Charles Barkley for President...over Oprah Winfrey?

Wally Watch: Where we read Wally Hall so you don’t have to.

June 4, 2008: Hail to the chief or get tossed through window.

Primary Theme: Wally makes his highly sought-after presidential endorsement, and let’s just say that Charles Barkley is probably forming his exploratory committee right about now.

Just Try to Say This in One Breath: “[Barkley] missed and hit a little girl, to which he not only apologized, he bought her and her family tickets to future games and when his career ended he said that was the only regret he had from his career.”

Straight Out of the Playbook: As we’ve noted before, a favorite Wally trick is to use the full name of a figure he’s writing about, and it’s on full display here. Apparently Sir Charles’ middle name is Wade.

What Would Hillary Say About This? We try to stay far away from politics here at Razorback Expats, but one thing that impressed us about this year’s primary season was that, for most people at least, the candidates’ genders didn’t seem to be a critical factor one way or the other.

Don’t count Wally in that camp, though, as he disqualifies Oprah on the basis that “there are too many countries we must deal with right now that would never accept any woman as a leader and spokesman.”

Possibly a Sign of the Apocalypse: We just spent a few minutes trying to properly phrase a sentence about Wally Hall’s evaluation of Oprah Winfrey as a fictional Presidential candidate.

Grammar Police, Arrest This Man: If you read Wally literally (and we always do), he seems to be suggesting that parents and teachers shouldn’t be raising Charles Barkley. Well, duh! Check it out: “…[Barkley] knew parents and teachers need to be raising their children, not him.”

Our Analysis: When Wally teased us by referencing his upcoming presidential pick in his June 3rd column, it didn’t take long for visions of jokes about Obama and McCain each trying to distance themselves from the endorsement to start dancing through our head. So, when we fired up the computer the next morning and learned that he was choosing between Oprah and Charles Barkley, we were a little let down.

In the end, it provided some decent Wally Watch fodder, but it wasn’t the bombshell we’d been hoping for. More than anything, it seemed to reveal an increasing desperation on Wally’s part to find suitable column topics during the football and basketball offseasons (hey, we can relate).

For all of our sakes—but especially Wally’s—football season can’t start soon enough.