View From The Middle
Just Give Me A Little Time; Maybe I'll Think About Running Too
By Charles Rogers

Thank you...thank you. I appreciate your thinking about me and, believe me, I'm grateful. But, despite the outcry, I'm going to have to turn you down and announce - at this time, anyway - that I'm not going to run for president in 2008.

(I'm waiting for you to quiet down, now; no tears, please).

First of all, it's much too early to make such an announcement now. I mean, the last time I thought about running was, uh, was, well, a few years ago when other candidates included a Vietnam war veteran and an ecologist, both of whose names I have since forgotten, although they did make a fair showing in the end.

Ah, but I don't want to hang onto past semi-victories. I dropped out of the race then for the same reason I'm not going to run now: What does it say about me if I beat a bunch of losers? If I beat a person who's a clear winner, then I've accomplished something. Know what I mean?

For instance, the front-runners at this time - A YEAR AND A HALF BEFORE THE ELECTION EVEN HEATS UP - are Hillary Clinton (I call her Hil; I used to call her Bill's wife, but...), Barack Obama (I call him Barack), former Senator and once-candidate for Vice-President of the United States John Edwards (known in media pundit-land as Edwards). One of the main problems here is could the nation stand to go another four years with another leader who doesn't know how to pronounce nuclear? And now we have Senator Joseph Biden (who was known as Senator Joseph Biden, but now goes by the name of "former plagiarist with foot-in-mouth."). And these are the Democrats.

They just took over both houses of Congress and named Rep. Nancy Pelosi as the first female Speaker of the House. After spending most of November, all of December, all of January and part of February patting themselves on the back, they turned to each other and said, "Now what do we do? I have it: We'll make a Resolution! It will be non-binding, so we don't step in anything too deep, and if the people from that other party want to join in...well..."

These don't sound like clear winners to me.

Now wait a minute. Don't push me. I hardly think my Democratic leanings will turn things around for them at this point. So far, they've already started trying to make themselves look busy. Aside from Biden's loser remark regarding Senator Obama (that's the "articulate, bright and clean" legislator from Illinois, of course) there's Speaker Pelosi's attempt to go to and from her home state of California via military aircraft with her family - at taxpayers' expense. The arrogance is astounding, even this early in the game! Is there any way we can change the name of the Democratic Party to, maybe, the Faux Pas Party? Or the Blunder Party?

Then there's that other party. Hell, we're just getting rid of them. As one jungle explorer said to the other, "There're too many Bushes around here anyway." (I told you candidates need joke writers!). We have Senator John McCain (I call him Senator McCain) and Rudolph Giuliani (No journalist is ever to call him Rudy...EVER! He said so himself). They're both essentially on the same side as the President - except McCain has finally decided to start arguing with the military commanders who have been botching up the Iraq thing all along. And Giuliani is supposedly running ahead in the polls, even though he hasn't officially thrown his hat into the ring (He's signed almost all the papers, he said). The chance is even better now that the man who was police commissioner when Rudy...er...Mr. Giuliani...was mayor, Bernard Kerik, has taken a job out of the country as the king's bouncer in Guyana. (There's gotta be a joke there somewhere). There are a few more webs that need dissecting before he actually runs for the nomination. The third on the list is someone who will probably remain third on the list until there is no list left: Mitt Romney, the former Governor of Massachusetts (I call him Mitt. Sometimes I call him by his nickname - Catcher's! See? I told you we need joke writers!).

Oh, and one more thing (or two): I won't run on any Independent Party ticket, with all due respect to Senator Joe Lieberman. Then there's the Green Party (pick a color), starring the contumacious (look it up!) Ralph Nader.

No. Please don't push me. If nominated, I won't run; if elected I won't serve (Now where did I hear that before?). I'll wait awhile - maybe a year. By that time, I'll be much wiser and the Democrats and Republicans will follow their usual trend and they'll be that much dumber.

I'll think about it then. BUT DON'T PUSH ME!