Mika Brzezinski on David Letterman

I have to admit something. My wife, I am pretty sure, already knows this but I have to admit publicly that I have a crush on Mika Brzezinski. I am sure that says something about me, not all of it I am sure allows me to stay in the he man club.

Mika as some know is the cohost of the Morning Joe program on MSNBC and plays the Democrat to Joe's Conservative. Her father is Zbigniev Brzezinski who was President Carter's National Security Adviser, who in fact often appears on the show as a guest.

Mika is incredibly intelligent, politically minded and engaged, a Democrat but not a knee jerk liberal and possessed of a very wry sense of humor. She broke with the administration and expressed dismay over the Catholic church as employer being forced to provide birth control and can often take the left to task. Much like Joe she is a member of her party but shows respect and the ability to appreciate the other sides opinion.

When you are 47 and you list intelligence as the most attractive thing about a woman you know you have aged. She is attractive but not in a typical way. Bottle blond and with wrinkle lines when she smiles she is a grown up.

So now that I have confessed this I want to talk about her appearance on Dave last night. Interestingly she was obviously nervous. I find it interesting that any one, herself included, who handles with such aplomb Presidential candidates and international figures would be nervous being interviewed by David Letterman. I guess it just goes to show that anyone taken out of their normal environment can change.

I watch Morning Joe most every day. I respect Scarborough, find him intelligent and rational, but I think that Mika with her sense of humor, enormous wit and intelligence, and her lone female in the boys club ability to fend for herself is the star of the show. A modern woman who recently wrote a book about women in the workplace and pay equity amongst other issues Mika is a role model for our daughters. A woman, respectful of her church, but willing to question when she feels necessary, attractive without being objectified, incredibly intelligent and conversant in the issues of the world and a mother and family woman as well who by all accounts is able to maintain a work life balance. And she has a great relationship with her father filled with respect and obvious affection.

Yes Mika is the star of the Morning Joe show, underrated as the glue that holds the show together but also an incredibly strong role model for women, especially young women, everywhere.