WhatsAPundit

Me, not the PhantomWife, with whom I had a rare political conversation this morning.

No, the Presidential race this year is muddled. I mean, forget that my fourth favorite Republican is going to be the nominee. (The first three were Rudy, Fred Thompson, and Romney in that order.)

On the Democrats side it will be either the Screecher or the Holey Man.

I mean, with Obama, there really doesn't seem to be any there there, other than naked ambition and the willingness to say something with utter conviction to one crowd while backchannelling to the Good Old Boys that it's just talk.

And then there's Hillary, and I just totally lost what the difference would be.....

Oh, wait, the difference would be that she's putatively heard Bill talking in his sleep, and she took notes or something, so she's at least taken the Presidency 101 course vicariously. Obama didn't even CLEP it.

Whatever.

So to Karol's commenter Shawn who said...

Just you? I'm seeing a clash between politics as usual and a new politics based on hopeful change.

...I would recommend he listen real close to the lyrics to Baba O'Riley before getting too invested in the hopeful change thing. Especially if the agent of said change happens to have cut his teeth in Chicago politics.

I mean, jeeeezus. How gullible can an electorate get?

On the other hand, both of them strike me as less stupid than a bucket of bricks, so the Democrats will be fielding their best challenger since 1992, one way or the other.

So I guess this is a better-than-average cycle for this Republic, heaven help us.

It would take an Orson Wells to make a movie that would do justice to the Eliot Spitzer saga.

If any of the Spitzer daughters are reading this, please stop now.

At the beginning of this Election Cycle (i.e. when the last poll closed in each district on < a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_general_elections,_2006" target="next">November 7, 2006), I wouldn't have given much of a chance that any Republican other than Giuliani could be elected President in 2008. And when Rudy (and Fred Thompson, once he started floating the idea) both flamed out, I figured whoever did win (McCain, Romney, or Huckabee) was toast.

Well.

What I've always figured was Hillary! would win a squeaker. Nothing on the Republican side to inspire any but the base to get out and vote. Most of the rest of the 50% who wouldn't vote for her even if Malcolm X was the only other choice would just sit it out. She'd get her base plus Independents who liked the idea of a competent woman as President and voila, a low turnout and another co-Presidency.

Well, the Democratic Primary race has become a choice between a candidate for whom 50% of the electorate wouldn't vote if Malcolm X were the only other choice, and Malcolm X.

Yes, that's unfair to Obama, but he did worse than whiff badly at a great opportunity to hit one out of the park. (He could have fundamentally changed American politics by defining exactly how he differed from the old racialist politics of Sharpton et. al.) Instead he hit a monster pop-up that let people see exactly how much sympathy and respect he had for the racialists, and how little he was willing to do to actually change anything.

So the mainstream media is chanting "back back back" while the outfield, second baseman, and short stop (blogs, Hillary!, and McCain) are camped underneath in short centerfield. Somebody's going to field that airball (most likely Hillary!, in the form of finessing the delegates at the Democratic National Convention) and Mighty Obama will be out.

Meanwhile, the only real thing Clinton had going for her was her air of inevitability, and the associated assumption of competence, Well, kiss that goodbye, and say hello to all the reminders of exactly why so many people dislike her so thoroughly.

My predicting ability has been lousy re: the Republican primaries, so I'm not as confident in this prediction as I might have been hadn't I been so far in the tank for Rudy, but I don't see how McCain loses in November.

Assuming, of course, he makes it that far. Damn, the man looks old. Nothing wrong with that (Reagan was no spring chicken when he took office, and he made it through eight years, but then again, he didn't spend time in the Hanoi Hilton) but the Presidency is a hard, hard job. McCain's VP pick is going to be very, very important. (And if it's Huckabee, I'll vote for either Malcolm X or the Shrew.)

Gah, what options.