I am beginning to like Hillary Clinton.

Now please, pick your jaw up off the floor and try to understand where I'm coming from. Like me, I'm sure you can remember a time when you thought of this woman as a virtual Antichrist....that is, until Barack Obama swooped onto the scene. Everything he has said and done on this campaign trail has convinced me that, should he be elected this fall, he would become the most horrific, disastrous and unmitigated catastrophe of a president this nation has ever known. Now, I realize that when compared to about 99.9 percent of Republicans (including Arnold Schwarzenegger, John McCain and Charlie Crist), Hillary looks like the Wicked Witch of the West. But when seated beside Barack Obama, she reminds me more of that giggly, pink witch from the north who flew around in bubbles. (Sorry Hillary, inflated soap ain't gonna do much good against those Bosnian sniper rifles). But seriously, think about it for a moment:

• Hillary had the sense to vote to authorize the use of force in Iraq when all reputable intelligence estimates agreed that Saddam was an imminent nuclear threat.

   
• She has repeatedly emphasized the need to "finish our mission in Iraq" before pulling out.

   
• She actually places her hand over her heart (or at least the cavity where it should be) during the Pledge of Allegiance, wears flag lapel-pins and occasionally utters the words "God bless America - all tremendous no-no’s for the extreme, America-hating Left.
   
• Overlooking the obvious political expediency involved, she has actually aligned herself with religious Pennsylvanian gun-owners in indigence of Barack Obama's spectacularly arrogant statements about them last week.

   
• And just when I thought the deal couldn't get any sweeter, she has now officially survived six months without that political life-support all liberals rely on: the mainstream media bias.

Honestly, I'm beginning to admire her. And with John McCain as our nominee this time around, who can blame me? But it goes further than that. Hillary has survived not only in the absence of media worship, but in the searing hellfire of the media's full hatred. Just look at the obsessive coverage they aired after her "sniper fire" incident compared with the season pass they've given Obama on the Rev. Jeremiah Wright controversy, his inflammatory insinuations about "typical white people," his severe inexperience and thus glaring misstatements about everything from constitutional authority to foreign policy, his blatantly racist autobiography, and most recently his terrifically insulting crack about "bitter Pennsylvanians clinging to guns and religion." [P]MSNBC (yes, I actually allow their headlines a small place on my computer's sidebar), even went so far today as to openly declare victory by informing us that the "Obama's “bitter Pennsylvanians” comments have done little or no damage to his campaign."

It may be that I have Rush Limbaugh and his Operation Chaos to thank for this Democratic demolition derby more than Hillary herself. But as Ann Coulter said in a recent column, "I've always wondered how a Democrat would fare being treated like a Republican by the media. Now we know." In my view, Mrs. Clinton has done pretty darned well for herself. Now Hillary, I'm not pledging you my general election vote yet. But hey, keep on tearing up Obama like you have and maybe I'll consider it! *wink*