Even Mr. Obama admits that he is a blank slate upon which all sorts of folks are inscribing their hopes and dreams. Yup. He said that! Now isn't that like voting for a reflection off a pool of water? Let us return to 7th grade language arts class with a little refresher on the myth of Echo and Narcissus: http://thanasis.com/echo.htm

Jeremy

I regret to inform you that you may be smarter than you think. Voting for Sen. Obama was not voting in vain, and despite peer pressure form the media, it was not voting for the most inexeprienced candidate. In fact, Sen. Obama has more years as an elected official than Sen. Clinton.

Here's an article in the New York Times, her home state, about Sen. Clinton's experience.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/26/us/politics/26clinton.html

It's an in-depth article listing her one success, speaking at the Women's Summit in China, and her many failures, false starts, and campaign hype. Far from being an attack peice or a puff piece, it intelligently analyzes the truth of resume as First Lady.

And if you look at her wikipedia entry, which you know has been vetted by her staff, she was a well-liked Senator but has only accomplished minor victories.

By contrast, Sen. Obama, as a two-term State Senator, a far less politically powerful position, has acutally accomplished radical healthcare reform in Illinois.

The botom line is one has had 8 years as Senator of the most powerful state in the US to do everything she says she's going to for America -- and hasn't done it.

The other guy had took a position that few people have truly distinguished themselves at, and consistently transformed his state for the better, time and time again.

Honestly, you have to ask yourself with the problems we have now, who would do a better job as President? The one with all the money, all the breaks, and has performed mediocre? Or the one who had no breaks, no money, yet has overcome every barrier?

Only one of those is a true winner. And I think you know the answer, because you voted for him.

My compliments on tackling politics.

Historically, these are very interesting times. Militarily we have not been this impotent since the Great Depression (the 1930's for those who aren't into dates). From an economic standpoint, the U.S. has not been this weak in the manufacturing sector since prior to the Industrial Revolution.

The Administration of G.W. Bush is full of private-sector cronies who have been in government just long enough to change tax laws and business regulations so that they can now melt back into their native surroundings once Bush's term ends. As we all know, many of them already have.

That makes this election year one of the more critical in our nation's short history. And it all comes down to action. Forget experience, the question is: who can get something done?

John McCain, from the GOP, is a mediocre choice. We can take solace in the fact that he is not a member of the radical Neoconservative Movement that has occupied the Executive Branch for the past 8 years. But his ideas well tread, and his social conservatism will likely make him seem like a crusty old man to younger generations.

Then we have Obama and Clinton. As you say, Barak Obama has used a wide assortment of qualitative arguments which have been appallingly light on specifics, numbers, and details. He has talked about "change," but what is change for change's sake?

Hillary is more "experienced" and has been brave enough to put out a few policy specifics while dodging continuous questions about her gender, past, and overall ability.

I would tend to go with Barak Obama. My reason is this: If Hillary were elected president, she would have a troubling number of built-in enemies right from the outset. Most members of the stodgy GOP despise anyone even loosely associated with the name "Clinton." I would suspect that Congressional Republicans would work hard to railroad her at every opportunity. Thus, we would likely see four more years of gridlock with a bickering congress and a fairly impotent president.

Not to be overlooked is the sexism aspect of things. I have actually been fairly impressed with the American voting public's ability at looking beyond her gender. Being that out country has been traditionally slow at progressing in the realms of gender and race, the fact that Hillary is the Democratic front-runner means that people are looking beyond it. Of course, that might have something to do with limited options. If Al Gore had decided to run, he'd likely run away with any and all contests.

But in terms of foreign policy, the Middle East remains the hotbed of our planet regardless of doctored intelligence and war-mongering that has gone on. Nevertheless, the leaders in those countries are extraordinarily sexist. Hell, they'll whip any woman who dares show so much as an exposed ankle. So how much success, and how much respect, would those leaders show toward Hillary Clinton? Probably about as much as they've shown current Secretary of State Condi Rice. And that ain't much.

Tough call. This is going to be damn interesting...