Snow in February

It used to be unthinkable that a presidential press secretary would be out and about on the rubber-chicken circuit, banging the drum for his president's political party, but Tony Snow has pretty much buried that convention of American politics.

Snow, the Princeton High School grad and former Fox News talking head, was out on the campaign trail last fall to help GOP congressional candidates raise money - including a stop here for Jean Schmidt.

He'll be back next week, as the keynote speaker at the Hamilton County Republican Party's $80-a-pop Lincoln-Reagan Dinner at the Westin Hotel.

(Republican old-timers will remember this annual event as the "Lincoln Day Dinner." A few years ago the party decided that the Great Communicator was to be given equal billing with the Great Emanicipator.)

While out on the stump for Schmidt last fall, Snow began his speech by saying he wasn't there to bash Democrats; and would launch into a misty-eyed paean to the joys of going to work every morning and being in the presence of greatness and how he still can't believe how such a thing could happen to a regular Princeton boy like him.

If you'd like to hear it again, it will cost you 80 bucks.