Every time some racist has used the word "nigger" in front of me, I have shortly therafter asked him or her if they would vote for Colin Powell for president.

The results have been encouraging to some degree, with about 60-75% saying that they would. Often times this is accompanied by the remark that Powell must have had white ancestors, which for them accounts for his positive qualities.

That's the kind of poll Gallup will never run, but if you want the hard turth, that's it.

How Obama would make out with them I don't know, but I suspect not as well.

It takes time for attitudes to change. I suspect that a run for Obama will have to wait for people to get to know him, and watch him perform for a bit. Obama may run just to build a support base, to see how its done, etc, kind of like JFK in '56, or he may not.

My guess is that the conservative wing of the GOP may run Powell in '06, maybe McCain in the VP slot, but who knows?

Clinton could get the Dem nomination, but I doubt if she could win.

I am sorry to see Boehlert leaving public service, but I think that Rohrabache and Gordon and Wiener wil still be around on space science. We'll just have to see.

Amazingly, asteroids and comets are bipartisan, and don't care about the party affiliation of targets, or for that matter their country, or how convenient it is.