...to keep from crying.

The Tale of Obamacles:

"I bid thee welcome to the White House
where your true test now begins:

Markets deaf to happy buzzwords
Blind to Shepard Fairey's art,
Heeding laws of economics,
Not the wishful laws of man;

A world of of evil filled with monsters,
who are unmoved by flowery talk,
Invulnerable to race cards
or leftwing blogger insults,
Who Hope for Change in megatons.

Do not despair! For look before you,
The noble army who brought you here:
Thespians and hiphop moguls,
Graphic artists, hipster twats,
The academic scribes of Athens,
basic cable sycophants.

These are the arrows in your quiver,
for the coming epic tests;
Use them well, but first remember:
They're waiting on those magic tricks.

Good luck with that, well-spoken hero,
I think I'll grab a snack and watch."

The same way we were united in 2000 and 2004, and the same way California is united right now over Prop 8. But don't let reality intrude on a good story:

It's all kind of confusing: 46 percent of the country voted against Obama. You would think that people in business might want to avoid potentially antagonizing such a big chunk of consumers.

My guess is that he'll be seen as something of a disaster on domestic policy, what with the massive spending and growth of the federal government. But on foreign policy? I believe he'll be vindicated.

In the avalanche of abuse and ridicule that we are witnessing in the media assessments of President Bush's legacy, there are factors that need to be borne in mind if we are to come to a judgment that is not warped by the kind of partisan hysteria that has characterised this issue on both sides of the Atlantic.

The first is that history, by looking at the key facts rather than being distracted by the loud ambient noise of the 24-hour news cycle, will probably hand down a far more positive judgment on Mr Bush's presidency than the immediate, knee-jerk loathing of the American and European elites.

We'll give it 20 years or so. Time will tell, but I think people will appreciate W's stalwart approach to foreign policy. My real fear is that Bush will look great in comparison to his successor, who will likely be as much of a disaster (or more) than Bush's predecessor on the international side...

From The Road To Serfdom, Chapter Two: The Great Utopia

To the great apostles of political freedom, the word had meant freedom from coercion, freedom from the arbitrary power of other men, release from the ties which left the individual no choice but obedience to the orders of a superior to whom he was attached. The new freedom promised, however, was to be freedom from necessity, release from the compulsion of the circumstances which inevitably limit the range of choice for all of us, although for some very much more than for others. Before man could truly be free, the "despotism of physical want" had to be broken, the "restraints of the economic system" relaxed.

Freedom in this sense is, of course, merely another name for power or wealth. Yet, although the promises of this new freedom were often coupled with irresponsible promises of a great increase in material wealth in a socialist society, it was not from such an absolute conquest of the niggardliness of nature that economic freedom was expected. What the promise really amounted to was that the great existing disparities in the range of choice of different people were to disappear. The demand for the new freedom was thus only another name for the old demand for an equal distribution of wealth. But the new name gave the socialists another word in common with the liberals, and they exploited it to the full. And, although the word was used in a different sense by the two groups, few people noticed this and still fewer asked themselves whether the two kinds of freedom could really be combined.

F.A. Hayek, writing during World War II:

We have progressively abandoned that freedom in economic affairs without which personal and political freedom has never existed in the past. Although we had been warned by some of the greatest political thinkers of the nineteenth century, by Tocqueville and Lord Acton, that socialism means slavery, we have steadily moved in the direction of socialism. And now that we have seen a new form of slavery arise before our eyes, we have so completely forgotten the warning that is scarcely occurs to us that the two things may be connected.

The Road to Serfdom, Chapter One: The Abandoned Road

I like U2, and I'm looking forward to No Line On The Horizon and whatnot, but I gotta say that the fact that Bono is now a regular guest columnist for the New York Times is just, well... It says something about the Times, now, doesn't it?

And goodness, can't he come up with something new to write? He's been telling that Sinatra story since 1995 at least.

But on the bright side, there's a killer audio stream of Sinatra singing "My Way" on the page.

On this, the most anti-climactic of holidays, I wish you a peaceful, joyful, and prosperous new year!

Now, back to once-a-week posting.