The Dish

Megan on Obama’s speech:

I’m watching his speech now, and it’s inspiring. But it’s also saddening, because deep down, I don’t believe that Obama is going to change Washington, eliminate lobbying, etc. I wish he wouldn’t tell me things that I can’t possibly believe–and moreover that I can’t really understand anyone believing. He might be the best president; he might even make Washington work a little better, though I kind of doubt it. But he isn’t going to transform American politics in the utopian way his speech implies. No one who has dried out behind the ears could reasonably believe that he has this power. So why is he saying he does?

No he will not transform politics. He won’t abolish our problems. He won’t eliminate our enemies. He won’t disappear partisanship. That’s not the point. He’s a decent, reasonable human being prepared to tackle these problems outside the depressing template of Morris-Rove politics. One way he can begin to do that is to bring a wave of support with him, to appeal beyond Washington to Americans who know this country is in a terrible mess and want to fix it. That’s what Reagan did. He wasn’t perfect. But we still remember the difference.

Obama has a 17 point lead.

The terrorist who was behind the mass murder of US Marines in Beirut in 1983 has been assassinated. This is a big deal:

Security officials in Lebanon said the man, Imad Mugniyah, who was believed to be behind attacks in 1983 on the United States Embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut and the terrorist hijacking of a T.W.A. jetliner in 1985, died in a car bomb in Damascus, Syria, on Tuesday night. His organization may also have been involved in the bombing of the Khobar Towers military residence in Saudi Arabia in 1996, in which 17 Americans were killed.

It’s not your freedom Islamic fundamentalists want: it’s your roses.

Worth savoring one more time:

Man the lifeboats! The Clinton Titanic plows on.

It’s on now. Crowley:

I can’t imagine Hillary was happy to see Obama cap off his night with a juicy, barbed back-and-forth with McCain that will have everyone talking about a general-election dynamic between those two.

Here‘s McCain’s riff on Obama’s message and here’s Obama’s attack on McCain. McLovin it.

Frank Newport analyzes McCain’s problems:

…a tepid 34% of Republicans say that McCain is the best presidential candidate in ‘your lifetime" or better than most candidates in your lifetime. I say that’s tepid because the comparable number among Democrats about Barack Obama is 60% and among Democrats about Hillary Clinton is 62%.

Paris Hilton’s latest project bombs at the Box Office. Know hope.

(Hat tip: Kottke.)

Matt Cooper, whose wife is Mandy Grunwald, sums it up:

…the point is that Clinton is starting to resemble Huckabee–a boutique candidate, catering to a small portion of the electorate. In fact, Huckabee is running stronger than Clinton which is saying something.

Glad I’m not in his bedroom tonight. Marty thinks Clinton is done:

[Clinton] will dismiss and dismiss. And then others will resign. There will be bloodshed in Billaryland. Already, super-delegates committed to Hillary are reconnoitering.  This is the beginning of the end.

Fallows’ scales fall a little further from his eyes:

She has not had the grace to mention Barack Obama’s name, nor his existence or success. Not as "Senator Obama," not even as "my worthy opponent in the contest for our great party’s nomination — for this battle we all believe in to change the course of the nation’s future" and so on. This on a night when he has just trounced her fair and square in Virginia and, presumably, will in a few minutes be shown to have done the same in Maryland and D.C.

Kevin Drum:

So did Hillary lose in Virginia? Or did she get smoked like a Virginia ham? Answer: things are looking pretty hamlike tonight.

Two snaps, okaaaay?