Julian Assange, 2010’s Person Of The Year

He said he wouldn’t mind prison. Julian Assange sort of looked forward to it, even. He’d read a nice, long book in peace. And he’d get to sleep in the same bed for the first time in years.

Assange got his wish when he surrendered to British authorities Tuesday. He is charged with allegedly sexually assaulting two women during a lecture stop in Stockholm this August. The first court appearance was predictably messy. He refused to be photographed, finger-printed, or DNA swabbed. And that was before the judge asked Assange for his current address. He gave some post office at first. Then some place in Australia he hadn’t visited in four years.

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The 2010 Year In Review – Volume 1

It may be the most creative way to quit a job in American history.

A baby had been crying since take-off. Two female passengers had been fighting about overhead bin space since boarding in Pittsburgh. As soon as the Jet Blue plane touched down at JFK, one of the women hopped up to grab her bag. Never mind that the fasten seatbelt sign was on. Never mind that flight attendant Steven Slater had repeatedly told her to wait until the plane taxied into the gate. She told him to go sleep with himself and whipped out her suitcase, accidentally whacking him in the forehead. And that’s when Steven Slater lost it.

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Thanksgiving & Black Friday: A Tale Of Two Americas

Turkey, NFL, and family drama. It’s the most American of holidays. We brave invasive TSA pat-downs to brave invasive aunt interrogations. Families pose a little too forced in maybe a little too bright sweaters for the holiday picture. Siblings smile knowingly at each other in between sips as the odd uncle starts to ramble.

Mothers and daughters watch SpongeBob Squarepants float by in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Fathers and sons chuckle at the Detroit Lions’ secondary and John Madden turducken references. And we all take a long, wistful look at the “Wizard of Oz” during commercials.

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Being George W. Bush

George W. Bush is bored these days.

The 43rd President of the United States is addicted to Scrabble for the iPad. He takes the dog Barney out on the morning walk. And he tried getting his hands dirty for Haiti earthquake relief. Emphasis on tried.

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Too Fast, Too Furious – 2010 Midterm Edition

Think of the American economy as a car, President Obama starts. Republicans were behind the wheel for eight years before they drove it into a ditch. So Democrats got the keys. Now they’re in the ditch. And it’s hot. It’s muddy. There are bugs everywhere. But they got their boots on. And they’re pushing, they’re clawing, they’re doing everything they can to get the car out of the ditch. They look up and see Republicans just standing there, saying: You’re doing it wrong. So Obama asks them to come down and help, but they go: No, no, we’re good, and keep “sipping on a Slurpee”. While you’re reading this article, you might be interested in vehicles. You might also be interested in this great spare saver offer, so check this out!

So Democrats keep slipping and sliding and finally they shove it out of the ditch. The car’s not pretty. It looks-. Well, it looks like a car that was stuck in a ditch for two years. It looked like it has a car stereo but not used in a long period of time, it has cracks in it but can be replaceable. It desperately needs a tune-up, could use a carwash, “but it’s moving.” Obama wipes his brow, opens the door when he gets a tap on his shoulder. It’s the Republicans. They want the keys back. No, Obama tells them, you can’t have them. You’re a terrible driver. You’ll just put the car in reverse and drive it back into the ditch.

Now Obama pauses at the podium. He smiles before his favorite part of the car analogy: “There’s a reason why, when you want to go forward, you put it into ‘D,’ and when you go backward, it goes into ‘R’. It’s not a coincidence.”

Obama and his 29 year old speechwriter/“mind reader” wunderkind Jon Favreau have been driving the Car Speech across the Midwest all summer. They kind of have to. The 2010 Midterm Elections are five weeks away, and Democrats are in trouble.

Think of the America political psyche as a pendulum. At rest, it’s tilted a tad right of center, but it swings left and right with the political times. It oscillates right during times of war and urges for Less Government. And it swings left in lieu of economic hardship, social issues, and Bush presidencies. The pendulum almost broke swerving left after the last one. So far so that the Incredibly Shrinking Republican Party was deemed white, nestled in the foothills of Appalachia, and an endangered species. It really only had two talking points: tax cuts and “drill baby drill!” MSNBC cheered the possible demise of the entire Republican party. They were wrong.

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