Bill Clinton confirms many Democrats' worst fear - that he and his wife are going to grind this race out until the last dog dies - with this statement today in West Virginia tellling folks to "saddle up" (via First Read):

"If a politician doesn't wanna get beat up, he shouldn't run for office," he said. "If a politician doesn't wanna get beat up, he shouldn't run for office. If a football player doesn't want to get tackled or want the risk of an a occasional clip he shouldn't put the pads on."

Clinton then alluded to the resignations and calls for resignations that have been traded back and forth between the campaigns.

"I don't think any of these people oughta be asked to resign," he said. "All these guys that say bad things about any other campaign, they say, 'Should they resign?' My answer is no; they're repeating party line. They oughta stay right where they are. Let's just saddle up and have an argument. What's the matter with that? That's what America's about, right?"

The "matter with that," of course, is that many Democrats are apoplectic about the way the Clintons have gone about waging this intraparty argument, and the lengths they appear to be willing to go to win it.

The Clinton and Obama campaigns are locked in a vicious cycle of negativity, with each side holding daily conference calls and blasting out memos to reporters slamming each other's integrity, honesty, judgment, experience, and behavior. And there doesn't appear to be any event on the horizon that will break this cycle over at least the next four weeks (when PA votes) but more likely until June 3 (the end of the primaries).

This seems to suit Bubba just fine, which has me thinking that Maureen Dowd wasn't too far off the mark this morning in writing about the Clinton's "Hillary or Nobody" strategy.