Michael Smerconish

While in China last week, Vice President Biden mistakenly said we own 85 percent of U.S. Treasury securities, while the number is actually 54 percent. But who am I to criticize?

Sitting in front of a live microphone can be dangerous. I know because I do it for 20 hours each week for my nationally syndicated "Michael Smerconish Program." And over the span of the last decade, plenty of dumb things have rolled off my lips.

I didn't yet know what a font was but I do recall that learning how to write in cursive was a big deal, the sort of thing you anxiously anticipated.

I can still picture how each letter was posted in cursive above the blackboard in classrooms, and I remember all the time we spent trying to mimic those letters with our No. 2 pencils on white-lined paper. It was a milestone lesson, akin to learning to tie your shoes or to read.

Why is there always such poor advance work when it comes to presidential candidates and theme songs?

Every four years, it seems, someone uses a song without getting the necessary clearance. You'd think politicians would learn from their predecessors' mistakes.

Three decades ago, Bruce Springsteen didn't want Ronald Reagan using "Born in the U.S.A." And last week, Tom Petty told Michele Bachmann to stop using "American Girl." She should have known better, given that in 2000, Petty objected to George W. Bush's use of "I Won't Back Down." (After which Bush began relying on John Mellencamp and Sting, only to have both of them ask him to back off.)

Mitch Daniels would have added some much-needed substance to the national dialogue. His reason for not running for president is a sad commentary on the sideshow our elections have become.

I spoke with Indiana's popular chief executive last week. We discussed how he had turned a $200 million deficit into a $1.3 billion surplus without raising taxes. And how his insistence on drastic spending cuts had played a large part in Indiana's ability to avoid a dip into the red.

When I heard that McDonald's planned to hire 50,000 people next Tuesday, I thought it was a sign of reluctance by suburban kids to enter the workforce by wearing the Golden Arches.

I'm one of the many Americans who have worked at a McDonald's, which puts me in the company of Jay Leno, Carl Lewis, Keenen Ivory Wayans, Andie MacDowell and Macy Gray. But it's a bigger group than that. Some estimates suggest that as many as 10 percent of Americans once did likewise.

Harry Reid just called for "an adult conversation" about prostitution. OK, I'm in.

A few years ago, he published a memoir, "The Good Fight." When it was released, I interviewed the Senate majority leader about growing up in Searchlight, Nev., a town he said that then had "13 brothels and no churches."

"I learned to swim in a bordello swimming pool," he told me with a laugh. I couldn't resist responding, "Today they call that a Jacuzzi, senator." (I spared him my joke about the backstroke.)