Opinion: What do John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama share?

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Believe it or not, here’s what The Ticket wrote last July 23:

‘Rudy Giuliani’s campaign for the presidential race is over. Simply close up shop now. Save all that money. The same goes for both Fred and Tommy Thompson, MikeHuckabee, Bill Richardson, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo and Dennis Kucinich. To continue their expensive campaigns would be an unnecessary drama and simply futile.’

Let’s see, how many of those guys are still in the race? Uh, none, now that Huckabee dropped out the other day. And how did we know all this all those many months ago?

Call it Rule 7.

In the last 52 years, Americans have not elected a president with more than seven letters in his name. Think about it. Bush (4), Clinton (7), Bush (4), Reagan (6), Carter (6), Ford (4), Nixon (5), Johnson (7), Kennedy (7).

In fact, because all three remaining candidates for the 2008 election -- John McCain, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton -- have seven or less letters in their last name, the total in our nation’s history come next Jan. 20 will be 29 of 44 presidents with short names.

Yet another reason -- or seven of them -- to remain a loyal Ticket reader.

-- Andrew Malcolm