Having exhausted oneself in “I told you so” boasts of anticipating the Trump counter-revolution, one feels the need to observe the change-of-mood that has accompanied the end of the Obama revolution.  Now that our eight-year dalliance in central planning, socialism, authoritarianism, globalism, and un-payable national debt is coming to a nasty, sore-loser conclusion, it is time to reflect.  Time to give credit where it is due, to acknowledge that President Obama, for all his dark intentions, has given America the greatest gift that could have been bestowed at this scary stage of our devolution: a master class in where Obamaism leads.  If we survive the Obama years, if we can even make it through the President’s astonishing exit-tour agenda of completing the obliteration of the State of Israel and of the constitutional principle of “separation of powers,” the country might still be salvageable, even if not especially healthy.

After an adult lifetime of noticing how well the country does when mostly left alone by its government, one is not shocked by the stock market rally or other indicators of a revival in domestic confidence and international respect.  Corporate America loved Obama once it thought it had bought him, but it turns out that in the end, the private sector would rather compete in a free market than perpetually pay the going price for favored treatment from the government.  In dealing with the president, Wall Street eventually realized that, as the late Mayor Daley of Chicago once said of an adversary, “the trouble with this guy is that he won’t stay bought.”

The animal spirits are re-emerging, and already it is invigorating to feel it might once again be great to be an American, to expect to be rewarded for industry and talent rather than for one’s race, creed, gender, sexual orientation, or political leaning.  After eight depressing years of darkness, suddenly there is light, suddenly it is morning in America again and “hope and change” can mean something other than a step back into the Middle Ages.  Suddenly one feels less fear about exposing one’s progeny to long-term reeducation by the country’s education system.