When John Kerry picked John Edwards as his running mate this week, there was a lot of excitement, of course, almost as much as when I chose a cyborg rat to run with me, or when I chose Peter Sagal to replace the rat. We presidential candidates know that our choice of running mates is a great way to generate headlines.

But it doesn’t really make a difference, according to those who know.

In every newspaper, on every news network, on every evening news program, there was the Smug Political Analyst. The Smug Political Analyst’s job is to tell you what’s “really” going on, and successful SPAs are supposed to wear a perpetual half-smile and phrase their deliveries as though they’re saying something Amusing, even though there’s never a punchline or humorous observation to be found. Their real job, though, is to tell you what the vast community of SPAs think - originality of viewpoint is about as common in the SPA community as it is in the weatherman community, as though cogent analysis was as singular, fixed and knowable as today’s temperature.

So here’s what every SPA “observed” this week: The vice presidential candidate doesn’t matter. Polls show that people vote for the presidential candidate.

They’re wrong. I may be torpedoing my future as a SPA, but every single person who offered that “analysis” this week is completely and totally wrong.

Think about your friends. Every once in a while, one of your friends gets a new girlfriend or boyfriend or spouse, right? And here’s the thing: That new person in their life really can and often does affect your friendship, doesn’t it? Sometimes the love of a good man or woman can make your pal a little better, help him or her grow up or get in touch with his/her emotions or remember birthdays. And sometimes the new love interest utterly ruins your friend; turning your friend into a pretentious yoga enthusiast or an off-putting evangelical Scientologist or a rapacious oil mogul who blatantly favors big energy contracts over environmental concerns or diplomatic good sense. Don’t you hate it when that happens to your friends?

Yes, when I decide to spend an afternoon with a friend, I choose the friend, not their significant other. Any poll of my household would illustrate the truth of that fact. But the way that the new girlfriend or boyfriend has affected my friend is often at the heart of whether or not I pick up the phone and call, even more so if we’re planning some sort of couples-oriented event.

The analogy is painfully obvious, but I’m going to play SPA here and make it devastatingly obvious: A running mate really IS a lot like a new spouse or significant other, a person that the candidate suddenly spends a lot of time with, goes places with, and consults with about a lot of their decisions.

John Edwards is the kind of boyfriend that’s going to make John Kerry a little more fun to be with, loosen up a little bit, and maybe take that extra five seconds to hear the answer after he asks someone how they’re doing. Dick Cheney is kind of boyfriend that makes George Bush have to come home before the party’s over and wear clothes that he’s not completely comfortable inside. Cheney’s the kind of boyfriend who makes you stop calling certain friends because they’re not “appropriate” for you, and if you’re dating Dick Cheney, you’re probably going to get less calls from your old friends anyway, at least until you break up with him, at which point all your friends will suddenly breathe a huge sigh of relief and let you know how glad they are that you’ve finally dumped that conniving bitch.

Vaguely homoerotic analogies concerning major politicians are clearly out of bounds in SPAland, of course. So now I’ve thoroughly destroyed my future as a SPA. That’s a relief.