Hillary Clinton has made a habit during the course of this campaign of trivializing just about anything that gets in the way of her argument for the party's nomination.  Red state, small state, caucus state, moving oratory, even the passion of youthful involvement in the political process have all fallen prey to the cynicism of her single-minded pursuit.

Lately she has chosen to trivialize Barack Obama's early and active opposition to the Iraq war by saying that speeches don't compare to the solemn burden and political risk of casting a vote in the US Senate.  Leaving aside her implicit diminution of civic participation, I find it difficult to see how this argument isn't an inadvertent admission that considerations for her own political welfare do enter into the calculus she uses to determine her votes - even those that may send young men and women to die in war.

[Late-middle-aged man quietly mowing the front lawn - very "Leave it to Beaver"]

VO: It's 3:00 PM.  Your kids are all grown up now, starting their own families.  Your afternoons are a little quieter and you smile when the phone rings.

[Cut to same man inside home, answering phone.  His wife approaches slowly, her face and his slowly morphing from joy to concern]

VO:  The phone rings.  It's your 26 year old son asking you to help with his wife and their two year old daughter.  He's being deployed to Iraq again, for the third time in two years.  The army is stretched thin and they need his help fighting a war you don't think was such a good idea; a war that isn't making you or your family any safer and that's taking money away from your grandkid's education; a war that John McCain and Hillary Clinton voted for just six years ago.  Didn't they have the experience then to know better?  Do they know better now?  Maybe there's more to making good decisions than just working and networking in Washington year after year after year.

[Fade to Obama logo]