New Mexico guv Bill Richardson has successfully destroyed Barack Hussein Obama and Hillary Warmonger Clinton and will now run for president.

Yes, he has some minor political problems -- unspecified bimbo-itis, lied about baseball, confusing/forgotten Los Alamos stuff and everything else you'll kindly add to the comments. But Richardson's a surprisingly good candidate, which we'll put in one of those bullet-point lists everybody loves so much, after the jump.

* He's half-Mexican and speaks Spanish.

* Latinos now outnumber blacks in the United States.

* Western governor.

* For 23 of the past 27 years, governors have been president.

* UPDATE: We tried to forget about Carter again. For 27 of the past 31 years, governors have been president.

* For 15 of those years, Western governors have been president.

* Congressman, governor, Energy secretary, UN ambassador, yet basically unknown/fresh to the general dumb voter.

* Actually a talented politician.

* Ran the DGA and almost ran the DNC, so knows the machine.

* Born in California, raised in Mexico and Boston -- he's got the local angle everywhere but the South, which could be fixed with Edwards on the ticket as veep.

* Somehow just got a cease-fire in Darfur and gets sent to North Korea by Bush to calm Lil' Kim.

* No war support vote to worry about.

* Actually coherent on the get-out-of-Iraq plan, because it's the Baker-Hamilton plan and he understands how to make it work with Syria and Iran.

* Old enough to make Edwards and Obama look like kids, yet young enough to make McCain look like a crazy old man.

What if Richardson was president? [Hardball]

Gov. Bill Richardson plans to take first step toward White House run [IHT]