The DVD has only been out a week, so no real spoilers, but I have a few thoughts about the two unaired episodes of Dollhouse.

* "Epitaph One" is as ambitious and as amazing as promised—definitely my favorite episode of Dollhouse and one of the top Whedonverse episodes of all time. It is, in every sense, just great, laying out a blueprint for the future of the series that is so compelling I'm not sure we need to actually see any of intervening episodes. (As far as I'm concerned they'd just be killing time before we get to "Epitaph Two," which is what I really want to see.) Joss and his co-writers have been pretty open with the fact that the episode came out of the assumption that there wouldn't be any more; people reference "Objects in Space," but the comparison to the season one finale of Sledge Hammer! seems much more apt. Have they written themselves into a corner? It'll be interesting to see if Joss & Co. can make the second season work when the real story now seems to be happening in 2019. Will people really sit still for john-of-the-week episodes with the stakes raised so much higher? Or will season two be more like Lost seasons four and five, with flashbacks and flashforwards that meet somewhere in the middle? Honestly I think I'd be most happy if they stuck with the "Epitaph" frame for good and did 2009-2018 just in flashback. It's not like we're getting a third season; don't leave anything on the road.

* Speaking of 2019: Was that a Dark Angel shout-out? The episode definitely had a post-Pulse vibe, and Joss and Dark Angel have something of a checkered past: widely understood as a Buffy rip-off, Dark Angel was unceremoniously canceled in favor of Firefly, which was later (you may have heard) unceremoniously canceled...

* The unaired pilot is, I think, probably a little worse as a pilot than the actually aired pilot—a rare case of network interference not being all bad—but it's pretty clear that Joss bitterly prefers it. (I haven't listened to the commentary yet, but apparently he has a lot of thoughts along these lines there as well.) Not only did he make oblique references to the original pilot throughout the season and in Epitaph One *and* bring back the astoundingly unimpressive Chrissy Seaver for "Omega," but he ended the (aired) season on the same audiovisual image—a whispered "Caroline"—that the original pilot ended on. The implication seems to be that the whole of the first season gets us to the same place the pilot did in just one hour.

* The most interesting thing about the unaired pilot, I think, is the discovery that Eliza Dushku is actually pretty good at doing a series of drastically different characters when it happens in rapid-fire, three-minute bursts. It's only over the course of a full episode that she really struggles as an actress. The hints toward Future Caroline in "Epitaph One" look like the latest attempt to explain away the one-note-acting; we'll see how this plays out.

Calvino in the New Yorker.

What happens on the earth when a moon dies is not easy to describe; I’ll try to do it by referring to the last instance I can remember. Following a lengthy period of evolution, the earth had more or less reached the point where we are now; in other words, it had entered the phase when cars wear out more quickly than the soles of shoes. Beings that were barely human manufactured and bought and sold things, and cities covered the continents with luminous color. These cities grew in approximately the same places as our cities do now, however different the shape of the continents was. There was even a New York that in some way resembled the New York familiar to all of you, but was much newer, or, rather, more awash with new products, new toothbrushes, a New York with its own Manhattan that stretched out dense with skyscrapers gleaming like the nylon bristles of a brand-new toothbrush.

In this world where every object was thrown away at the slightest sign of breakage or aging, at the first dent or stain, and replaced with a new and perfect substitute, there was just one false note, one shadow: the moon. It wandered through the sky naked, corroded, and gray, more and more alien to the world down here, a hangover from a way of being that was now outdated.

Ancient expressions like “full moon,” “half-moon,” “last-quarter-moon” continued to be used but were really only figures of speech: how could we call “full” a shape that was all cracks and holes and that always seemed on the point of crashing down on our heads in a shower of rubble? Not to mention when it was a waning moon! It was reduced to a kind of nibbled cheese rind, and it always disappeared before we expected it to. At each new moon, we wondered whether it would ever appear again (were we hoping that it would simply disappear?), and when it did reappear, looking more and more like a comb that had lost its teeth, we averted our eyes with a shudder.

