Thoughts on this year's election

I'm feeling more hopeful about the future of our country than I have for ... more years than I can count. Inconvenient as it was for regular caucus-goers to be inundated with record numbers of first-timers last night, it was tremendously exciting. And ridiculous as our presidential nomination process is, it seems to be doing a stellar job this year. What an impressive field of candidates this has been! Almost all of them are terrifyingly intelligent (with the notable exception of Huckabee. And at least he's funny.) A couple of really bad candidates managed to prove that no amount of money can turn a true sow's ear into a silk purse. Romney still hasn't quite gotten the message, but what could be more satisfying than watching The Country's Mayor discover that the more the electorate got to know him, the more they loathed him? *heh*

At this point it very much looks like the next president will be one of three people who are competent, intelligent, passionate and reasonably honorable. It's like a Final Four on Survivor made up entirely of contestants that you liked from the beginning. I won't vote for McCain, but I won't feel like committing hari-kari if he's elected. I know I should be hoping that the Republicans put up a more beatable candidate, but I'd rather not have to spend the next 10 months holding my breath.

Hillary or Obama, Hillary or Obama? I like them both so much. And isn't that a nice problem to have for a change.

Estimate up to 320,000

Now they're saying that 320,000 people caucused last night in Minnesota! Holy cow!