NBC: Raul 'Officially Chosen'; Penn and Pile O' Donuts

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Here in Ithaca and no doubt in other liberal bastions across the land, you can still see cars festooned with those bitter bumper stickers: "Re-Defeat Bush!" and "Bush: Selected, Not Elected!" Those sentiments remain reflected in an MSM still smarting from Florida 2000. All of which made Ann Curry's words on this morning's Today, announcing the ascendancy of Raul Castro in Cuba, so ironic.

ANN CURRY: In the news this morning, we begin with Cuba and its [first] new president in nearly half a century. Raul Castro was officially chosen on Sunday to take over from his brother Fidel who announced his retirement last week.

View video here.

Just what does it mean to be "officially chosen" in a totalitarian police state? Would it have been too indelicate for Curry to have pointed out that there are no free elections in Cuba and that the officially prescribed method for expressing dissent is to raise your hand and say "throw me in prison, por favor"?

A bit later, Andrea Mitchell reported infighting within the Clinton camp about mistakes that had been made. Just as she was discussing the issue of the campaign's overspending, there appeared the image displayed here, juxtaposing chief campaign strategist Mark Penn [who would never be confused with Sean] and . . . a pile of donuts.

Ouch.

Note: the background on Penn and the donuts is that, as per this article, his firm has billed the campaign $10 million, and the campaign spent $1,200 on donuts in January. But I sensed some malice on the part of the producer who chose to juxtapose the images.

Update | 9:40 AM ET: Appearing on Morning Joe this morning, Andrea Mitchell described the situation inside the Clinton campaign as "a mess," with people "openly at war with each other." She added that there have been charges of "campaign malfeasance."