Your Abbreviated Pundit Round-Up

Your one stop pundit shop.

Maya Angelou is ready for "the real deal":

Over the past five decades, our national spirit has ebbed, our self-confidence has waned. The presence of Barack Obama seems to return us to our national motto: "Yes, I can. I am an American."

Will Ferrell talks about playing George W. Bush on Broadway.

S.E. Cupp gives a young conservative's perspective on the soon-to-be inauguration of Barack Obama:

None of my conservative friends -- in New York we all know each other, since there are roughly 14 of us -- plan to attend the actual event, and very few of us are planning to rearrange our schedules to watch on TV. Hampton Williams, the head of NYU's College Republicans, is staying in town to prepare for the start of his last semester. "I have come to the conclusion that this will be the highlight of my liberal friends' lives," he told me over a flurry of Facebook exchanges. "Eight years down the road I will have a career and a family, and my liberal friends will have a faded Obama button." The slight tone of resentment did not go unnoticed.

Yeah, it's pretty hard to miss.

Frank Rich talks about race and Washington D.C. and Barack Obama.

Maureen Dowd on George Bush's long goodbye:

Right now, though, it’s a huge relief to be getting an inquisitive, complicated mind in the White House.

W. decided there was no need to be president of the whole country. He could just be president of his base. Obama is determined to be president of as much of the country as possible.

We’re trading a dogmatic president for one who’s shopping for a dog. It feels good.

Colin Powell wants us to answer Barack Obama's call for a "renewed and enduring commitment to enriching the lives of others." Hard to argue with that, but I still can't believe he gave that U.N. speech.

Mark Levy trots out the FDR sucks card.

Ed Feulner opposes the financial bailout.

But this is no time to throw good (borrowed) money after bad. If all this spending was going to get the economy growing, it would be working. Yet nobody expects things to improve soon. There's a lesson there, if we care to learn it.

Joan Vennochi, says that there is a double-standard in the confirmation process, and that a woman would be getting a much harder time than Treasury Secretary nominee Timothy Geithner.

Doyle McManus says that George Bush's legacy will depend on how things turns out in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now if someone could just describe what victory means.