I have some close friends who are from Canada, and I pay attention to Canadian news mostly just to give me something to razz them about. After all, living here in the the US gives them so much ammo to fuel a lively conversation.

I found this back just after Christmas, and had it in my file of things to Blog about, but never got around to posting it. This is a commentary on the US election from a Canadian journalist, Theo Caldwell.

While we do not yet know who the Democrat and Republican nominees will be, any combination of the leading candidates from either party will make for the most obvious choice put to American voters in a generation. To wit, none of the Democrats has any business being president.

This pronouncement has less to do with any apparent perfection among the Republican candidates than with the intellectual and experiential paucity evinced by the Democratic field. “Not ready for prime time,” goes the vernacular, but this does not suffice to describe how bad things are. Alongside Hillary Clinton, add Barack Obama’s kindergarten essays to an already confused conversation about Dennis Kucinich’s UFO sightings, dueling celebrity endorsements and who can be quickest to retreat from America’s global conflict and raise taxes on the American people, and it becomes clear that these are profoundly unserious individuals.

A point I have tried to make in the past, albeit less eloquently. None of the Democratic candidates have the job or life experience for the job - there resume’s should have been tossed out early but in place the Democrats are allowing the manifestly inexperienced and unprepared to assume the role of the President.

Forget for a moment all that you believe about public policy. Discard your notions about taxes and Iraq, free trade and crime, and consider solely the experience of these two sets of candidates. Is there any serious issue that you would prefer to entrust to a person with the Democrats’ experience, rather than that of any of the Republicans?

Now consider the state of debate in each party. While the Republicans compare tax proposals and the best way to prosecute the War on Terror, Democrats are divining the patterns and meaning of the glitter and dried macaroni glued to the page of one of their leading candidate’s kindergarten projects.

It really is that easy people. Who do you want at the helm when the next crises comes along? Heaven forbid another terrorist attack occurs - the Democratic candidates would be unable and unprepared to successfully navigate the nation through such a difficult time.