Electing Sweetie

Despite his penchant for saying "sweetie" to shut women up, Barack Obama does seem more likable than Hillary Clinton. But so what?

The press loved frat boy George W. Bush and hated nerdy Al Gore eight years ago. And look what we got? Endless war, economic meltdown, torture, a bigoted Supreme Court, the destruction of our Constitution and Bill of Rights, a desecrated planet. Will Americans never learn that who they think is a "nice guy" is no reason to elect a president? Apparently not.

At this very moment, right wing swiftboaters are vetting Barack Obama's life to see how they can smear him if he becomes the candidate. Real estate deals, sexual peccadilloes, pastors -- you name it. They're on his trail. One good thing about Hillary Clinton is that the vast right wing conspiracy has been at her for sixteen years and nothing they came up with has stuck. Not Whitewater. Not witchcraft. Not nothin'. All they got on her is her husband -- the sex-addict who was a great president.

You'd think that would make her electable. After all, she is not Bill. You'd think that would make her a better candidate. But shut my mouth, Americans don't vote pragmatically. They vote emotionally. And the devil you know is always inferior to the angel you don't know. Barack is currently that angel. How long he'll keep his wings is anyone's guess.

So here we go again. NARAL loves the new boy on the block -- even if HRC was there at its founding. So does John Edwards. And Ted Kennedy. The fact that Barack has little experience makes him the hot new ingénue, whereas Hillary is old like your mother.

The truth is we know about her -- and we know very little about Obama. That alone makes her detractors scream: Get Out! Off the stage with you! Give us that hot new boy! Give us that sepia Brad Pitt! Old women are so over!

OK sweetie, we'll step aside. Watch your own cauldron bubble. You're in a heap of trouble -- and you don't even know it.