What A.L. said

Because, why go to the trouble of coming up with an insightful post about Hillary Clinton’s Nevada victory, when Anonymous Liberal has already done the heavy lifting:

And with apologies to Senator Clinton and her supporters–to whom I mean no disrespect–I find the prospect of a Clinton-led Democratic ticket depressing and problematic.

I say that for several reasons. First, from a purely strategic standpoint, I am deeply concerned about Hillary’s ability to win a general election. I sincerely hope that I’m wrong about this, but my gut tells me that she’ll lose. General elections inevitably hinge on perceptions of character, and Hillary is already disliked by over half the country. And perhaps more importantly, she’s disliked by much of the mainstream media, which will ensure that she gets relentlessly bad press coverage throughout the election. That’s particularly true if she ends up running against John McCain, who is beloved by the media and who, unlike Hillary, has high cross-party appeal.

I’m pretty surprised by John McCain’s strong showing in South Carolina, and it makes me even more nervous than before that he will end up being the Republican nominee.

A Clinton/McCain contest in the general election would represent just about the worst possible outcome for Democratic chances of retaking the White House. If you thought the media campaign against Al Gore in 2000 was bad (“He’s a serial liar! He wears earth-tones because Naomi Klein tells him to! He’s an irritating know-it-all!!”), it’s going to pale in comparison to the one they’ll wage against Hillary Clinton should she be the nominee.

And in the other corner, St. John McCain, brave POW, noble centrist, and captain of the Straight Talk Express. Having spent the days since the New Hampshire primary promoting the McCain comeback story, the media is now all but declaring him the Republican nominee, despite the fact that he has fallen even farther behind Romney in terms of the number of delegates.