It was a depressing sight. We went out in the crowds, our arms laden with parcels, coming and going from the big department stores that were open day and night, and while we were scanning the neon signs that climbed higher and higher up the skyscrapers and notified us constantly of new products that had been launched, we’d suddenly see it advancing, pale amid those dazzling lights, slow and sick, and we could not get it out of our heads that every new thing, each product that we had just bought, could similarly wear out, deteriorate, fade away, and we would lose our enthusiasm for running around buying things and working like crazy—a loss that was not without consequences for industry and commerce.

That was how we began to consider the problem of what to do with it, this counterproductive satellite. It did not serve any purpose; it was a useless wreck. As it lost weight, it started to incline its orbit toward the earth: it was dangerous, above and beyond anything else. And the nearer it got the more it slowed its course; we could no longer calculate its phases. Even the calendar, the rhythm of the months, had become a mere convention; the moon went forward in fits and starts, as though it were about to collapse...

The much-hyped Supreme Court section of the Katie Couric interview aired a few hours ago, and it's just as cringe-inducing as anticipated.

COURIC (to Palin): Why, in your view, is Roe v Wade a bad decision?

PALIN: I think it should be a states issue not a federal government -- mandated -- mandating yes or no on such an important issue. I'm in that sense a federalist, where I believe that states should have more say in the laws of their lands and individual areas. Now foundationally, also, though, it's no secret that I'm pro life that I believe in a culture of life is very important for this country. Personally that's what I would like to see further embraced by America.

COURIC (to Palin): Do you think there's an inherent right to privacy in the Constitution?

PALIN: I do. Yeah, I do.

COURIC: the cornerstone of Roe v Wade

PALIN: I do. And I believe that --individual states can handle what the people within the different constituencies in the 50 states would like to see their will ushered in in an issue like that.

COURIC: What other Supreme Court decisions do you disagree with?

PALIN: Well, let's see. There's --of course --in the great history of America rulings there have been rulings, that's never going to be absolute consensus by every American. And there are--those issues, again, like Roe v Wade where I believe are best held on a state level and addressed there. So you know--going through the history of America, there would be others but--

COURIC: Can you think of any?

PALIN: Well, I could think of--of any again, that could be best dealt with on a more local level. Maybe I would take issue with. But you know, as mayor, and then as governor and even as a Vice President, if I'm so privileged to serve, wouldn't be in a position of changing those things but in supporting the law of the land as it reads today.

Transcendentally bad. But Matt makes the point that Palin's Couric problem has come from the fact that Couric asks follow-up questions—indeed, that she is gently insistent on getting a substantive answer to every follow-up—and that Ifill will have far less opportunity to do the same tomorrow, especially given the last-minute criticism of Ifill's long-announced book:

Meanwhile, if you watch Palin’s interviews you’ll see that she’s perfectly capable of parrying an initial question with some nonsense and then shifting to her pre-prepared talking points. What was so devastating about the Katie Couric interview is that Couric would gently — very gently — prod Palin with follow-ups that revealed she doesn’t know anything about anything. But with this cloud of suspicion hanging over her, Ifill will probably treat Palin with kid gloves and she’ll be able to turn in the sort of competent performances she offered on the Hugh Hewitt and Sean Hannity shows.

For this reason I want to remind everyone that a Palin meltdown is by no means guaranteed tomorrow—it depends on her ability to spontaneously improvise non-answers to tough questions and Ifill and Biden's willingness to let those non-answers stand. Biden in particular is in a tough spot—he can't allow himself to look like a bully, which means he'll either have to point out that she's speaking nonsense very carefully, with kid gloves, or else hope the comparison speaks for itself.

So Palin may muddle through with nonsense, or she may completely implode. We won't know till it happens.

McCain is trying to run out the clock and have the last word. He tries to go to experience as a closing argument, the idea that Obama needs "on-the-job training"—I thought this was change vs. change, but perhaps that's no longer operative.

Oh, and by the way, he was a POW.

McCain goes back to the well perhaps one too many times on "doesn't understand."

Obama returns to two issues: nuclear proliferation and actually taking on al Qaeda.

Last question: What are the chances of another 9/11 attack on the U.S.? McCain visibly thinks for a second before saying it's lower than it was the day after 9/11. He then turns to the 9/11 Commission as a major accomplishment.

Last question. But first a McCain interruption. "No one on earth is against solar." Will that come back to hurt McCain tomorrow?

Think Progress is doing real-time fact-checking.

More of McCain's travelogues. He's been everywhere! What a maverick.

