WASHINGTON (By Melinda Henneberger, Newsweek) November 6, 2005 — The good news is that I have found the presidential candidate I’ve waited for all my life.

On the down side, he is Rep. Matt Santos, a Texas Democrat who exists only on TV’s “The West Wing.” (Santos, played by Jimmy Smits, is supposed to have a real debate, though, when he and his Republican opponent, played by Alan Alda, face off in a live episode this Sunday
night.)

Some have been similarly smitten with this show’s President Jed Bartlet, for years, I know. But I’m too reality-based to have even a good political fantasy about a character so didactic I’m not positive he could win a city council seat on New York's Upper East Side. (And a president who fires one of his top aides just for compromising national security? Please.) I am open to a campaign crush on “Commander In Chief” Mackenzie Allen, but she’d have to be better written.

Santos, on the other hand, is moderate but not muddled, acute without any need to condescend, capable with people but not a total operator, a man of faith so centered he can stride right past the culture wars. As for real wars? Ha! This is a gulf war vet and Marine Reservist who knows that not all military interventions were created equal.

Our man Matt grew up in Texas but definitely does not clear brush for fun, in August or any other time. In my imagination, at least, he does not belong to the DLC, either, and has never forgiven Bill Clinton for welfare reform. And the recent scene where he stands up to the NARAL
purity patrol? Well, Jimmy Smits never had this effect on me back when he was a cop.

Congressman Matt likes his wife, yet he doesn’t confuse her with his campaign manager. He has a conscience, and often minds it, yet he can also be cold--this, too, being something of a requirement for the job--as when he ships a longtime aide back to Houston without so much as a wave or a thank-you note.

Of course, I know I’m dreaming whenever the action turns to Leo McGarry, the recovering addict and former White House chief of staff whom Santos has chosen as his running mate. (Are you White House veterans on the writing team having fun over there or what?)

But somehow, I’m happy knowing that there is at least a pop-culture model for the kind of candidate who would nix a smear job on an opponent for other than tactical reasons. And if knowing what you’re looking for is the first step to finding it, it might actually be useful for the Democrats to have a model for the kind of candidate who could, you know, win.

Karl Rove once told me, “If there weren’t a George W. Bush, we would have to invent him.” So I hear it can be done.