Will we elect a rock star as President?

There have been a lot of interesting story lines to emerge during the presidential campaign so far.

Last year, pundits and pollsters said Arizona Sen. John McCain had no chance to win the Republican nomination, but he has pulled off a remarkable comeback to earn that party's nod.

Also, many believed former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson would become a frontrunner in the Republican race as the choice of the conservative wing of the party. However, he spent too much time deliberating about whether to run, and when he finally joined the race, his campaign generated little momentum.

However, the most interesting story line is easily the emergence of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama. Whether a person supports him or not, the hysteria his campaign has generated is something that is not often seen in the political world.

I don't believe 'hysteria' is too strong a word. According to some who are covering his campaign, he is generating the type of emotion that is directed toward rock stars and not politicians.

It seems like in every election cycle there is rhetoric about the need for change, and at this point, many Democratic voters are looking at Obama as the person who can bring that change.

It's no secret that people are fed up with what is coming out of Washington. President Bush and the Democraticly-controlled Congress both have terrible approval ratings.

Obama has been able to tap into that discontent, and it is serving him well so far.

However, recent history shows that other presidential candidates have been able to successfully exploit this dissatisfaction.

For example, when the 1976 presidential race began, Jimmy Carter was nothing more than the obscure former governor of Georgia. However, he had good timing because his candidacy came when America was emerging from the stench of the Watergate scandal.

The fallout from the scandal was that President Richard Nixon resigned and several from his administration went to prison. Gerald Ford became president after Nixon left and alienated a lot of Americans when he pardoned Nixon for any crimes he might have committed.

Nobody will ever confuse Carter with a rock star, but he was able to use the discontent in the country to his advantage. He beat Ford in the '76 general election.

Unfortunately for Carter (and America), there was no happy ending during his presidency. The economy fell apart during his tenure, and terrorists raided the United States embassy in Iran and held Americans hostage for more than a year.

The general consensus about Carter when he left office was that he was a nice guy but a bad president.

Other recent Democratic presidents also had the ability to touch the hearts of voters in a deep way. For example, there can be no questioning that President John Kennedy did that.

However, I believe his presidency has been romanticized through the years because he was assassinated. After all, he won the election in 1960 with only 49.7 percent of the popular vote. He was far from a landslide choice.

The same goes for Bill Clinton. He won the 1992 election against incumbent George Bush and Ross Perot with only 43 percent of the popular vote. In '96, he was re-elected with only 49.2 percent of the vote.

As for Obama, it will be fascinating to watch how his candidacy plays out. He communicates well and has charisma. While those may seem like superficial qualities to consider when electing a president, there can be no doubting that America is superficial in many ways.

It is part of our human nature to be attracted to what is pleasing to the eye without considering the content of what we are pursing.

That is not meant to be a slam of Obama. It is meant to be a slam of voters.

Too often, voters take the easy way out when casting their vote. They don't study candidates closely and then complain when the results are not up to their satisfaction.

Regardless of who a person votes for in the general election in November (whether it is Obama, McCain, Hillary Clinton or whoever), my challenge to you all is to cast your vote based on the positions candidates take on the issues.

Don't take the easy way out.