McCain keeps saying that Obama is naive and doesn't understand things. I'm not sure that's such a great line for him. It doesn't have an impact.

10:19 Russia.

McCain just lost it over the Kissinger thing—hard to say how that will play with the Real Americans in the Heartland.

Brings up the Spain gaffe. OWNED.

Obama says the name right, and gets to the point: "I reserve the right to do whatever I think is best to keep America safe." Namechecks Kissinger, who agrees with Obama on this. Uses North Korea as an example of what happens when you embark on this policy.

McCain brings up the sitting down with dictators issue, but he bungles Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's name, badly, twice.

Both candidates try to tie Iran to Iraq from their own perspective, Obama getting the better end of it by tying Iran's rise to the Iraq invasion and eight years of cowboy diplomacy.

McCain brings up his nonsensical League of Democracies idea in the context of the Iran answer.

10:03 Iran.

Obama has a bit of a stunt reply: "I've got a bracelet too." Now he's hitting McCain on a poor choice of words: the "muddle through" quote. McCain's reply is that he's traveled to these places, a common retort of his I now finally understand: McCain's narcissistic worldview is such that a place isn't real unless The Maverick has seen it with his own two eyes.

Oh, here it is: "I have a record." That was the worst answer from either candidate yet. He's still talking, by the way—now he's going on about Iraq and gold-star mothers.

McCain's defensiveness is hurting him here. He keeps bringing up his own gaffes and drawing attention to it. Now he's rambling about every military action he's either supported or opposed. This is awful. What is he talking about?

Obama decks McCain on the Pakistan issue, bringing up bomb-bomb-bomb-bomb-bomb Iran and McCain threatening North Korea with extinction.

Unless I'm mistaken, McCain just confused Pakistan and Afghanistan.

9:50 Afghanistan.

The surge. Obama hits back on the judgment involved in going in in the first place. McCain wants to hear Obama say we're winning. This has been pretty deep in the weeds, but Obama needed to mention that everyone relevant has come around to his plan on this, including the Iraqi government. (UPDATE: Ezra Klein disagrees with me here:

Interestingly, Obama is MUCH more compelling on national security and foreign policy than he was in the domestic portion. McCain is agitated and shifting and giving awkward, digressive, angry answers. Obama seems confident and fluent and in control of this part of the discussion.

)

9:39 Iraq.

McCain rebuts: I'm a maverick, and so is Sarah Palin. Does he not realize that everyone hates Sarah Palin now?

Obama asks why McCain hasn't had anything bad to say about spending in the last eight years of Bushonomics. Verdict: Obama is killing.

9:37 McCain still talking about spending. Jesus Christ.

Lehrer wants to hear exactly what the crisis is going to do to the way these people will govern. Obama gives a solid answer that goes to priorities, bringing back the issue of $300 billion in tax cuts for rich people and corporations. McCain says he doesn't want to turn health care over the federal government; since Obama doesn't want to do that either, that point's a wash.

McCain says we need off-shore drilling and nuclear power. This was sort of non-sequitur.

Obama praises his Google for Government initiative. McCain had something to say about this, but Lehrer won't let either of them off the hook. How is the financial crisis going to affect your presidency? McCain wants a spending freeze. Obama says the problem with a spending freeze that you're using a hatchet when you need a scalpel. Good line.

McCain wants to cut defense spending. Why does John McCain hate America?

McCain wants to cut spending! Why doesn't he talk about this more?

9:26 Question #3, and Lehrer has abandoned all pretense that this is a foreign policy debate. Obama lays out his budget priorities, including alternate energy and fuel-efficient cars. He talks about health care and education as well, bring up the specter of the Chinese space walk as a measure of competitiveness. Infrastructure, especially new electrical infrastructure.

9:26 First appearance of McCain's creepy, creepy smile at the tail end of a heated exchange over taxes in which each called the other a liar.

McCain goes back to earmarks. Obama won't have it: "John, you want to give the oil companies another $4 billion."

McCain brings up his own Achilles heel, the health care tax cut! That answer spewed so much nonsense, Obama can hardly respond to it all—but he gets to the health care tax cut issue and lays it out clean.

McCain wants to cut the business tax. But he *really* wants to talk about earmarks.

