The Dog Days of Politics

February is a lousy time for a political junkie. The heady celebration of November victory has worn off. Republicans haven't stopped crying in their amaretto. They are getting pitiful. Even the most thoughtful of them are stuck trying to explain how poll leader Rudy Giuliani^tm really, truly, honestly, is just a whiz-bang conservative despite his pro-abortion, anti-gun, sexual adventures, and used-to-live-with-a-gay-couple history and, despite having a shorter resume than any President since Woodrow Wilson, how he'd make a peachy Leader of the Free World.

Bush is limping around like a one-legged mallard but Congress hasn't quite figured out how to get more than a condescending smirk from him. Congress won't catch their stride until May. Bush's stride is shorter than an inch-worm and getting smaller. When he rattles his saber at Iran it looks like a toothpick mostly because he has to tag every belligerent comment with a pledge not to do anything military against them.

The 2008 Presidential campaign is going to heat up about six months ahead of schedule but it is still too early to get interested. We are in that phase when we are still questioning if Barack Obama is too black (or not black enough), Hillary Clinton is too butch (or too female), and John McCain is too senile (or, naw, he is too senile).

Trying to write about politics just now is like trying to eat three-week old oatmeal. It's possible, but on the whole I'd rather be eating a bacon cheeseburger and listen to my arteries harden.