That line of reasoning has a name and even lots of philosophers that support it. It’s called agnosticism. Which, in my opinion, is a fairly rational way of looking at life.

Oh, I don’t mean to imply that you have to either follow one particular religion or be an atheist to be a thoughtful person. But I think there are a lot of people who use the “spiritual” label as a kind of intellectual crutch, because they haven’t really thought their religious beliefs through. Sorry I wasn’t more clear on that.

Well, in my view, you follow a particular religion, theoretically, because you think the person who founded this religion is the one who got IT right. Maybe a person who doesn’t follow any particular religion, but still believes there’s something more to life, simply believes that no one has the knowledge to know precisely what happens after you die. That line of reasoning has a name and even lots of philosophers that support it. It’s called agnosticism. Which, in my opinion, is a fairly rational way of looking at life.

I suppose I would end up voting for Hilary during the primaries, God help me, because she’s been in the White House and she has Bill to fall back on for experience.

He said that right before going into a rant on Ronald Reagan. Who, in my opinion, is the person who perfectly represents the damage that a “master of inspirational rhetoric” can cause.

His rhetoric is good, but his ideas are hardly revolutionary. I think he’s got as good a plan as any candidate for dealing with the Iraq mess. He couldn’t possibly do much worse of a job than our current president — but then again, he shares that distinction with everyone from Al Roker to Bobcat Goldthwaite to, hell, maybe even Marion Barry.

Funny, I heard talk similar to this in ’92 about Bill Clinton.

I think the thing that makes Obama so attractive to people — particularly college students who may or may not pay attention, but certainly speak out — is that he is about as far from W as a presidential candidate can get. Do I think being the anti-W makes you worthy of getting votes? No. But then again, I don’t think being Bill Clinton’s wife makes you worthy of getting them either.

I am Tony Williams fan, too. I’m not sure that any mayor of DC can move on to a national office. The mayorality of NYC has never been a stepping stone to a national office, why should we expect anything different from DC?

I will say one thing, however. After 8 years of feeling depressed and dejected about my leaders I think I’m entitled to a bit of hope and optimism. Don’t take that away from me so soon! There’ll be plenty of time to rally behind the nominee that I probably will disappointed with.

I know that sounds flip, but I’m serious. I’m sick and tired of waking up every single day with a sense of twitchy foreboding about what idiotic, jaw-dropping, excruciatingly embarrassing or blatantly villainous things my global representatives have done in my name – and gotten away with – in the past 24 hours.

Every time I hit the blogs and news feeds, I’m flinching inside about what I’m going to find.

We could do far, far worse than 4 years of meditative, reflective calm, like the stunned breath-catching, pass-the-cigarette-around thing that actors do at the end of a zombie movie right after rescue comes, but before the “riding off into the sunset” and rebuilding begins.

If nothing else, four years with Obama would quite likely be four years of sensible, calm and deliberate movement. Which would be a balm to the nerves of this shell-shocked survivor of the last eight.