Rebecca Traister has a great piece up on Salon.com about the real reasons Clinton supporters are mad that Obama won.

Sour grapes? Yes, but there's more to these voters, some of whom Traister says are calling themselves "'PUMAs' (as in, 'Party Unity My Ass')" than simple sore loserdom.

Among the insights: "They are mad at Mark Penn." (#9) and "They are mad at everyone who believes them to be old, white and racist." (#11)

"So, like, did you hear what David said about Bill and Hillary?"

"No, I thought they were totally best friends."

"No, they, like, hate each other now, because David thinks Barack is way cooler and wants him to be homecoming king."

"No way! What did he say? Was it really really mean?"

"He called them, like, totally liars."

"Oh – My – God!"

First of all, let me begin by saying I'm nearly 40 years old and have no earthly idea how teenagers talk. But they spoke that way in the 1980s, or at least they did in the movies, and that's good enough for me.

And now, political coverage in this country has taken on all the depth and incite of shop class at West Encino High in 1982.

Yes, David Geffen threw a big time Hollywood fundraiser for Barack Obama, something he used to do for Bill Clinton and yes, he told Maureen Dowd of the New York Times that the Clintons lie with greater ease than everybody else.

Ummm, so what? David Geffen is a music producer, philanthropist and art collector (he also can throw money around like Paul Bremer on a Vegas bender, though at least it's his own money). Geffen is also an American citizen who gave his opinion on the presidential race, both financially, through his fundraiser and verbally, through his chit chat with Dowd.

It is a non-story, save the potential weakness in Hillary Clinton's perceived financial dominance. Yet the mainstream media is treating this story as much more than an amusing distraction from a relatively slow political week.

ABC News references the Democratic "infighting" in its lead in a story about REPUBLICAN infighting.

CNN has chosen to use the story to ask whether either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton can be elected president. (Can you imagine a story that asks whether the two leading Republicans, McCain or Giuliani, are electable? Let me answer that for you – you can't).

To the press, it's Brad and Jennifer II, with a hunky leading man, his new lover and a spurned woman. Who cares if most of the country couldn't identify David Geffen if he were remodeling their kitchen counters. It's an opportunity to ignore what's important and instead speculate about whether Obama will apologize (By the way, to everyone, from Tim Hardaway to John McCain, please no more saying you're sorry. One, it's become a tired act. Two, you clearly don't mean it)

While the mainstream media spins its wheels and ours, let's not forget that this campaign is not a horse race, it's a presidential race. It's about more than 3,100 dead American troops. It's about extricating ourselves gracefully from the disaster of Iraq. It's about not repeating the disaster in Iran. It's about securing loose nukes in the former Soviet Union. It's about health care and the environment and balancing the budget.

Actually, as I watch the news tonight, it appears it's about figuring out who what to do with Anna Nicole Smith's body. Never mind.

One interesting aspect of the Democratic cage match that John discusses below is the source of the animosity towards the Clintons on the part of Hollywood big-money Democrat David Geffen. In most of what I've read, the source of Geffen's outrage is said to be Clinton's decision to pardon the crook, Mark Rich. But, as Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post noted, Maureen Dowd herself says that the real sore spot is the decision to pardon Rich in the context of not pardoning Leonard Peltier, a Native American who killed two FBI agents years ago.

The far left always needs a "political prisoner" to rally around, preferably one who belongs to a minority group. In our radical college days (perhaps we should start calling them our "young Turk" days), John and I used to joke about how each leftist splinter group we encountered had its own favorite victim, each one more implausible than the last. Even by this standard, Peltier doesn't stack up too well. You can find out more about his situation (and read the relevant court documents) here.

Perhaps Geffen can persuade Barack Obama to go on record in support of clemency for the convicted murderer, Peltier. I wouldn't bet on it, though.