When the expression "I got your back" hit politics, I never expected it to mean you actually run and grab a shotgun, but lo and behold, that's become one of the major qualifications for Vice President. (To be fair, Spiro Agnew didn't need a shotgun, he was dangerous all by his lonesome).

And then when a governor went out an bought a ranch so he could act like another governor-turned-president, I thought, "That'll never work", but boy was I wrong. This year's fashion is Snowcats and free (taxpayer) public ranch. (Sans drilling rights, of course). We're just skimming the surface of the new non-ownership. (Are there grazing rights as well?)

And then there's that "It's gotta have a twang thang, It's gotta bend a heart strang" thang. We've been electing folksy speakers ever since, well, Richard Nixon. And note that George Wallace was the last independent to win electoral votes (if he hadn't of run with some NORAD bomber squadron nuclear war advocate, he'd have gotten more). If Lyndon Johnson had only thought about it, he would have realized war or no war, he was a shoo-in being the only major candidate with a twang.

So I don't know - Americans have a painful choice. I suppose a beer brewery owning candidate is kinda close to "who I'd rather have a beer with", but what will they do when we run out of Snuffy Smith and have to choose between and old uptight geezer and a none too loose law prof? It's one thing to betray the Consitution and give in on financial restraint, but it's another to give up your principles. What will we do?