The US Government Accountability Office says we could save $5.5 billion over the next 30 years if the dollar bill was phased out in favor of a dollar coin. I don't feel strongly one way or another, but I want Obama to propose this just so we can all see how much the Tea Party cares about our paper currency. I think the meltdown would be epic.

Last year, I spent about a month putting together this 2008 Election Round Up of reactions, articles, thoughts, videos, etc. It's fun looking back at it now and actually using it the way it was intended. It seems like a year was a long time ago and yet not that long ago. I'm not sure how many of the links are broken now, but take a look through it and pass it on.

Via Talking Points Memo, a poll from Public Policy Polling drilling down into the nonsense regarding whether President Obama is a naturalized citizen of the US.

According to the poll, 24% of the population do not believe Obama was born in the US. That's not a huge surprise, because that's about the % of the country that supported Bush until the end of his presidency (though, it's obviously not certain these are the same people). More of these people (10% to 7%) believe he was born in Indonesia, rather than Kenya, which is weird because as TPM notes, everyone knows that Obama was born in Kenya, or at least that's what they say.

Most telling, tough is the 10% of people who acknowledge Obama WAS born in Hawaii. 6% of them don't think Hawaii is part of the US and 4% aren't sure.

Reasonable people can disagree, sure, but these people aren't reasonable.

Remember these?

I read Elizabeth Kolbert's profile of Van Jones in the New Yorker a couple months ago and was struck by what he's doing tying the environment to the war on poverty. A couple weeks ago, the Obama administration tapped him to be the 'green' jobs adviser.

The profile of Jones is interesting on a couple points, Jones changed his name from Anthony to Van to create a new persona, his ability to speak to different audiences (“That was my street rap, you get to hear my élite rap later on”), and his single-minded approach to recognizing his goal.

I’m not looking for the points of difference. I’m looking for the points of commonality. I’ve trained my mind so that people can say twenty-seven things that might be objectionable, but as soon as they say one, that twenty-eighth thing, that’s in the right direction, that’s where I’m going to go in the conversation. I think that’s really important in a country as diverse as ours, to listen. So this guy, he says, I don’t want this, I don’t want that. But he says, I want everybody to be included. Well, that’s all I need. Dayenu.

The aspect I found most fascinating about Jones is how everything he says sounds like a sound bite (in a good way). I imagine this comes from his appreciation of Ronald Regan's speaking ability.

Ronald Reagan I admire greatly. You look at what he gets away with in a speech—unbelievable. He’s able to take fairly complex prose and convey it in such a natural and conversational way that the beauty of the language and the power of the language are there, but you stay comfortable. That’s very hard to do.

I'm not the first to say this, but I know I won't be the last. Van Jones is going to be a very big deal very soon. Mark it.

The single serving site to rule them all. I can't stop clicking refresh because every time I do, I'm greeted by another bad painting of Obama. The paintings aren't all bad. And some are good. But as a collection, it's like a car crash. This is the type of internet I want on my computer and I can't look away.

(Via Woot, thanks, Aaron!)

What do you need cable for anymore when you can get programs about stuff you want to see so easily on the internet? Sports. That's what. (I was just looking to see if the Superbowl is being streamed this year, but couldn't find any reliable results.)

Also, you know what? I don't care that the Shepard Fairey backlash is in full swing, I'm still going to the Supply & Demand show at the ICA, and you should to. Let me know how much of a hack or farce or fake or fraud or rip off he is in the comments, I'll be at the museum.

Watch the positive Tweets come in in the days surrounding the Inauguration - it gets crazy around 9 AM Tuesday morning.

Since my favorite authors refuse to have blogs of their own, I will do it for them. Here's an article by Chuck Klosterman about Obama's brother-in-law Craig Robinson a college basketball coach in Oregon. The famous campaign story of Michele making (NBA alumni) Craig let Obama play basketball with him and his friends is retold and analyzed from a different light.

Here's Klosterman on The B.S. Report podcast. Haven't listened yet, but I imagine it will be good.

And you know what else? Someone needs to come up with an Alltop channel that features all the articles by all the good authors who refuse to have blogs. I'm thinking Michael Lewis, Michael Pollan, Klosterman, maybe Susan Orlean if it's about origami or orchids, maybe Krakauer, Gladwell because he never updates his site. There's others. Who am I missing?

Another big event calls for another look at the Facebook Status Stream or FaStStream (get it? get it?). This one's even in chronological order as opposed to the 273 Facebook Status from Election Day.

You can see the waves again, from mood to mood, more subtle this time. From eagerness the night before, to some folks waiting in line on the Mall, to when CNN/Facebook started up (those status messages are tagged), to when Obama was speaking and peeps were calling out their favorite quotations, to Rev Lowry calling for an 'Amen', to people getting ready to go out to Inaugural Balls.

One surprising absence is commentary on Chief Justice Roberts' flubbing the oath (it's been confirmed that the 20th Amendment makes the Oath a formality, so Obama IS officially the President). And it's hard to tell that anyone was watching the parade (even the viewing stand was empty by the time it started). CNN was making references to the ceremonies running late all day and I hope, hope, HOPE, they don't turn this into a 'theme' of the Administration. We'll see. I watched the ceremony in a conference room at work on ABC via Slingbox. There were about 30-40 co-workers watching as well. Those are my memories from the day, what did you catch?

I'm exhausted and the Obamas still have 4 more balls to get to as of 11:46PM on 1/20. Not sure how they're still going.

I'm going to lay it out right now. Facebook/Twitter needs to allow for exporting of these streams, or someone's going to have to build the tool, because I don't have the time to format these bitches every time we come together as a nation to celebrate the election of a transcendent figure. Got it?

Without further adieu, below are 208 Facebook Status Messages from my friends in 24 hours including the Inauguration.

BK is celebrating the final night of the worst 8 years our country has seen -- at least in my lifetime. on Monday
JA has acquired his inauguration tickets. We're in the back in the silver zone. Can't wait till tomorrow! on Monday
EL is so excited for tomorrow i can hardly focus on anything! holy schmoley! we will finally have an inspiring leader! on Monday

More messages after the jump.
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