have hammered her about Clinton scandals past, present and future 24/7 for the last year. He said nothing.

Hillary is not hammering away about race because she's a racist; she sticking with this attack because it's enabled her to dominate the airwaves. If Rezko had worked, she would be talking about that around the clock. It's a matter of practical destructive politics. Whatever destroys Hillary's opponent is good. It doesn't have to be racism, but that will do in a pinch.

Forgot to add, girl from the Bronx, that I'd love to hear your thoughts on the interplay of race and gender in this election. I'd especially like to know what you think about the idea that the discussion is inevitable and so we should just dive in, feeling free to speak our minds - particularly when our once tolerant minds suddenly tell us we should bow down to what until recently we regarded as prejudice to be overcome. Strikes me that Hillary has turned "We shall overcome" into "We must knuckle under."

I've done that too. Sorry you fell victim. I still look forward to your thoughts.

Funny how this subject keeps a hold on us, isn't it? You think, surely Hillary won't really, or surely she doesn't mean, or surely knowing the stakes she wouldn't - and then she does it again and again and again. Some of us try (however unsuccessfully) to keep our traps shut in the interest of repairing the party after the damage she's done. Certainly Obama has kept his trap shut. But Hillary just keeps attacking, searching for the fatal flaw. Meanwhile, though she's always on the offense and Obama takes punch after punch in almost total silence, Hillary keeps a good portion of her followers fulminating with righteous anger as though she's the victim.

Can she pull that off because of the sense among her generation of women that their time has come at last, and that anything is justified to see Hillary through? Do they feel genuine fury toward Obama for daring to run against the annointed first woman president? Is their fury greater because he's clearly a superior candidate? He's eloquent, a unifier, strong on the Democratic Party's traditional themes of tolerance and inclusiveness. She's plain spoken, blunt, even crude, a divider by history and instinct, building a coalition through a sense of entitlement and resentment. How can she be preferable to Democrats?

I'd give anything if she had competed with Obama in offering an inclusive vision of a less partisan America. I'd almost give anything if she were black and had given all Obama's speeches, rendering the gender/racial divide irrelevant to this contest.

I supported Hillary until she turned into somebody very different from the person I thought she was. I preferred her experience. I thought Obama could stand more seasoning. Trouble is, I want our next president at least to make an attempt at honesty, tolerance, and building coalitions based on common interests instead of fear. It turned out Hillary had no interest in that approach. Obama showed the will and the potential to make it work.

Bronx girl. She might be the VP.