Besides poetry, my other love is politics. Up until now, I have refrained from commenting much on politics, but a relative encouraged me to speak my piece a little. I will promise not to write about candidates in races where I have a vested financial interest, i.e., where someone is paying. I won’t necessarily tell you who I’m working for, but I won’t comment on their campaigns.

Senator John Thune (R-SD) pulling his name out of contention for the Republican presidential nomination is the best thing that could have happened to President Obama and to former Governor Tim “T-Paw” Pawlenty.

Obama is consistently polling slightly behind a “generic” Republican. But, once the names of the leading contenders are included, he jumps to a solid lead. Thune was the closest thing the GOP had to a “generic” Republican. With the exception of his vote for TARP, there were no major knocks on him. He was telegenic, handsome, conservative, and… well, generic.

Absent Thune, T-Paw becomes the closest thing the field has to a “generic” Republican. He has a decent shot of snatching the nomination against better known and better funded rivals, just on the basis of being less unpalatable than figures like Romney, Gingrich, Palin, and Bachmann.

Unfortunately for the GOP, while T-Paw is a decent campaigner, he will also lose his home state of Minnesota and is probably not dynamic enough to take out Obama. He would probably do better than those other names I mentioned, but he is unlikely to win the election.