Obama cuts him off when he starts talking about raising taxes and says "I don't know where John is getting his figures." Insists upon the fact that 300 > 18.

Obama says McCain's earmark talk ($18 billion) is dwarfed by the size of his tax cuts to the rich and corporations ($300 billion), pivots to growing the economy from the bottom up. This was a good comparison. McCain ignores the substance of what Obama said completely and starting talking about corruption.

9:14 Question #2: Are there "fundamental" differences between what you and Obama would do to lead us out of this financial crisis? McCain goes back to spending, and earmarks of all things, using the "We Republicans came to change government, and government changed us." Points to Obama's alleged earmarks.

Another age joke—After being instructed to direct his comments directly to McCain, Obama does so, prompting from McCain: "Are you afraid I couldn't hear him?"

McCain brings up his Cox gaffe, framing it in terms of a need for accountability. Obama responds with a pivot back to the Wall St./Main St. line, which he seems to be quite fond of.

Are you gonna vote for the plan, Senator McCain? "I sure hope so."

McCain opens with a shout-out to Kennedy, who is apparently in the hospital. Tries for an early age joke: "the greatest financial crisis of our time, and I've been around a little while." Kind of a rambling answer in comparison, though of course I'm biased.

Obama is giving a remarkably polished answer to this. (Debating pants?) Outlines his plan, hits Bush and then McCain on "eight years of failed policy."

Lehrer quotes Eisenhower: "We must achieve both security and solvency." Question #1: What's the deal with the financial crisis?

9:03 Here they are.

Debate #1 liveblog. Fingers crossed that Barack brought his debating pants.

Everyone who's still awake (Mark Ambinder, Think Progress, Ben Smith) seems to be running with the Biden news. I'm pretty lukewarm, to be honest—I don't think Biden (D-MBNA) is an interesting enough choice to justify the anticipation that's been built, and he doesn't do what Kaine or Warner might have done for us in a major swing state. And Ambinder's list of pros and cons hits a whole lot of big negatives:

Some liberals think he's a bully who got the Iraq war wrong (although Biden did try to pass a less bellicose resolution.) . But I suspect that the general response from Democrats will be "Great choice."

The criticism will focus on Biden's 1987 plagiarism bout, his support of credit card companies (he pushed the bankruptcy bill that Dems now hate), his comments about Obama, his racial obliviousness (the comment about Indian-Americans in 7/11).

Yeah, that about covers it.

(Though it should be said this so-called "racial obliviousness" actually plays as something of a positive in this context. The Biden choice in this respect is Obama ceremoniously returning the race card to the deck; it's a not-even-coded reassurance to white Americans that Obama isn't going to get hung up on race.)

And Biden's a pitbull, too, which will be nice for a change. His reputation for logorrhea is definitely a plus here as well—nobody will blame Obama when Biden inevitably runs his mouth off, because everybody knows that's just what Biden does.

So while on balance I would have preferred somebody else, it's not really an awful choice, and in any event I've said before that I'm not the target audience for just about anything that happens in American politics, which is as true of this as it will be of just about everything else Obama does between now and November.

(...unless it's all an elaborate head-fake. No text yet...)

10:37 PM: In our country, I have found that this cooperation happens not because we agree on everything, but because behind all the labels and false divisions and categories that define us; beyond all the petty bickering and point-scoring in Washington, Americans are a decent, generous, compassionate people, united by common challenges and common hopes. And every so often, there are moments which call on that fundamental goodness to make this country great again.

So it was for that band of patriots who declared in a Philadelphia hall the formation of a more perfect union; and for all those who gave on the fields of Gettysburg and Antietam their last full measure of devotion to save that same union.

So it was for the Greatest Generation that conquered fear itself, and liberated a continent from tyranny, and made this country home to untold opportunity and prosperity.

So it was for the workers who stood out on the picket lines; the women who shattered glass ceilings; the children who braved a Selma bridge for freedom's cause.

So it has been for every generation that faced down the greatest challenges and the most improbable odds to leave their children a world that's better, and kinder, and more just.

And so it must be for us.

America, this is our moment. This is our time. Our time to turn the page on the policies of the past. Our time to bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face. Our time to offer a new direction for the country we love.

