Early morning thought: will those on the Port side accuse Obama of going to Iraq for a photo op? IHT - Media stars will accompany Obama overseas

Senator John McCain's trip to Iraq last spring was a low-key affair: With his ordinary retinue of reporters following him abroad, the NBC News anchor Brian Williams reported on his arrival in Baghdad from New York, with just two sentences tacked onto the "in other political news" portion of his newscast.

But when Obama heads for Iraq and other locations overseas this summer, Williams is planning to catch up with him in person, as are the other two evening news anchors, Charles Gibson of ABC and Katie Couric of CBS, who, like Williams, are far along in discussions to interview Obama on successive nights.

And while the anchors are jockeying for interviews with Obama at stops along his route, the regulars on the Obama campaign plane will have new seat mates: star political reporters from the major newspapers and magazines who are flocking to catch Obama's first overseas trip since becoming the presumptive nominee of his party.

I wonder if Obama will have any time to meet with the commanders and troops on the ground? WIll he have some preconditions to meet with General Patreaus? How many photos will they have that make it look like he is wearing a halo? Will Katie Couric ask Obama what's on his iPod? Will Barry find time to talk to the "insurgents?"

The extraordinary coverage of Obama's trip reflects how the candidate remains an object of fascination in the news media, a built-in feature of being the first African-American presidential nominee for a major political party and a relative newcomer to the national stage.

Well, not completely. If it was Hillary, or Biden, or Dodd, or any of the other myriad Democrats who were the presumptive nominee, the media would be fawning virtually the same way.

Interestingly, the International Herald Tribune discusses something most media outlets won't: the appearance of massive bias in the media towards Barry.

All in all, how pompous will this trip make Obama look?