From the YEEEEEEAAAAAARRRGGGHHHHH!!! department...

Well, Dean's out of the race. As Craig Kilborn used to ask on the Daily Show (when it was good) "What have we learned today?"

1.) The current US news media has pretty much finished slouching towards the direction of tabloid/Fox News Channel yellow journalism, and has shown signs of this all the way back to the 1970s. It's accelerated thanks to the concentration of the US media in the hands of an increasingly smaller and smaller number of companies. Issues? What's that? Oh, Janet Jackson flashed RAW TIT AT SUPERBOWL HALFTIME! Hey, that's news...SHOCK! HORROR! FILTH! BARE BREAST!

2.) A candidate needs to be 1000% on their guard while campaigning. Either they have to be beyond reproach and have a perfectly bland, "sanitized for your protection" personality, or they have to be George W. Bush or have his connections.

3.) When all is said and done, in a race between a quirky guy with ideas and a bland, safe guy who is telegenic but has all the ideas of a Rorschach blot, the bland, safe guy will win every time.

This all said, I wish nothing but the best of luck to Kerry/Edwards or Edwards/Kerry. America is in dire need of REGIME CHANGE, and anyone, repeat, ANYONE but Bush will do.