The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people. Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth. This was the moment - this was the time - when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves, and our highest ideals. Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

10:22 PM: Good line from Obama on McCain: In just a few short months, the Republican Party will arrive in St. Paul with a very different agenda. They will come here to nominate John McCain, a man who has served this country heroically. I honor that service, and I respect his many accomplishments, even if he chooses to deny mine.

10:17 PM: Reaching out to Clinton's supporters now, being far more gracious than I think I could be in similar circumstances.

There are those who say that this primary has somehow left us weaker and more divided. Well I say that because of this primary, there are millions of Americans who have cast their ballot for the very first time. There are Independents and Republicans who understand that this election isn't just about the party in charge of Washington, it's about the need to change Washington. There are young people, and African-Americans, and Latinos, and women of all ages who have voted in numbers that have broken records and inspired a nation.

All of you chose to support a candidate you believe in deeply. But at the end of the day, we aren't the reason you came out and waited in lines that stretched block after block to make your voice heard. You didn't do that because of me or Senator Clinton or anyone else. You did it because you know in your hearts that at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - we cannot afford to keep doing what we've been doing. We owe our children a better future. We owe our country a better future. And for all those who dream of that future tonight, I say - let us begin the work together. Let us unite in common effort to chart a new course for America.

10:15 PM: The nominee.

10:13 PM: Obama thanks his grandmother, and gets a little bit misty-eyed about it.

10:08 PM: Obama taking the stage now.

10:00 PM: Obama wins Montana.

9:59 PM: Last word on Clinton tonight: It may be that nobody in America has more invested in Obama winning now that Hillary Clinton does. If he loses, the bulk of the Democratic Party will point to what she said (and didn't say) tonight, and we will not forget.

9:55 PM: Olbermann reporting now that Clinton gave her speech in a basement with no TVs and no cell phone service, perhaps deliberately so, so that no one in her audience would know she's already lost.

I suspect those people already knew, and, like Clinton, they just don't care.

9:53 PM: Yglesias: I probably shouldn't write any more about this woman and her staff. Suffice it to say that I've found her behavior over the past couple of months to be utterly unconscionable and this speech is no different. I think if I were to try to express how I really feel about the people who've been enabling her behavior, I'd say something deeply unwise. Suffice it to say, that for quite a while now all of John McCain's most effective allies have been on Hillary Clinton's payroll. Yes. Yes.

9:50 PM: The question is, "Where do we go from here?" This has been a long campaign and I will be making no decisions tonight. Followed by a plea for donations at hillaryclinton.com.

Anyone who primaries Hillary Clinton in 2012 is getting a check from me.

9:48 PM: She's got the crowd chanting "Denver" now. JESUS CHRIST.

9:45 PM: georgia10 takes us back in time to October 2007.

9:40 PM: Okay, now she's seemingly dialing it back again. The beginning and end of this speech sounded a lot like a dignified concession—only the middle third sounded like damn the torpedoes. I honestly don't know what to make of it.

9:39 PM: Seriously, she's taking this further? Seriously?

9:37 PM: I was just typing that this is Hillary's "Mountaintop" speech—she may not get there with us, but she has shown her supporters the Promised Land.

Then she started in with this stronger candidate / popular vote bullshit.

She's got her crowd booing now at the thought that this is over. My God. The horror. The horror.

9:35 PM: Reporting from the future, TPM Election Central has the full text of Obama's speech tonight in Minneapolis.

Tonight, I can stand before you and say that I will be the Democratic nominee for President of the United States.

9:32 PM: Hillary coming out now.

9:19 PM: Fox has called South Dakota for Clinton, which hopefully won't give her reason to declare herself the nominee tonight as well. (We were already playing under "next vote wins" rules.)

Much of the discussion on MSNBC is centering around this absurd kabuki dance currently being played out over whether or not Clinton merely wants to be asked to be VP, or if she would actually take it if asked. Dear God, Obama, do not ask Clinton to be your VP under any circumstances.

9:16 PM: Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC says that Clinton is demanding a private sitdown with Obama before she'll concede or embrace his candidacy. Matthews calls super-double bullshit on this: "Why are they telling the media they want a secret meeting? Why not just have one?"

9:04 PM: Jesse Taylor, having returned to Pandagon after a years-long absence, gives Srinivas a run for his money on the definitive word on McCain's speech: McCain’s speech was inspiring. Literally dozens of people standing in a room, booing things.

