After Clinton’s decisive victory in Pennsylvania pollsters need to parse the effectiveness of her last-minute advertisement, employing images of Pearl Harbor and Osama bin Laden. She was expected to win the Keystone State anyway, of course, and Obama’s people were quick to remind folks that they had narrowed a 30-point lead to a 10-point victory over the course of a few months. And most of the voters she got (older, whiter, bluer of collar) were ones many had ceded to her long before the bitter-voter brouhaha.

But did that fleeting image of bin Laden help persuade some of those last-minute voters she looks to have won? It couldn’t have hurt, her people must be thinking, in which case you can expect to see more subliminal images marching through her ads: earthquakes, floods, Vesuvius erupting. “It’s the toughest job in the world, you need to be ready for anything,” the announcer declares, and only a superhero (aided by her league of superdelegates of course — join now and you could be looking at an ambassadorship to someplace nice in about eight months!) can save the planet.

I don’t want to add anything to the opinions already out there about the toll this is or is not taking on the party. Like Will Rogers, I only know what I read in the papers, and seeing the coverage of last night’s primary in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal side-by-side was an instructive reminder of the importance of perception. “Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton scored a decisive victory over Senator Barack Obama on Tuesday in the Pennsylvania primary, giving her candidacy a critical boost as she struggles to raise money and persuade party leaders to let the Democratic nominating fight go on,” ran the Times lede — a scrappy kid-says-in-the-picture story that goes on to say that “her victory nonetheless gives her a strong rationale for continuing her candidacy in spite of those Democrats who would prefer to coalesce around Mr. Obama.”

The Journal’s take was slightly more downbeat, at least if you’re a Hillary supporter. “Hillary Clinton kept her presidential candidacy alive with a decisive victory in Pennsylvania’s Democratic primary, but still faces long odds in her quest to overtake front-runner Barack Obama on the road to the party’s nomination,” begins the report, going on to note that her campaign was struggling for money and that her margin of victory probably wouldn’t change the conversation.

The Murdoch-owned Journal has arguably been more Obama-friendly in its coverage of the election in general, but its worth remembering that the Murdoch-owned New York Post started being friendlier to Clinton when it was obvious she would win her senate seat the second time. Is it just because he likes a good news story? (Look at the paper’s coverage of the departure of the WSJ’s managing editor, also on the front page: “Editor Out as Murdoch Speeds Change at WSJ,” making it sound like Marcus Brauchli was old and in the way.) Or does he know something the Times doesn’t, ie, when to back a winner?

More disturbing than invoking the Evil Cave Dweller before the closing bell were remarks Clinton made about Iran. “I want the Iranians to know that if I’m the president, we will attack Iran,” she smiled sweetly on ABC’s Good Morning America yesterday. “In the next ten years, in which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them.” Actually, we’re able to totally obliterate them now. Maybe she was thinking of her opponent. Or maybe she just wants to assure any Democrats leaning toward McCain that she remembers the Beach Boys too.

One of the great things about a hotly contested political campaign is that you get to see the opponents change roles, sometimes several times over the course. “The loser now shall later be win,” as Dylan sang in his usual challenging syntax, or more accurately: the loser now shall later act like a winner. Or the underdog who should be winner. Or the person who used to complain about getting ganged up but who now says ganging up on the lead candidate is an all-American sport, like horse shoes, or shooting at birds just like I did with grandpa when I was a little girl…

After Obama complained about the tenor of Wednesday’s debate, Hillary saw this as an opportunity to call him a weenie again. “We were both asked some pretty tough questions,” she told a local TV station in Pennsylvania yesterday. “That’s part of what happens in a debate and a campaign,” she said. “And I know he spent all day yesterday complaining about the hard questions he was asked. But you know, being asked tough questions in a debate is nothing like the pressures you face inside the White House. And in fact when the going gets tough you can’t just walk away…”

Actually you can walk away from the helicopter, cupping a hand over your ear to indicate you can’t understand what reporters are shouting. Be sure to smile, and have someone cue the dog.

Obama, in all fairness, spoke more about the level of the discourse in the debate, and the rather three-pronged nature of the attack: At times ABC moderators Charles Gibson and George Stephanopoulos played hoods to Hillary’s Sinatra (“Okay, boys, that’s enough”). But blaming the press is a chump’s game. The anchors who moderate these things are the worst kind of media prima donnas; surrounded by sycophants, they come to actually believe that their opinions matter. And a candidate’s press corps, the people who gamely follow them around from one stop to the next, on planes and busses, are already beleaguered. (Think of your last plane trip, multiply that by 1000, and add the joy of listening to the same stump speech every day for months.) You can’t afford to have them turn on you. Look at what’s happening with McCain’s coverage now that he’s doing less straight talking and more spinning. Feed the animals and maybe they won’t bite.

