I cannot believe this thread has gone on for 4 pages.
The new MWC is the better conference competitively until proven otherwise. I don't put a whole lot of stock in the BCS berths in and of themselves because while they're nice to claim, it really doesn't address the conference as a whole. Would Southern Miss losing to TCU in '03 have made CUSA a stronger conference because it put a team in the BCS? Of course not. That a BCS hopeful finished 2nd in the league should actually demonstrate the opposite.
The thing is, even discounting the BCS appearances as such, the MWC has all-around done a much better job stating its case OOC than CUSA since its 2005 realignment. CUSA teams have continually put scares in AQ-conference opponents, but with rare exception have failed to seal the deal. The MWC holdovers & WAC incomers have fared noticeably better in that regard. Whether or not that continues or reverses over the next 5 years, well, you may as well call Miss Cleo and ask, but to be the man, you gotta beat the man.
Ultimately, the two conferences need to combine and cut the dead weight in order to make a dent. Put together CUSA's marketability and outlets for exposure and the MWC's quality as well as the on-field competence of the best of both, and you'd really be on to something. It's got to happen eventually, assuming the Big Dogs don't get their fill and shrink major college football to 60 teams first. A 16-team co-op could easily put 4 teams in the polls every single year, a half-dozen in a good one.
Understandably, though, neither league wants to kick any of its members to the curb so they both hold out in the hopes that the other will be ripe for cherry-picking at some point in the future. It's a draw right now because CUSA's got the potential of a BE raid hanging over its head and the MWC has the millstone that is its TV deal hanging around its neck. As always, just follow the money (which may or may not coincide with competitiveness, unfortunately). Once it's profitable for something to happen, it will.