There was a poignancy about the moment, seeing Hillary crack with exhaustion from decades of yearning to be the principal rather than the plus-one. But there was a whiff of Nixonian self-pity about her choking up. What was moving her so deeply was her recognition that the country was failing to grasp how much it needs her. In a weirdly narcissistic way, she was crying for us.

I rarely think that Dowd writes a column worth reading, but this one is interesting -- both given her place in the media-pundit-ocracy as well as for the analysis itself.