JOHN ADAMS, our second president, wrote the following in a letter to his wife, Abigail, on Nov. 2, 1800 the first night he spent in the newly constructed White House:  “I pray heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this house and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.” Adams’ words are now the official White House prayer and inscribed on the fireplace mantel in the State Dining Room.  My hope for America is that President Obama lives up to President Adams’ description.

In full disclosure of none of your business, I slant conservative: I believe in small government, that people should keep most of what they earn, and that many social services are better served by private enterprise. I care about universal health care, but I also care about the quality of health care.  You hear about a woman’s right to choose? How about a woman’s right to choose her doctor?

I’m also wary of a man who was able to successfully cater to so many divergent groups in this campaign. Who is President Obama?  Yesterday, he was the elegant orator, a one-term Senator from Illinois who found the time to author two autobiographies but not to sponsor any major legislation while in Congress.  Today he is my president.  I hope I like his version of Change.  Best case scenario is that in four years, I line up at the polls to vote for him.

For John McCain, I’m sad.  Although I think he buried his most admirable qualities in this campaign and stood for what was wrong with Obama rather than what was right about McCain, I believe he is a good man and would have made a great president. I think McCain should rent a very large yacht, park it off the coast of Italy, and let the paparazzi get some nice shots of him sunbathing naked, smoking a cigar, and drinking Cristal from the bottle. The upside to losing a presidential election is that you get to stop pandering to public opinion. You become your own man again, and that is the McCain I like the most.

Over the next four years, I look forward to watching President Obama try to make everyone who voted for him happy.  After eight years of listening to criticism, second-guessing, and vitriolic personal and political attacks on this last president and his decisions, I get my chance to sit in the cheap seats and pass judgment. I wish President Obama the best of luck taking care of the public’s mortgage and gas needs.  However, President Obama would be wise to remember that even the Sheriff of Nottingham eventually ran out of money.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR —

I've traveled to India and watched the Hindus wake up Mother Ganges. I lived in Italy during September 11th when the Italians draped the Ponte Vecchio with an American flag, and I watched the Italians procrastinate until December 31st to transition from the Lire to the Euro. Tourists have pushed me off the sidewalk on 5th Avenue, and I have been laid off twice in one year. I've worked in the White House Social Office and welcomed guests on behalf of the President. I've been molested on the subway on my way to work but then been rescued by an undercover New York City police officer. I've eaten bagels in the Gehry-designed Conde Nast cafeteria and produced quarter of a million dollar photoshoots for Vogue. I've served food to the homeless in New York and delivered meals to the housebound in DC. I've run a half-marathon in Birmingham and been encouraged to 'keep up the good work' by a white-haired old man as he hauled by. I've toured the Three Gorges in China before the dam raised the water level and been told by a Beijing man that it is the Southern Chinese who eat 'little brown spotted dogs'. I've danced in the Orangerie at Versailles to Jimmy Buffett beneath a statue of Louis XIV singing 'Here Comes the Sun'. I've watched President Bush put his hand on Putin's shoulder and call him 'my good friend.' I've watched Russian tanks roll into Georgia on CNN. I've sent a note of condolence to the mother of a friend my age who died in September of a rare neurological disease. I am a great admirer of etiquette because good manners can transform you into royalty but inconsideration makes tatters from glamour. Manners are not a minefield. They are a 'lets try hard to make this other person more comfortable'. The true secret behind lovely etiquette and flawless entertaining is to make an effort. Yes: effort/strain/brawn/sweat/struggle/learn-the-rules/apply-them, and the energy expended absolutely pays off.

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