Rush Limbaugh:

You think I ought to be happy that there's conservatism out there. I'm not happy my own party wants to get rid of it. I'm mad that my own party wants to cast conservatism aside. I know there's plenty of conservatism out there. That's the source of the frustration. But conservatism by itself cannot move things. It needs a political party. In our political structure, it is parties that get things done. The Republican Party was the home of conservatism, and it still is. But the people that run the Republican Party right now are trying to get rid of it. And it's a death wish. It is an absolute death wish.

Rush is not being prophetic, he is just stating the facts on the ground. The current Republican leadership is pushing the panic button because they keep losing fights they shouldn't. Why? Probably because the GOP (at least at the top) no longer stands for conservative values on a whole host of issues, including spending, amnesty for illegal immigrants, punishing American industry for global warming. And today we have corporate welfare for rich farmers.

Rank and file conservatives are fed up, because they know that McCain is at best condescending to them, and at worst, actively conspiring to render them irrelevant to the political process. See this from Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler.

First off, I understand "compromise", I also understand "give and take" and I know full well that sometimes you have to compromise to get some of what you want. But voting for McCain isn't "compromise", its proper name is "abject surrender."

What's in it for me? The answer is "nothing."

At some point, you have to say "stop! No further!" The thing is, we should've done that a long time ago, but instead we kept reinforcing bad behavior by rewarding it. I don't know what kind of magical, wishful thinking it is that makes people think that rewarding scum for drifting to the left is going to one day, miraculously, make them turn around and drift the other way. I don't know what the proper name for it is, but I'm certain that the word "pathological" is part of it.

I just listened to Hillary's victory speech. As of right now she's leading 64-29%. Ouch! With numbers like that, this is the last time that West Virginia sees Barack Obama for, like, ever.

Hillary's speech was fairly unspectacular as usual, but in the first few paragraphs, I think she managed to squeeze in just about every West Virginia cliche about mountain people, going to the mountain, etc. Cringe worthy.

And then she started in with a rousing defense of why she's still in the race (remember, when you're explaining, you're losing) But she does have some valid points. She is the "strongest candidate" based on her ability to win swing states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. That it has been since 1916 or so since a Democrat won without West Virginia. That's true, too, but it probably has more to do with West Virginia being a marginally leaning state, and Al Gore came within 300 votes of busting that record.

Anyway, it didn't sound to me like she was quitting, or even thinking about quitting. In her quest to stay in the race, she also received some unexpected support from Obama who stated that the race wasn't over yet. Hillary should send him a thank you card.

I don't think it's that big of a deal, but some lefty blogs are worried that this behavior is a little too Bushlike for them.

Other lefty bloggers say grow up and get a life. Heh.

If Hillary is imploding, nobody told the good folks in West (By God!) Virginia and Kentucky. She's still showing huge margins of support.

RealClearPolitics has the roundup:

Suffolk is out with a new poll in West Virginia (May 10-11) showing Clinton with a 36-point lead:

Clinton 60
Obama 24
Undecided 8

And Research 2000 has new numbers in Kentucky (May 7-9), where Clinton also enjoys a substantial 27-point lead over Obama:

Clinton 58
Obama 31
Undecided 11

Even with results like this, we probably won't see another shift in the race back to Hillary. These results are "baked in," they are expected, and in fact anything less than a 20 point margin may be looked on as a Hillary loss. Apart from some handwringing over Obama's lack of appeal to Appalachian voters, the Democrats will remind themselves that most Americans aren't from the hills and hollers, and that will be that.

And Kentucky and West Virginia will go red in the fall. The Democrats will just have to win without them, if they can.

We have already discussed crackpot theory #1: Hillary 2012, which necessitates an Obama loss. In this theory she stays in not because she can win, but to make sure that McCain wins so she can run against him later. The downside and where the theory falls flat is the assumption that the party would forgive her enough to give her a plausible run.

Theory #2, which is plausible, is that she is staying in because the longer she stays in, the more leverage she gets. This article suggests that she will deploy that leverage to demand the Veep slot from a hesitant Barack Obama:

A person close to her, with whom her campaign staff has counseled at various points, said this week, "I think the following will happen: Obama will be in a position where the party declares him the nominee by the first week in June. She'll still be fighting with everybody -- the Rules Committee, the party leaders -- and arguing, 'I'm winning these key states; I've got almost half the delegates. I have a whole constituency he hasn't reached. I've got real differences on approach to how we win this election, and I'm going to press the hell out of this guy. ... Relief for the middle class, universal health care, etc.; I'm Ms. Blue Collar, and I'm going to press my fight, because he can't win without my being on the ticket.' "

Another major Democratic Party figure, who supports her for president, agreed: "It's not going to be a quiet exit. ... Obama has got a terrible situation. He marches to a different drummer. He won't want to take her on the ticket. But he might have to, even though the idea of Vice President Hillary with Bill in the background at the White House is not something -- especially after what [the Clintons] have thrown at him that he relishes. I believe she'll go for it."

However, several important Democrats aligned with Obama predicted that he -- and Michelle Obama -- will vigorously resist any Clinton effort to get on the ticket. Rather, Obama is more likely to try to convince Clinton to either stay in the Senate or accept another position in an Obama administration, should he win the presidency.

Carly Fiorina, whose term as CEO of HP was an absolute disaster, is now speaking up for John McCain. GOPers must be hoping that she doesn't apply any of her management magic to her stump for McCain routine. But hope fails, and Carly starts by emphasizing that McCain is not Bush, by emphasizing that McCain is not a conservative!

