Mark KennedyRaise your hand if you've ever had a photo of Jimmy Carter hanging on your wall.
No? I didn't think so.
Well, I have. Years ago in my single days. It's not a partisan thing; I also have some Ronald Reagan playing cards.
I thought about that old picture of President Carter last week when I saw a news photo of Jimmy kissing his wife, Rosalynn, at the Atlanta Braves game. Bless their hearts.
No matter what you think about his time as president, it's hard to fault Carter's "retirement" resumé. A post-presidential life filled with relieving human suffering and teaching Sunday School sounds virtuous to me.
As a kid, I was a political junkie. I came of age in the '60s and '70s - the era of Vietnam, Watergate and the Kennedy assassinations. My dad read three newspapers a day. He and I would have long talks about current events. We watched the Watergate hearings together. The cast of characters in that drama - John Dean, Bob Haldeman, et.al. - still occupy some sepia-toned chamber of my brain.
My dad and I also watched "The Advocates," an old PBS debate program, and "Firing Line," the late William F. Buckley Jr.'s cerebral talk show. By high school, I was reading political biographies and policy books. I note this not to brag, but to point out how political engagement has changed.
I am sure there are some teenagers today who are deeply interested in politics. I hear highly ideological presidential candidates such as socialist Bernie Sanders (running as a Democrat) and libertarian Rand Paul (running as a Republican) have rabid youth followings.
Still, our two boys have shown no signs of being interested in politics. As an experiment, I decided to leave the second GOP presidential debate on the family-room television, just to see if anybody would notice. My 13-year-old son lifted his Beats headphones just long enough to ask, "Daddy, is that Trump guy going to win?"
"I wouldn't bet on it," I said. "But who knows?"
My 8-year-old son, on the other hand, emerged from underneath his throw blanket - where he holes up to watch videos on his iPad - to watch the debate with me. After about 10 minutes I asked him: "So who do you like so far?"
"I'll show you," he said, scanning the line of candidates spread across the TV. He lifted an index finger in the air to tick through the candidates one by one.
"It's that one, the black man," he said after a few minutes, pointing to the genial, retired neurosurgeon, Dr. Ben Carson.
"Why do you like him?" I asked. "I'm just curious."
"I don't know, he just seems nice," he said.
"A lot of people say that," I added.
With that, Carly Fiorina began to talk about U.S.-Russian relations.
"Why is she taking about Russia so much?" my 8-year-old asked.
"Russia is a big, important country," I said.
"It's not important to me," he said.
Changing the subject, he observed: "Is there somebody on this show whose dad used to be the president?"
"Yes," I said. "His name is Jeb Bush. He's the tall man in the middle. Some people think if your daddy was president it would make you a better president, while other people think that it might be some other family's turn to have a president. What do you think?"
He didn't answer, but looked up at the ceiling - thinking.
"I can really, really see it both ways," he said, finally.
"Me, too," I said.
In an instant it struck me that my 8-year-old would make a terrific focus group of one. With no biases, he was able to see the debate with complete - if childlike - clarity.
Without really trying, he had drawn the following conclusions: A) It pays to be nice; B) Candidates should talk mostly about things that matter to people; C.) Experience and fairness count for something in politics.
You can keep your pundits and pollsters. If I want to know who's going to win an election, I'm going to ask a third-grader.
Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645. Follow him on Twitter @TFPCOLUMNIST. Subscribe to his Facebook updates at www.facebook.com/mkennedycolumnist.