Magic Walls and Holograms

I begin by congratulating Senator John McCain for a valiantly fought campaign and a gracious concession speech. I didn't agree with him most of the time and I didn't vote for him, but he's a stand-up guy, a war hero and as true a patriot as they come.

Watching President-elect Barack Obama on that stage in front of hundreds of thousands of people was a very surreal experience. Despite my disagreement with several of his positions on issues, I had been pulling for him over the last several months; his idealism, energy, and reconciliatory attitudes converted me...and GODDAMN, can the man give a speech. Obama will go down in history as one of the best orators to ever hold the office of President, and rightfully so. He achieved some of the larger margins of victory ever amassed by a Presidential candidate, and will have a Democratic House and Senate to work with for at least the first two years of his administration.

After two years, having the election finally come to a close is very odd. Coverage of the election, starting with the first debates between over a dozen candidates for each party, had become so widespread and common that it seemed natural to hear so much about it throughout the course of the day or the week. Now it's over, and I don't know what to do with myself.

I'm hoping to get down to Washington DC for Barack Obama's Inauguration in January; I experienced Bush's second one in 2004 thanks to LeadAmerica's PYLC program and found it to be a lot of fun...but thanks to DC and its one-extreme-to-another weather, VERY cold.

I can tell that my writing is rambling as much as my thoughts are tonight; I've been up for a LONG time today and have basically been sitting in front of the TV since 4 PM. Speaking of TV...what the hell was up with CNN tonight? During this campaign season, I have been a big fan of CNN due to a combination of Wolf Blitzer, Anderson Cooper, and a large touch-screen map (the Magic Wall, apparently) of the United States that can be used to display just about any kind of information relating to voters, elections, etc. This map is cool as hell; CNN reporter John King was able to bring up any county in the country and its data dating back to the 2000 election. He could expand and collapse screens using his fingers (kinda like an iPhone, for anybody who has seen one of those in action) and could conjure various graphs and pie charts. Very cool. However, it seems that CNN got a bit technology-happy tonight...at one point, Wolf Blitzer was interviewing Jessica Yellin. Or, should I say, a holograph of Jessica Yellin. Apparently unveiling this new technology tonight, the network took great pleasure in summoning a half-size graphic of Yellin, who apparently had 18 cameras ringing her at whatever location she was in. If you didn't see it, go YouTube it...it looked EXACTLY like that scene from Star Wars when the hologram of Princess Leia pops up (in fact, the first thing I thought when I saw it was "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi...you're my only hope").

Anyway, it was a hell of an election. Good luck to Senator McCain...take a vacation, man. As for President-elect Obama...time to go to work. We're with you.