THE Boston Phoenix staff buys an audio copy of Barack Obama's award-winning first autobiography, Dreams From My Father. They notice the president's voice, reading out lines (often quotes from his old friends) such as "They on us like there's no tomorrow. High school chicks, university chicks, it don't matter!" And that's the printable stuff.

This raises the obvious question: Why didn't one of Mr Obama's enemies use these tapes against him, if only to make him look silly? Believe it or not, someone did. Ten months ago, Hugh Hewitt, a conservative radio host from southern California, played these tapes on his show and theatrically asked whether they should or would be used against him by a political enemy. They never were, of course. And now they're most likely to end up as the ringtones of those hip kids wearing "Barack to the Future" T-shirts.