I posted this in January, but I'll do it again because the obvious is still obvious, even if it's ignored.

"It's not easy, and I couldn't do it if I didn't passionately believe it was the right thing to do. You know... I have so many opportunities from this country. I just don't want to see us fall backwards. You know, this is very personal for me. It's not just political it's not just public. I see what's happening, and we have to reverse it. And some people think elections are a game, they think it's like who's up or who's down. It's about our country. It's about our kids' futures, and it's really about all of us together. You know, some of us put ourselves out there and do this against some pretty difficult odds, and we do it, each one of us because we care about our country but some of us are right and some of us are wrong, some of us are ready and some of us are not, some of us know what we will do on day one and some of us haven't thought that through enough.

Dowd: Can Hillary Cry Her Way Back to the White House?

Atrios responding to Dowd: "Because only boys are allowed to cry. Or something. These people are all broken. Complete monsters."

Gitlin: Hillary Teared--and Edwards Blinked

Pollitt: Hillary Shows Feeling, is Slammed

Listen to Clinton's words, and ask yourself what exactly she's crying over. The response has been based on the assumption that Clinton was describing and reacting to the pressure of campaigning itself, but that's not it.

"You know... I have so many opportunities from this country. I just don't want to see us fall backwards."

She's crying because she's scared of what will happen to the country if she doesn't win. Dowd hints at this and no one else even comes close, but it's front and center: "It's not easy" trying to save us from ourselves. The performance and response have been equally embarrassing to watch. Does Clinton even know what she's doing? Does Katha Pollitt? It's obscene that our self-righteous liberal "reality-based" political class is so incapable of self-awareness and self-reflection that their candidate's narcissism is misread as concern.
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Ill add -June 1st- that Krugman's performance a Clinton hack recently has been nothing short of hilarious, and that in the end what pisses off people about Maureen Dowd is not that she's an intellectual lightweight but that she's disrespectful to their heroes. It's Dowd's vulgarity that's offensive.