What an interesting picture to head this article from Salon:

Clinton, in a brief moment of enthusiasm between her usual robotic speeches, and Obama, in a brief moment of solemnity.

I'm *so* surprised. No, really. I'm, like, flabbergasted. Hillary Clinton must be an exciting, dynamic candidate, and Barack Obama must be, like, omg, totally boring.

That ugly little situation could turn the Democratic Convention into Florida in November of 2000.

Repeat after me... "Every Vote Has To Be Counted!"

"The Rules are the Rules!"

That could make Chicago 1968 look like a love in.

Except for this: "[Clinton] also needs to develop a new rationale for her candidacy, since voters have not been flocking to the polls brimming with enthusiasm for the notion that she is "Ready!" or that she promises a third Bill-and-Hillary term." I thought Clinton got more votes yesterday overall than Obama, and those blue-collar and female voters are voting for *something*, surely...? In a largely substantive and objective article, this seemed like a gratuitous crack to me.

are reaaally paranoid.

I read somewhere that Catholics and Latinos voted for Billary. Huh?!

So much for family values counting I guess. Memo: you voted for the woman whose husband was chasing skirt before and after she was his first lady in the White House.

Obama is a devoted family man who loves and respects his wife. That sounds like family values to me.

Florida and Michigan broke the rules set up by the Party. To make this a civil rights issue is misleading, manipulative and obnoxious.

Already Clinton proxies have sued Dean and the Democratic Party to have them sat. The judge just ruled against them.

Not too smart to sue Dean and your own party. Besides, the DNC is going to sort it out. The have several months.

But if whining and suing is the way to get delegates than maybe my state can move it's Primaries to December 2011. Or December 2009. Anything goes!

Blacks overwhelmingly for Obama, Latinos and Asians overwhelmingly for Clinton. . . males for Obama, females for Clinton. . . It is certainly inspiring to have a woman and a black man vying for the democratic nomination, but the sad fact is that the deciding vote will ultimately be cast by someone whose preference is largely an expression of their racism or sexism.

Sure, these blocs of voters may have particular concerns that are better addressed by one or the other of the candidates, but not enough to account for the huge disparity along the lines of race and gender. When all is said and done, the people who will determine the outcome of this primary are voting for whomever they perceive to be closest to "one of their own". For a contest in which America initially seemed to have overcome its historic prejudices, this is a disappointing conclusion.

By the NYT's delegate count, Obama trails by 80 delegates. Not a thumpin' by any means, although Clinton will likely carry Texas and Ohio, which'll probably finish Obama, even if he manages to pick up the states between now and then and come close.

And if even that's not enough, the Clintons have two safeties: 1) their bid to seat the bundle of delegates in MI and FL -- the poison pill delegates, basically, which will cause a huge rift with the Democratic Party if used, rewarding Clinton's faithlessness to the DNC; and 2) the superdelegates, which Clinton still likely has in her pantsuit pocket -- the connected, the powerful, the insiders with clout.

So, Clintonite tooth-gnashing aside, the strategic edge remains with Clinton in this, even though she's demonstrably failed to broaden the Democratic Party base, to bring in male, new, young, and independent voters -- the same voters who will be vital in a fight with Mad John McCain. Win the battle, lose the war. At least McCain's old enough that he's unlikely to get a second term. I'm sure the Clintonites will be ready to blame everybody but their candidate when they lose the general election, so they can repeat the same mistakes in 2012.

I voted at a precinct in downtown Minneapolis--a lot of oldsters, especially older women, and youngsters. Mark Dayton, a former senator, came to our caucus to give a stump speech in support of Clinton. At the end of his speech, everyone in the audience "sat on their hands." After a few seconds, he received polite applause from about a quarter of the audience. We could all see that he was shocked--a deer in headlights look. He thought he was in Clinton country. He wasn't.

Obama took the cities of Minnesota, the miners up on the range, and the farmers in the southern part of the state.

If Clinton steals the nomination with dirty backroom tricks and deals, a lot of Minnesota Democrats will stay away from the polls in November.

Catholics believe in redemption but you don't. Catholics believe that God is the judge of human conduct and not the snooping voyeurists who gloat at the humiliation of another person. Catholics don;t admire the likes of Ted Kennedy, a so-called Catholic, who let a young woman, Mary Jo Kopechne, to drown in order to save his precious self. All decent people, Catholic, non-Catholic, atheist, humanist, should abhor Ted Kennedy's craven behavior. And as for "skirt-chasing", JFK had some very dangerous erotic liaisons. As well, people of more taste and class don't visit the "sins" of the father (Obama) on the son and neither do they blame a woman for a husband's transgressions. Keep on peeping through the bedroom keyhole if it keeps you happy but it's amazing how many Obama supporters find it so easy to moralise on the marriages of people they haven;t even met, to the extent that they can make emphatic pronouncements on the marital bliss of Michelle and Barack Obama.

Now there is a real race between Hillary and Barack, can we please focus on policy and less on personnalities? There should be policy debates to outline each candiates plans for the economy, healthcare, social security, military spending, Iraq, Afganistan, supreme court nominees and the environment. I would also like to see a proposed budget from each candiate in response to Bush's just budget.

If democrats engage in such a debate in the run up to the convention, maybe it will carry through to the presidential election. Democratic values align with the vast majority of American's no matter if they vote republican or democratic; we need to focus on that rather than the emotional topics the GOP is adept at generating.