Tonight, Bill Richardson, the Governor of New Mexico and recently announced presidential candidate, is coming to our humble office to watch the State of the Union address and give comments to us afterwards. And I do mean "humble" office...we have probably less than a third of a floor of a 1970's vintage non-descript office building in Westwood.

Does anyone double-dog dare me to say, "Mr. Richardson, I entered a presidential nominee pool and went long on Obama...do you think you could campaign for awhile and then throw whatever support you get behind Obama, in order to help me win the pool?"

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In more serious news, the Daily Show recently played a telling clip from Jim Lehrer's interview of President Bush the other night on PBS.

Here is the the relevant part of the transcript:

MR. LEHRER: Let me ask you a bottom-line question, Mr. President. If it is as important as you've just said - and you've said it many times - as all of this is, particularly the struggle in Iraq, if it's that important to all of us and to the future of our country, if not the world, why have you not, as president of the United States, asked more Americans and more American interests to sacrifice something? The people who are now sacrificing are, you know, the volunteer military - the Army and the U.S. Marines and their families. They're the only people who are actually sacrificing anything at this point.

PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, you know, I think a lot of people are in this fight. I mean, they sacrifice peace of mind when they see the terrible images of violence on TV every night. I mean, we've got a fantastic economy here in the United States, but yet, when you think about the psychology of the country, it is somewhat down because of this war.

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My comments: That's the most pathetic war-time "sacrifice" I have ever heard of. Seeing images of war on TV as a sacrifice? Good grief.

As an example of real sacrifice, so many Americans would respond positively if Bush traveled the country and relentlessly pounded his fist about the importance of energy conservation, and explained to people that by conserving energy, we would help deny funding to the terrorists and simultaneously show our troops in the field that we support them. These things have a snowball effect; if some of your neighbors are doing lots of things to conserve energy at the behest of the President, you would start feeling unpatriotic and puny if you weren't doing your share...and the opposite if you were doing your share.