Ezra Klein has called this video "the most arresting segment of political television I've seen since the campaign started", and I have to agree. Mark Penn, David Axelrod and Joe Trippi share a screen on Hardball and demonstrate all the tragic flaws of this Democratic field. Watch:

If you need to go take a shower before you continue reading, I understand.

...Even if it wasn't constantly interrupted by the nails-on-chalkboard screech of Chris Matthews, this would be an unpleasant thing to see. All of these men have been beaten to within an inch of their lives by the rigor of the campaign schedule, and amid the exhaustion they've all internalized the meaningless platitudes of their respective candidates in the place of actual thought. These are hollow men.

Penn is of course the worst offender; however brilliant a strategist he might be (and that is in question lately), he is not made for TV, and the bullshit he's spouting is so transparent it'd embarrass a used-car salesman. Axelrod, standing quite literally "out in the weeds", seems to have neither the ability nor the desire to enter the conversation at all. And Trippi, who has never been good at controlling his temper, looks -- probably to his credit -- like he's desperately repressing the urge to either storm off the set or grab for Penn's jugular. This is politics at its worst: half Oscar Wilde comedy of manners, half cockfight.

You know, watching these guys makes me realize how upset I really am at the way this campaign is turning out. We had such a great field and nothing materialized. Hillary could have been an inspirational candidate if she hadn't run such a goddamned mechanical campaign; Obama was the most promising figure the Party's had in decades and he decided to throw progressives under the bus; and Edwards -- who I am nevertheless proud to support -- is clearly the worst imaginable messenger for what should be a winning message. All the other candidates (even the cool ones like Chris Dodd) couldn't get a word in edgewise. My God, who'd have guessed that the most interesting person in the whole 2008 race would turn out to be Mike Huckabee?

Atrios said something today that hit me pretty hard:

Whoever does become the Democratic nominee had better plan to win the general election. If they screw it up, they will become the most hated political figure in Democratic circles for years, like Mike Dukakis only 1000x times worse. If you can't manage beat one of these clowns in the wake of Mr. 24%'s reign of error....

Quite right. This election is ours to lose and the consequences are dire -- but with these kinds of people running the campaigns, I really wouldn't rule it out...

COUNTERPOINT: Improve your health and emotional well-being by reading Kevin Drum instead.

I guess it's human nature to obsess more than we should on flaws and weaknesses, but honestly, these three are all pretty damn good Democratic candidates. With the possible exception of the Dr. Jekyll half of LBJ, any one of them would be the most liberal president in the past half century — and unquestionably the most liberal since 1969.

And electability? They're all electable. Every single one of them is an almost certain winner next November if they run even a merely competent campaign. [...]

Clinton, Edwards, and Obama are all solid liberal candidates; all of them are pretty good at inspiring their own base; and all of them seem to know how to run a campaign. I'm still dithering about who to support, but while I have issues with all three of them, I'm mostly dithering because they're all really good and the differences between them are, frankly, pretty small. Let's not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.