LADY SEUSS HOWLS AT THE MOON: Too funny! Barking mad—howling at the moon—Maureen Dowd achieves a new level of wish fulfillment at the close of this morning’s column. Citing the work of Dr. Seuss, she lets herself dream her soul’s greatest dream. Yes, the Times published this:

DOWD (4/23/08):

''The time has come. The time has come. The time is now.
Just go. ... I don't care how.
You can go by foot. You can go by cow.
Hillary R. Clinton, will you please go now!
You can go on skates. You can go on skis. ...
You can go
In an old blue shoe.
Just go, go, GO!”

This is a major American journalist, insisting, in the language of a child, that a major pol stop competing in a White House campaign. But it isn’t like Dowd didn’t marshal a brief in support of her childish wish. Here’s the nub of her argument, just a few paragraphs earlier:

DOWD: The Democrats are eager to move on to an Obama -McCain race. But they can't because no one seems to be able to show Hillary the door. Despite all his incandescent gifts, Obama has missed several opportunities to smash the ball over the net and end the game. Again and again, he has seemed stuck at deuce. He complains about the politics of scoring points, but to win, you've got to score points.

“The Democrats” are eager to move on? Certainly, many Dems feel that way. But just yesterday, well over a million “Democrats” voted for Clinton in Pennsylvania. No, Dowd never quite explains who “the Democrats” of this column might be. But she’s nice enough to help us see why Obama can’t make Clinton leave:

DOWD: Is he skittish around her because he knows that she detests him and he's used to charming everyone? Or does he feel guilty that he cut in line ahead of her? As the husband of Michelle, does he know better than to defy the will of a strong woman? Or is he simply scared of Hillary because she's scary?

Yeah, of course—that’s probably it! Readers, it all becomes so clear when somebody finally says it!

This year’s campaign has shown what can happen when a party has two closely-matched candidates. There are potential downsides for the party, as anyone can see. But journos like Dowd think it’s their role to demand that the person they hate should just quit. Those million-plus Democrats don’t exist in Dowd’s world. In Dowd’s world, Dowd wants Clinton to quit. And so, by the laws of childish dreams, “the Democrats” must want that too.

Once again, they demand the right to pick your nominee for you. They busted their keisters during Campaign 2000, trying to get you to nominate Bradley. Four years later, they didn’t like Dean, so they pretended that he had howled at the moon. But right until this very day, they’d never cited Dr. Seuss, telling a candidate to “Just go, go, GO!” Surely, this morning’s barking-mad column takes things to a new level.

But then, Dowd has long been mad as a hatter. Anywhere but the palace-bred Times, colleagues would possibly see that.

PALACE LIVING: In 2006, Oprah magazine toured Dowd’s crib. If you’re curious, go ahead—just click here. “I go over the top at times with too many leopard-print pillows,” Dowd says. For ourselves, we’ve always admired journalists who can spot—and admit—their mistakes.

OFF TOPIC: We’ve finally decided to dump a post about how foolish we think this editorial is. We do think the editorial is foolish (and weirdly illogical in parts); but then, Keith Olbermann shrieked even louder about its central point Monday night. (Understandable. Keith has been a bit overwrought since he stopped mocking those young blonde women on his show every night.) But the topic is a bit off our path. So we’ve decided to dump it.

There’s a reason for our lethargy, though we hate to say what it is. It has to do with the size of the role the press corps is currently playing, as it becomes a bit more clear that the Clinton-Gore era may end.