Laura Bush Will Be Wearing Blue

Somebody keeps saying these debates are important. I don't see it. What Laura Bush and Teresa Heinz Kerry wore made as much of a stir as anything the candidates said.  As usual. 

All the noise about which candidate won more points, which one squirmed more, who has more character and who has more substance are as meaningful as high school gossip -- much ado about nothing.  Like you could wade through all that polemic muck to find anything of value. We've got candidates who fudge facts on Iraq like political Pinocchios, who repeat their litany of catch phrases like the rewind button got stuck. Let's face it they're politicians. They're full of wind and cut from the same cloth, so, in the end if they aren't lying or fudging, their ideas have all the drama and excitement of a beige tablecloth.

Why don't they just sit their butts down and let their women have a say?

Give Laura Bush, Lynne Cheney, Teresa Heinz Kerry and Elizabeth Edwards a chance to face off against each other. 

But let's not debate the way the guys debate, standing at a podium with more rules than the Marquise of Doonesbury.  Let's do it girl style. All four women sitting around a kitchen table with homemade bread, fresh coffee and a pot of tea. 

We'll put a fish bowl in the middle filled with a bunch of problems the country needs to solve, submitted by people selected from all over the the United States.  One at a time each candidate's wife takes a turn.  She closes her eyes and reaches in to choose a topic from the bowl. And they all discuss it for fifteen minutes. Finally the one who picked the topic gets to have the last word.

The women offer their solutions for six different randomly selected problems facing the country for ninety uninterrupted minutes. They could go three hours easily, but the networks have to run Jerry Springer, Oprah, and Dr. Phil every so often.

Instead of arguing and criticizing each other, they would compromise and build on each idea. At the end we might have something useful to get us out of Iraq, as well as save Social Security, the environment, and stem cell research, you name it. 

Just why do I think the four wives of the candidates have more to say to us than their husbands?

Let's start with their kickass resumes. Each one brings a different strength to the table. While I can't begin to include all their accomplishments here -- I wanted to but the list is so long there's not enough space -- let's just offer some very basic information about each one.

Laura Bush was a teacher and has her master's in Library Science. 

Teresa Heinz Kerry speaks five languages and worked as a UN interpreter.

Lynne Cheney is the author or co-author of seven books and has a Ph.D in 19th century English lit.

Elizabeth Edwards was a practicing attorney, a la Hillary Clinton, before she retired to raise two more children.

These are women who have something to say.  They are educated and well traveled, knowledgeable enough to talk about anything: History, education, the UN, the law, childcare, taxes, feel free to add your own -- like I said, anything.

I'd really like to hear their opinions, without any handlers to keep them from falling off the party line. I'd especially like to listen to the creative ways they could solve the problems we face in the next four years.  From the safety of our children, to the safety of our troops.

And I really don't give a bleep that Laura's wearing blue on Friday. Unless Teresa decides to be bitchy and wear blue, too. You go, girl.