George SOros,who aspires to philosophy as well as to financial trading, makes the point that it is impossible to get a clear analysis of a system within which one is a participant. He extends the discussion much firther but he raises a good point, I think--we are all shooting in the dark, extrapolating against our best efforts to imagine probabilities, through an unknwon series of filters, emotional biases. and so on.

Given this through-a-glass-darkly syndrome as an inherent part of the human condition I would argue that it makes little sense for us to get very heated up about our partial analyses; it makes sense to educate oneself as best one can and try to do better and support those who are seriously trying to do the same. Obama is such a person. I have no idea how successful he will turn out to be, given the rivers of human emotional fire through which he has to wade. But I am pretty sure he is not signing in with a conspiratorial power clique at the top of the world. Billionaires are human beings, just like centenaires.

A