There is a deep-seated craving common to all
                men of words which determines their attitude
                to the prevailing order.  It is a craving for
                recognition; a craving for a clearly marked
                status above the common run of humanity.
                "Vanity," said Napoleon, "made the Revolution;
                liberty was only a pretext."
                               --Eric Hoffer, The True Believer

Too many progressive websites now serve up identical daily fare: endless praise for Barack Obama; relentless criticism of Hillary Clinton; and, above all, great torrents of mathematical argumentation explaining why the contest needs to end immediately.

Some on the left are worried about potential Democratic disunity in the fall.  Many more seem dazzled by Obama's apparent charisma.  Still others are simply incapable of dealing rationally with the Clintons.  (Jonathan Chait of The New Republic called Hillary a "fratricidal maniac" for not yielding to the dictates of Obama math.  Whatever, Jon.)

But there's another reason for Obama's popularity among bloggers--indeed, among much of the left-of-center commentariat from TNR to The Nation.

They need each other.

Hillary Clinton may or may not make a good president, but one thing's for sure--she won't be reinventing the wheel.  No transcendental speechifying.  No post-partisan mind-melding with Mitch McConnell.  A Clinton presidency will contain its fair share of divisive politics.  We pretty much know what that looks like.  Some of us even welcome it.

For many bloggers the problem with Hillary isn't that she's a shrieking, mendacious harpy.  That's for their comment sections.  The problem is that her candidacy doesn't provide them with a subject worthy of their talents.

Enter Barack Obama, a slick politician peddling an extremely vague blueprint for change that cries out for further explication.  In due course, from the fertile steppes of progressive cyberspace, appears a multitude of bold theoreticians and stalwart number crunchers, all eager to work overtime constructing an intellectual framework to support the Obama hype machine.

Right now their efforts are concentrated on ensuring that no renegade superdelegates or pesky voters in Michigan and Florida threaten the Obama campaign's Fortress of Inevitability.  Leading the charge is Josh Marshall, and what a sad and sorry spectacle.  Once an indispensable source of honest progressive journalism, TPM has lost all credibility by becoming little more than a clearinghouse for the latest Obama campaign spin, sprinkled with a few Clinton smears.  (Has a more shameless Washington suck-up artist ever revealed himself?)

As long as the mainstream media has the Clintons to kick around, they'll be in lockstep with the Obamasphere, at least until their McCain fetish overpowers them.  If Obama manages to get elected, an unfortunate dynamic will emerge.

The media has no interest in promoting a Democratic agenda--ever.  Obama will be expected to fulfill his canpaign promise--as caricatured by the press--to end all the "partisan bickering" and start compromising.  If he doesn't...Well, Time magazine has some vintage Clinton-era "Incredible Shrinking President" covers they can recycle.

Obama won't relish getting photoshopped into that particular picture.  His universal health care plan will start looking even less universal than it does now.

Howls of protest will come from hardcore policy wonks, but Obama needn't worry--the big brains at Open Left, along with the rest of his online vanguard of hope, have his back.  They're currently seen waving his old Iraq speech in front of Hillary Clinton like Van Helsing brandishing a crucifix because they're not sure he's very committed to progressive solutions.  It's no big deal, though.  Obama is transcendentally transforming American society, and something so grand takes time.  The policy will have to wait for the politics.  Someday Congress will be full of Wellstone liberals.  Someday.

Eric Hoffer:

               What de Remusat said of Thiers is perhaps true
                of most men of words: "he has much more vanity
                than ambition; and he prefers consideration to
                obedience, and the appearance of power to power
                itself.  Consult him constantly, and then do
                just as you please.  He will take more notice
                of your deference to him than of your actions."

At least we still have Paul Krugman.

Thus far Barack Obama has been subjected to virtually no media scrutiny and--much more importantly--has been the target of no Republican attacks.  It is therefore ludicrous to make any claims about his ablity to defeat John McCain.  It's like saying the Dolphins will beat the Patriots provided the Patriots don't take the field.

John McCain and Hillary Clinton have been around for a long time. They have rich, compelling and complicated biographies full of many successes and not a few failures. The public knows who they are.  Democrats who think they can turn McCain into a flip-flopper or Hillary into Miss Congeniality are living in fantasyland.  A few things can be done at the margins, but the candidates cannot redefine each other.  They will try, of course, but the public will soon tire of it.  A McCain-Clinton race will end up being more about issues than personas. The Democrat will win that race.

Barack Obama's campaign was going nowhere until Obamamania spread throughout the land.  There's a very good reason for this--when the spotlight was on him alone, he couldn't deliver.  His paper-thin resume and his lack of a coherent agenda made people wonder what all the fuss was about.  Only when he became bathed in the reflected light of his supporters' adoration did he become viable. His campaign has now reached the stratosphere, but it's the political equivalent of a Ponzi scheme.  It's fundamentally about nothing--by design.

Obamamania will weaken. The media and the Republicans are going to put the spotlight back on the candidate. He has defined his movement, but he has not defined himself.  I don't know what he's going to come up with, but it better be good.  

After 9/11 George W. Bush put the country on a permanent war footing and created a new role for himself--The Decider.  In so doing he revitalized his presidency and greatly expanded and solidified his political base.  His most rabid supporters now saw little difference between Osama bin Laden and Harry Reid.  They were both enemies of Bush and needed to be defeated by any
means necessary.  In this domestic war confrontation was unavoidable and to be welcomed.  His base demanded it, and Bush was happy to oblige.  It was the source of his power.

In the wreckage of the Bush presidency Barack Obama has pursued a different means of obtaining power.  He would end the political wars and declare himself The Uniter.  In this role confrontation is his enemy and must be avoided.  (This does not apply in Obama's current struggle with Hillary Clinton because she is seen as a Divider.  She and her supporters just don't get it.  Once they are disposed of, Obama can begin bringing us together.)