"I think there's a reason that the AP and the New York Times are lining up against Obama."

Said Rush Limbaugh yesterday, looking at AP's "Are rich taxed less than secretaries?" and David Brook's "I'm a sap" column in the NYT. So what's the reason? It's got "nothing to do with taxes and who pays and who doesn't," he says:

I think there's a whole other reason why that's happening...  And that is, they see their ideology on the line here.  This guy is going to sink liberalism if he is not propelled to victory or if somebody doesn't take his place.  They have figured out on the left that Obama's not worth saving if it means bye-bye liberalism....  And they were ecstatic, finally got somebody in office that they thought was gonna be the standard-bearer to take 'em to utopia and, instead, we have a country on the prospect of ruin.  And they cannot allow for people to associate the ruination of this country with liberalism...

The New York Times is leading it; the others have caught onto it. Even the Chicago Tribune had a column yesterday -- the Chicago Tribune! ["Why Obama should withdraw."] The best thing he could do for the party and the country, just not run. The only way the party is gonna stand a chance of winning under current circumstances is if Obama's not on the ticket.

Is it really such a strong phenomenon — liberal media turning against Obama? And, if it is, is it that they're trying to bring in a new Democratic candidate? The Chicago Tribune piece assumes that new candidate would be Hillary Clinton. But, I'm sorry, I can't see the Democratic Party thriving by ousting Obama. What chaos! And Hillary would have to compete in the primaries. Presumably, other Democrats — those characters who are otherwise waiting for 2016 — would jump into the fray. (But who are those other Democrats? What is the next wave of presidential-seeming Democrats?) I think it would be an awful mess if he were publicly hounded into withdrawing.

If some powerful alliance of liberals really wanted Obama to withdraw, they would — I imagine — be operating in private. It would be handled in a way that would preserve Obama's ability to come forward and present his withdrawal in a very grand and lofty style, as a matter of his own decision and not out of desperation and for highly altruistic reasons.

ADDED: Who are the Democrats for 2016? The Mayors Emanuel and Bloomberg? Andrew Cuomo? Janet Napolitano, Claire McCaskill, Kathleen Sebelius, Mary Landrieu, Kirsten Gillibrand, Sonia Sotomayor, Gabby Gifffords?