The media horse race and the presidency

I don't want any more unqualified presidents. I don't want any more Fundamentalists, or ideologues who want to abolish Social Security, or anyone else with fringe ideas, either, but the worst problem with Bush is his complete lack of qualifications (and I don't mean credentials, or other paper qualifications) to be president.

Hillary is a nice person, who knows a lot about health insurance but not much else. Most of the people who back her seem to think she would bring Bill back to the White House, and that is what they are really interested in. Nineties nostalgia is what it's all about. Bring back the nineties.

Barack Obama is wonderful. I love him, but as a first term Senator, with no foreign policy experience, and little national experience, he's just not qualified yet. He's got plenty of years to go (I know, we thought that about Jack Kennedy, too, until his assassination - but you can't worry about that except to try to prevent it) so there's no hurry to make him president.

Edwards? Please. He couldn't carry his own state last time, and didn't even run for Senate from there because his own fellow North Carolinians were ready to dump him. His whole thing seems to be that he's southern, and the Democrats have to nominate a southerner if they expect to win the White House again. Maybe, but Edwards won't win the south.

All of these people will go down in flames in the general election. I'm not saying I wouldn't vote for them. I can't imagine voting for any Republican over any of them, but I know they're going to lose the general election.

General Clark is the most qualified to lead the country out of the two wars we are in. If you're worried that electing a general will lead to militarism or more wars, there's no historical precedent for it. Of the six professional military generals we've had for president (Washington, Jackson, Harrison, Taylor, Grant and Eisenhower) only Eisenhower has had a war during his term. He inherited the Korean War and shut it down as fast as he could. Eisenhower is also the only president who has warned us about the military industrial complex.

General Clark promises to do the same thing to Bush's war in Iraq, and he is the only candidate who knows how to do it safely. Furthermore, he knows as much about economic issues as the other candidates, and is the only candidate who will unabashedly call himself a liberal. But somehow the media keep ignoring him.

He's the only candidate who knows what he's doing. All he has to do to get my vote is to ask for it.

Oh, and he's a southerner, if you're worried about that. I don't care. I'll vote for him anyway. ;-)