This whole house thing is pretty darn stupid, and the two of them ought to be ashamed of themselves.  So many words wasted, so much valuable time now gone that could have been devoted to something meaningful in helping us make a decision for our election day plans.

Senators John McCain and Barack Obama traded house drivel this week, each trying to outdo the other on who “feels our pain” as an average Joe America.  McCain couldn’t answer a simple question about how many houses he owned; Obama, who owns a home worth seven figures bought with the help of a now convicted felon, ridiculed him.  Please, gentlemen, tell us how that’s going to help buy groceries this week, or make our mortgage payments next month, or heat our homes in the northeast come cold weather.

Nobody elected of late to the White House had to worry about where his next meal was coming from the day before he was elected.  Former President Bill Clinton was probably the least wealthy to hold the office in recent memory, but he and his wife have certainly made up for that since he left office.  Former Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis was poor by presidential nominee standards, too, but he wasn’t elected.  America has come to accept that candidates for the nation’s highest office really aren’t “one of us” when it comes to average man and woman on the street net worth.

But really, fellows, to bicker over how many houses one owns, or to throw stones when your own home is made of pretty expensive glass, is a bit insulting, all things considered.  Tell me what you’re going to do for me, not how comfortably you’re going to live after the election even if you lose.  We deserve better than that.

The phrase “It’s the economy, stupid” is referring to the big picture economy, the one that is affecting all the rest of us at the pumps, at the grocery store, and in every other facet of our lives.  It doesn’t refer to homeowner’s association dues in gated communities of million dollar homes or condos, and it doesn’t refer to making that million dollar per year income stretch farther for basic staples of life.

It gets harder and harder to feel that one or the other is really one of us, or someone who has substantive policy answers to address the needs of today and tomorrow.  Next week we have the open air theater that will be the Democratic Convention in Denver, a scripted drama of self-importance, hail fellow well met moments, balloons and buffoonery.  That will be followed by whatever McCain’s people can come up with to deflate those balloons, and the same scripted scrabble that will be the Republican Convention.

Maybe when all of that has passed, the candidates will speak to real people about real issues, and we can take their measure on substance.  Maybe.  In the meantime, it’s dueling doorbells between the McCain and Obama homes.