Last night, millions of Americans put down aside their personal feelings and sat down in front of their televisions for a farewell from the man who, right or wrong, we’ve been living under since the end of 2000.
Wherever you go from here, Gil Grissom, happy trails.
Oh, and Bush resigned or something, but we forgot to tape it.
In other news, a US Airways jetliner with 155 people aboard lost power in both engines after colliding with a flock of geese. The pilot ditched in the icy Hudson River and all on board were rescued by ferries and emergency boats. Is it OK to laugh about air travel again? We like to think so.
Can’t make it to the inauguration next week? Attend one that is not quite as historic but a hundred times more adorable by going to Legoland!
President-elect Obama once again brought up Social Security and Medicare, pledging to shape a new “bargain” with the American people. It will be just like the old Social Security and Medicare, but this one will come with the rust-proofing at no added charge.
This post is a little flippant– here is some Krugman.
The President’s trip to Afghanistan and Iraq this weekend designed to highlight security improvements in the region only ended up highlighting the throwing arm of an Iraqi journalist, who threw both of his shoes at the President during a press conference. In the Arab world, throwing your shoes at someone is a serious insult. The sole of the shoe is considered dirty because you step in all kinds of mud and crap during the course of the day. Another facet of this is when you see members of Arab and Asian cultures taking off their shoes before they enter their home or a place of worship. When this story comes up at work, I suggest a joke about how quickly the President ducked, the odds of David Gregory doing the same thing next week or how the Yankees are looking to sign the journalist as a middle reliever for $161 million over 7 years. Be careful though, every office will have one wet blanket who will say that even though they don’t like the President they find it incredibly disrespectful.
Throw your shoes at them.
Blagojevich , Ponzi Schemes and Krugman after the jump.
Bailouts Bailouts Bailouts! The federal government agreed Sunday night to rescue Citigroup Inc. by helping to absorb potentially hundreds of billions of dollars in losses on toxic assets and injecting some fresh capital. I am not sure exactly how these things work, but some how the government is going to invest more than the company is worth and still not actually own it. The other key part of this story is that President Bush emphasized how he and President-Elect Obama worked closely on this plan. As I said, I don’t know whether this is a good idea or not but I tend to defer to Paul Krugman in matters like this (what with his Nobel prize and all):
A bailout was necessary — but this bailout is an outrage: a lousy deal for the taxpayers, no accountability for management, and just to make things perfect, quite possibly inadequate, so that Citi will be back for more.
Meanwhile, GM remains in a lot of trouble and is considering bankruptcy if they don’t get a federal bailout. The New York Times has a great article which includes interviews with several bankruptcy specialists about what bankruptcy proceedings would look like for GM and what they could accomplish. If that sounds a little dense for a Monday, then the money quote says it all: “Bankruptcy sucks as a way to achieve real business resolution.”
Twilight, a movie I probably won’t see based on a series of popular books that I have never heard of was the #1 film at the box office this weekend. James Bond took the #2 spot with Disney super-dog epic Bolt coming in third.
SuperbloggerKanye West’s new album drops this week and while we will have a longer review later in the week, the initial reports are that like all of West’s albums he succeeded somewhat in spite of himself.
So what do I write about now? I mean… is there still news? I heard Barack Obama went to the gym yesterday. That’s news right? So cold… so very cold…
What’s that? A light at the end of the tunnel? Could it be? Could it possibly be useless bullshit coded as culture wars that I can get outraged about again? When all hope fails, turn to BIll O’Reilly. Last night, Bill O’Reilly kicked off his annual War on Christmas, or, his war on the War on Christmas? I am not sure how it works exactly but I am pretty sure it is coded hate speech of SOME kind. The Christmas arms race escalates this year with bumper stickers.
I am not the only person feeling a little empty after this election. Both David Brooks and Paul Krugman use their columns to project their fervent wishes onto the incoming administration. Krugman wants them to think big while Brooks just sort of awkwardly bares his soul and says “think Republican.”
Democrat Barack Hussein Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States on Tuesday, becoming the first African American to win the post and completing a meteoric rise from state senator to the White House. The Illinois Senator rode a message of change and an inspirational exhortation of hope to a victory over Senator John McCain of Arizona. Thought votes are still being counted, Senator Obama currently has 52% of the popular vote and 349 electoral votes. Obama gave his acceptance speech in front of 200,000 people in Chicago’s Grant Park.
This is the biggest news story in the world today, you can takeyourpick as to which newspaper coverage of the election you want to read. Or, you can do what I did and just go here and cry for a while. All of the coverage focuses on the historic nature of the election, both what it means for race in America and how President-elect Obama (there goes the crying again) is going to face a daunting set of challenges.
What do your favorite writers think?
Tom Friedman calls this election the true end of the Civil War.
Matt Yglesias is trying to insist that this is really a victory for a progressive agenda.
Paul Krugman calls this an end to the Monster Years of American politics.
