There's already been one radical in the White House. I don't believe it could survive another.

What we need in a President.

We need a President who is...

Comfortable around firearms.

A non-smoker.

Bowls well.

Wears a flag lapel.

Doesn't have a funny sounding foreign name.

Doesn't believe people are bitter.

But they never will, Dick. No matter how many elections you win, they never will.

If you check any of the political debate this morning on neutral political sites you'll probably notice that much of the discussion around Barack Obama's electability continues to focus on race. I personally don't get it. Obama would have a hard time getting elected President but it's not because he's black. It's because he continues to believe we can make nice with the other side.

His supporters as evidenced by comments on Kos on his victory speech are downright delusional if they think that "hope" will carry us through to election victory. Hope is meaningless without action. The only action Obama consistently promises is to reach across the aisle to find consensus with Republicans. There is none.

I've supported politicians as preachers before. This isn't the time for that. We need a fighter not a preacher.

I've never thought it a fair characterization to say that presidential candidates "don't have the experience" for the job. Lot's of presidents have done a terrific job with little experience in politics. But Barack Obama is dangerously naive when it comes to taking an open-eyed view of the political situation facing the country today. It's a bad thing that he won Iowa yesterday.

When they look at me, they see what they are.

I really try to live by the adage to never speak ill of the dead but I can't be the only one finding the adjective "brave" a little tough to swallow when referring to Gerald Ford. His crowning achievement was his pardon of Richard Nixon- an act that won him a "Profile in Courage" award from the Kennedy foundation a few years ago. Ted Kennedy said he spoke out against the pardon at the time but realizes now that it was a brave act that will be looked on favorably by history. He may be speaking too soon.

It's too soon to tell for sure, but it seems to me that history will judge that the scorch-and-burn political strategy really came into it's own under Nixon and Ford's pardon did nothing but push it out of sight. It continued to fester and plague our political system for the next thirty years. Had Nixon actually been tried and convicted we MAY not have had to suffer through the likes of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove with the damage they've done to America and our political system.