Hurry, hurry, hurry. You don’t want to be the last of the sappy, hopeful idealists who still believes in the Obama message of hope and unity. Why believe and work for change if cynicism is just around the corner?

Yes, I mean you David Brooks and others who were fawning all over Barack Obama just a few months ago. You were excited about the potential of a transformative leader. About the promise of a post-Bush future tackling issues of today’s and tomorrow’s America. About breaking from the old liberal/conservative debates from the 60’s 70’s, and figuring out new solutions and a new coalition of people from left and right for a new, and united, United States.

It’s like Cook Hand Luke. The other inmates idolize Luke’s bravery–that he challenges the status quo. They egg him on to take risks while sit back to enjoy–and exalt–his strength which gives them hope. When Luke shows that he is just flesh and blood like them, his former fawners show their disappointment with Luke–and with their own cowardice–by turning their backs on him. They won’t take the risk, but are excited that he does. And reject him rather than take up the mantle.

It’s easier to say that he isn’t who we thought he was, rather that to see that we aren’t who we wish we were.