■"Newt and Hillary Agree, Oddly Enough, to Agree," by Raymond Hernandez, New York Times, 13 May 2005, p. A1.

I always get the painfully sarcastic emails whenever I say anything nice about Hillary. Today, you can send those letters to Newt directly, who's apparently meeting regularly with her on a pet issue for them both--healthcare. He's even gone so far as to talk her up as a serious candidate for president.

But this is what I am told by friends in DC: you can't start a conversation with the Dem establishment unless you can name a couple of red states that you can steal outright, as in, replicating Kerry's effort won't do--for obvious reasons.

Here, insiders say, Hillary comes up short. Name the state she will carry that Kerry couldn't. Awfully early for such a firm judgment, but the only question that matters.

Two names that do come up are Bill Richardson, presumably for his strength in SW and among rising percentage of Hispanic voters in general, and Evan Bayh of Indiana, presumably because he steals Indiana and Ohio.

Hmm, such a scary pair those two might make, and I think it would be Richardson as VP so the American public could try out the concept of an Hispanic (by half) national official.

It's amazing, but here is this huge country and we elect only 2 national officials. That's it!