The last time I looked, all the levers of power seem to be pulled by men. You know, wars, bribery, environmental degradation, political and corporate leadership, to just name a few.

Even in my house, my wife who has some feminist sympathies, supports Barack Obama. The significance of this is, I believe, that a female candidate must meet certain very proscribed standards, almost none of which apply to men.

When was the last time we hard about how men dressed, whether they revealed a bit of true feelings, and how their hair looked (one exception: John Edwards) and how their voice sounds. Especially, no one talks about mean some men are.

And calculating . . . I rarely hear male candidates described as calculating.

Yet every candidate is calculating - how else could you plan and run a national campaign? And mean- I think, and thought, both Bush and Cheney were very mean and hostile men. And please tell me what is wrong with revealing feelings? Should our leaders be so callous that they don't care about the welfare of our children- our planet - in fact every human being? Since when is it a good thing to be an uncaring asshole? Is that the mark of a strong leader?

While I support Hillary I'm not saying that her gender automatically ensures that she will be a successful president. Yet everything I've read about her personal and political life, on a one- on-one basis, by people who actually know her, state that she is a very caring , intelligent, well prepared and thoughtful person, with good values. I don't think we hear much about this.

When I hear people say that we are not ready for a woman president I usually interpret the questioner as making a very personal statement. Are some of these people in the media? Of course. The members of both print and broadcast journalism are not automatically or universally unbiased, so I believe there is much gender discrimination.

There is no magic bullet that will make prejudice disappear. Each of us has some areas that reveal ignorance, bias, ill will. The opportunity for each of us is to acknowledge our dark side, and having done so, be in a position to become more conscious, more caring, more responsible.

Who really knows Hillary Clinton? Only a select few. The issue for all of us is to look at each candidate as a real person, and ask: is this person genuine, believable, competent and responsible? Until we are able to do that, each of the candidates becomes merely a symbol of what ever we'd like them to be. Until we are honest with ourselves, we will be unable to make valid judgments of those running for office - our own biases will get in the way.

As always, our own personal journey profoundly affects our capacity to make an honest evaluation of those we choose to lead us.

I always get a kick out politician's claims of how many jobs they have created. Likewise for how we must keep our economic growth alive and well. And how we must always be number 1. ( well, that one bit the dust some time ago).

Politicians and business leaders act as if the only thing that matters is growth. Well, we've had unprecedented growth for some time now, and I haven't noticed the environmental problems going away. In fact . . . you might even say they have gotten worse.

Now these observations will hardly qualify me for a Nobel Prize.(Damn- someone beat me to it!), but they do illustrate a very simple and profound bit of truth. The systems we live under are not subject to our desires. Is that so bad? Smaller cars, smaller families. natural shrubs etc.

A simple solution: stop bitching about the invisible hand that rules all of us and start thinking smarter. Notice that many of the global problems exist either because of overpopulation and/or environmental degradation. We should talk about this at a local level and stop worrying that someone might get upset if we have to change our ways.

Actually the earth will survive no matter where the water is or the nature of our air. But our children and grandchildren will care. They may well ask: why didn't you pay more attention, and take better care of our home?

We spend enormous amounts of money educating our children. Shouldn't we think just a little further out and make sure they have a decent home and environment to live in?

I think the bottom line of dealing with the invisible but inevitable laws we live by will ultimately rest on how much we care and how we are willing to conserve for future generations.

As always, all politics is local and the question always is: what will I do?