(h/t on the title of this post to the usual brilliant inspiration of HSB)

A Zogby Poll shows MA Senator-elect Scott Brown and President Obama in a dead-heat in a hypothetical 2012 presidential matchup. The election night partying wasn't even over when people started speculating about presidential possibilities. Consider his resume: a telegenic state senator who would have about 2 years experience in the Senate before making a White House bid. Sound familiar?

Obama was thrust onto the stage during the 2004 DNC because dems saw the promise; articulate, young, good looking and black. Certainly they weren't thinking as early as 2008, but Obama was. I remember being stunned at his 2007 entry, thinking his impatience would cost him dearly. I, of course, was wrong. Obama benefited from great timing and a polarizing primary opponent in Hillary Clinton, and, yes, from being black..

Brown could benefit from the same timing. Conservatism is making a comeback, but the movement has no leader.  Brown could benefit from that leadership vacuum and from a conservative wave that could last until 2012. Brown's resume is virtually the same as Obama's, except you have to replace black with "the Republican that won Teddy Kennedy's seat." Obama's experience is proof it could happen. The question for conservatives is; should it? Remember, inexperience was the number one weapon conservatives used against Obama. How do you fall in love with Brown as a candidate and NOT look like a hypocrite if you ripped Obama for having roughly the same resume in 2008? And the reality is Brown most likely is not any more ready for the presidency than Obama was. Sure, the formula worked; Obama got elected, but he's in over his head every bit as much as those of us who played the inexperience card said he would be. Even if Brown is a dyed in the wool conservative, the same may be true of him. He may not be ready.

On the air today I made the analogy of Brown to fresh out of the oven bread, one of my all-time favorite scents. Brown is fresh out of the oven, politically speaking. If you're not reading this in Massachusetts, how much do you really know about him? Let's let this loaf of bread sit and cool awhile and then see how we feel about it. I like what I've seen and heard so far from Scott Brown. I may hear enough in the next year or so to be convinced he's ready for a presidential run.  Even with his inexperience he might prove to be the most viable candidate, if not the most qualified. But let's find out before we start worrying about hypothetical match-ups with the incumbent.