Achenblog - The Washington Post's Joel Achenbach on whatever strikes his fancy - November 2, 2008

Obama's First Gaffe

Just watched Barack Obama's first news conference. He looked presidential, or, more precisely, president-electial. It would be presumptuous to look too presidential, but it's perfectly appropriate to be extremely president-electial. [I'm going to keep making this joke until it's...

Obama Among the Radicals

Maybe the Republicans would have had more luck against Obama if their central strategy hadn't been based on nonsense. The GOP tried hard to prove that Obama is a radical, dangerous, risky. But Americans saw otherwise -- that the...

Obama's Secret Weapon

[My article in today's paper.] There are a lot of reasons why a guy with the improbable name of Barack Hussein Obama just won the presidency of the United States -- such as Wall Street's meltdown, a wildly unpopular...

Print Journalism Lives!!!

[Photo by Joel Achenbach] Amazing scene outside The Washington Post on 15th Street: Hundreds and hundreds of people are lined up to buy a commemorative edition of today's newspaper. Shown here are Post Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli and publisher...

All-Night Party at the White House

The spontaneous Obama party on the streets of Washington, D.C., roared past midnight, past 1 a.m., past 2 a.m., with all the centripetal forces driving the revelers to Lafayette Park across from the White House. It was an explosion...

Party Like It's 1989

They're going crazy on the streets of Washington: The mood is so ecstatic, the celebrations so spontaneous, that it brings to mind what we saw on TV during the fall of the Berlin Wall. I'm not saying that the...

Dead Man Voting

One of my goals is to continue voting after I'm dead. You know the five things every man must do: Raise a child, write a book, build a house, plant a tree, and vote from beyond the grave. This...

Obama and Gators and Nittany Lions

[Cross-posted from The Trail] Last night on Monday Night Football, Chris "Boomer" Berman asked both presidential candidates what they'd like to change in the world of sports. McCain's answer was pretty straightforward: Get rid of performance-enhancing drugs. But Obama's response...

The View From Mumbai

[I asked my friend Carl Hoffman, who is on a crazy journey around the world on the most dangerous conveyances imaginable, if he'd tell us how the election looks from Mumbai. Here's his dispatch.] By Carl Hoffman Mumbai's commuter...

Obama's Final Rally

[Cross-posted from The Trail.] Like human landscaping -- an artificial lake of humanity -- the Obama supporters filled a vast swale at the Prince William County Fairgrounds on Monday night. This was the last rally for Barack Obama's presidential campaign,...

If McCain Wins

I showed my eldest all the various Electoral College scenarios, including those in which McCain pulls the inside straight. She was appalled. She's an Obama supporter. A McCain victory is something that stretches her young brain to the snapping...

Achenblog: November 2, 2008 - November 8, 2008