Meanwhile, MSNBC has had its mind totally blown by Obama's victory, almost as if no one could believe this was happening even as it seemed inevitable over the last few months. Chris Matthews is even comparing this moment to the fall of apartheid in South Africa, which is a stretch, but not by all that much.

9:00:01 PM: MSNBC cuts into McCain's speech to report that Barack Obama, winning Montana, is the presumptive nominee of the Democratic party. History: made.

[Ed: He'll win Montana, but the polls are still open there. MSNBC is actually just projecting that he'll be pushed over the 2118 line no matter how he finishes tonight.]

8:59 PM: Srinivas, my old political co-blogger from '04, has the definitive line on McCain's speech in Google Chat: so where was all this the last 5 years johnny boy

8:57 PM: Good points from Matt here.

Marc Ambinder writes about an RNC memo "that portrays the Democratic Party in a state of disarray and claims that legions of Hillary Clinton voters are poised to jump to John McCain." As Marc says, "privately, many Democrats would agree that that 'united' is not the best adjective to describe the party right now." If anything, though, I think this ought to give McCain serious pause. How is it that he's in a dead heat with an opponent who's party is an a maximum state of disunity?

8:53 PM: TPM's got the ever-growing list of the dozens of late-to-the-party supers who endorsed Obama today.

Meanwhile, McCain drones on. "My friends, that's not change we can believe in." How long until he's reduced to chanting "No, we can't!"?

8:49 PM: Is that Bush getting booed at a McCain event?

8:46 PM: Now he's after Obama, in a rather ham-fisted way. He's actually coming across as pretty smarmy—mean-spirited, petty, and nasty.

I'm actually surprised McCain decided to give another speech on the same night as Obama. I thought he wasn't going to do this anymore, as the contrast is just too stark to do McCain any favors.

8:35 PM: Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her father is Janet Reno.
—John McCain, 1998

He's on TV now, shamelessly sucking up to Clinton's supporters. Pathetic.

8:30 PM: Tonight's the night. The AP has already reported that Obama has the nomination cinched tonight—his speech tonight in Minneapolis (at the site of the 2008 RNC Convention) should be one for the ages. Keep watching.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is not a rumination on the ravages of age, though early in the movie it briefly pretends to be. Nor is it an examination of the Cold War's culture of paranoia and suspicion—though it has a little bit of that too—nor is it about the way power ultimately looks the same whatever uniform it happens to wear or which flag it claims to fight under, nor about Chariot of the Gods and saucer men from Mars. In the end, it's about being an Indiana Jones movie, which is to say it's all about car chases, booby traps, clever in-jokes, and the sheer, unstoppable force that is Harrison Ford's charisma.

And it does this job quite well.

Now, if I were inclined to look at Indiana Jones with anything like a critical mind, I'm sure I'd find plenty of negative things to say about this movie, from a story that's strikingly light on character or emotional depth (even for its genre) to more than a few embarrassingly silly plot moments to a characteristically Lucasian overreliance on CGI. (Don't even get me started on politics, postcoloniality, or heteronormativity.) El Dorado is a good MacGuffin, but it just doesn't pack the same mythic punch as the Lost Ark or the Quest for the Grail—and while I thought the alien stuff was pretty well-handled overall, fundamentally there's a style mismatch here that approaches the level of category error.

And of course on some pure plane of aesthetic valuation it must be said that Lucas and Spielberg should have resisted the temptation to mess with perfection and let Last Crusade stand as the proper ending to this story it's always been. In this sense Crystal Skull is actually worse than superfluous—the need to return to Indy, 20 years on, undercuts and arguably destroys entirely the narrative arc that somehow took the cartoon hero of Raiders and turned him into a human being. Last Crusade didn't need a sequel; the trilogy was already a complete story, not Episodes 44-46 in the 108 Adventures of Indiana Jones.

Phantom Menance betrayed us right up front, and was pretty noisy about it. What Crystal Skull does is quieter, subtler, and perhaps ultimately more devastating to its franchise: it takes that human being from Crusade and turns him back to a cartoon again.

If I were inclined to look at Indiana Jones critically, I'm saying, I think I'd have a pretty ambivalent view of Crystal Skull. But tonight I'm not at all inclined to do any of that—I watched Indiana Jones tonight as I always do, with the spellbound eyes of my twelve-year-old self, and he liked the movie just fine.

