Tonight -- and the future

When I wrote my first small check to Mike Huckabee last year, and talked to Gov. Beasley about endorsing his former colleague, I did not think the former Arkansas governor would really be the winner of the Iowa caucuses and a potential front-runner. Tonight, before the votes of New Hampshire are in, some bettors suggest that John McCain is now the favorite to win the GOP nod, and that Barack Obama is now the overwhelming favorite on the Democratic side.

I have no idea how that kind of race will turn out -- and of course I hope that Gov. Huckabee gets the Republican nod. But I certainly don't fear a McCain-Obama contest. With the way the two conduct themselves, with the way they talk about their opponents and the nation, I actually think that contest might be wonderful to watch.

The reason I am warming to McCain is the same reason that I like Gov. Huckabee and, even though his policy views are typical garden variety liberalism, Sen. Obama -- a hunger for a new kind of campaign and a chance to turn the page from the past 20 years of dispiriting trench warfare. It's a bigger and a better country than that.

If Mitt or Fred or Rudy win the nomination, I hope they'll show they believe it too. Unfortunately, I hold no hope that Sen. Clinton will execute an uplifting kind of campaign. One only has to look at this video to believe it.