Journalism justifies its own existence by the great Darwinian principle of the survival of the vulgarist.
— Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), Irish writer

A friend in Wilmington sent this report on what’s happening in the Tarheel state as we slouch toward the primary:
O.K. newspapers in Raleigh and Wilmington have picked up on theme of Obama not being around much. Hillary and Bill energized and everywhere. Hillary’s TV ads on economy are sharper than his which are somewhat unfocused. [...]

The biggest stories on ABC…

…and CNN
I guess it was a slow news day, and that’s why the MSM is focused on Barack Obama and his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. There just wasn’t any good competition. Let’s see…
Actual news stories today, from Reuters:
Baghdad Green Zone blasted under cover of storm
Militants bombarded Baghdad’s Green Zone with [...]

The woman with the plan
New York Daily News columnist Mike Lupica’s sportswriter background is showing but he makes more sense than most of the strictly political pundits.
Through it all, Clinton continues to run on the idea that she is ready “day one” to be President, when she wasn’t ready on day one for a rookie [...]

The Democratic primary, or as many refer to it, our long national nightmare, will be remembered for a lot of reasons. One of the biggest — literally — is the amount of money spent.
John McCain continues to be the main beneficiary of this wasting of Democratic bucks
Obama and Clinton have spent a combined $110 million [...]

The North Carolina Republican Party appears to have jumped its track. They have ignored demands from John McCain and the Republican National Committee that they stop running the now-famous Swiftboat-style ad linking Barack Obama and two Democratic candidates for governor, Bev Perdue and Richard Moore, to controversial statements of Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Obama’s former pastor.
At [...]

John McCain’s spiritual adviser, John Hagee, has apparently gotten the word from on high and has now recanted his assertions that Katrina was God’s curse on New Orleans because it hosted an annual gay event:
“Ultimately neither I nor any other person can know the mind of God concerning Hurricane Katrina. I should not have [...]

Looks like John McCain has only been born once. Rut-roh.
Bloomberg, via BeliefNet
John McCain’s pastor ends his sermons with an altar call, beckoning any stirred souls to the front of his 3,500-seat “worship center” to publicly dedicate their lives to Jesus Christ. In McCain’s 15 years of attending Dan Yeary’s North Phoenix Baptist Church, the pastor [...]

Has Rush Limbaugh had a drug relapse? That’s the only plausible explanation — other than blind contempt for the rule of law — for his call on Wednesday for rioting at the Democratic Convention in Denver this summer:
“Riots in Denver, the Democrat Convention would see to it that we don’t elect Democrats.”– Rush Limbaugh
Talk [...]