While Hillary Clinton attacks Barack Obama on his lack of Washington experience, North Dakota Sen. Kent Conrad made a point I've been waiting to hear from the Obama campaign for weeks.
In answering Clinton's attack, Conrad last night pointed to another Illinois lawyer who took the presidency after little time in Washington: Abraham Lincoln.
When Lincoln ran for president in 1860 (as a Republican), he had served four terms in the Illinois state House, one term in the US House of Representatives, and had lost the 1858 race for the US senate to Stephen Douglas.
Obama, on the other hand, served eight years in the Illinois senate, and has been in the US senate just under three years.
Lincoln managed to take on the greatest political challenge our nation has ever faced and come out victorious. He didn't need years in Washington to deal with secessionists, antiwar "copperheads," cut-and-run types in his administration, and a series of generals who were unwilling to take the fight to General Lee.
