I watched him take the oath of office, and heard him speak to America and the world after, with my co-workers here in the Institute auditorium.  I was too young to appreciate Kennedy, really.  But I remember not only the excitement of the adults around me, but also the sense of promise everyone saw in him.  The nation was young again, and the future was full of promise.  I never really appreciated what so many decades of Kultar Kampf had done to take that away from me.  So much Ronald Reagan.  So much Moral Majority.  So much George Bush.  So much Karl Rove.  So much James Dobson.

And then I watched Obama take the oath, and I heard him speak to America, and to the world, and I felt it again, just as I had when I was a kid, doing my duck and cover exercises, listening to the civil defense tests on the radio and TV, and nobody knew who was going to win the cold war, or the space race.  And I wasn’t the only baby boomer in that audience.  We all felt it.  I could tell.  America is young again.  The future is full of promise.  We can do it.  We can do anything…