Two things worth reading about Obama's first year

Andrew Sullivan's take, and John Scalzi's additional thoughts. Best bit, from the Scalzi piece:

The man has monolithic, unified opposition in the Washington GOP, a fractious and fragile base in the diffuse Washington Democrats, and was handed two expensive, unpopular wars, a profoundly degraded political environment at home and abroad, and a national and global economy which were dual scorching pillars of oh shit we’re all going to die. That the man got anything substantive done, much less had what is objectively a politically remarkable first year, is impressive.

Next up: my thoughts on Avatar (finally).