I am a big fan of boxing, and sometimes in boxing a young fighter needs a tough fight or even a loss to grow in the sport.  They need to face adversity, they need to taste the canvas, and they need to get up, shake it off and fight again.  From this they can--if they have the right aptitude, the right intelligence--learn what it takes to compete and win at a championship level.

Could this not be similar to the situation tonight? Could it be that this high level adversity--and I say high level because he has faced adversity in his life, we know--could this high level adversity be a net positive for Obama and his campaign?

This morning brings us a new Paul Krugman op-ed entitled "Deliverance or Diversion?"  The article hits Obama with some standard Clinton talking points: his relative inexperience, the media's favoritism of him over Clinton, his supposed preference for rhetoric over substance. And it his with his rhetoric, seen as bipartisan and not explicitly liberal enough, that the thrust of this editorial is aimed.  Will an Obama candidacy deliver the Democratic party not just the presidency but the progressive policies it seeks to institute? Or will it simply divert the party, by dint of personality and empty rhetoric, from its true goals of policy enactment.  If the latter happens, Krugman concludes, it "could tear the party apart."

There is little substance behind Krugman's piece, but the issue behind Obama's rhetorical style could be important to the progressive movement as a whole and is worth some discussion.  Follow below the fold for a more sober assessment of Obama's lack of explicit liberalism made by Kevin Drum back in January:

The Washington Post has put out an article (subscription may be req'd) about the concern that some have for a white man portraying the man who could be our first black president.

The brunt of the criticism comes from Maureen Ryan and Hannah pool.  The latter is a black writer for the British Gaurdian.  She has a blog post up that accuses SNL of employing blackface and says that minstrels come to mind.

SNL defends the Fauxbama, Fred Armisen, who is of white and asian background, saying other blacks have been portrayed by whites successfully in the shows history without being racist.  For example, Darrell Hammond impersonated Rev. Jesse Jackson.

"Did SNL go beyond the pale?" My opinion and a poll beneath the fold.