Obama's Record and Capacity Superior to Hillary's Experience

Interesting take by columnist George Will (Playing the 'Fair' Card, Washington Post -2/21/08) on the whole issue of "experience" as superior qualification for the U.S. presidency than are valor, vision, excellent communications skills, sense of timing and capacity.

[Hillary] is 60. She left Yale Law School at age 25. Evidently she considers everything she has done since school, from her years at Little Rock's Rose law firm to her good fortune with cattle futures, as presidentially relevant experience.

The president who came to office with the most glittering array of experiences had served 10 years in the House of Representatives, then became minister to Russia, then served 10 years in the Senate, then four years as secretary of state (during a war that enlarged the nation by 33 percent), then was minister to Britain. Then, in 1856, James Buchanan was elected president and in just one term secured a strong claim to the rank as America's worst president. Abraham Lincoln, the inexperienced former one-term congressman, had an easy act to follow.

But even in the area of experience, I much prefer Obama's community organizing, stint as constitutional professor at the University of Chicago, work as an effective State Senator and short but substantive tenure as a U.S. Senator from a major state, to Hillary's health care reform debacle, miniscule U.S. Senate record, questionable business dealings and lead "war room" dirty tricks and negative campaigning.

(See Helenann's Daily Kos diary, I found the BEEF - Obama's Senate Record, for more on Obama's impressive record.)

What say you?