The president and first lady are making a habit – a very public habit – of reserving one night a week for a date. Marriage maintenance is important for couples who’ve been together a while, especially if they have kids and the day job demands plenty of attention and energy.

So, it’s great to see the first couple going out to eat or catching a Broadway play. (Some of the Obamas’ opponents have sniped that the Broadway excursion cost the taxpayers money. They’re right. It did. What did those many long weekends in Crawford cost? Why didn’t those same people mention that?)

So I think it’s great the example-setters-in-chief are seen holding hands and making time for each other. On these warm, early-summer nights, it’s nice for Adrienne and I to take an evening stroll along the lakeside, maybe stop for a creamee. (That’s Vermont vernacular for soft-serve ice cream.)

I mentioned the Obamas’ example on one of these strolls, but I didn’t get the reaction I was hoping for. “Obama date night?” Adrienne said. “You think this is Obama date night? This is not Obama date night. This is….this is Joe Biden date night.”

Ouch.

Hey, I don’t have access to Gulfstream jets or a ranch in Texas. We all do what we can with the budget at hand. (Thus, creamees.) Still, no one wants to feel like a second-class citizen.

Gay and lesbian Americans feel like second-class citizens because, well, because they are. Lesbians and gays approach first-class citizenship here in Vermont and a handful of other states, but as far as the federal government goes, fugheddaboutit.

When Mr. Obama was running for president, he criticized the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DoMA), which defines marriage as occurring between a man and a woman. On the other hand, he’s said he thinks marriage should be between a man and a woman. (What’s the difference between saying you believe it and criticizing the law that says it? Ask law professor Barack Obama. Maybe it depends on how you define the word “was.”)

Two weeks ago today the Obama Justice Department filed a brief in federal court supporting DoMA. Perhaps there’s some room to give Mr. Obama benefit of the doubt here. Like it or not, DoMA is federal law. The executive branch does have a duty to defend legitimately passed laws, no matter how wrong-headed they may be.

The language of the brief, however, compared same-sex marriage to incest. Incest, really? Really. This is the kind of language one might expect from Rick Santorum, not Barack Obama. How does that happen? Of course, Mr. Obama didn’t write the brief himself, nor did Attorney General Eric Holder. But people who work for them did and, yes, it all does flow from the top.

Speaking of Joe Biden date nights, the vice president is hosting a Democratic fundraiser in Washington tonight in which the party will be attempting to squeeze funds from the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered (LGBT) community. Talk about bad timing.

Vermont Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin was to be honored at the dinner for his role in passing our same-sex marriage bill. After the 11 June Justice Department brief, he wrote the Dems to say he’s not coming. “By defending DOMA and making reference to horribly inaccurate and deeply hurtful stereotypes about gay and lesbian Americans,” he wrote, “the Administration has chosen discriminate against a minority group that we all have a responsibility to be more courageous in defending.”

Sen. Shumlin is not alone in passing on the dinner and Mr. Biden may well be close to alone tonight as he dines with the crickets. Unfortunately, rights for gay and lesbian Americans is not the only area where the Obama administration too closely resembles the Bush administration. There are civil liberties, global warming, government secrecy, global warming, bank regulation and global warming.

Hey, Mr. Obama! This is not about winning or losing the chess game with the Republicans and triangulating and blah, blah, blah. These issues are important to the lives of Americans today and more important tomorrow. Last November’s was a “change” election, remember? Straighten up. Fly right.

© Mark Floegel, 2009

Mr. Biden, long known for working the border between candor and too much candor, must be scratching his hair-plugged forehead over this week’s events involving Gov. Rod Blagojevich of Illinois. Mr. Blagojevich has enough hair for himself, Mr. Biden and Sam Zell, the skin-pated publisher of the Chicago Tribune, who Mr. Blagojevich attempted to extort into more lenient editorial coverage by threatening to withhold political favors. Perhaps he’d have done better to offer a few locks hair.

Joe Biden’s a pretty bright guy, really bright when it comes to politics. If he says the only things that’s kept him from the nation’s highest office are a few hundred follicles, then that’s where I’m looking to understand this whole Blagojevich scandal.

