A change of pace

He hasn't even announced himself as a candidate for President in 2008 yet, but people are already looking even more closely at his past actions than they had before. Maybe it's because he seems to be a favorite for the Democratic candidacy. Maybe it's because of the almost meteoric rise he has shown on a national level. And then again, maybe it's because of a memoir he wrote over a decade ago; a memoir wherein he admits to having experimented with drugs, including cocaine.

This is what will set apart the campaign of Barack Obama, should he decide to run for office.

Of course, the Dems are already planning on covering their heads and tucking their tails. They seem to feel that Obama making these admissions, admissions that so many candidates have avoided stepping near in the past, will damage his chances at the Presidency. Obama himself is refreshingly honest about the whole thing, acknowledging that the incidents were part of his past, and that it's up to the voters to decide how that colors his future.

But honestly, is this admission such a bad thing? It's not like he admitted to having snorted coke off of the corpse of a two-dollar hooker. It's not like he's saying he went on a Robert Downey Jr.-esque binge, barely surfacing for long enough to realize that Howard the Duck was an awful film. And it's certainly not like he's still running around, doing lines of coke while drinking to excess. The man's a US Senator, for crying out loud, not Paris Hilton.

Ultimately, Obama's admissions about his past will influence his possible candidacy in one way, the negative campaign ad. But really, how can you attack someone who already admitted to having used cocaine? It's not like the Republicans can send any with similar life experience to the ballots against him, in an attempt to equal the candidness. Their guy will be finishing his second term.