I think there’s something fitting about starting a blog the day after an election. It’s a new day; the world’s changed. History was made, there’s a lot going on. Amid all the chatter and hubbub on the web, my own still, small voice.

There’s a lot of excitement, and a lot of fear. The economy, our number one issue, is most vulnerable now. For the first time ever, I want to believe that the candidate’s rhetoric was just that, rhetoric. I’m hoping he only relied on these people in order to place himself in power, stepping stones to the throne. For any nation, the greatest mistake is punishing the rich, squeezing the middle class, and enriching the poor. But these things are hard to track. The death tax. A property tax “cut”. How many people truly understand the insidiousness of socialist policies when they are densely coded in the language of tax law?

And as a Jew, I’m afraid for Israel. Israel won’t stand up to America; they can barely run their own country. But a President who doesn’t believe that there’s something there, a President who thinks that nobody has suffered more than the Palestinian people (Nobody? Really, Obama? Including Darfur?) is a tragedy. But the picture of Rahm Emanuel whispering in Obama’s ear is comforting. The chief of staff isn’t an outsider to an administration, William Safire’s Full Disclosure notwithstanding. And this chief of staff had a father in the Irgun and has volunteered for the Israeli Defense Force. He knows, more intimately than the media or most Americans, what Israel means to the world, what it doesn’t mean, and how that affects American foreign policy.

Much scarier, to me, is the absolute power of the Democratic Party. We have a Democratic President-elect and majority in both houses. In the next two years there’s a very real possibility of overriding any legislative steps the Senate Republicans can take, in the next four the possibility of an “activist” court. The old saying holds true, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

People are tossing around the idea of assassination, not as a plan of action, just as a possibility. Will it happen? Will he be a black Kennedy? I think the idea hideous. Even though I don’t like the man, I don’t want him dead, but I also pray for his safety for more selfish reasons. There’s nothing like a good martyr to burn race relations in America into the ground.

Having worked for an elected official, I know what it’s like to lose an election. I don’t feel the same way now. It’s not that crushing feeling. In the end, most people, including myself, are moderates. There’s a mixture of emotions for all Americans. We’ve chosen the dark horse, the one we don’t know. Will he govern wisely, moderately? Or will he rely on socialist ideals and political party tricks, gutting the country while the liberal ideology runs roaring like a lion through our lives, swiping people down? Liberal ideologues have been working so hard for this. Conservatives and Republicans had allowed their divisiveness to run away from themselves, to bloat them, to make them weak. They didn’t caucus well. And while President Bush did present a tremendous amount of equanimity in the past few years, he presented too much even handedness, allowing himself to be slandered into the gutter. A good man ruined by his goodness. Peggy Noonan was right; a President cannot afford to squander his popularity. His should have known that a lame duck President is still campaigning, if not for he than for his party. But President Bush has always made a better President than candidate.

Perhaps conservative defeat will bring them back around, circle the wagons, and make them motivated to come together, tighter, faster. How conservatives react to this challenge will mean a great deal toward whether or not the country rises and becomes great.

There’ll be more on this later, I’m sure, but for now, I’d like to settle in to my new home on the web. Hello. (vigorous hand shake, warm smile) I’m pleased to meet you.