Jonathan Krohn has Obama in his sights

Since George Bush left office, the Republican Party has seemingly been led, at various stages, by Bobby Jindal, Rush Limbaugh and Joe the Plumber.

Now they've found a new figurehead: Jonathan Krohn. He's a precocious young man from Georgia with curly brown hair and braces. And he's 14 years old.
 
America's answer to William Hague has, he says, four key principles: "Respect for the constitution; respect for life; less government and personal responsibility." And last year, while his contemporaries were busy at summer camp, Krohn went about writing - and financing with $6,000 of his own money - Define Conservatism, an 86-page book about these core beliefs. It was good enough to persuade a conference of Washington's top conservatives to give him a three-minute slot at a grassroots seminar.
 
Having acted since he was eight, and made it to the third round of auditions for the Broadway production of Mary Poppins, the speech Krohn gave (see clip below) - "I want the American people to understand that conservatism is an ideology of protecting the people and the people's rights" - was delivered with an uncanny stage presence.
 
It became a huge YouTube hit, and now Krohn finds himself juggling appearances on NBC, Fox and countless radio shows, and making comments like this: "Now that I'm a political pundit, I have the ability to influence people."

Krohn is certainly not lacking in confidence. Home-schooled, he took up Arabic several years ago. "Before I got into politics," he told the New York Times , "I wanted to be a missionary to people in the Middle East. I thought it would be better to speak with them in their own language."

When Krohn was interviewed recently by the Guardian journalist Ed Pilkington, he was flattered by the Hague comparison. "I agree with a lot of [Hague's] views. We both admire Margaret Thatcher. I'm glad to be compared with him."

When Pilkington asked him whether he'd like to be a fireman, a beekeeper or a superhero when he grew up, he chose none of them: "I'd like a nationally syndicated talk show as soon as I can get one. If God provides for it, I'd love to be on the air right now."

Obama has been warned. ·