Hillary Clinton's latest game - when she's not busy saying that Barack Obama isn't a Muslim "as far as I know" - is tantalizing supporters with the idea that Obama could wind up as her vice-presidential choice on a so-called Dream Ticket.
It's a genius strategy: Democrats, forced to choose between Hillary and Barack, don't need to choose after all, since they both could run together - as long as Barack is at the bottom of the ticket, of course.
Let's leave aside for the moment the question of why the candidate who has more delegates would somehow be relegated to the vice-presidential slot. That's the kind of Clintonian logic that I'm too unsophisticated to grasp.
Let's focus, instead, on this puzzle:
In her relentless attack ads before the Texas and Ohio primaries, and in public comments since, Hillary has said that Obama is not ready to pick up the "red phone" and serve as Commander-in-Chief. If that's true, why would she imperil the nation by choosing him as her vice-president?
Last time I checked, the vice-president was one heartbeat away from Commander-in-Chief. Which means, if anything should happen to Hillary, Barack Obama would be picking up that darned red phone.
Oops.
Now, before I get accused of misogyny - which seems to be the reflexive response of certain Hillary supporters whenever she is criticized - let me say that her talent for making blatantly contradictory statements without any sense of irony or shame makes her every bit the equal of a man. In this case, the man I'm talking about is Bill Clinton.
(Oddly, Samantha Power's "monster" comment was slammed by some Hillary supporters as being misogynistic, too - kind of a reach, given that it came from a woman. My only beef with Ms. Power is that her comment demonstrated too much restraint. I guess she already used "a problem from hell" to describe something else.)
So let's get back to Hillary's selection of a not-ready-for-red-phone-maybe-a-Muslim as her vice president. Instead of trying to sell us on the Dream Ticket, why doesn't Hillary call her accountant at 3 A.M. and ask him to email her a PDF of her tax returns? Sharing them with us shouldn't be such a big deal. Unless - and this is just a wild guess - is there something in those returns, say, about where her 5 million dollars she loaned herself actually came from, that might torpedo her candidacy?
Not as far as I know.
Andy Borowitz is a comedian and writer whose work appears in The New Yorker and The New York Times, and at his award-winning humor site, BorowitzReport.com. He is the host of "Countdown to '08" at the 92nd Street Y on Tuesday, May 13 at 8 PM with his special guests Susie Essman (HBO's Curb Your Enthusiasm) and Jeffrey Toobin (CNN, bestselling author of The Nine. For tickets, go to 92y.org.