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The media's gone mad for Obama.

Howard Kurtz is agonizing over the adulation of Obama. (Oddly, he illustrates his column with the cover of the new issue of The New Republic, which I think has one of the worst pictures of Obama I've ever seen.)

Each writer, each publication, seems to reach for more eye-popping superlatives. "OBAMAISM -- It's a Kind of Religion," says New York magazine. "Those of us too young to have known JFK's Camelot are going to have our own giddy Camelot II to enrapture and entertain us," Kurt Andersen writes. The New York Post has already christened it "BAM-A-LOT."

"Here we are," writes Salon's Rebecca Traister, "oohing and aahing over what they'll be wearing, and what they'll be eating, what kind of dog they'll be getting, what bedrooms they'll be living in, and what schools they'll be attending. It feels better than good to sniff and snurfle through the Obamas' tastes and habits. . . . Who knew we had in us the capacity to fall for this kind of idealized Americana again?"...

"Obama is a figure, especially in pop culture, in a way that most new presidents are not," historian Michael Beschloss says. "Young people who may not be interested in the details of NAFTA or foreign policy just think Obama is cool, and they're interested in him. Being cool can really help a new president."

Let's adulate Obama for the sake U.S. interests in international trade and foreign affairs?

Anyway, obviously, at some point, Obama will start governing, and the giddy/inane enthusiasm will end. Whether these high expectations will help in the long run, who knows?

Full post as published by Althouse on November 17, 2008 (boomark / email).