Despite all the evidence that points to a good year for the Democrats, is it possible that the GOP might pull out a victory in November? Well, several things have to happen.

First, a viable third party candidate might help pull a few votes away from the Democrats. So thank you Ralph Nader for announcing that, once again, you are throwing your hat in the ring. Alas, I suspect that a lot of liberal voters have learned their lesson from 2000 and 2004 and, besides, Obama is much more to their liking than Gore or Kerry.

Second, the Democratic Party needs to engage in a long, drawn-out fight for the nomination, perhaps all the way to the convention. This will prevent the eventual nominee from doing fundraising and campaigning for the general election during that period and, more importantly, could result in bad blood between partisans of both candidates. This fact is becoming more and more apparent to media observers, and clearly must be on the minds of those inside the party leadership. Bob Novak, observing this, wonders who among them will tell Hillary that she needs to drop out. Jonathan Alter is conflicted, as his media persona wants the compelling story that would be generated by a fight all the way to the convention, but his liberal self wants Hillary to get out now.

Finally, it could be that Obama's messianic vision of himself might become apparent to the voters, something writers (and McCain supporters) like Bill Kristol will keep pointing out between now and the election.

Pretty thin stuff, I know, but it's all I can hope for at the moment.

Meanwhile, if this is the end for Hillary, we can join Andrew Sullivan in marvelling at how all their old, bad habits came back to bite them, and rejoice at finally (perhaps) seeing them recede in our rear view window.

One other story of note, as the New York Times puts into print the hushed talk that has surrounded the Obama campaign (I've heard it myself in casual conversation with a number of people). Is Obama more likely to be a target for assassination than any other presidential candidate? A lot of folks think so, including the Secret Service.