About a month ago, I returned to the U.S.A. for the first time in about seven years. Needless to say, lot had changed in that time. When I was last there, I was an incredibly gawky student celebrating an improbable win for a fresh-faced Barack Obama. I returned as a *marginally* less gawky adult, watching in despair as the U.S.A. seemed poised to follow Obama with an irredeemable maniac in an elaborate practical joke on itself.
