PEBO becomes PBO

Congratulations! The 44th President of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama, has now officially taken office, oath administered by Chief Justice John Roberts.

God bless America!

King Obama, monarch of United Kingdom of America

Even the Brits are noticing the inauguration events are looking more and more like a coronation of a king. Millions of dollars are being spent on Inauguration Day events, and this during a recession. All I can say is that there better not be a crown placed on his head when he's taking the oath of office.

Funny enough, King Obama may face some cold shoulders in his own royal court of Democrats. To his credit, many people think he really means it when he said he wants to change Washington, be bipartisan, reach across the aisle, etc. And yes, his selection of inauguration speakers, cabinet members and inner circle advisors have illustrated that. But the Democrats in Congress seems to be drunk on majority power already, their leaders Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi publicly reminding folks that they don't work for the king. Minority Republicans may end up being Obama's closest allies in his first term. After all, the king needs friends to counter the influence of Reid and Pelosi.

Fred Barnes of The Weekly Standard has some fears about Obama -- and rightly so, now that we've come to know PEBO a little better. My greatest fear is that the likes of Reid and Pelosi, with the help of the media which packaged Obama into a pop star, will decide that this president is their puppet and overstep their authorities.

Imagine what took place in Obama's meetings with columnists

Obama had dinner with several prominent conservative columnists a few days ago, and followed up with a meeting with the liberals (of course he had to). Nobody's leaking details of these events, honoring the off-the-record agreement. Larry Kudlow shares some opinion of PEBO. Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic isn't talking. No juicy stuff (heck, Kudlow can't even remember what food was served)!

My guess is that during the dinner with the "crazy" conservatives, the conversations were about the economy, Washington war stories, and lots of exchanged pleasantries. Congratulations. How's the family? Thank you. What delicious food! Here's a toast to our new President...

And what of the meeting with liberals? I bet they complained about not having dinner -- not even refreshments! Are we not as important as the right-wing nuts?! And after a brief exchange of pleasantries, they probably treated the meeting like a BDS support group, whining and moaning about Bush's stupidity and Cheney's dishonesty, and Palin's family. These liberal columnists probably hinted to PEBO that it was their words and leftist colleagues in the media that helped him to the White House. Take good care of us. Don't let us down. We can't believe you invited Rick Warren...

Best of luck to PEBO. As Kudlow pointed out, there's a lot of things to deal with already...

Where's the free in free press?

Can you believe Obama has a list of press members who've been told they will be called upon during a press conference? We know Obama loves the teleprompter, but it's laughable that a U.S. President cannot handle the heat from the press.

Blame goes to the press members, too. Are some of them plain worried about keeping their jobs? So they play it safe by cozying up with PEBO and his team. It's no wonder newspapers are going the way of dinosaurs.

America already has superheroes to save her

Gerard Baker of The Times begs a superhero to save America:

But what Mr Obama really needs right now is a television superhero to help him to rescue the US economy. His inauguration as president in 11 days' time will take place in what can be described, without hyperbole, as the worst economic conditions the US has faced in at least 70 years. Data due from the Labor Department this morning is likely to show that the US lost more jobs, net, in 2008 than in any year since the Second World War. Economic activity in 2009 is likely to decline at its fastest since the same historic landmark.

Most alarming, not only is there no obvious end in sight, the evidence suggests that things are getting worse. Despite the bailouts last year, the financial system, crippled by the housing market disaster and folly, remains clogged and more big financial institutions are likely to be in trouble in the next few months.

He's right in calling the American consumer "the hero of the global economy," but the true superhero is good old fashion American capitalism. Unfortunately, Captain Capitalism is losing the battle against his Big Government, Big Spending nemesis, President-elect Barack Obama (now affectionately known as PEBO in the blogosphere). An $800 billion stimulus package. Are you kidding me? Read carefully and it's all about Obama's socializing education and health care. He's found his excuse to spend money, increase taxes, and all that anti-capitalism stuff.