Barack Obama Watched The Godfather Closer Than I Did

In an interview last winter, Barack told Entertainment Tonight that The Godfather movies were among his favorite.

Shame on me for letting these few days go by before I realized the real wisdom of getting Hillary locked down in the State Department under his thumb and unable to openly lay the groundwork for a primary challenge in 2012.

Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.

The March of the Clintonistas Continues

It's not as surprising as it sounds...if President-elect Obama is going to pick people who already know their way around Washington, he's going to be very likely to get people with some kind of connection to a previous Democratic administration.

The Politico and others are calling it a done deal that Monicagate defense attorney Greg Craig is slated to be Barry's White House counsel.

He's notable not only for helping Bubba wrap a legal towel over his torso, but also his notable defection to Team Obama, which included a detailed rebuttal of Hillary's claims of foreign relations cred during the Dem primary.

Here's Kim Gandy...Bet She's Pissed About Something!

NOW is upset that of the zero cabinet level positions announced so far, none of them are women.

For the Love of God, Barack, Don't Make Richardson the Secretary of State

Much as my testicles shrivel when I hear Hillary scolding the person who's most recently pissed her off, and for all the times my toes are sure to curl when I hear John Kerry pontificate on world affairs, I would take one right after the other rather than suffering through a month of having Bill Richardson represent us abroad as Secretary of State.

Now, even Richardson would be better than the over hyped, abysmal failure named Condie Rice, but there are so many more ways that Barry can repay the New Mexico governor for his act of betrayal on Good Friday, 2008 than making us suffer through his brainless observations on the world stage.

The Dream Tream

I'll grant that nightmares also qualify as dreams, so the post's title will be accurate for more than just the Obammies (we need to come up with a good collective noun for his supporters).

Anyway, I came across a picture from Barack's hotel room on election night.
Robert Gibbs, David Plouffe, Barry, David Axelrod.

The Terrorist Speaks!

One of Barry's "associates" will be interviewed on ABC tomomrrow morning...

George W....A Real Hands-On Guy

G.O.P Dog Days?

I generally don't have a hell of a lot of use for William Kristol.

During the campaign, he spawned silly rumors like the imminent arrival of Mike Murphy in Team McCain that never happened.

He's a regular panelist on Fox News Sunday and has the awful habit of finding himself more charming than just about anyone else on the panel or off does.

But this morning in the Times, he comes through with a mildly clever observation about Barry's dog talk...and how it might not bode well for conservatives.

Up until now, many of the swing voters who decided to go black did so on the hope of competence rather than because of some seismic ideological change in the country. But in talking about the dog, he added the deadly element of empathy for dog lovers and parents throughout the country.

If Barack can bring not only competence to the table, but also a healthy dose of "I feel your pain," it could be a long few years for the Republicans in the wilderness.

Job Search

Yeah, maybe what I do currently just isn't socially meaningful enough...maybe I should go work for Barry and Joe...

The Odd Couple has a transition website up. Will need to explore this later on, but they do have some kind of job application forum.

Transparency is good.

Crap! I May Have Screwed the Pooch!

There are a number of arguments against Obama...

Socialism? I don't care. We're socialist enough, Hillary.

A black guy in the White House? Stifle yourself, Archie. No one cares about that anymore.

A White Sox fan? Well, maybe I can see why I should have had a troubled conscience over this.

But there's one consequence I didn't fully consider when casting my vote.

Dang.

Highlights and Low Lifes From Tuesday's Elections

I guess I paid attention to the same bigger issues/races that most other people were on Tuesday night, but here's my little take from the roller coaster we just got off of...


The Big Enchilada- Like anyone else, whether for or against his candidacy, I extend congratulations and a skeptical eye towards Barack Obama. I could have done without the shots of race-baiting bigot, Jesse Jackson and self-centered attention whore, Oprah Winfrey, weeping for the cameras in Grant Park, but it is what it is and they are who they are. I was talking with a friend out west last night and, while we come from different parts of the spectrum, we both had a similar experience in the voting booth. I stared at my paper ballot before turning it into the machine, not quite believing what I was doing, but on Jerry's good name, it never even crossed my mind that I was voting for a black guy. Obviously, I know Barack is black, but the big "whoh!" moment of it all didn't really occur to me until Tuesday night when a panting Keith Olbermann made the call. This was a big moment for the country, one which I didn't really give a lot of thought to when deciding who to vote for, and that's probably both a good and generational thing.

And I'll side with Joe Scarborough and others who think it's time we taunt the liberal European countries with this one. While they often like to look down their pointy noses at the crass, racist America with our imperfect present and more imperfect past, I have to ask where their President/PM of African descent is if they're so damned enlightened.

But now it's time for the guy to get to work and, as I've said, I'm skeptical of him. While I'll concede the possibility that, in his heart, the guy is every bit the bleeding heart/pinko that some claim, I also think that he's a pragmatist above that. The guy is smart and wants to retain power. He would not have gotten where he is without those qualities. And he must know that he won't be able to get the legacy and time in office he wants if he governs like a left-wing loon, so I think his alleged/reported tapping of Chicagoan Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff is telling. Barry's heading to town to get shit done. His biggest challenge could actually be fighting back the beady-eyed, angry liberals who've been waiting to stick it to the GOP for the last eight years.

California Prop 8- Shame on the voters of California for choosing to put a ban on gay marriage in their Constitution. Before anyone gets smart with me, I realize that they probably have the right to do so (current ACLU challenges notwithstanding), but it's just in such bad taste. I won't waste my free space here recycling the full laundry list of arguments for gay marriage, but for the life of me, I can't see why it's worth their share of $74M to build the case for why two people can't just spend their lives together. For years, the rap against gays was that they're just a bunch of pleasure-seeking hedonists so then when it turns out that they want to settle down just like anyone else, the argument shifts. I'm neither a theologian nor an expert on what God believes, but my guess is that he's got bigger trout to fry.

Connecticut 4th District- As has been well-noted, New England now has no GOP representation in the House of Representatives since Chris Shays lost his seat. While smarty pants guys like Chuck Todd and Michael Barone might be able to correct me on this, this is probably the starkest regional imbalance in federal representation for either of the two major parties. The GOP is becoming the party of stodgy old white men and it's just not good for its future. Anyone who's interested in this might pick up Grand New Party. I guess the first big shin-dig will be today, when a bunch of 'thinkers' get together at the home of rabble rouser Brent Bozell to plot a comeback strategy.

Minnesota Senate- The Senate race in the Land of 10K Lakes is still going on. I've blogged here before of my visceral dislike for Norm Coleman so I'm really rooting for them to make up for the few-hundred votes short Alan Franken is before the recount.

North Carolina Senate- While the race had more history than took place in the last week of the campaign, Liddy Dole's "Godless" ad spoke volumes about the GOP's tactics. The Democrat party is not above deceptive, tasteless ads, but this one just hit a lot of people in the gut and I'm actually happy she lost, if for no other reason than as punishment for pulling such a ridiculous stunt.

Selah.

Cabinet Speculation

HuffPo has a little rundown of the conventional wisdom leaders for the various visible cabinet positions in the Obama Administration.