Michael Bloomberg, Sit Down And Shut Up

No amount of your billion dollars is going to make anyone want to vote for you.

Over on his blog, Greg Mitchell flags a new Gallup Poll that probes these questions in some detail. The poll, which surveyed roughly 2,000 adults, finds:

* A startling 84% of respondents think there's a candidate running who would make a "good president."

* Nearly three in four -- 72% -- say that the candidates are talking about issues they "really care about."

* A solid majority -- 58% -- feel that one or more candidates has come up with "good ideas for solving the country's problems," a finding that runs directly counter to Bloomberg's frequent and self-serving criticism of the other candidates.

Gallup's conclusion? "The American public does not appear to believe it is important or necessary for an independent candidate outside of the traditional two major parties to step into the race in order to save the nation." That couldn't be clearer. Are you there, Dean Broder?

To the extent that there's even minor daylight for a third-party run, it comes from the opposite pole of the Broders of the world. It would be fiscally populist and socially conservative (think Huckabee or Lou Dobbs), not fiscally conservative and socially liberal. That position is already filled. A Bloomberg third party would probably not even be so much as a spoiler.

It's not David Broder's country. Sorry.