Women Get Their Swoon On for Obama

Barack Obama can say nothing better than just about anyone I know and women are swooning:

College Park, Maryland - You can see it in their flushed-face smiles and hear it in their screams. They say the phenomenon is difficult to describe, but once they experience it they tell their friends, sisters, mothers and daughters, and they come back for more if they can.

"He's very charismatic. It was a 'you-had-to-be-there' kind of experience," said Lolita Breckenridge, 37, after hearing Democratic White House hopeful Barack Obama address a packed rally at the University of Maryland on Monday.

A dedicated supporter, she brought two of her friends to hear the Illinois senator deliver one of his much-talked-about speeches.

"Not too much of the speech was new to me," she admitted. "But hearing him live..." she trailed off, shaking her head and grinning.

When Obama addressed the crowd of 16 000 on the eve of primaries which he is tipped to win in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, DC, he carried himself with his habitual worldly confidence, interspersed talk of foreign policy with recollections of his childhood and even poked political fun at his Republican adversaries.

He did not flinch when women screamed as he was in mid-sentence, and even broke off once to answer a female's cry of "I love you Obama!" with a reassuring: "I love you back."

A typical Obama speech consists of a lot of "hope" and "change" and a few vague generalities, but little actual detail. Oh, he says he'll end the war and get our troops out in 2009...in his speeches, but when pressed by talking heads on Sunday morning shows he says he reserves the right to change his mind. Translation - you're not going to blame a loss in Iraq on me, so if I have to leave the troops there until my second term, that's what I'll do. The folks at the big rallies never hear that.

He has star appeal, no doubt, but he's an unreconstructed lefty in those policies he's actually and rarely articulated. However, to some women voters the only thing that matters is the charisma and the flowery words designed to generate an emotional appeal. While this may help him in some sectors in the general election, I have to think he'll come off looking shallow and silly should he get in a serious discussion with John McCain on the tough and dangerous issues of the day.