You guys make it sound like the Media knows what it is doing. Yes, they seek money, power and influence. Yes they influence and wield great power. But it's really just a bunch of people stumbling around in the dark reacting to events. They generally don't have any superior wisdom or insight or predictive skill. And outside a narrow range of expertise, they can be quite clueless.

Late last year they thought Hillary was going to win because they had sat around for months on various shows gossiping about how Hillary was going to win.

Suddenly Obama is a viable candidate, and they don't have any angles on him, no quick soundbites, no short stories, no drive-bys (although in the last few days Salon has tried it's best to remedy that) to rocket up page hits and eyeballs and generate the illusion of fairness. They've been waiting and waiting for the Clinton campaign to supply some narrative without much luck. They've gotten spoiled by the right wing smear machine making home deliveries. The Farrakhan bit was an attempt to generate some action. Maybe Rezko will help, or McCain will supply some chum.

The media thrives on controversy, but they know, like sharks, that the controversy has to keep moving. Which is why they loathe Healthcare.

Hillary and Barack know that everybody wants it (well everybody except maybe for Manjoo). If you don't have health insurance or if you are self employed and have to pay for your own, you are not a happy camper right now.

Joan, If you think Hillary conceding at this point is crazy, why perpetuate the craziness? I heard J. Alter speak about his article and he failed to convince me. There's only 6 days until March 4th. Things may look real different after that. I think this topic came up in the War Room letters recently and a lot of Obama supporters thought Hillary should stay in for now.

There's got to be something else significant to talk about. Did you hear Rachel Maddow's comment that she thought [paraphrased] this debate a bit of a buzzkill?

She's the typical post pubescent teen who didn't quite understand that there is more to helping a campaign than slobbering when you see your candidate. This is typical of Obama's cult members...those who are too young or rich or male to know what it really means to work your butt off in this country, take punches for it, and keep going...Obama hasn't proven that he can do this either, so it is no wonder these types are attracted to him.

That venomous spew of yours makes it sound like you've been caught thinking Republican. You are busy shredding this younger person for her political naivette in posting about her personal, selfish reasons for Hillary dropping out. Meanwhile, you (and other posters) are neglecting the two other points that are coming from a person directly engaged in the grass roots political process that are far more significant than cleaning toe-nails:

1) The more decisive this contests becomes, the harder it becomes for the winner to unite the Democratic party. Let's try the Dude article for an example of a unity theme (not).

2) Money spent by both Hillary and Obama is, at some point, better spent against McCain.

If you really have exit polling data regarding crossover voting or link(s) to same, you should post them here. That would be really cool. Otherwise....

Yeah, I could google for it and spend some time searching CNN. I've heard of them. I might even find it. But I always ask people who make your type of claim to back it up with external data. Usually it's those claiming that vast hoardes of Republicans are voting Obama. Not one of them has delivered any numbers. You're claiming it's only a trickle. It's your post, your claim, you should sex it up with an URL to help make your case.

But you can stop it from spreading to others, and you can encourage people to abandon it.

I've grown to enjoy your iconic, drive-by posts. Most of the time. Still laughing about those machine-gun nests along the border. You probably got a finger wagging for using the P-word though.

Those who argue things outside of conventional boundaries basically can't go on [TV] because it takes them longer, by definition, to argue their premises (those who spout CW don't need to argue premises, since they're just assumed) --

Hmmm. One could make a case that both Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul dealt with this. Unsucessfully.