Speeches! We need speeches!

These last few months have seemed like years.

My Hope and Change are wearing a little thin. The monumental tasks ahead sort of take the shine off the historic victory and I begin to worry; can any person parachute into this mess and hope to succeed?

Then I catch a snippet of press conference and hear "The unemployment numbers this week are terrible" instead of "The fundamentals of our economy are strong". The answer to the question "Will some ambassadors be political appointees?" is a simple "It would be disingenuous to say no". And I feel a tiny bit better.

I've been enjoying working my way through past seasons of "The Wire", the fantastic HBO series about the Sisyphean task of combating the drug trade in inner city Baltimore.

On the episode I watched last night a policeman was speaking to an angry group about the problems in their neighborhood. He had charts and graphs and spoke only of the great progress the police were making and how the people in the neighborhood really needed to step up to the plate and do their part. As the room erupts into angry chaos his superior, a tired, frustrated major, five months away from retirement, pushes the cop away from the podium, faces the crowd and acknowledges the reality of the situation.

Pushed by the crowd for a solution, he delivers the line that says it all.

"I don't know what the answer is, but it can't be a lie".