Well Judy I would hope in the new year we could start thinking about politics not like it was the Super Bowl where you always have to have one team that wins and the other team has to be a loser.

The hope of a new politics does not lie in formulating a left-wing reply to the right-it lies in rejecting conventional political categories.

To my great disappointment it appears that the politics of division are making a big comeback. Many Americans share my disappointment - especially those who were filled with great hope a few years ago when then-Senator Obama announced his candidacy in Springfield Illinois.

It is a vain hope to make people happy by politics.

In the end that's what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or a politics of hope?

In my early 20s I studied history and politics and I really thought that perhaps I would devote my life to that.

A year is an eternity in politics - though less than a moment in history.

Is there in all the history of human folly a greater fool than a clergymen in politics?

We can't afford to sacrifice another generation of American children to bureaucratic politics. We've got to get it done. The future the health the life - our nation depends on it and it's just foolish to think or act otherwise.

Obama seemed poised to realign American politics after his stunning 2008 victory. But the economy remains worse than even the administration's worst-case scenarios and the long legislative battles over health care reform financial services reform and the national debt and deficit have taken their toll. Obama no longer looks invincible.