A round-up of this morning's must-read stories.

GENERATION SQUEEB
(Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone)
The endless onslaught of tiny scandals trains the electorate to be hyper-responsive to temporary, superficial outrages while simultaneously chipping away at their long-term memories, their inclination to look at the big picture, their ability to grasp subtleties of opinion and policy. So instead of talking about the fact that Barack Obama once introduced a bill to give a tax break to a Japanese company whose lawyers donated fifty grand to his Senate campaign, we're freaking out for five minutes about the fact that Obama's pastor thinks America spread AIDS on purpose in Zambia. And instead of talking about the fact that Hillary Clinton took $110,000 from a New York food company she later helped by introducing a bill to remove import duties on tomatoes, we're ranting and raving about Gerry Ferraro's paranoid ramblings about Obama's blackness. We can't keep our eyes on the ball and really think about the serious endemic problems of our system of government because we're too busy freaking out like a bunch of cartoon characters over silly, meaningless bulls**t. And then forgetting about that same bulls**t ten minutes later, so that we can freak out all over again about something else later on.

IN OBAMA'S NEW MESSAGE, SOME FOES SEE OLD LIBERALISM
(Alec MacGillis, Washington Post)
As Obama heads into the final presidential primaries, Sen. John McCain and other Republicans have already started to brand him a standard-order left-winger, "a down-the-line liberal," as McCain strategist Charles R. Black Jr. put it, in a long line of Democratic White House hopefuls. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign has also started slapping the L-word on Obama, warning that his appeal among moderate voters will diminish as they become more aware of liberal positions he took in the past, such as calling for single-payer health care and an end to the U.S. embargo against Cuba. "The evidence is that the more [voters] have been learning about him, the more his coalition has been shrinking," Clinton strategist Mark Penn said. The double-barreled attack has presented Democratic voters with some persistent questions about Obama: Just how liberal is he? And even if he truly is a new kind of candidate, can he avoid being pigeonholed with an old label under sustained assault?

HILLARY OR NOBODY?
(Maureen Dowd, New York Times)
While the cool cat’s away, the Hillary mice will play. As Barack Obama was floating in the pool with his daughters the last few days in St. Thomas, some Clinton disciples were floating the idea of St. Hillary as his vice president. She can’t win without him, said one Hillary adviser, and he can’t win without her.  A couple of weeks ago, when Hill and Bill mentioned the possibility of a joint ticket, it was an attempt to undermine Obama and urge voters and superdelegates to put Hillary on top; the implication was that this was the only way Democrats could have both their stars, and besides, it was her turn. The precocious boy wonder had plenty of time. But with the math not in her favor, her options running out, Bill Richardson running out and her filigreed narrative of dodging bullets in Bosnia and securing peace in Northern Ireland unraveling, could Hillary actually think the vice presidency is the best she’ll do?

THE MAVERICK AND THE MEDIA
(Neal Gabler, New York Times)
It is certainly no secret that Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is a darling of the news media. Reporters routinely attach “maverick,” “straight talker” and “patriot” to him like Homeric epithets... What is less obvious, however, is exactly why the press swoons for him. The answer, which says a great deal about both the political press and Mr. McCain, may be that he is something political reporters really haven’t seen in quite a while, perhaps since John F. Kennedy. Seeming to view himself and the whole political process with a mix of amusement and bemusement, Mr. McCain is an ironist wooing a group of individuals who regard ironic detachment more highly than sincerity or seriousness. He may be the first real postmodernist candidate for the presidency — the first to turn his press relations into the basis of his candidacy.

WHY HILLARY'S LAST STAND WILL BE NORTH CAROLINA, NOT PENNSYLVANIA
(John Heilemann, New York)
Why is the Tarheel State ostensibly so important? Because, of the nine states (including Puerto Rico) still waiting to hold primaries, it’s the only one in which African-Americans make up north of 10 percent of the population — thus it’s the last opportunity for HRC to score a ringing, unequivocal upset against BHO. (Indeed, blacks are expected to make up as much as a third of the Democratic primary electorate in North Carolina.) Can she do it? Maybe so. Although polls showed Obama ahead by double digits there a month ago, his lead has dwindled to within the margin of error in the most recent major survey... Such a feat would do little to change the math that makes it nearly impossible for Hillary to finish the primary season ahead of Obama in pledged delegates or the popular vote. But it would surely buttress the argument that she and her people are adamantly making to the remaining undecided superdelegates: that buyer’s remorse is setting in among Democrats as they learn more about her rival; that they are slowly waking up to the fact that she and not Obama would be the stronger runner against John McCain.

SOUTHERN DEM WARNS PARTY TO AVERT DISASTER
(Jonathan Martin and Mike Allen, Politico)
Democrats are increasingly nervous about their party’s protracted nomination fight, and some prominent figures are publicly warning that the party needs to act fast to avoid disaster.  Chief among these voices is Phil Bredesen, the two-term governor of Tennessee who is uncommitted to either Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) or Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.). ... “They have a much steeper, rockier hill to climb if it goes to the convention,” the governor said over a dinner of rockfish and red wine. “You’re going to spend this whole summer – and lots of money and time and effort – trying to convince people that whoever isn’t eventually nominated, isn’t electable."... If Obama were denied the nomination by Democratic insiders after winning the party’s popular vote, Bredesen said, “There would be hell to pay in the party for a long time to come.”  Bredesen is doing something about his concerns. He was in Washington this week to promote his idea for holding a “superdelegate primary” in June, in which the 795 party bigwigs would gather to hear one last time from Clinton and Obama before casting a final vote.

FLIP SIDE OF DEMOCRATS' SPAT: HIGHER TURNOUT
(Dan Balz, Washington Post)
The conventional wisdom that a prolonged race for the Democratic presidential nomination between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton is bad news for their party may be turning on its head. Figures released by Pennsylvania's Department of State on Monday night showed that Democrats have topped 4 million registered voters, the first time either party in the state has crossed that threshold. Democrats have added 161,000 to their rolls, a gain of about 4 percent; Republican registration has dipped about 1 percent, to 3.2 million. That is consistent with the pattern since the beginning of the year: Democratic turnout in primaries and caucuses has topped Republican turnout, often by huge differences.

HOW BAD IS IT FOR OBAMA IN PENNSYLVANIA?
(G. Terry Madonna and Michael Young, RealClear Politics)
Across the board Clinton is winning and winning big. She has decisively stopped Obama's earlier momentum in Pennsylvania--and seems set for a romp. Statewide among Democrats, Clinton holds a lead that ranges from 16 to 26 points. The Real Clear Politics consensus estimate is roughly 16 points. She is winning every major region of the state except Philadelphia, while Obama has actually slipped slightly with blacks and more substantially with younger voters--two demographics that are critical backstops for him in the contest. He has also lost support with other key constituencies including white males and evangelicals. Moreover Clinton is seen by voters as the overwhelming favorite to deal with the economy and healthcare, two of the three issues Pennsylvania voters care most about, and she is virtually tied with Obama as the candidate voters most support to end the war.