Frat Boy

After listening to Obama speak last night, one thought came most to mind; Wow. Actually, there was a second thought; the contrast between our current leader and frat boy. George W. Bush never once assumed the mantle of leadership bestowed upon him without the ever-present smirk on his face that belied the truth of his reading of his teleprompter messages that said, in effect, this is what they have told me to say. Where our previous president was a hollow shell, Obama has substance and guts. Why am I returning to Bush at this moment? It is not simply that I no longer have him to kick around any more, but I did view Frost Nixon this week and the impact of that film on its subject matter served as a timely reminder that Bush and his minions utterly failed to grasp the lesson that politicians needed to learn from the Nixon failure. Instead of substance, Bush as frat boy brought the keg of beer to the party. He ran the country by serving up generous sloppy mugs full of the beer of the nation's largesse to his friends. His minions drank to excess and became sloppy drunk while the rest of us pressed our noses to the windows of the frat house watching what was going on and wondering if we could just have a sip. Last night, there were no smirks. We were told that we too had to share the responsibility of the burden. We were told, in essence, that the party is over. Wow!