Later, after Bill Clinton (who hates the press with a passion) accused Obama of “whining,” his wife came back for another swing of the bat. “Having been in the White House for eight years, and seen what happens in terms of the pressures and stresses on a president, that was nothing,” Hillary told kids at a high school in Pennsylvania, confusing, once again, being on the premises with having had the job. When she speaks of her eight years in the White House as the cornerstone of her experience I think of little kids, behind those toy steering wheels, who believe they are driving the car.

But if turnabout is fair play, as the former frontrunner seems to think, she must have relished the release of her own secret fundraiser tape. Speaking to supporters at a closed-door event after Super Tuesday (note to candidates: there are no closed doors anymore), Hillary decried the effect of MoveOn in the election, both its money and its zealous supporters. “So they flood into these caucuses and dominate them and really intimidate people who actually show up to support me,” she complained. But wait — I thought you were the tough guys? And that with MoveOn it was not just about Obama: they have had you in its sights ever since you gave George Bush a blank check in the Middle East.

Personally, I think Hillary and some members of the media may be doing our man a favor by laying out the GOP playbook for him. He does need to respond to stupid, offensive, beside-the-point lines of attack without looking pissed off. The most difficult part of being a politician is probably learning to smile when people say imbecilic things. The primaries are like a tryout before the real battle. A true hero needs to be challenged, as Joseph Campbell reminded George Lucas and others. Sometimes they even have to die before they come back.

Did somebody say Sybil? I was worried there, for a minute; Hillary came out soft, her cheeks looking particularly dumpling like, for the early minutes of last night’s debate but then, with the predictable hand from ABC’s Charles Gibson (who, on top of everything else, holds a Nobel Prize for his work in economics), she got going on the bitter tea of General Obama.

First, the teachers tried to make them dance. Quoting some wacko idea of former NY Gov. Mario Cuomo about the candidate with the second-most votes becoming vice-president, Gibson asked the two candidates if they would pledge to name the other as running mate should they win the nomination (what is this, Washington-Adams?). Long, awkward silence. (“Go on, hold her hand, it’s not going to kill you”) Followed by kind, never-in-a-million-years dissembling from both candidates.

Then, not being able to resist anymore, Gibson mentioned Obama’s remarks regarding those embittered, bible-thumping, gun-toting voters in the lost hollers of Western PA. “Do you understand that some people in this state find that patronizing and think that you said actually what you meant?” asked the anchor, sounding pretty patronizing himself.

Obama made another attempt at an apology and then Clinton weighed in, reminding people of her midwestern Methodist bonafides and talking about the “wonderful,” “positive,” “resilient” people she has met traveling that great state. But she couldn’t stay on that high road for long. With more help from Gibson and former Clinton lieutenant (and co-moderator) George Stephanopoulos, she got to rag him about Rev. Wright again, even claiming that his remarks about 9.11 were all the more hurtful because the attacks occurred in “my city of New York.” (You know: Hillary from the block.) Now it was open season on Obama, and out came Louis Farrakhan, Hamas and, most surprising of all, former Weather Underground activist William Ayers.

Ayers, as part of the SDS splinter group, helped bomb a number of government buildings during the Vietnam War. He hosted a house party for Obama’s campaign for state senate, 12 years ago, but more importantly, he said he wished the Weathermen had blown up more stuff, and those remarks were published on 9.11. Get it? Stephanopoulos thought the affiliation cast Obama’s patriotism into question, and the senator used the moment to ridicule his interlocutors and the silly season in general.

“George, but this is an example of what I’m talking about,” he said. “This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who’s a professor of English in Chicago who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He’s not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis. And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn’t make much sense.”

Well, it’s not about sense. But before the media and Obama’s enemies (and don’t worry, Hillary will be out of the running soon) twist themselves into too many contortions trying to find the next Swift-Boat, Willie-Horton, flag-burning-amendment issue to take him down with, remember the millennials who don’t give a rat’s ass about who did what during the Vietnam war, who went to Woodstock, who fought the man. Even September 11, 2001 (put your hand over your flag pin when you hear that date!) seems like ancient history to them. For those voters, who could very well swamp this election come November, the old dogs won’t hunt. They want to know that there might be job waiting for them and that they won’t have to live with their parents forever. Their parents want to know that they’ll be able to retire someday and won’t be spending their golden years dumpster diving. And both want to hit Reload, change the channel, pull the pitcher. The same old teams don’t cut it anymore.

