Being President of the United States ain’t all that it’s cracked-up to be. Just ask George W. Bush. For that matter ask former President Bill Clinton. No longer do we live in that Franklin Delano Roosevelt age when POTUS was Daddy who told us “there’s nothing to fear but fear itself” and we believed him. 

It’s Camelot no more if you are the President of the United States. All you have to show for your hard work are grey hairs are some serious battle scars and a thankless citizenry. You’re labeled dumb or sleazy or whatever derogatory word will do the job of tearing you down.

I was thinking about this when President Tush announced that he was sending his éminence grise Vice-President Dick Cheney to the Middle East to see what he could do about the abysmal price of oil trading today at $110 a barrel … and … counting … and killing the American economy…not to mention diminishing the chances of the Republican Party winning the 2008 presidential election.

Tush has tried on two occasions to use the weight of the presidency to get his influential good friend-ha! King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia to reign in oil prices. On his own recent trip to the Middle East Tush visited with the King and practically begged him to intervene with OPEC.

The King gave Little Georgie a slap in the old punim before Little Georgie had even left the country when Abdullah’s spokesperson announced there would be no interference. Just last week on his own turf Tush again kneeled before His Arab Eminence and begged for mercy once more. The King laughed in Tush’s face and the price of a barrel of crude skyrocketed ten bucks in a week and OPEC issued a great big edict: No increase in production. 

So much for the once all powerful office of the American President.

Since all else has failed, that hand that rocks the cradle, the big gun VEEP Cheney, is getting on his white horse and galloping over to have a těte á těte, mano y mano with the bad King to see what influence he can peddle.  

Cheney might have more success since we all know that number two is really number one and no one wants to mess with him. When the Big Gun gets mad he topples whole countries and takes joy in public hangings.

It’s all sort of a strange twist on the state of the American presidency. It used to be that the VEEP was sent out as the emissary and the President only engaged in “diplomacy” when all other avenues were exhausted.

But that has changed maybe going back to President Kennedy’s election when the telegenic, charismatic, pretty boy, less seasoned than his opponent, was elected president and his surrogates became more powerful than he.

Look back in history. Presidents used to be UGLY! But that isn’t true anymore. Kennedy, Carter, Reagan once a movie star. Have you ever seen President Clinton in person? HANDSOME! Dare I say Little Georgie is cute, certainly when compared to his opponents the wooden Al Gore and that skinny long-faced windsurfer John Kerry. 

And that takes me to that Prince of Charm, Barack Obama, who is another telegenic candidate and like Tush, according to the old standard, more number two material than number one. No doubt in this age of American Idol worship, Obama will be elected president.

In the spirit of these twisted times, Prince Charming has already said he will sit down and talk to our adversaries in the way our VEEP’s used to engage in diplomacy. Like his predecessor Tush, Obama will learn his powerless position as president and he’ll have to call on his vice-president, who will know how to pack a gun and will be positioned to go if not hand to hand, mouth to mouth, with any leader in the world.

Bring on that power behind the throne, Hillary Clinton, the next Vice President of the United States and the true leader of the free world. Been there done that and who said experience doesn’t count! There are more ways than one to leverage power. Just ask every woman in the world, and, while you’re at it, ask Dick Cheney, too.