"While words matter, the best words in the world aren't enough unless you match them with action," the New York senator [Clinton] said. [...]

Without naming Clinton, [Obama] said that change would "require more than policy papers and positions and websites. . . . Because the problem that we face in America today is not a lack of good ideas. It's that Washington has become a place where good ideas go to die."

Obama called McCain a "genuine American hero" but disputed the premise of his candidacy.

"When he embraces George Bush's failed economic policies, when he says that he is willing to send our troops into another 100 years of war in Iraq," Obama said, "then he represents the policies of yesterday, and we want to be the party of tomorrow."

—Obama, McCain win Wisconsin primary

Mr. Obama’s audiences, meanwhile, were filled with a tapestry of supporters — young and old, black and white — many of whom said they had been following the presidential race as it unfolded in neighboring states like Iowa.

Mary Liedtke, a defense lawyer in Eau Claire, Wis., said she had been a supporter of Mrs. Clinton. But in the final weeks of the Iowa caucus campaign, she said she had become inspired by Mr. Obama’s supporters.

“Some elderly women I’ve heard say, ‘I want to see a woman president before I die,’ and I know that’s why some of them are supporting Hillary,” Ms. Liedtke said in an interview after seeing Mr. Obama last weekend in her town.

“But you know what? That’s a selfish reason to vote for a president just because you want to see a woman before you die,” she added. “What about the kids coming up? I feel we should vote for the young people.”

—Wisconsin and Hawaii Hand Victories to Obama

That's a nice way to see things, I think. But I'd guess the kids are voting for themselves in this election. And in record numbers.

Wisconsin offered some promise to Clinton because of its mass of mostly white working-class voters -- who until last week had backed her. Yet they spurned Clinton on Tuesday. She won women, a bulwark of her campaign, only narrowly. Obama swamped Clinton among one of his strongest voter blocs, the young. He won all age groups under 65, and ran strongly among independents, who were allowed to vote in either primary. —Obama, McCain win Wisconsin primary

This is, I'd muse, the point where The Cling-ons either embrace the zeitgeist or begin to rack up some very negative feelings against themselves that will stick around for a while. This moment very well may be their last chance to be "good losers" and step away as if with their own will.

Will they take it?

No. My guess is that the Clingons are going to carry this forward until they are soundly and inarguably and embarrassingly beat, and in public, and at that point people will be so annoyed with them for putting everyone through their personal quest to redecorate the White House that nobody will even be there to sympathize.

In a way, it reminds me of a day back in the early 90s, when I lived on South Queen Street in York and I was living with a bunch of cats in a halfway house. One dude—Gary—from Philly, always talkin' smack about how tuff he was, came running in the house all fired up about how he had started this fight and we should all come out to see it go down. That moment in the living room was Gary's chance to let it go. And that was his last chance to be reasonable, it turns out. But no, he ran back out into the street, all sure he was going to give a world-class beatdown to somebody and after he arranged for an audience, even.

So a few of us, who were probably watching the tube, or doing laundry, or on the fone or something, ambled out onto the stoop to see what he was up to.

Well, this fella in the street just about smacked Gary senseless. It was such a lopsided beating that you almost felt sorry for Gary, but in the end, hey. He arranged the whole thing, had been bragging and without doubt that he was gonna tear it up, and had every reason to avoid it. But this vato in the street ended the scene by pounding the hell out of Gary. The whole situation was so stunning that nobody even moved.

I wasn't sure what to say to Gary afterward—I wasn't really good friends with him or anything—and for a moment I just watched him sitting there on the stoop, head down, dripping blood from his face onto his expensive shirt. It looked extremely humbling for him and he could hardly look anyone in the face. And all I could think was "Don't start fights you can't finish. And know when to walk away, bro."

But sometimes nothing breaks through denial but utter humiliation. What are ya gonna do?