Serious candidates

I watched Barack Obama's interview on Sixty Minute tonight. He continues to surprise me as a man with hardly any of the politicians' pretense or evasion. He needs to flesh out his policies, and from what I can see he needs to much work on his organization (although getting 16-17,000 people out to see his announcement in freezing weather yesterday seems to bespeak an efficient cadre, at least in his home state), but if he is right about the American people hungering for new leadership as they were in 1960, he's going to be even harder to stop in 2008 than JFK was then.

I also caught Chris Dodd on Face the Nation this morning. (Poor Dodd: after more than 3 decades in Congress, he gets 10 minutes on Sunday morning, while Obama gets twice that on the highest-rated magazine show on television.) Dodd (D-CT) was sensible, clear and well-reasoned. Another serious candidate who deserves a full hearing.

I also saw a newspaper interview with Joe Biden (D-DE) this week. (Sorry, I don't have a link.) He was self-effacing on his gaffe about Obama, but also came across as a man with real ideas on where the nation should go.

All of the Democrats deserve to be listened to. Which is more than I can say about that other party.