(Can I let my fingers have a second of airtime here? We’ve been pounding keyboards for 30 years and we have to say “Blagojevich” is the most unnatural word we’ve ever typed. “Blago” gets out OK, but then there’s some sort of alphabetical u-turn that aims for “jevich.” The fingers rebel. This can’t be right. “Hang on, boss!” they yell. “We’re heading for a typo!” But no, it’s correct. The brain has to go to “manual override” and force the fingers to finish the word.)

Last weekend, a 13-year-old girl sat at my kitchen table, preening her wavy hair and lamenting that it’s not straight. Straight-haired girls lament their hair isn’t wavy.

Last night Adrienne told me I get more handsome as I age, one of her not-quite compliments. She’s right, though. If, when I was 20, someone said, “All the handsome guys, over here,” a hand would have been placed on my arm and a voice would have said, “Not so fast, Floegel.” Then I was all cowlicks and elbows. Now, as I push 50 with most (!) of my hair and a bit heavier than that gawky kid, I’m (relatively) more handsome. Not handsome enough to run for office, so don’t fret.

Got a holiday card from some friends I haven’t seen in a while and damn, if the dad in the family isn’t getting bald. Fortunately, he’s a scientist. I think baldness is an asset in that field.

If, as Mr. Biden thinks, there’s a proportional correlation between hair density and political success, then all becomes clear. I’ve been reading the case against Mr. Blagojevich and I couldn’t figure how anyone this freaking stupid could be elected fence watcher, much less congressman or governor. Worse still, this guy is a former prosecutor who knows he’s been under investigation for the past three years and yet he’s screaming curse words into the telephone and promising everyone in sight that he’s gonna demand cash and seven kinds of favors in return for one of Illinois’s seats in the US Senate.

But Joe Biden explains it. It’s the hair. Mr. Biden’s lack of hair has prevented him – he thinks – from realizing his full political potential, despite his brains and his drive. In Mr. Blagojevich’s case the headful of luxuriant brown strands have caused his political fortunes to vastly overshoot his mental and ethical capacities.

I’d like to think we elect leaders based on what’s in their heads, rather than what’s on them, but who knows? Joe Biden may be right. Kind of explains Ronald Reagan, too.

© Mark Floegel, 2008

In the last month of the ’92 campaign, with a sluggish economy controlling the debate, the Republican candidate was falling behind in the polls. George H.W. Bush, aghast at the prospect of being forever branded “one-term president,” began leaking bile. Behind in the polls, Mr. Bush was advised to “go negative” and try to tear down his rivals. To his misfortune, Mr. Bush’s master of negative campaigning, Lee Atwater, had died of a brain tumor the year before, after apologizing to the many people he’d smeared in his career.

Absent the coaching of a professional mudslinger, Mr. Bush was reduced to referring to Bill Clinton and Al Gore as “bozo and the ozone man.” He sounded weak and hapless and Clinton/Gore won with 100 electoral votes to spare.

Now it’s John McCain’s turn to sound like an angry, impotent old man as he watches Mr. Obama and Joe Biden widen a lead in the polls. Americans today wish we could describe our economy as “sluggish,” rather than “catastrophic.” Senior citizens, who should be part of Mr. McCain’s base, are watching their IRA/401k nest eggs disappear overnight. So much for getting Florida in the GOP column.

I’ll say this for the elder Mr. Bush: at his worst, his bilious name-calling never fell to the despicable level we’ve heard at McCain/Palin rallies in the past week. Accusations of treason, terrorism, veiled race baiting and now the veil has begun to slip as Mr. McCain’s supporters begin to call for lynching.

This is ugly stuff, unworthy of any American, much less a senator and a governor. While we can’t hold the candidates accountable for everything that gets shouted from the crowd at their rallies, the silence from the campaign in response to those shouts has been terrible to behold.

I suppose we shouldn’t be surprised. Last year, when it was expected Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic nominee, a stupid old lady asked John McCain to his face, “How do we beat the bitch?” His response was a snicker rather than a remonstrance for what was clearly and out of line comment. He then called it an “excellent question” and addressed his chances of beating Sen. Clinton.

In his autobiography, Mr. McCain portrays himself as a selfish and shallow youth who learned the meaning of duty an honor during five and a half years in a prisoner-of-war camp.

In the 1980s, now a U.S. senator, Mr. McCain abused the power of his office to aid a corrupt savings-and-loan operator who showered the McCain family with gifts, contributions and get-rich(er)-quick investment deals. Reprimanded by the Senate, Mr. McCain professed to have learned his lesson and had become a better man.

