This is a decent article, but rather apologetic (in the traditional sense) and sort of off-point.

The problem I think most people have with the campaign coverage is that certain groups of 'journalists' within the media will find some kind of 'story' and then latch onto it unapologetically, giving it more coverage than it deserves and completely distracting from the real issues. The fact that these so-called stories are so often about the same people and issues leads us (the public) to believe that the mindless herd really is out to get certain candidates.

For example, all the crap dealing with race, gender, Clinton, and Obama recently has been getting on my nerves. The media, and that includes Salon, has been making a huge issue out of little quibbles between the campaigns. Clinton mentions LBJ in a speech and suddenly the media paints her as anti-MLK. Obama, for his part, mentions Reagan in a speech and suddenly the media is having a feeding-frenzy. Any interaction of any kind between Obama and Clinton is played up and drawn out to extremes.

Clinton has been taking the worst of it, but really, both candidates are being royally fucked by the media right now. And it's hard to believe that that's just happy coincidence, that we should ignore it, that we should feel sorry for the poor scared reporters on the ground who are just worried about missing the story or not talking to the right people.

What I find so fascinating about this entire situation is the idea that a black person can be a "sellout" to black people, without ever having signed up to be in the "black people" club. Let me elaborate....

It seems to me that, having been born black, there are certain expectations from within the black community, or perhaps part of it, that you must agree with certain things, you must act in certain ways, or else you are a "sellout."

This seems incredible to me. As a white person, I don't think there is a way for me to sell out. I haven't signed up for anything! I could be a Republican or a Democrat, a libertarian or a socialist, a Christian or a Muslim, a good person, a bad person, or anything in between. And it wouldn't have anything to do with race.

But the African-American community has apparently placed certain expectations on their people... people who did not choose to be born into that community... that they must act in certain ways in order to be a good "black person," or else they are selling out "their people."

I don't disagree that Clarence Thomas is a slimy little piece of shit, and that if any morally dubious loser ever benefited from affirmative action to the detriment of his peers, it's got to be him. But I think his moral failings are those of a human being, not a "black man." He has betrayed all Americans and not just the black ones. Unfortunately, the black community's strange sense of ownership over its members and the ideas of their members has overshadowed Thomas's moral failings, implying that by "selling out" for one team, he has just been joining another, when in reality, Thomas is a universal human sellout.

It seems stupid to me that black people are treated as a group and not as individuals. That is my point. But what seems even worse is that much of the treatment of black people as a group seems to come from black people themselves.

I'm young and relatively sheltered from race conflict, but I have an adopted Korean cousin, my best friend in elementary school was Indian, my two traveling companions in Europe this summer were black and Hispanic, respectively, my roommate is Native American, one of my best friends is Thai. I have not known a great number of non-white people in my life (I am from Montana and go to school in Minnesota), but those that I have known have definitely been individual, unique human beings. I know that all of them had problems being labeled as simply cogs in a larger machine, whether they were being labeled by the old-school white racist system, or whether the labeling was being done by people of the same race. It just seems sad to me when not only white people, but black people as well, can be equally guilty of racism against blacks.

All due respect, but... people being discouraged from even attending the caucus if they don't caucus for their union's candidate of choice? On a systematic level?

I'd say we don't need Salon's help to paint a pretty depressing picture of the race so far. They could have reported this story with flowers and smiles and hearts and it would still be depressing.

If you're saying that folks like Chris Matthews are more educated and sophisticated than the average voter, you've set the bar pretty low for American intelligence.