I've relatively quiet about the election, the post-election, the pre-Inauguration and expect to say relatively little about the Inauguration. At the moment, my favorite Obamas are the kids who while as bright as the previous Democratic kids of my lifetime seem to have the ability to cut to the quick. "First African-American president...speech better be short." "It better be good.."
Well, there's no doubt that Batboy will deliver an eloquent speech. The problem is the reality that underlies the speech. Things suck, and will continue to suck for a long time and the American people -- hell, the people of the world -- have short attention spans. We'll waive flags, talk about how great everything is going to be and then like Cthulhu, return to our slumbers. (AXE just compared the American people to Dark Gods, the old ones? Yeah, make something of it...) And things will continue to suck.
Now, I hope I'm wrong. I suspect not, but I hope I am. In general, the level of hysteria is absurd. This isn't going to be like the revitalization of the countryside in one of those Stalinist films where all the happy peasants go out and build fucking canals. It's going to take time. And for many, time is not what we have a lot of...we have several wars going on (Drugs, Terrorism, Iraq, Afghanistan); a tanked economy; a tanked world economy. In the past, the military has done well on recruiting and retention when the economy has sucked. Well, duh, of course it has. But, enlistments are up and retention is way up in the middle of two wars and whatever we want to think of Drugs and Terrorism as...)
So, it's looking grim. And, at about 1215 tomorrow, reality should be setting in.
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