these issues, unfortunately, *do* matter to voters

what do you think is swaying voters more, hillary's healthcare proposal or the bosnia flap?

You mean the proposal Elizabath Edwards endorses over Obama's, one which cost him their endorsement???

Obama's wildly hyperbolic followers can best be described as "drama queens" in its most perjoratve sense. They rant and rave every time anyone dares to question his record, and when he is called on it, they become rabid. Such is the case that the more they engage in this irrational behavior, the more average voters, with no investment in his candidacy, will flee him in droves...in 1968, Nixon cashed in on the "silent majority's" reaction to the scenes of kids rioting in the streets of Chicago during the Dem convention. McCain will do the same if Obama's frantic fans don't simmer down.

I have seen this man personally in action and his pretentiousness and pompous behavior match Obama's...no wonder he shills endlessly and absurdly for him...birds of a feather.

The Dem contenders realize that it is make or break time in Indiana, and Hoosiers I know are grateful for the face time.

I enjoyed Andrew Sullivan's summation and Houston Baker's very telling words:

I sit before the flat screen and watch a minstrel, signifying, megalomaniacal, handsomely suited black minister Wright...

This is exactly what I saw...a man not only mocking the press, but Obama. Wright made a pathetic sideshow of himself before the cameras...he has become a joke, not a serious preacher who cares about his community, but a man who cares only about one thing: himself. He insults the dignity of so many ministers in the black church who uplift and edify.

I read some of the comments here...especially "Dr. Soft's" somewhat soft in the head rantings about Mr. Wright and others here equating Salon to do the bidding of two-bit racists...

Any half-wit could see that Jeremiah Wright is not in the business of caring what happens with Obama as he pursues the White House, or for that matter, with the black community at large...his sorry, pathetic display of minstrelry is a deep insult to so many preachers who minister day in and day out in the black community without resorting to making themselves the center of the show. His dismissal of Obama as a "politician" says alot about Wright also. Wright's degree of righteous indignation is an antique from a time that America can no longer afford to have any truck with. Obama was trying to look beyond the hostile world of black victimization that has crippled so many for so long. Wright wallows in it; delights in it. For that reason alone, he deserves to be roundly dismissed as a hopeless relic. Time has thankfully passed him by.

...that Wright's message deserves any degree of cred, check this out:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0408/9912.html

Then be mindful of the errors of your ways.

Brilliant analysis by a commenter at Politico:

Wright and Sharpton and the rest of the black preacher con artists can do what they want, plenty of white redneck preachers do the same thing. But they will bury Obama for good if he does not fully break with Wright and change his religious affiliations. Americans will not put up with black incendiary paranoia.

Unfortunately, this is what did Jesse Jackson in, a man I always respect and voted for over Bill Clinton in the 1992 NY primary...it is also what sunk Al Sharpton, a man who I also believe has his finer points, yet mired himself in the disastrous Tawana Brawley debacle.

Bob Herbert's column in The Times is a great summation of why Wright is toxic for Obama...a clean break from him in no uncertain terms is in order. Wright certainly makes it clear he wants to rub Obama's face in the shit he has spread over the whole campaign...:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/29/opinion/29herbert.html?ref=opinion

...can say Madonna may be past her prime, but I give her cred for still getting out there...she needs now to concentrate on what she has always done best: marketing...leave the music and certainly the movie making behind a focus on her mogul status...

I like her pop songs though. Cherish and Get into the groove are fantastic.

-- LauraBB

Anyone who hates pop would hate Madonna...as you say, those two pop hits, along with a few others, like "Holiday" or "Express Yourself" (dance remix, thank you), show that she got what pop was all about. When she sometimes dabbled in wayward genres, she faltered, but sticking to the tried and true AM catchy tunes that made her a star is what she will be remembered for.

I too, was glad to see Obama throw Rev Wright under the bus...it was about time...Wright's horrendously embarrassing minstel show at the Press Club should be a blue print for what not to do if you want to burnish a damamged image. Obama had no choice but to cut him out of his life...I just wish he had done it ages ago, for his campaign is hemorrhaging as a result...what I find more ominous is the ongoing Rezco trial which has been covered extensively by Chicago papers and ignored by mainstream press and pro-Obama blogs. Obama is up to his neck in the corrupt nature of Illnois politics, and either the national media better get on board about this soon, or it is all going to come tumbling out when it is too late...opening up an opportunity for the Repubs to hammer him day in and day out.