(Opinion crossposted from Brainstorm)

Mainstream political commentators have reacted to Hillary Clinton’s decision to have a roll-call vote at the Democratic convention as if it were a slap in Barack Obama’s face. I don’t get it: Why wouldn’t there be a roll-call vote? Well over a thousand delegates were elected in state presidential primaries and caucuses for the precise purpose of voting for Clinton in Denver. For them not to be allowed to do so — now, that would be news worth commenting on.

Mainstream commentators are also portraying the Clintons’s prime-time speaking slots as insults to Obama. But since when is the runner-up in the presidential nominating contest — not to mention the party’s only two-term president since FDR — not entitled to a prominent place on the program?