One of the reasons Barack Obama may be so smokin' (in the Jim Carrey sense), suggests Slate, is that he's still smoking.
Writer Juliet Eilperin suggests the US presidential hopeful's possession of a voice "political consultants dream of", which makes even "hardened cynics go weak at the knees", is down to many things - but perhaps the most important is that he is an occasional smoker.
A lot has changed in the relationship between politics and smoking since the days of Winston Churchill's cigar. David Cameron has testified to his use of nicotine patches. But as the Slate piece argues, there is an irony: "If he quits, Obama may lose that wonderful maple-syrup sound just as he begins running in earnest."
The 45-year-old's none-too-surprising announcement yesterday that he was setting up a committee to explore a presidential bid has, predictably, attracted a lot of attention - some of it excitable in the extreme.
A post from one of the Chicago Tribune's blogs, however, strikes a note of scepticism and asks readers for reasons why the Illinois senator will not be the Democratic party's 2008 presidential nominee. Suggestions include less of a national campaign apparatus than Hillary Clinton, limited political experience and the possibility that his current appeal may one day be looked back on as a honeymoon period - but no mention of the smoking.