In the 2000 Republican primary, Mr. McCain was subjected to Lee Atwater-style gutter politics, at the hands of George W. Bush and Karl Rove. Trying to stay alive in South Carolina, he endorsed the flying of the Confederate flag on the statehouse grounds. Later, he said he regretted that position. He said he’d learned a lesson and was now a better man.

That was then, this is now. Mr. McCain hired one of Karl Rove’s acolytes – Steve Schmidt – to run his campaign. Immediately after Mr. Schmidt came aboard, things began to get nasty and have gotten nastier with each passing week. Mr. McCain, to what little credit can be accorded him, at least seems to wince as he delivers his venom. Sarah Palin, the self-described “pit bull,” winks when she does it.

Barack Obama, for his part, is doing his best to ignore this. The general campaign seems not only like the ’92 contest, but eerily like this year’s Democratic primary, when he slowly pulled away from Ms. Clinton, as she (and the former president) sank to depths unworthy of them.

Soon this will be over and two of the three senators (Ms. Clinton and one other) will have to walk back into their chamber and begin their post-campaign careers. I hope the losing senators will have learned something from the experience. I hope they will become better people. I wish I could believe it.

© Mark Floegel, 2008

I was not so wrong that I mind taking a lump or two. I was not so right that I can gloat.

Ms. Clinton’s campaign is far weaker this morning than it was 24 hours ago. I was surprised by the size of Mr. Obama’s eight-point margin of victory and Mr. Edwards squeaking into second-place by half a percentage point.

On the GOP side, I was surprised Mr. Huckabee’s margin over Mr. Romney was nine points, although unlike Mr. Huckabee, I don’t see the hand of Jesus in it. I was stunned that Fred Thompson beat John McCain for third (again, by less than half a percentage point). I think no one is more disappointed by that result than Mr. Thompson. In recent days he’s been sounding like a man looking for a reason to drop from the race and now he doesn’t have one. On to New Hampshire, Fred.

Democrats Joe Biden and Chris Dodd did drop from the race Thursday night after each of them failed to break the one percent threshold. Inexplicably, Dems Mike Gravel and Dennis Kucinich and Republican Duncan Hunter – all of whom scored zero in the caucuses – are still “in” it, whatever that means.

Rudy Giuliani, who recently led national polls, finished in sixth place, behind Ron Paul, but supposedly “that’s part of the plan,” same kind of “planning” that put his emergency response center in the number one terrorist target.

New Hampshire predictions tomorrow.

On the Democratic side, my prediction is: Hillary Clinton comes out of Iowa weaker than she went in.

The Iowa Democratic caucuses are complex processes with “preference groups” and “viability thresholds.” It’s important to note that this is public democracy. It’s not a secret ballot, voters have to go and stand under their candidate’s banner.

There are eight candidates on the Democratic side. After the first session, the supporters of candidates not deemed viable will be asked to stand with their candidate of second choice.

People supporting Bill Richardson or Joe Biden or Chris Dodd – all of whom are unlikely to pass the viability threshold – go into the evening knowing their man is unlikely to win, so they stand with their initial candidate to send a message. It’s a form of idealism. Ms. Clinton has not presented herself as the candidate of idealism, she presents herself as the candidate of inevitability.

For that reason, I think Barack Obama and John Edwards will pick up most of the supporters whose first choices didn’t make the cut.

I’m not saying both Mr. Obama and Mr. Edwards will beat Ms. Clinton, but I think one of the them will. I think Mr. Obama more likely to do so than Mr. Edwards.

This will not mean Ms. Clinton is out of the race. She has a good organization, a solid war chest and a base of support in New Hampshire. But she will come out of Iowa weaker than she went in.

On the Republican side, I think it will be Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney and John McCain. (n.b. – GOP caucuses in Iowa are nothing like the Democrats’. It’s straightforward ballots with no second choices.)

My sense is Mr. Huckabee wins by default, with Mr. Romney – for all the money he’s spent in Iowa – coming across as too phony. Rudy Giuliani is a) too scary and b) has not campaigned much in Iowa. Mr. McCain – who has also not campaigned much in Iowa – is the default third place finisher.

I could be wrong about third place. Ron Paul, with his zealous followers, could turn in a surprising performance.

Cheer or jeer on Friday morning.