Crossword writers have some different criteria for who they pull for in crosswords. The crossword writer's candidates

It’s election season, which means pundits are busy discussing — and pollsters busy polling — key voter groups. Will the college crowd turn out for Barack Obama like it did in 2008? Can Mitt Romney appeal to enough blacks, Hispanics and unmarried women? Who will seniors and small-business owners vote for on Nov. 6?

The question no one’s asking: Are crossword-puzzle writers pulling for Obama or Romney?


Like any group, we have our own interests to look out for, but it’s not the deficit, drone strikes or the Dow Jones Industrial Average that concerns us. Instead, we’re simply looking for a candidate who will appoint usefully named people to high positions, expanding our pool of usable crossword entries.

A name is especially useful to us if it:

1) Is three, four or five letters long, since those lengths dominate crossword grids.

2) Contains mostly common letters — think 1-pointers in Scrabble — since they’re easier to mesh with crossing words.

3) Is novel to the general public.

For example, ANN (as in Ann Romney) meets the first two criteria but not the third, since there are already many ANNs to clue with. MALIA (as in Malia Obama), on the other hand, is more useful since it meets the first two criteria and there’s no other famous person with that name (apologies to Massachusetts state Rep. Liz Malia).

Just as there are “crossword famous” celebrities whose puzzle prominence outweighs their real-life fame, such as actors UTA Hagen and ESAI Morales, so too are there political figures whose usefulness to crossword writers exaggerates their importance on the world stage. Not to disparage mid-20th-century Burmese Prime Minister U NU, late Israeli statesman Abba EBAN or 1980s Attorney General Edwin MEESE, but if you got your worldview only from crosswords, you’d think these three were Napoleon, Churchill and FDR in terms of geopolitical impact.

Through this narrow lens, then, let’s rate how well Obama’s first term has gone, beginning with his two Supreme Court appointments, Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Two solid choices: Sotomayor is too long and Kagan too high scoring in Scrabble to be of much use, but it’s nice to have another option besides the well-worn “Actress Braga” for SONIA, and ELENA is an outstanding crossword entry we’ve been forced to clue in middling ways until recently (“1941 hit song ‘Maria ___’” or “Tennis player Dementieva,” for instance).

So we’ll call SONIA and ELENA stand-up doubles. To see what an upper-deck home run Supreme Court nominee looks like, go back one justice to Bush appointee Samuel ALITO, whose surname is rapidly making him one of the most beloved political figures in the crossword community. He’s got it all: five letters — all them Scrabble 1-pointers — and there was no famous ALITO to clue with before his ascension to the court. I can’t tell you much about his legal stances on critical issues, but I do hope he serves for decades to come.

Now, the Cabinet appointees: Besides the above-mentioned MEESE, other useful picks in the past few decades have included LAURO Cavazos (secretary of education under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush), Les ASPIN (secretary of defense under President Bill Clinton) and Elaine CHAO (secretary of labor under President George W. Bush). Two or three decades, incidentally, is about the cruciverbal shelf life for most Cabinet members, so fingers crossed on another LAURO or ASPIN emerging sometime soon.

Overall, Obama’s Cabinet picks have been quite strong: Hilda SOLIS and Steven CHU were tough to clue pre-Obama, and ARNE Duncan is an outstanding four-letter entry (though already a familiar crossword presence, owing to English composer Thomas ARNE). ERIC obviously isn’t a new guest to crosswords, either, but it is useful to have two more (Holder and Shinseki) in the Cabinet to give Clapton, Cartman and Idle a well-deserved break.

So what would Romney bring to the crossword solver’s table? We won’t know for sure until — and if — he’s elected. His choice of running mate, however, didn’t help much because both PAUL and RYAN are easily clued to in dozens of ways. Either Marco RUBIO or John THUNE would have been markedly superior. (Obama’s pick of Joe BIDEN was excellent for us, by the way.)

There aren’t too many crosswordy names being bandied about for a Romney Cabinet — the major exception being Florida Rep. John MICA for secretary of transportation. If Romney wins the election and wants to cement the crossword vote, Secretary MICA is a no-brainer.

Lastly, candidates’ families are supposed to be off-limits, but we’ll make an exception here because the issue is so important. Beginning with the wives, ANN Romney edges out MICHELLE Obama; they’re two easily clued to names, but ANN is a snappy three letters while MICHELLE is a crossword-awkward eight. In the kids’ category we have SASHA (good) and the aforementioned MALIA (excellent) on the Democratic side. Can the Romneys capitalize on their 5-2 numerical advantage? Not really: Eldest son TAGG is very good, but JOSH, BEN, CRAIG and MATT are already very easy to clue.

The 2012 race is a tight one, from a crossword writer’s perspective. On balance, has President Obama earned a second term from crossword puzzle writers? Or should we gamble that Gov. Romney will provide greener cruciverbal pastures?

Obama’s Supreme Court and Cabinet picks have been strong, while Romney’s choice for vice president wasn’t remotely helpful, so I’m going with the sure thing over the unpredictable challenger. We may be a small and politically irrelevant group, but crossword puzzle writers are indeed better off than we were four years ago.

Matt Gaffney has been a professional crossword puzzle writer for the past 15 years. His website is www.mattgaffney.com.