Petless in Chicago

Barack's daughters joined his parents for a TV interview with some gossip show, clips of which were shown on the Today show this morning. Great revelations? Barack has promised, win or lose, that the kids get a dog in November. What's the political motivation for this announcement?

The pet-owning public may have caught on to the fact that McCain, like George Washington and George W. Bush, shares his home with a number of pets - more than a dozen, in McCain's case. Democrat Barack Obama, by contrast, is petless.

Petless? Can a man win the presidency today without having a dog or a cat?

Among pet-owners, McCain has clawed his way to a marginal advantage; 42 percent supporting the Republican, 37 percent the Democrat, according to the results of an AP-Yahoo News poll (remember, it was Jonathan Swift who brought us the Yahoos.)

Among the petless, the poll found, Obama is favored by a rather solid margin of 48 to 34 percent.

Considering that an estimated 63% of Americans have pets, we can see what Barack is up to with the (campaign) promise to his kids.