Promises to keep

Sarah Vowell has a really nice homage to Ted Kennedy and the Democrats, the party of Pell Grants, in yesterday's NY Times. I particularly enjoyed her interpretation of Obama's vision of the "promise" of the U.S.:

Picture this: a wind-powered public school classroom of 19 multiracial 8-year-olds reading above grade level and answering the questions of their engaging, inspirational teacher before going home to a cancer-free (or in remission) parent or parents who have to work only eight hours a day in a country at war solely with the people who make war on us, where maybe Exxon Mobil can settle for, oh, $8 billion in quarterly profits instead of $11 billion, and the federal government’s point man for Biblical natural disasters is someone who knows more about emergency management than how to put on a horse show.