Sprinter v. Miler

The Democratic presidential campaign looks like a footrace between a sprinter and a miler.

The sprinter puts on this dazzling display of speed - arms and legs flaying, she is the epitome of frantic action. For a couple hundred yards. No human can keep up that pace and, even if she can, nobody else can watch that kind of frenzy for very long. The miler keeps to his firm, steady pace - arms tight into the body, legs rhythmic pistons. He looks like he can keep to this pace forever and, damn it, he can.

The sprinter, after those 200 yards of fervor, has to slow, put her hands on her knees, and gasp for oxygen. The miler, seemingly effortlessly, passes her by. The sprinter curses. "How can he beat me!" she screams. "I am so much faster than he is!"