You have foolishly traded your freedom and mine — what little there is left — for the chance to feel good

I cannot join you in your celebration. I feel no elation. There is no smile on my face. I am not jumping with joy. There are no tears of triumph in my eyes.

Thus writes Anne Wortham (center) who is black and who grew up in the segregated South (merci à Stu et Trish) but who says "I do not require a black president to know that I am a person of worth, and that life is worth living. I do not require a black president to love the ideal of America."

For such emotions and behavior to come from me, I would have to deny all that I know about the requirements of human flourishing and survival – all that I know about the history of the United States of America, all that I know about American race relations, and all that I know about Barack Obama as a politician. I would have to deny the nature of the "change" that Obama asserts has come to America. Most importantly, I would have to abnegate my certain understanding that you have chosen to sprint down the road to serfdom that we have been on for over a century.