I'm working on some other things, which is why liveblogging has been a bit slow. I'm not planning on waiting up until Texas is called, frankly. Events have hewed so closely to my initial predictions that I'm not sure what else there is to say. Regardless of how Texas ultimately shakes out, Clinton clearly has the credibility with her Ohio win to go forward to Pennsylvania despite the fact that from a mathematical standpoint she really can't win the nomination, and no matter what it will do to the party to have her slinging mud at Obama until April. Neither a close Obama loss or a razor-thin Obama victory in Texas changes the calculus in any significant way: If Clinton and her people are determined to go quixotically forward, they will, and the rest of us will all just have to live with it.

Despite losing Ohio 58-40 at the moment, Obama is actually ahead in delegates, 32-28. That's a pretty astounding differential, but probably closer in line to what the final results will look like—as I said below, he'll lose the state, but probably not by 18.

Su, my operative in Ohio, called me just a few minutes ago to concede the state and apologize for her colossal failure in delivering Ohio for Obama. And now Hillary Clinton is the projected winner in Ohio by what looks like a good margin, though it's likely to narrow significantly when the cities start reporting. (Cleveland in particular has barely reported anything yet.) I'd guess the final margin will be under ten points, but that's just a guess.

Josh Marshall boldly tries to claim kos's "line of the night re: Huckabee" award for himself:

Can someone get Huckabee off the stage and end the most painfully embarrassing concession I think I've ever heard? I mean, put him out of my misery. Huckabee seems to have forgotten that this isn't the end of a grand, hard-fought race. It was a farce that everyone indulged because Huckabee's sort of a feel-good wingnut and had a good sense of humor. When he started on to 'Victory or Death' riff at the end I thought he might be about to end with a stunning crescendo of a ritual suicide. But apparently it was Victory or Death (or windy concession speech), the lesser known original version of the line.

John McCain comes out to "Eye of the Tiger." This is a good night for him at least insofar as it's the last night for a good while that he'll have his speeches directly up against Obama's. Meanwhile, kos reports that Obama took the under-65 demographic in all four states.

...got to give McCain credit: it's hard to believe he was able to hang in there and pull it out. A few months ago we all had him counted out entirely. I'm sure a few Imperial Republicans are happy—bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran—but the social conservatives and the natalists have got to be kicking themselves. I bet they're wishing tonight that they'd run only one Ronald Reagan wannabe as opposed to five or six.

No credit for this speech, though. Dull, dull, dull.

As expected, Rhode Island is called for Clinton, though the margin is quite a bit closer than I expected it would be pretty much exactly as I predicted last night, a little less than the margin of victory in Vermont.

Actually, Huckabee dropped out just now. The real loser in all this, of course, is poor Stephen Colbert.

...kos gets in the line of night re: Huckabee. Where's Chuck Norris? Doesn't like to hang out with losers?

The networks are reporting that John McCain has clinched the Republican nomination. Huckabee to drop out tomorrow; better yet, Bush to endorse McCain tomorrow...

Still not much word on Ohio or Texas, but the results so far don't look half bad. Texas has already reported what are apparently the early voting numbers, and Obama has a lead of over 100,000. That's going to be hard for Clinton to make up.

Ohio said to be too close to call. Given where we were a few weeks ago, that's certainly good news...

Since MSNBC isn't streaming tonight, I'm forced to watch CNN. But Marc Ambinder gives me my Chuck Todd fix:

NBC News Political Director Chuck Todd on MSNBC points out that Hillary Clinton's delegate spread in Ohio, assuming she wins the popular vote narrowly, could be as large as +5 or as narrow as.. -1..if Obama runs up the margins in the Cleveland-area districts held by Rep. Dennis Kucinich and Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones.

Go on, Cleveland, work your magic. Ambinder also notes that Vermont may paradoxically be the most important state of the night—it's the only state where one of the candidates is likely to gain very many delegates vis a vis the other.

MSNBC projects Vermont for Obama. No big surprise there.

