It might still be up in the air between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Republicans might all be holding their breath for the inevitable explosion of the Rudy bubble and the subsequent inflation of — who? McCain? Romney? — a successor. But one primary has solidified in the last few days: Media moguls are backing Mike Bloomberg for president.

As the Politico's Ben Smith reported, New York Times Company chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. endorsed Mayor Mike at a Newspaper Association of America meeting Monday morning. "Sulzberger cited the paper's 2005 endorsement, in which the paper wrote that Bloomberg could be 'one of the greatest mayors' in the history of New York," Smith wrote. "Then he mentioned the presidential buzz. 'We could do worse,' Sulzberger said, according to two people in the room." Then, yesterday, Smith followed up with news News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch paid a similar compliment. "Bloomberg 'has two choices — bid for Dow Jones or run for President,'" Smith reported the Australian mogul said. "'And I am happy to report he is not bidding on Dow Jones.'" An ability to draw simultaneous support from crunchy, granola, sensitivity-trained, diversity-loving, Outward Bounding Sulzberger and ruthless, conservative, Democrat-skewering, union-busting, Post-publishing Murdoch strikes us as a pretty compelling argument. But not enough for you? John Heilemann summed up all the, you know, substantive arguments for a Bloomberg campaign in a December issue of New York.

Sulzberger for Bloomberg?
Media Moguls for Bloomberg [Politico]
Related: His American Dream [NYM]