Random Thoughts About The Campaign So Far

[THUNDER HANDS]

* It's starting to look more and more like one of those Discovery Channel episodes on lions. You know the one's where there's a pack of lions and an old lion leading his pride with his mate and their children. They own that spot of land they're in and they've ruled it for years. Then, off in the distance, a new younger lion comes in and challenges the old lion for his mate and his land. Then the old lion and the young lion have to have a fight to see who will control the pride and the land and stuff. The loser, all bloody, has to do the walk of shame all alone out into the wilderness. I don't think I need to explain who's the young lion and who's the old lion in this analogy.

* Watching the debate last night and the discussion of the candidate's spouses, it made me think of the 2004 election and how hampered John Kerry was by his wife Theresa. Yeah, I liked her, but she wasn't a very good advocate for him. If he had been blessed with a spouse like Bill Clinton or Michelle Obama (hell, or even Elizabeth Edwards), he would have been in much better shape. Having a spouse who can effectively speak on your behalf and be one of your main surrogates is a tremendous asset to a campaign, and that was just one of many thing that hampered Kerry in his 2004 run.

* Clinton, you could tell, was just waiting to unload on Obama tonight. I think she's been waiting for 15 years to be able to really hammer someone. After all those years of being attacked and abused, she has a lot of pent-up rage and anger and it's just waiting to be unleashed on someone. Yeah, I'm supporting Obama in this current fight, but if this is the Hillary Clinton who's going to be going into the General Election, I think we're in for a very entertaining contest. If she could hit Barack Obama like she did - and what Obama has said about her is - in all reality - NOTHING compared to what the GOP has said about her, I can't imagine what she'd say in a debate with one of them. She's likely to rip her blouse off - ala Hulk Hogan before a match - and reach over to McCain or Huckabee or Romney and pull their tongue out their mouth and hogtie them with it and pummel them with her shoe.

* Edwards is probably upset nobody was yelling at him last night. He got the opportunity to play the 'let's stop fighting and get back to the issues' card - which was the only one available to him, but from his vantage point, a good scrum with one of the candidates is the only way he's going to get noticed. He tried to goad Obama into one, but it didn't go very far.

* Wolf Blitzer and all the other hosts of debate want to keep a candidate's answer to 30 seconds or less when they're talking about policy. But if a fight breaks out, by all means, yell as long as you want.

* Obama does much better when he's sitting down in a debate.

* When they started their fight last night and Hillary was hammering away at Obama, I saw Obama lean over to her a little bit and I thought he was going to walk over towards her. I had a mini heart attack right then with visions of Rick Lazio dancing in my head.

* I was surprised that nobody wrote about this narrative for last night's debate - two white people attack a black man on Martin Luther King Day. I mean, sure, that wasn't the actual story. But I was expecting to see that somewhere. For snark value alone, I think it should have at least appeared on Drudge.

* Whoever emerges the winner between Clinton and Obama will be a million times more prepared for the general election than Kerry was in 2004. Say what you will about Kerry's experience in politics, there's nothing like having a heated primary to get a good sweat going and get your mind and body ready for a long campaign across America. He could have benefited from a Hillary Clinton-type in 2004. It's a shame Dean's candidacy fizzled the way it did and Edwards wasn't the attack dog he is now.

* Based on what I saw last night, if I were a producer for CNN or MSNBC or whatever tv station will be hosting the next debate, I'd have all the chairs physically removed from the room before the debate starts. Stand-up debates are much more ferocious. Must be the nature of standing for two hours. I'd be pissed off too.

[THUNDER HANDS]

1. oh, one more random thought

* I wish the candidates talked more about illegal immigration, because I think that's going to be THE big wedge issue the GOP will use against us. I think illegal immigration is going to be the gay marriage of 2008.