HuffPo has what it describes as "first exits." I'm not sure whether that means they're the first batch of unweighted exits, which would make them almost entirely useless, or if they're just the first exit polls anyone has seen, which would make them only mostly useless. Regardless, here are the numbers:

VT Obama - 67, Clinton - 33
OH Obama - 51, Clinton - 49
TX Obama - 50, Clinton - 49
RI Obama - 49, Clinton - 49

Based on these numbers I would advise Obama fans to brace themselves for possible disappointment tonight. While Obama has consistently outperformed the last telephone polls before primaries, he has consistently underpeformed early exit data. If the exit data is biased towards Obama in the same proportions we saw last month on Super Tuesday, that would suggest he'll lose all three of the close contests by a few percent.

(On second thought, since the early voting in Texas was generally agreed to favor Obama, he may still squeak out a close win there even if this data is biased towards Obama in the way I fear it is.)

Close margins like that won't matter for the delegate math, but they do matter for the spin war, which rightly or wrongly is the important thing tonight...

While we're waiting for actual information, check out "Hillary's Math Problem" from Jonathan Alter at Newsweek, probably the most linked article of the day, which shows how Clinton can go on to win all of the remaining 16 states by huge margins—which she won't—and still not catch up to Obama's current delegate lead. This thing is already over, regardless of what happens tonight; Dean or Gore or someone needs to pull the plug.

Drudge has already called Vermont for Obama despite the fact that the polls don't close there for another half-hour. It's irresponsible and unethical but almost certainly correct.

That leaves Rhode Island, Ohio, and Texas, which Drudge describes as "deadlocked." A look at the random and unreliable exit polls shows good news for either candidate depending on how information that is currently unknown shakes out. There were high numbers of independent voters in all four states, including 20% in Ohio and 25% in Texas—beating the Survey USA assumptions, which is obviously good news for Barack. Fox asked voters "which candidate could better defeat the Republican in November" and the results are also quite O-positive.

Among Ohio voters:

Obama: 52 percent
Clinton: 44

Among Texas voters:

Obama: 52 percent
Clinton: 41

However, other signs point to Clinton, including signs of high Latino turnout in Texas. Without knowing how many people voted early, and in what proportions, Texas in particular is impossible to gauge based on this data alone.

The media seems to be doing its damnedest to help Barack out for tonight's debate: the front-page story of the New York Times looks like the gift-wrapped answer to the inevitable Rezko slur, while Good Morning America has video of Hillary Clinton sitting idly by on the board of Wal-Mart while the friendly megastore beat on unions.

It's not all good news for Obama, though—The Washington Times reports that his commitment to the incredibly stupid Drug War is not especially iron-clad. For me that's three wins for Obama, but as a dirty-hippie quasi-pacifistic vegetarian atheist I'm not the target audience for just about anything that happens in American politics.

I'm going to try and watch the Democratic candidate debate tonight—I've avoided these things so far, because they're almost always unwatchable, but there comes a time when you can no longer run—so if anything interesting happens I'll be around to blog about it. In the meantime, though I have a few more primary links for those of you who aren't totally sick of this topic yet:

* The new ARG poll, previously favorable to Clinton, now shows Obama clobbering her 38% to 26%.

* Inevitable "Worst Person in the World" Bill O'Reilly got accosted by the Secret Service today after making a scene at an Obama rally. If the party alignment were switched he probably would have been arrested, but for now I'm content just to see the guy continuing to make a complete ass out of himself.

* Pictures from an Obama rally this morning show the huge numbers of people who are turning out to see him speak. I believe this particular rally had over 2,500 people attend—they packed two gyms. Marc Ambinder, though apparently a Clinton supporter, has a nice post that recognizes the sheer magnitude of what is going on here, and what it means for the Clinton campaign going forward.

* This cartoon comparing the greatness of two Illinois politicians with limited "national experience" is very cute, but even it returns us inevitably to the current paroxysm of fear gripping many in both the African-American community and the progressive left, before and after Iowa, my endlessly pessimistic self included: What if the worst happens, again? I don't fear violence after either an Obama victory or loss, as some on the right already claim to; all I fear is that at some point in the days and months and (hopefully) years ahead the country will once again be made to suffer its best and brightest hope being snatched away. I've felt this fear intensely since immediately following the news of Obama's Iowa victory, and I suspect I'll keep feeling it on some level or another until Jan. 20, 2017. I admire the hell out of the man just for risking that alone; talk about the audacity of hope.