Show Business for Ugly People -- Except Mitt

Time's Joel Stein brings his L.A. perspective to the Iowa caucuses:

My wife and I play this game called Better, Worse, Same. You see a celebrity in person, you compare her to what she looks like on TV and photographs. For instance: Jenna Elfman: better; Kate Hudson: worse; Will Smith: same.

I saw Mitt Romney speak for the first time, and all I could think the whole time was: Better. I knew he was good-looking, but, wow, that is one good-looking bastard. His kids are good-looking. Their wives are good-looking. The grandkids are good-looking. Olympic speedskater Dan Jansen, who was also on the stage for some reason: good-looking.

Mitt was speaking, just hours before the Iowa caucus, at the corporate headquarters of Kum & Go. Romney is a candidate so wholesome, he can afford to speak at a company called Kum & Go.

There were about nine reporters there for every Kum & Go employee and/or Romney supporter. You could tell the difference because even Romney supporters are good-looking.

When I finally heard Romney through the deafening handsomeness, I'm pretty sure he was full of crap. I haven't checked the local Des Moines TV listings last night, but did he really come home from campaigning, flick through the channels and find Seven Brides For Seven Brothers – just so he could make a totally lame joke about having five sons? And shouldn't the best-funded Republican campaign fact-check that Niels Bohr, not Yogi Berra, said, “Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future.”? Am I asking too much from my President?

And, despite the presence of Dan Jansen, I wasn't convinced of Mitt's chances when his wife introduced him by saying, “I want to introduce probably the next president of the United States.” Probably? My wife has more confidence in me than that, and she's married to me.

I did, however, legitimately laugh at Mitt's retort to Huckabee's campaign manager threatening to knock Mitt's teeth out: Just don't touch the hair. Good-looking people making jokes about their good-lookingness is always a winner. I'm not counting the handsome bastard out.