Kyle Kutuchief's comments from the Point:

As this campaign plays out, it is going to be difficult for John McCain to energize a Republican base while trying to be the maverick moderate. ABC's This Week had McCain surrogate Carly Fiorina as the guest this morning. She began the interview by saying, "I've heard a lot that John McCain is a third Bush term. Nothing could be further from the truth. It was John McCain after all who spoke loudly for four long years saying that Don Rumsfeld was the worst Secretary of Defense in history, that the prosecution of the War in Iraq was going badly, and we are now executing a new strategy because of John McCain. John McCain has differed with George Bush on global warming, climate change, on how we should deal with high fuel prices right now saying that we should stop the fill of the strategic oil reserve for example."

It is remarkable to see the Republican nominee for president already sending surrogates out to trash the Bush Administration record on the Sunday morning shows. Carly Fiorina was armed with talking points to distance Senator McCain from our unpopular president. President Bush's approval ratings have been around 30% for a long time. That 30% wants President Bush to have a third term. How is that 30% going to respond to Senator John McCain constantly bad mouthing President Bush's record? At some point, McCain is going to have do something for that 30% because he needs that support. Changing his position on abortion appears to be his first overture to the base.

Tommy has a great rundown, but let me add one interesting fact-o-tum to the mix. UPI is reporting that the Clinton campaign is out of money and canceling events:

The cash-strapped campaign of Sen. Hillary Clinton has forced curtailments of political events and advertising as the primary season winds down, aides say.

...

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times reported options are being considered to allow Clinton a graceful exit from race with Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, who leads in pledged delegates and popular vote.

One supporter familiar with the campaign said Clinton wanted to leave on an up note, possibly after winning a couple of the remaining primaries. The supporter also said Clinton would want a resolution concerning the seating of Florida and Michigan delegates, who lost their seats the Democratic national convention as punishment for the states' changing their primaries.

The last paragraph (emphasis mine) is an important one and the reason why she hasn't thrown in the towel yet. She will win in WV and KY, she may even blow Obama out, and this is where I disagree with Tommy, even with the late news, I don't think it's likely that she will lose outright. She will have more delegates and more bargaining power in a few days, so it would be quite easy to persuade her that she owes it to her supporters to stick it out for at least a little while longer.

And if that's so bad, why did Reagan go to the convention in 1976 and Kennedy in 1980. That was Kennedy's last hurrah, but Reagan weirdly enough might be an inspiration to Hillary (yeah I know!) . By going to the convention and fighting for his platform, he was able to set himself up for 1980, thanks to Gerald Ford's loss.

It's not outside the realm of possibility that Hillary doesn't care about the damage to the party, because she is setting herself up for 2012 in the face of an Obama loss. In this case, she would need Obama to actually lose, so again, her interests are aligned with McCain, not the Democratic party. If that's the scenario, she fights to the end, regardless of the delegate count. For the Democratic party, that's one ugly thing to think about. This is where my healthy dose of cynicism comes in handy.

As expected following her blowout in NC and squeaker in IN:

The campaign is clearly running low on cash, although advisers would not say how much money - or how little - Mrs. Clinton currently has. The campaign had started April with over $10 million in unpaid debts, and Mrs. Clinton was vastly outspent by Senator Barack Obama in North Carolina and Indiana.

...

Mrs. Clinton had been increasingly relying on Internet donations this spring from new and small-amount contributors; the day after she won the April 22 Pennsylvania primary, the campaign brought in a record $10 million online. But Hassan Nemazee, one of Mrs. Clinton's national finance chairmen, put the amount she collected online in the 24 hours after the Indiana and North Carolina primaries at only "$1 million-plus."

...

Still, other top fund-raisers working for Mrs. Clinton said that enthusiasm among donors had fallen sharply and that they had little confidence there would be a financial turnaround. They said that some donors had questioned why they should give more money when another set of numbers - the calculus to win enough delegates for the nomination - seemed so against Mrs. Clinton at this point.

The one bright spot for Hillary is that the next two primaries are in extremely friendly Clinton territory. Check the map.

George Stephanopoulos reports (via RealClearPolitics):

"I think it's very much a possibility and there are others around Sen. Clinton, other top Democrats who think the strongest ticket would be a joint ticket," George Stephanopolous, ABC News' chief Washington correspondent, said Monday on "Good Morning America."

The dream team ticket was discussed earlier this year, but fell by the wayside as both sides ramped up the rhetoric against each other, intensifying their battle for the Democratic nomination.

The talk has revived as Clinton now looks like an ultra-long shot for the presidential nomination, and her disappointed supporters are threatening to vote for presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., instead of Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

"There are intermediaries discussing this very scenario," Stephanopoulos said on "GMA".

Absolutely. I expect this to be the natural outcome of this primary (also see Tommy's piece). At this point Hillary is doing enough damage, she can demand it if she wants it. And Obama has proven that he is extremely weak where Hillary is strong. He must be loathe to admit it, but he needs her.

One question is whether she is demanding that he pay her debt off. That could be a grating thing to do, and my initial response would be to go pound sand. But again, if she wants to be veep, she could probably get that spot and her debts paid off.

If this comes off, I hope McCain enjoyed his little holiday, because the fun time is over. We will now witness the power of this fully armed and operational battle stat... Oops wrong movie. Anyway, Obama and Clinton will come together, their supporters will come together, and they will destroy him with full on attacks and endless sniping. Age, ties to Bush, Iraq, connections to lobbyists, Keating five, temper and temperament, it's all out there and waiting. And it's going to be ugly.

Oh and one other stipulation that Obama should demand: Bill Clinton must NOT be a part of the package.