I'm actually quite happy

[davidn]

Have I somehow become interested in politics because of the election? This is awful. But it's true that I can't seem to stop reading Electoral Vote, mostly because it's honestly a novelty to have some chance of good news. I've started habitually going on to the USA section of the BBC News site in the mornings to see what's being sorted today, after the promise for a more open government on the White House site and asking for requests and suggestions led to the plan for the next four years being a bit like a very long episode of Jim'll Fix It.

Obama's been around a week now, and naturally he could only really live up to the amazing expectations of him at the moment if he actually performs miracles like uniting the Middle East or releasing Duke Nukem Forever, but even if he achieves a tiny fraction of what he's set out to achieve, then it's still very uplifting just knowing that he's there. gr33bo recently posted about an anti-abortion video, and far from banging my head repeatedly on the screen about its actual message, all I could think of was "You see those people? None of them are the President any more".

Of course, I've still seen little mutterings in the various diverse places I read on the Internet about feeling safer with Bush and proclaiming him the "greatest President of the 21st century" (which I suppose is technically true even if it's like saying "the funniest woman on the Catherine Tate show"), but any feelings I might have had towards those have just been replaced with utter mystification. Having seen him for the last eight years, seeing the country in the state it's in now, your wars, disastrous economy, and wanting him back... none of them will read this so this question is largely rhetorical, but is there something you know that I don't, or are you just a bit of an imbecile?

A non-political good thing is that I think I can now safely declare that we've found the American equivalent of Crunchy Nut - it's an offshoot of Breadtangle of Pizza Honey Bunches of Oats called Just Bunches. Naturally, the disadvantage is that it's one of the most expensive cereals around and only comes in tiny packets, but I won't have to pine quite so much in between British aid packages any more. This country's getting better already.