Bill Richardson Should be the Next President

Barack and Hillary May Just Fight to a Dead Heat

Bill Richardson makes a great presentation in forums and he is a natural. He's a successful two-term governor who was re-elected with 69% of the vote in New Mexico, a red state. He has foreign policy experience. He was U.N. ambassador. He worked in the State Department. He's made a second career of negotiating on special assignments with dictators like Saddam, Castro and Kim Jong Il. He negotiated a truce in Sudan.

Most of all, he's not a senator. Since the election of John F. Kennedy, 40 sitting senators have made the run for president and their record is 0-40. A senator could this year. I don't believe that it is safe to bet on a Senator this time. The odds are stacked against you.

His political position is just instep to carry liberals and independents. While governor, he covered the normal Democratic causes: He raised teacher pay, he expanded children's health insurance, he began programs to stall global warming, he built a light rail line.

He also cut New Mexico's top income tax rate from 8.2% to 4.9%. Tax credits were made to stimulate economic growth. (He's the only Democrat completely invulnerable on the tax cut issue.) And he not only balanced the budget -- he also ran a surplus.

On cultural issues, Richardson has the distinct advantage of not setting off any culture war vibes. Just and I, he was in college in the 1960s, but he was listening to the Beach Boys, not Janis Joplin. He was playing baseball in the Cape Cod League, not going to Woodstock. He idolized Hubert Humphrey, not Eugene McCarthy. I didn't play ball, but my labels fit his.

When you forward to next winter, you see that this campaign will at some point leave the "American Idol"/"Celebrity Deathmatch" phase. The Clinton-Obama psychodrama may cease to fascinate while the sheer intensity of coverage will create a topsy-turvy series of revolutions.

Richardson will be prepared to step into the void. He doesn't treat politics as a moral crusade and that is appealing.

Don't count his out. He has the personality to be our President.