All He Wants For Christmas Is A Two-Horse Race

Bless his poor little heart-analogue, Ben Smith really, really wants the 1% to buy him a primary challenger for President Obama for the holidays so he has a story to cover that doesn't involve a political party convention that includes the very real possibility of being covered in thrown feces.

Progressive disgruntlement with elements of President Obama's governance, and with his principled fondness for compromise, has not at any point seemed on the verge of a serious primary challenge, and the most serious potential challengers -- Howard Dean and Russ Feingold -- have ruled it out.

But a New York reader sends over the stirrings of that disillusion in one of America's true liberal heartlands, Manhattan's Upper West side, where Obama and Biden won 84% of the vote in 2008. A longtime local Democratic activist, Bob Ginsberg, has sent around a mailing to about 1,800 New York Democratic leaders and activists, calling for a progressive challenge to President Obama.

Obama, Ginsberg writes, is destined for David Weprin-style defeat because of "his wimpiness; his unwillingness to fight for anything; and his addiction to compromising."

Some kids want a pony, some kids want a Red Ryder BB Gun, some kids want Santa to bring them a primary challenger for the incumbent President, because that always turns out awesome for the party doing that.

Here's a hint.  If you have been unable to identify a primary challenger before now and the primaries start in, oh, two months or so, then your grand plan probably isn't working too well.

Might I suggest a heavy investment in a robotics fabrication team and a skunkworks instead?