Political junkies, ages 4 and 6

OMG, I think I've created 2 mini-political junkies! Guess they're taking after Mom.......

A is a Hillary fan, much to my chagrin. Not sure why he likes her, maybe just because he wants to be different from me? Anyway, he's been a diehard fan throughout the primaries, but E has been on "my side" with Obama. I've posted before; he calls him Rock Obama and proudly wears his Obama '08 shirt to school, etc.

Well, this morning we had an incident that just goes to show how truly invested in these candidates they are........... DH and I love to watch Morning Joe on MSNBC while getting ready for school. Can't let the kids watch Noggin or anything b/c they'd never actually put clothes on and wouldn't be ready on time without a struggle. So, DH tells me this morning that we need to make sure A is watching the show b/c they've announced they'll have Hillary on in a few minutes. The boys are eating breakfast in the living room and watching it, and we're in our room brushing teeth, etc. DH steps out to check on them, and comes back in holding E, who is crying almost hysterically.

He hands E to me, and I try to get him to tell me what got him so upset. He manages to say: "A said that Rock Obama is going to drop out" and then collapses in tears again. I immediately went into consoling Mommy mode, hugging and rocking him, saying "it's going to be ok honey, A is wrong, I promise Rock Obama is NOT going to drop out" etc. It took him quite a few minutes to calm down, and finally we had to pull up an Obama speech on the computer for him to watch, and that did the trick. But he was still clingy and semi-sad the rest of the morning.

Oh, and when I asked A if he knew why E was so upset and if he'd meant to do that.....he said yes (sheepishly, but with a little smirk on his face). He knew it wasn't true, and knew it would upset E, but that's what he was trying to do! (can you say "typical big-brother" stuff?) I reminded him about how sad he would feel if it were the other way around, and that seemed to straighten him out.

But I tell ya, it's going to be rough when the day comes that one of the candidates (ahem, HC!) has to actually drop out in favor of the other. One of my sons is going to be devastated, I can see it now. We've gotta start planning for what kind of special treat or activity we can do for that child, to help cheer him up, b/c it's going to be ugly, I'm afraid. Hope I haven't done a disservice by getting them so interested in all this, knowing that one of them will most certainly be disappointed in the end. :(