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Mr. Tyrrell, your review of the Hillary campaign misses one facet that is of some significance for the nation. For at least some Democrats, rather than the primaries being a choice between cults-of-personality, they were about ideology, and to a lesser extent one's faith that one's selection could implement. Some of Hillary's supporters, based on her history and that of her husband, perceive her as having a moderate ideology, whatever positions she put forth while attempting to get the left-tilted Democratic Party's nomination. Those individuals likely see Barack as representing the left wing of Democratic thinking. Thus the primary campaign for those Dems was an ideological contest. Compared to the broadly pundit-espoused view that intransigent Hillary supporters are either racists or selfish brats, this much better explains the difficulty that the Barack phalanx and Hillary-the-leader are having in convincing those individuals to switch their support to Barack, at least for those observers with a smattering of historical awareness. *If* one believes that the national sense of wellbeing is maximized when government operates somewhere near the ideological center, at least in regard to issues where a moral issue isn't non-negotiable, then it was unfortunate for the nation that the Democratic moderates lost.