My friend Bob sighed. Bob always sighed whenever he read the newspaper so I didn’t bother to pay much attention to it. “Man, I wish some of these guys would get out of the Presidential race, there’s almost too many of them to keep track of.”
I shrugged. “C’mon, Bob,” I said, “what’s the big deal? There’s only like 6 or 7 of them, right? What’s so hard?”
Bob put his paper and turned to face. The incredulous look on his face let me know that I had just said something stupid that he was going to need to correct. “6 or 7?”
I shrugged again. “Yeah,” I insisted, “there ain’t that many of them. The Democrats have Bill Clinton’s wife, that black dude, and the guy with the hair and the teeth. The Republicans have Mayor Rudi, that cranky old guy, the Mormon fella, and, sooner or later, my pal Fred.” I paused and looked at Bob. “Seems easy enough to me, Bob.”
“Michael,” Bob as patiently as he could, “those aren’t the only candidates. Haven’t you seen all the other people onstage during the debates?”
I frowned. “Well I don’t really listen to the debates that closely but from what I can tell those other folks never get to say much. I thought they were just there to make the stage look fuller. Are you sure they’re real candidates?”
Bob started to say something but, for once, he seemed to not have a comeback. “Well,” he said finally, “given the way the media treats them, you sort of a have a point. It’s a moronic point…but not completely incorrect.”
I felt quite pleased with myself. “Well, odds were that I would get something right sooner or later, Bob.”
Bob sighed again…that one was for me but I didn’t mind….and went back to reading the paper while I stared out the window idly humming the theme from Law and Order.
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