Economist Dodges Draft

Jesse Walker | February 9, 2007

Mallard Fillmore has been on a quixotic crusade to draft the free-market economist Walter Williams to run for president. Here's a sample:

First: No, I don't get it either. Second, and more important: Yes, that is Williams' email address on the right-hand side of the first panel. It has appeared in several recent editions of the strip, and readers seem to have noticed it. "I've been inundated," Williams told Robert Stacy McCain of The Washington Times. But he says he still won't run:

The biggest obstacle to his own candidacy, Mr. Williams said, is his wife of 47 years, Conchetta.

"She said that if I ever thought about it seriously, she'd assassinate me," he said.

So who's he rooting for instead?

Mr. Williams' own '08 favorite is Rep. Ron Paul, Texas Republican and a 1988 Libertarian Party presidential nominee, who last month announced the formation of an exploratory committee.

"If the framers of the Constitution were somehow to come back, Ron Paul is one of possibly only three people in Congress that they'd even talk to," said Mr. Williams, adding that most politicians have a "generalized contempt" for the values of the Constitution.

Meanwhile, Mallard Fillmore creator Bruce Tinsley says he might back Newt Gingrich for the nomination. Gingrich or Paul...it should go without saying, but I think Williams has the better idea.

Update: Apparently it's an abortion joke. Très risqué!