The Nation (Sort Of?) Endorses Obama

The Nation very rarely does endorsements, but in their upcoming issue that hits newstands tomorrow, Barack Obama is on the cover and it amounts to, well, something very close to an endorsement.

"The magazine felt that the campaign was down to Obama versus Clinton and we felt that with the primary coming up that we would make the strongest stand for Barack Obama," said Ben Wyskida, the publicity director at the Nation. "It's not an endorsement in that it's a consensus of all the editors, or the editorial board. But in this case we felt there were enough poeple who felt strongly enough about him that we would make the biggest deal out of it that we could."

The semi-endorsement is featured in their cover story written by D.C. Bureau Chief Christopher Hayes and titled, rather forcefully, "The Choice." Interestingly, the last time The Nation endorsed a candidate? In 1988, when the magazine endorsed Jesse Jackson.

According to Mr. Wyskida, they aren't describing it as an endorsement because there was some disagreement within editorial ranks. "There were some people who agreed with Dennis Kucinich’s policy and some people who gravitated toward John Edwards," he said (The piece was written before Mr. Edwards dropped out).