Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher have drawn a particularly stellar crowd to their Carlsbad conference, this year. But so many powerbrokers, in such close proximity, can make for awkward encounters. In the elevator at the Four Seasons, Roger McNamee, the founder of Elevation Partners, was complaining to a journalist about the harsh coverage of John McCain, the presidential candidate, in the DC press. When who should step in, abruptly curtailing the private equity macher's rant, but Don Graham, chief exec of the Washington Post, the newspaper that's one of the presidential candidate's harshest critics. Here's the story, in the Seattle Times.

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