People keep saying that this presidential election campaign is too long. For me, it's feeling very, very short. The New York primary is just over two months away, and I'll have to know a lot more about the candidates between now and then.

Last night's debate on CNN helped a bit, in that it pushed Hillary Clinton farther down my preference list. Increasingly, she comes off as too scripted, too harsh, too calculating. And, like Kucinich, angrier than I want a president to be. And Clinton's opinions on key issues - when I can see those opinions clearly - aren't what I want in a president.

I keep hoping that Obama will seem stronger, steelier. He did well last night, but so did the people I most want to hear more from: Biden, Richardson, and Dodd. If I had to vote tomorrow, I'd vote for one of them.

Mostly, last night's debate made me angry, at the mainstream media in general and CNN in particular. The media have focused so much on Clinton and Obama that you'd think there was no one else in the race. It's way too early to narrow the public's choice, and the media have no business doing it.

Wolf Blitzer was particularly dreadful last night, insisting on one-word answers to complicated questions. He either didn't hear or pretended not to hear when Obama answered "Yes, but," to his initial question about giving drivers licenses to undocumented immigrants. When Obama tried to elaborate, Blitzer bullied and preened. And when he asked Clinton the same question, he let her come off looking like a strong decision-maker, accepting her clear "no" rather than asking why she had refused to take that stand in a previous debate.

Many in the media treat these televised debates as entertainment, and the commentary following them focuses more on who "won" than on the content. Voters don't have to buy into that, of course. But we'd all learn a lot more if the reporters doing the interviewing treated all of the candidates like the contenders they are.