If Pataki can craft a message that builds on this, then he has a story to tell. But the story has to have a happy ending.

There are more jokes about losers than there are books about losers. The most common volumes you see written about them are the bumper stickers during the next administration: Don't blame me; I voted for the loser.

They do make love stories for girls with black hearts after all. They go like this.

It builds to a crescendo.

So in that sense, it's a story that really is vitally linked to a staged situation.

I know that spinning sets me in a trance; it soothes me and charges my batteries at the same time. When times are tough I sit down to spin during the news-broadcasts, with therapeutic results.