We approach the prospect of one more debate with a sense of nausea. It’s like going into one of those all-you-can-eat places around Times Square: you look behind the glass at the steam tables, the ham that was sliced hours ago, the mashed potatoes that are getting crusty around the edges, and whatever hunger you had disappears. You know exactly what it’s going to taste like before you even try to crack a dinner roll.

But debate they must, and those who think Hillary will try to go out on what may very likely be her last face-off with Obama on a high note are dreaming. While some would say her shrinking poll numbers might be enough to convince her that the game is over, they are forgetting the Clinton never-quit mantra, one chanted more incessantly as the corner becomes tighter. Though the press has been thumping the “fall out” over Obama’s “bitter voter” comments, hoping a bigger story will appear amidst the dust, voters don’t seem to care all that much. Even Governor Ed Rendell, her biggest friend in Pennsylvania, said he thought the controversy won’t cost him “more than a couple of points at the margin.” Thanks, Ed.

No, I predict that Hillary will try and remind those who may not have heard of what Obama said in San Francisco last week, even if moderator Charlie Gibson doesn’t give her an early assist with a question about those gun-and-bible clinging townies — and she may very well be booed for her trouble, as she was at a union conference yesterday. Then don’t be surprised if she says something noble and compassionate about her opponent. This could be a political feint but at the risk of playing pop psychologist, I think it might be something she learned from having a temperamental dad.

No judgment here: I had one myself, and as anyone who grew up with an alcoholic for a parent can tell you, you never know what you’re going to get: that’s part of the fun. Where your singing at the breakfast table might have earned you a kind word yesterday, it could get you slapped this morning (“What is wrong with you?”). Until children of alcoholics figure out the rules of the game, they are left in state of confusion. And sometimes they adapt the behavior of their oppressor.

Hillary Clinton is a loyal party animal and I am certain that when Obama becomes our nominee, she will endorse him with conviction and urge her followers to lay down their resentments and get behind the man. But she must also be facing some bitter truths herself: if Obama’s remarks aren’t enough to alienate voters and/or convince some superdelegates that he is unelectable, she’s out of ammo. She can keep going through Indiana and North Carolina, and perhaps she must, but in her heart she’ll know she’s finished. That means back to the Senate with her future presidential aspirations very much in jeopardy, and more years of living in close proximity to Bill. That could drive any wife to drink.

So look for Sybil tonight and in the closing days of the campaign, a hydra-headed beast who must learn to accept the bronze medal with a smile and a wave but who must also curse the day that this skinny soul brother in the Motown suit snuck up and stole her crown. It’s enough to make anyone bitter.

After my second day of canvassing some pretty beat neighborhoods in East Philly for Obama, I had a couple of people tell me that no one from Hillary’s campaign had been by to visit. And these were Hillary supporters, at least the ones who weren’t gone or too old to answer the door. For the most part they seemed to enjoy the fact that some nice young (well, compared to them) man had dropped by and even pronounced their name right. And at least a few of them let me engage them and answer what questions they had about the junior senator from Illinois. No, he was not a Muslim. No, he was not an anti-semite. Yes, his mother was white and his father was from Africa, and no, he did not come from a wealthy family.

One of the organizers at the East Philly Obama headquarters had a theory about why there were no HIllary supporters working those streets next to me. “The Democratic machine in Philadelphia still believes in giving people money to go around neighborhoods and help get out the vote,” he said. “That machine is working for Clinton but since she doesn’t have the money for them to grease the supporters, there’s no one ringing those bells.”

It’s what they used to call “walking around money” in places like Chicago and even here in Brooklyn. (I saw it in action during the last state assembly election when winos were passing out fliers for party favorite Hakeem Jeffries. He won, of course.) “What Obama wants to do is reform the party from the top down,” my man in Philly continued, “which is why he poses such a threat to these people.” Maybe. But it’s that kind of zealotry that alarms some people and makes them think of his campaign as messianic. They were the ones Jon Stewart was making fun of when he told Larry King, “Obama cured my leprosy!”

Though the older, largely Catholic and Jewish voters I met yesterday were not too interested in Obama, only a few were overtly hostile and Hillary supporters said they would support the Democratic candidate in November no matter what. (These were registered Democrats, after all, though I met one old woman who was supporting Nader. “Ah, you’re the one,” I said.) More importantly, perhaps, were the non-whites I encountered: recent immigrants from India and the Middle East; an African caregiver at a halfway house; a Chinese-American woman who sold me water and sunscreen at the local supermarket. They were the ones who signed my forms and took my literature and made it clear that the only reason they wanted to vote was to help elect Barack Obama to the White House. The people whose houses they now lived in were like the voters who turned me away: older and more set in their ways. Some of them had moved on while others were literally dying, shuffling off this mortal coil in a neighborhood that was changing colors.