Absolutely not. To be fair, a lot of politicians couldn't pull that sort of thing off, but watching Hillary in those situations gives you that sinking feeling--like when someone does something SO embarrassing in a sitcom that you instinctively turn away for a moment. She's like that, only in real life. What a nightmare trying to get her elected would be, to know that so many people have a visceral reaction to her image.
 

Has our democracy become so otiose and irrelevant that a measure of a potential candidate is whether they can pull off SNL? In any case, Obama is way too earnest. And has any politician on SNL ever been truly, rip roaring funny? No.
Our democracy was a nice idea, but it's time to pull the plug and accept that it is DOA.
 

You're entitled to the opinion that the trend is regrettable, but don't pretend like this is the fault of younger generations or even a new problem. This started with the first televised presidential debate between JFK and Nixon in 1960. You know the story, Kennedy took a nap, had better makeup. Nixon had 5 o'clock shadow and a sweating problem. Kennedy was widely perceived as winning the debate, and he won the election by the smallest margin in history.
 

There's a big difference between losing a real policy debate, albeit because of a bad shave and makeup job, and hosting a comedy show. If you watch the Kennedy-Nixon debate, JFK was better on the issues, too.
 

Yes, as I remember, Nixon stumbled badly on Quemoy and Matsu.
 

Might be interesting to point out how an "earnest" candidate for Governor in Massachusetts (Deval Patrick) just eviscerated a poor woman's Hillary Clinton (and a Republican at that) in Kerry Healey by coming across as being more accessible and less, well... calculating.