Obama fans are incredibly naive if they doubt the Dem establishment with its long-term well-established apparatus in Washington wouldn't seize and exploit an Obama presidency for its own benefit.

It's not as though Obama is breaking from the past. Wasn't he relying on none other than Brzezinski for foreign policy advice? He's made use, then, of at least one Carter-era “retread” and DC fixture more substantial than what the Clintons did in their first term in office. (What's worse, old-Dem fixtures or another round of activists who are “indirect fixtures” due to their celebrity, such as putting Krugman in charge of the Treasury Department?)

The only innovative thing I can see in an Obama presidency (not specific to him, either) would be to scrap the long-obsolescent and Northeastern-conceited name of the Interior Department for a new name, Department of Natural Resources (not “the Environment”!) and putting Al Gore or some other environmentalist in charge of it to show the obvious emphasis of the new administration's agenda.

I don't think too many disaffected Hillary supporters will end up supporting McCain. Certainly some of them will… but true supporters will not turn their backs on her when she calls for their support. Particularly if she's VP or wrangles some plum position.

It would sort of be like a fundraiser asking for a million dollars from some donor, but when offered $500,000, that fundraiser turns down the money because it's not what they wanted for their cause.