If Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren does not prevail over the other, and they split even some vote in stately dignity, then neither will be president.

Now, obviously, the last two weeks have run a lot hotter than stately dignity, ending with Warren telling Sanders onstage that he called her a liar on TV, and he responding in kind, followed by the two gloomily declining to comment. Coverage of this dispute has largely operated in two ways: First, what reads like a WWII tactical synopsis that begins with a violation of sub-section 2(b) of The Nonaggression Pact. Second, an emotional “hear no evil” response that chalks everything up to a distraction, driven by the media’s capricious need for interpersonal drama, and one that will ultimately harm the progressive interests.

Either way, in these tellings, Sanders and Warren end up reading like robots, operating on some higher hyper-rational plane for the purposes of drama or academic furtherance of progressivism.