I was 17 when I took my first political door-to-door canvassing job. I had done babysitting and was working at a retail job in a book store. Oh, and was going to high school. I did my canvassing on Sunday afternoons, when there was no school and the store was closed.

It's not unreasonable, therefore, for me to believe that the young lady Mr. Lileks encountered was at a similar stage of life. I had not had the opportunity to get what you call a "real" job because I was encouraged to complete my education instead.

Perhaps his young lady was in college, on summer break. Perhaps she has a summer job and was working for her candidate on her day off. We don't know. I can tell you that that would be the likely situation, based on other girls I met when I was doing this kind of work. I can also tell you that the job probably pays nothing except a warm feeling of doing good, and coffee and cookies back at headquarters.

I should think that, instead of implying that she is a sponge and an idiot, we all ought to be impressed that she cared enough to get involved in the political process. After all, she could have been home watching reality TV instead of being part of reality herself.

The big difference between what she said to Mr. Lileks and what Mr. Lileks said to her lies in the amount of rehearsal each one has had. This goes directly to experience, both in debate and in life generally. She wasn't as quick with her canned remarks as he was with his. (And his were canned remarks. He canned them himself.) My best bet: she won't make that mistake again.

One other observation: Political organizers at the grass-roots level love to put very young women out in the field to do this kind of work. They seldom attack the people they solicit, and therefore do no harm even in areas where they are not expected to do much good beyond gathering information for their bosses. It's something of a carry-over from the days when they used to sell Girl Scout cookies, and believe me, most of the young ladies who would traipse door to door for a candidate once did the same thing for their Scout troops.

No one prepares them for debate, because debate is not what they're there for. They are not put out in the field to make converts. They are there to gather three things: information, information, and, when it's available, money.

Mr. Lileks' money wasn't available. But he gave her what she was really sent to get.