This morning, long-time Saturday Night Live writer Jim Downey was on MSNBC and was asked which candidate was funniest. He immediately said Obama. Then he explained that when interacting with Obama, he's just "a cool guy." Then after an explanation of the others he re-iterated, Obama's the funniest. Here's the clip:
Why is this relevant? Because the presidency is a large degree about personality and communications ability. If people actually want to turn on TV to see their president speak -- and if people on Capitol Hill want to bask in the presence of presidential coolness -- that's relevant to getting the job done.
I know that in this era of impending unity, we're supposed to throw in the obligatory, "But Clinton's personable and funny too." Nope...not the way Obama is. Obama has a gift of communicative ability and coolness that she simply doesn't have.
If you want others to see this clip, feel free to recommend.