Four Years of Obama-Biden...Saints Preserve US

Well, Obama won convincingly. I'm glad, in a way. His victory brings closure. McCain can take his rightful place as respected elder statesman of the Republican Party, and Palin can return to Alaska and continue her good works there, and get excited for 2012. The Republican party is struck down but not destroyed, and will rise again; hopefully better and stronger.

I remember reading a TIME article after Obama's watershed speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention, and having a positive impression of Barack Obama. Four years later, I still don't hate him. That's a little scary, considering that I loathe both John Kerry and Al Gore, the previous Democratic candidates. Frankly, the guy is just likable. As I've said before, it's unfortunate that he's a liberal Democrat.

His appointment of partisan Democrat Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff throws his campaign promises of country-before-party out the window. Emanuel, an Orthodox Jew, does underline Obama's support of Isreal however. In the four days since his election, Obama has made more gaffes than in the entire previous campaign combined: he made a insensitive, factually wrong remark about Nancy Reagan, and got into a bit of unpleasantness over a European missile shield. That makes two in four days. His previous record? 1, in the year since his campaign started: the so-called "Bittergate" comments about Pennsylvanians clinging to God and guns; which cost him Pennsylvania and delayed his win in the Democratic primary.

What kind of president will Barack Obama be? There are two options: he doesn't have the guts or the charisma to be the next JFK, but he could very well be the next Jimmy Carter. Republicans, obviously would hope for this, since Carter was so inept that he managed to lose a landslide election to the formerly-disgraced, only four years post-Watergate Republicans and a former actor named Ronald Reagan. He could also be the next FDR. I shudder at this, because the more I find out about FDR, the less I like him. Obama would, thank God, be banned from running for more than two terms, but he could have the same socializing influence; a second New Deal, perhaps--and after six and a half decades of Republicans trying to undo the first one.

I am not exceedingly sorry that the Republicans lost. Why not? The fact is, Democrats are the party of government and Republicans are not; they're preternaturally comfortable there, Republicans squirm. And then when Republicans get into power and office, they don't have the guts to do what they got in there for: reduce, cut, prune government.

And it's also true, conversely, that Republicans are a better minority party than the Democrats. How effective has the Democratic congress been since the 2006 midterms? The answer is, not at all. Reid and Pelosi have a lower approval rating than President Bush. When Republicans have a strong, focused minority, they can effectively block some of the more egregious Democratic policies, and yet still enjoy the inclusiveness of not having to appeal to voters outside the base, making for a stronger, more orthodoz party.

We shall see what the next four years hold. Safe to say, though, they will be nothing like the Bush years. What remains to be seen is whether that's a good or a bad thing.