A liberal’s perspective on the divisive dem primary (Brad DeLong)

Eschaton: [T]t really never mattered much to me who won this nomination…. I leaned various ways at various times, and I became more and more annoyed at the Clinton campaign over time. Obama did a bunch of things that annoyed me too, but not as much recently. I’m sure Hillary Clinton would be a decent president. “Electability” arguments for either of them aren’t very persuasive, though smart people on both sides are pretty convinced that their candidate will win and the other will flame out spectacularly.

At this point, however, Obama’s won. There’s no nomination path for her which doesn’t involve rewriting the rules in a way which would never be seen as legitimate, or a massive shift in superdelegates which would likewise be problematic, and even those paths range from unlikely to impossible….

One wishes we could’ve rewound things to about March 4 and had a more substantive campaign, instead of the identity politics-based Freak Show campaign we’ve had since then. It isn’t all the candidates’ fault, of course, as you go to campaign with the media you have and not the media you want…

My one caveat is the “sure.” I think it is highly likely that Hillary Rodham Clinton would be a better president  [. . .] But her campaign’s degeneration into a troop of flying leaking backstabbing monkeys accusing each other of incompetence does not give me great confidence in her as an experienced, crackerjack manager ready on day 1.