I freely admit that I like Hillary Clinton. She's legit, there's no way to get around that. She's smart, savvy, a political cutthroat - just what I look for in my presidential candidates. Watching her in the Democratic debates has been like watching Michael Jordan and Lebron James take on a high school basketball team; she's simply out of everyone else's league. I can't even keep myself from feeling sympathy pangs as poor Sen. Barack Obama realizes that this cunning Clinton just schooled him on national television. What's even better is that some of what Hillary says manages to filter through my big, thick conservative skull and strike a few chords. Thankfully, I always have some Wall Street Journal editorials to knock some sense back into (or out of) me. But it's not only Hillary. I like Chris Dodd, too - a lot. He's got a real solid head on his shoulders, and on that note, so does that Joe Biden fellow. Democrats ought to stop thinking about the unholy trinity (Clinton, Edwards and Obama) and start thinking seriously about those two. So how about those Republicans, or "authentic conservatives," as they call themselves nowadays? Hey, everyone, guess who I am: "I hate taxes and immigrants and that little tramp Roe!" If you said Tom Tancredo, you're right, but I suppose you receive half credit if you said Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson or Duncan Hunter. But Mommy always said a few bad apples don't spoil the whole bunch. Then again, she never mentioned if "half" still qualifies as a "few." Here's the Republicans' problem: They're too damned Republican. It's the 21st century, folks, and its time to start acting like it. Roe v. Wade, while founded on utterly dubious legal reasoning, should be here to stay. Can you honestly imagine an America in which abortion is illegal? Worse, even, is when the Republican candidates try to hide behind the curtain of states' rights. Abortion is not a state issue. Is murder a state issue? How about armed robbery or rape? I don't mean to equate abortion with these crimes but to simply highlight that some issues are not and can't ever be relegated to the state. So, I say, lets keep women in hospitals and out of back alleys. That's why I like Giuliani. Despite his semi-nutty foreign policy, he is a social liberal, like myself. On top of that, and regardless of what his detractors say, Giuliani pulled New York City out of the darkness and back into the light of day. I moved out of Brooklyn when I was 5 years old, soon after Giuliani had taken office. In the '80s, the city had suffered through the worst of the crime and drug epidemic that had swept through the nation. My mother, a native of Brooklyn and resident for 35 years, couldn't take it anymore and moved us to the safer, more mundane Connecticut. Now, 14 years later, my brother lives happily and safely in the Bronx and walks, without care, through Harlem at midnight. This column turned out a bit more liberal than I intended. I suppose that's what happens when your party becomes bedfellows with the Christian right. I do respect the Christian right, and I respect the candidates who align themselves with their doctrine. But while I respect them, I could never identify with or understand them. So let this column serve as a warning to the Republicans: You can only push some of us so hard before we go running into Hillary's big strong arms.
Charlie Szold is a freshman in the School of Public Affairs and a conservative columnist for The Eagle.
