It started early Wednesday morning with Tim Russert saying "we now know who the Democratic nominee is going to be." By Thursday the meme had spread throughout the media. Now, polling firm Rassmusen has announced that they will soon discontinue polling the Democratic Primary. Their press release today says:
[W]hile Senator Clinton has remained close and competitive in every meaningful measure, she is a close second and the race is over. It has become clear that Barack Obama will be the Democratic nominee.
...
Rasmussen Reports will soon end our daily tracking of the Democratic race and focus exclusively on the general election competition between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama.
I'm not crazy about the active roll that the media is taking in declaring it over. I mean, if it was merely a matter of objective reporting on the math they could have said this after the Texas/Ohio primary. The "media narrative" is this weird viral event that spawns somewhere and then crescendos through an endless cycle of repeating until it becomes truth. Be that as it may, it is absolutely true that Obama has this race. If this meme ends Hillary's campaign (or at least convinces her that her long term interests lie in eliminating negative, no holds barred campaigning against the next Democratic nominee for President) then all for the better.
UPDATE: Over at Tapped Dana speculates that Clinton may feel she has a responsibility to history to take it as far as she can. As long as she keeps it clean and positive, I think that's a fine idea. There certainly are women who have waited their whole lives to cast a vote for a female for president (hi Grandma!). If she wants to be on the ballot as a legitimate candidate in all 50 states, I think that's a noble goal. Just stop with the agreeing with McCain and attacking Obama k?
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