Bungling and Lip Syncing

America is in transition. As quickly as inaugural optimism came it faded into the sunset replaced with cantankerous media analysis. There could be no better example of this than NPR’s scrutiny of the administering of the Presidential Oath of Office by Chief Justice John Roberts. He and newly elected President Barack Obama both hiccupped on what seemed like an unrehearsed rendition of the oath. It broke the ice. Nina Totenberg, in gracious Nancy Grace style, critiqued the event with the overzealousness of a fastidious wedding planner. Did the nation really need to hear in such detail how our most powerful leaders stumbled verbally on such an anxious, strenuous, and omnipresent day? While punditry of the Constitution prevailed, and the two men went through the ropes again inside the White House, could National Public Radio not have found a more productive thing upon which to report? While the validity of the Oath of Office was in contention, comparing America’s third youngest Supreme Court Justice to veteran William Rehnquist was senseless. Nina made the point that Rehnquist performed a more accurate version of the Oath in 2004 with a tracheotomy tube implanted in his throat. If that is not petty partisan lambasting, what is? The majority of the country is elated a dying breed of white-haired, conservative, grifters are being forced to eat their own rotted flesh and contract Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. The more savvy financiers are playing David Blaine and are proving more difficult to find than Eric Rudolph. Isn’t it appropriate the new sheriff has run them out of town? Is this not why we elected Barack Obama? It is why we are proud to have a J.F.K like youthfulness in government again. While juniors Roberts and Obama stumbled on their words, it certainly will not reap the same consequences of a child George W. Bush stumbling on his words to Osama Bin Laden on the playground.