I think that Obama's 'lack of experience' in a non issue. For the record, he has had only four years in the senate, that is true, but he served for seven years in the Illinois Senate. And sure, that's not a national office, but its not like he was just hanging out at home watching soaps before 2004.

But take a quick look at previous Presidents and what experience they had going into their terms.

Ronald Reagan- Served two terms as Governor of California. Gives him a decent claim to experience credentials, but not in respect to foreign policy, where he arguably shined the best.

Dwight Eisenhower- While Ike obviously had a good deal of command experience during the WWII and after, before becoming President he had not had a single days' worth of experience in elected office of any kind.

Franklin D. Roosevelt- Before his four terms as President, the only experience FDR had in elected office was four years as New York Governor, and two as a state Senator in New York.

Woodrow Wilson- Before his Presidency, Wilson served a whopping two years as Governor of New Jersey. Not even a full term.

Teddy Roosevelt- After charging up San Jaun Hill, TR served one year as Governor of New York and then roughly six months as Vice President. So in total, he had eighteen months in elected office before becoming President.

Abraham Lincoln- Two very insignificant years in the US House of Representatives. Before that, eight years as an Illinois State Rep. That's it.

We'll stop at Lincoln. Before him Presidents had even less experience before assuming office, but then again people didn't live as long back then so you couldn't wait around too long, and the Presidency really wasn't the same kind of job before Lincoln as it was after.

Even without going back past Lincoln, here is a list of six Presidents, all of whom it can be argued were weak on experience; some which you can say had practically no experience at all. And at least five of these men, maybe all six, are widely seen as among the ten best Presidents we've ever had.

So really, I ask you, is experience really all that important?

Hillary is too wedded to and embedded with corporate interests to create the fundamental changes we need in our society. Because she is so uninspiring and the quintessential insider, she will never have the popular support a president would need to confront the corporate oligarchy that frankly, Hillary is a member of. Obama or Edwards would have the potential to inspire the popular support that would enable them to face the most powerful foe in the world-US corporate oligarchy, and perhaps even win a few battles.

Is not impressing anyone, because it's full of sound and fury but signifying nothing.

http://factcheck.barackobama.com/

answers each of her questions about his record in detail.

And what about Clinton's record?

Why did she vote for the Patriot Act twice, both in its original form and in it's new form, and then take on Obama in the debate as if he had done something wrong? Why isn't she talking more about her Senate record. Why, according to this article is she funding a New Hampshire attack campaigns (fear campaigns not unlike a Rove attack...hmm.....) on Obama--and trying to make it look like it's coming from Edwards?

Follow the threads down on this site: http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/01/06/553247.aspx

Why is Rupert Murdoch raising money for her in fundraisers? http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12762092/

Clinton is attacking Obama to try to protect herself from scrutiny, but her plan seems to be to make people too frightened to vote for Obama, so in her evoking of fear to elicit power, she reminds me too much of the dark side of politics we already know.

Horseshit!

That's all you got, Richardson? A prefab throw-away line you've been waiting all day to drag out for the right moment in the debate? Look, you're a nice guy, OK? A big lump of nice. You may well be a good bureaucrat. But you are dead slow on your feet and really don't have any business competing for the nomination. You lost me way back months ago when you couldn't answer Melissa Ethridge's question, whether or not being gay is genetic or acquired behavior. You sat there like a deer caught in the headlights and stumbled and fumbled around. The audience was even mouthing the answer for you, ge-net-ic, ge-NET-ic! And you still sat there like an oaf.

Get off the stage. Salvage whatever dignity you haven't squandered and hope nobody remembers your performance when it comes time to pick Sec of State.

When Hillary started yelling at her opponents last night, lecturing them on all the changes she says she's already made, and when she said she had "28 years" of experience, I let out an involuntary shout, "Bull Shit!"

She's delusional - Willard Romney style delusional. She's started to believe her own press releases.

is that whether she goes negative or positive, the instinctive perception of the public is that she is insincere. It seems like any comment she makes during debates or on the stump has been vetted by focus groups and paid consultants. As a lifetime Democratic voter who would love to see a woman president and who would vote for her in November if she's the nominee, I frankly have a very hard time believing that she actually has any convictions or an ounce of sincerity in her. If Hillary becomes president, I have little doubt she would capitulate to corporate pressure and interests and would be at best a status-quo president that will change nothing vis-a-vis the control the corporate oligarchy maintains over our gvernment.

Since I am covering all the barnyard excrement seen in the debates so far, I must included the canceled FOX 'news' debate that will not take place between the Republican front-runners because they declined to participate unless Ron Paul was included. Since Ron Paul is as welcome as a case of crabs, FOX just dropped the whole thing. Chickenshit!