SNOWED IN BY SNOWE

That teacherish, lean, mean look on Snowe's face ... I find myself wondering if she is the good witch or the bad one.

While I'm thinking about OZ, witches who did magical things, other guys are saying she's the Brett Favre of the political world.

Favre's a quarterback who's won -- you name it -- all the most this, the most that football awards, and suddenly retired -- suddenly came back, won more, retired again, and now he's playing again. This man is a winner who knows how to play ball and he's got everyone -- all the coaches, teams and fans -- wondering what he'll do next.

Sen. Olympia Snowe, Republican of Maine, definitely has everyone wondering what she'll say or do next.

Her vote unlocked a deadlock. She did something good, important for Health Care. Her vote, as the one and only Republican who's supported Obama's bill, could open the door for other Republicans who want to support the bill.

She's said that Obama's bill is a good place to start.

(Wait a minute ... "to start?" A lot of work, negotiations, revisions have been done already on the bill.)

And she's let it be known -- that she has reservations. -- that her vote, making her the only Republican to vote with the Democrats, does not forecast what her vote may be tomorrow.

Is Snowe another Palin? The fast-talking, down-to-earth, peppy Sarah tossing off remarks that suggest that what she stands for is the opposite of progress -- she scares me.

Olympia scares me.

Yes, she helped Obama, but she keeps stressing her "if"s, her "maybe nots," especially when it comes to the "private option" that many people seem to want.

There's something righteous, unbending, stiffly closed-minded about the woman.

And Snowe has mentioned "filibuster" more than once.

My first impression, when I meet someone, isn't always right -- their tone of voice, posture, facial expression, focus of their eyes -- I get stuck sometimes, in a wrong sense of friend or foe. But this lady from Maine, orphaned at an early age, widowed, then wife of the governor, the state of Maine's First Lady -- no matter what I read about her many good deeds -- I think Senator Olympia Snowe is NOT the good witch.

Is she going to turn into the Wicked Witch? I hope not.