MURDOCH DOESN'T THINK OBAMA'S A LOSER

So how did Rupert Murdoch, who hosted a Hillary Clinton fund-raiser a while back, commemorate her big West Virginia victory in his New York Post?



A cabdriver and a local news anchor who uttered cusswords -- both bigger stories to Rupe than Hill's win. Primary? What primary?

Not much more at the top of the page at nypost.com -- just a tiny headline under "News Alerts," and it's "Clinton's W.Va. victory does little to slow Obama."

Murdoch isn't playing Operation Chaos games. He knows Hillary Clinton won't be the next president, and he knows Barack Obama very well could be. How he treats Obama in the future will depend on how likely, in Murdoch's estimation, Obama is to win in November, but right now it looks as if Rupe firmly believes Obama has a real shot, and is worth treating reasonably well (for business reasons, of course). Check out, for instance, the cool, flattering Obama-as-pool-shark picture accompanying this Post story (headline: OBAMA AIMS FOR NOV.: HILL HINTS SHE'S SET TO PULL THE PLUG). Oh, and did I mention this headline from today?

MOUNTAIN LANDSLIDE FOR HOPE-LESS HILL
W.VA. WIN IS MEANINGLESS

You'll hear a lot of people saying today that the West Virginia results mean that Obama is doomed as a general-election candidate, and you'll hear a few saying he could still lose the nomination.

Rupert Murdoch doesn't think so. And Rupert Murdoch, however loathsome he may be, is a very smart guy. And he sure as hell isn't some "liberal media" guy who's "in the tank" for Obama out of a sense that they share a worldview.