State of the Union Preview; Other Stuff

Obama Set to Reveal Island was Figment of Locke's Imagination
After much consternation and angry message-boarding by Lost fans, the White House decided not to preempt the final season's first episode. As a complete non-fan (saw and hated the first five episodes), I've never been more proud of our country. After a year in which we dynamically shifted tracks politically, continued dealing with a Great Depressionish financial crisis, tried to figure out how to keep people healthy, disagreed on fundamental civil rights and followed a balloon in the Midwest like a modern Hindenburg, we effectively told the most powerful world leader, "Look buddy, enough is enough. We don't care. Just put Matthew Fox on the screen and let J.J. Abrams decide why Jacob had to die." And we wonder why the world laughs at us.

The Rise of Fascism in America
Am I the only one watching the rise of Tea Party politics with a healthy dose of fear? Apparently not. In this great piece in The New Yorker, Ben McGrath analyzes the rise of the right-wing crazies during the past year. What I find uniquely scary about this movement is that the goal at times seems to be to find ways to circumvent basic democratic processes. The logic process noted at times in the article (Let's have everyone vote in an internet poll as to whether the government should pay off the mortgages of homeowners who've defaulted!) seems to favor an Oliver Wendell Holmes-esque slavish dedication to majoritarian rule, even in the face of information (the broad positive impact single-payer health care would have on many of the tea party acolytes) that contradicts that same devotion. Then again, it lets journalists show off how many times they've read Hofstadter. So that's good.