NEW HAMPSHIRE: DECISION 2008

IBP will be welcoming a number of guest bloggers in the coming months to report on the 2008 Presidential campaign, including the venerable C.W. Eversham, who has reported on every American presidential campaign since Dwight Eisenhower's re-election in 1956. No less an authority than author, Theodore White, once dubbed Eversham as "the crustiness on the American political baguette."

And so, for the fourteenth time in my career as a political reporter, I have received my commutation allowing me to gratefully depart this sub-zero backwater of a state. New Hampshire! New Hampshire! The land of misfits and the ignorant!

I had fully anticipated being on scene, covering events as they unfolded, but as has happened so often in this forsaken outpost, I could not seem to get my feet warm, and decided to stay in my hotel room. For once, I was pleasantly surprised that New Hampshire voters, probably by accident, having gauged the intellect of these people over the course of fifty-two years, threw a brake on the runaway train that was the idea of a need for change.

While the idea of a change in government may have an initial appeal, the ship of state needs an experienced hand on the tiller. It is difficult at times to explain to exuberant youth, but any change should be tempered by the firm guidance of politicians who have benefited by the system in its present form.
By cutting out the legs of the "change" stampede, New Hampshirites showed rare good judgment in giving impetus to the campaigns of seasoned candidates who will insure that "change" is something you find between the cushions of your divan.