And the president is ...

I woke up this morning in the middle of a strange but fun dream. Michelle and I walked into a large room, kind of like a newsroom but not a newsroom, and amid a lot of clatter I thought I heard people talking about the presidential election. So I asked the question I like to ask sometimes to start a conversation and argument: Who's the next president going to be?

Somehow everyone in this big room seemed to hear me and there were loud but indecipherable answers coming from everywhere. So I tried to quiet the hubbub and ask people individually for their opinion. Almost before I could start with these little five-second interviews Joel Connelly appeared, in full-huff mode, insisting that a lot of thought and preparation go into the newsroom's election pool, and there are rules to make sure that political reporters and editors have no unfair advantage. First of all, I've been in a million election pools and I've never heard anything like that, but no matter. In my dream I just said this isn't a pool, it's a question, so shut up Joel.

Anyway, people one by one started answering, never mentioning an actual candidate. After a few of these I felt compelled to interrupt and re-explain the idea. The only rule, I said, is that you have to say who you think will win, not who you'd like to win or just think is a cool person, but who will be the actual president after next year's election.

Ok, everyone agreed. And the strange answers kept coming: names I've never heard, minor celebrities. Christopher Walken, one guy said. Ok, I said, singing and dancing news conferences, that's good. Melissa Something, a woman said, trying to remember a name. Etheridge, I offered. “Yes!” she said. “She has great thighs and I like her hair.”

Very weird. It kept going like that. Somehow along the way I had acquired a microphone and maybe a trailing TV camera, and I started shaking people's hands as I asked for their prediction, which seemed to please them. I was totally working the room, which seemed to keep getting bigger, and I still hadn't heard a single Obama, Romney, Giuliani, Edwards or any of the other clowns.

When I got to Michelle she said some name I didn't know. Who, I asked. She repeated it. Who? She said it again, Dan something, I think it was, and she seemed exasperated, like I wasn't paying attention. He's Valerie something's aide, on Vashon, she added helpfully, although it didn't help at all. Who, I asked, and that's when I woke up.

That's it. Ok, dream analyzers out there, what's it all about? There must be some deep-seated thing I'm too dense or self-deluded to recognize.

The correct answer, by the way, is Hilary Clinton.

People think the big deal is that she'd make history by being the first woman elected president. And that's pretty good. But the more amazing accomplishment will be being the first president whose popularity rating when elected is less than 50 percent. Nobody likes her, but enough people will vote for her anyway. It's the ultimate lesser-evil election.

Who do you think?