Another day, another list of V.P. possibilities for Barack Obama and John McCain.

A guy can't even troll the Internet for a rare song by my No. 1 guilty-pleasure band America (I need something written by Jimmy Webb from the soundtrack from "The Last Unicorn," in case you want to help quell this while-Sofia-naps-emergency) without getting smacked in the face with speculation.

I suppose it is righteous pontification. After all, the window dressing placed at the bottom of either ticket may be what ultimately decides this thing.

Ever since Hillary Clinton got the last laugh by painting Obama into a corner by stating she would be willing to be his second banana -- and make history for women the world-over in the process -- we've all be watching him deal with the ace-less hand she dealt him.

It certainly is a quandary.

She would bring a lot of her supporters -- women, hard-hats, racists, senior citizens and combinations of each -- to the cause. I've seen polls showing 15 to 25 percent of her supporters saying they are going to go another way and vote against their own self-interests out of spite. Another 10 to 15 percent say they just aren't going to vote at all (and you know the number is more, because no one wants to admit apathy to a pollster).

That doesn't bode well for Obama, who faces similar backlash from his own base -- blacks, yuppies, college kids, sexists and combinations of each -- if he goes with a woman who they think deployed dirty tricks that had their media-endorsed candidate limping across the finish line with Hillary on his heels.

Those of the misguided belief that Republicans and centrists are going to come Obama's way on the day of reckoning point to her polarizing effect.

Moreover, it has been stated that picking a Clinton flies in the face of the message of "change."

In response, Obama laughably tabbed a member of another Democratic Royal Family -- Caroline Kennedy -- to help pick his vice-presidential candidate.

His able-minded controllers of spin bounced back by floating a story that he is considering retired army types.

Meanwhile, yawn, McCain's list has about 999 boring white men and one Native American that would kill the "Obama is too inexperienced" argument.

And Hillary, she stays in hiding.

She may not want the job anyway.

That's where I come in.

Would I not be the ideal running mate for Obama? I'm from Pennsylvania and, as a Hillary supporter, I could bring some of the base with me.

I admit Pa. Gov. Ed Rendell has slightly better name recognition, but he already stated -- during a recent visit to Ambler to tout his smoking ban -- that he isn't interested.

Good thing, because Obama ain't interested in him, either.

And it's for obvious reasons.

There is a list of quality senators -- with vastly more experience and voting records than Obama -- who hail from key states and could balance the ticket.

There is Carl Levin from Michigan, Charles Schumer from New York and Russ Feingold from Wisconsin.

There are two others who have the added advantage of being women -- Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, both of California.

And they have as much of a chance as I of getting the call.

Why?

Same reason why neither Joe Lieberman nor our own Arlen Specter would be tacked onto McCain's ticket.

We won't be chosen because we are ... chosen.

Do I have to spell it out for you? J-E-W.

The candidates all court the Jewish vote and seek handsome campaign checks, but not the possible backlash that Al Gore — albeit in a pre-Sept. 11 world — had the courage to endure.

The country was almost ready for a woman presidential candidate and, we can only hope, a biracial male president.

But it is not ready for one of us.

It probably hurt Gore in 2000 and no one is going to run the risk during a time when the country is at war with a bunch of Arab Muslims who think Jews use their own children's blood to make matzoh.

Maybe I'm being paranoid.

Maybe it's not so much anti-Semitism as it reality.

Then again, history shows the two to be one in the same.

In a way, despite my bitterness, I feel vindicated.

The guitar player in my band of yore was a black dude. We used to argue about which of our downtrodden peoples would get to the White House first. While he was convinced it would be a Jew because Jews have white skin, I was convinced it would be an African American because enough whites attached an aura of mystique to blacks that it would cancel out the rednecks in the red states.

He asked how it could happen and I painted a scenario much like the one that has unfolded with Obama. He scoffed. I now know that I saw the future.

Since Nostradamus was a from a Jewish family who converted to Catholicism for obvious reasons, maybe I have some of his blood in my veins.

Hey, a guy has to think of something while the baby sleeps ...