Darth Vader for President 2016

While it’s too early to know if The Force is with any 2016 presidential candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton doesn’t believe Darth Vader is suited for the White House.

In a light-hearted moment from her CNN interview on foreign policy, the former secretary of State was asked what she thought of a recent poll showing Star Wars characters such as Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader with higher favorability ratings than Clinton, Rand Paul and a host of would-be candidates — as well as President Obama and Congress.

“Darth would not be my choice,” she told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, but maybe somebody with “a slightly more positive attitude in his presentation.”

The question did get a chuckle out of Clinton, who gamely answered Zakaria’s query about the “deeper meaning” behind the poll. (It’s actually a combination of a FiveThirtyEight.com poll on the popularity of Star Wars characters and The Washington Post‘s look at how they compare to various Democrats and Republicans being mentioned as 2016 prospects.)

“I think the deeper meaning is that people love fantasies and sometimes when we’re so frustrated with the gridlock in Washington, we would like some deus ex machina figure,” Clinton said.

As for the 2016 election, Clinton did not say whether she’s decided to run but talked in general about campaign themes in the interview that aired Sunday on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS.

“The next election will be based around the economy, around people’s standard of living, around what’s happening to the middle class in America,” she said. “And whoever runs is going to have to speak candidly and come up with a set of recommendations that the American people believe would be in their interest, so that you have an election not about a candidate, but you have an election about an agenda.”