He just told the truth…

…and they think it's Hell.

“There were a few sharp elbows that really rankled and I felt were not as magnanimous as the occasion called for,” Karen Hughes, a longtime Bush confidante, said in an interview.

***

Dan Bartlett, another top adviser...added: “It was an ungracious inaugural. It was pretty clear he was taking shots.”

Sorry, kids, the tantrum won't work this time. We've turned this country around and we're headed home.

Nice one…

…by Bob Weaver at Democratic Underground.


You can click it a bit bigger.

Of what she sang.

While tongues wag about Aretha's very fine but hardly extraordinary church hat (I mean, haven't y'all ever been to church? The Queen was the very model of taste and decorum in the selection of her crown), DHinMI shines some historical light on her performance, in harmony the still vibrant echoes of Marian Anderson and Martin Luther King, Jr.

And then he said...

Of course, he had me at "Hello."

I just want to say...

...President Barack Hussein Obama.

Without prefix, without suffix.

With joy.

From the "Ain't that America" file.

A thought. Tomorrow morning we will see the 44th consecutive peaceful transition of executive authority under the provisions of the Constitution of the United States of America.

That's a heck of thing when you think about it. That Constitution has proven amazingly resiliant, surviving even the recent resurgence of the counter-revolutionaries posing as "movement" conservatives.

Just a thought.

Just a few hours…

…and I'll be up to salute the new era over a champagne breakfast with the Brilliant and Beautiful Bride of Upper Left. Here's the uniform of the day…

The BBBUL's got one in white. Yeah, we're pretty hyped at this point.

It's just about here. It's going to happen.

It's been a long time comin'...

Not a Friedman Unit (™ Atrios) too soon...

Friedman his own self says…

Just get me a Supreme Court justice and a Bible, and let’s swear in Barack Obama right now — by choice — with the same haste we did — by necessity — with L.B.J. in the back of Air Force One.

I'm in.

Hat tip to Gordon.

And counting...

change.gov

Hat tip to jnfr.