Apologies to Tom Lehrer for the Header.

I sent myself on a fool's errand this morning: to write down a mathematical formula which would encapsulate the degree of satisfaction I might reasonably feel with the Obama administration at any time during the running of its course.  The problem wasn't in defining the variables-I have pretty fair sense of what they are: ODWIW, ODDWIW, WIWMB, WOPW.

ODWIW = Obama Does What I Want.  The course of Obama's administration is close enough to my sense of what's right that I would be unreasonable to expect more.   My cheesecake came with strawberries instead of cherries on it.

ODDWIW = Obma Doesn't Do What I want.  The course of the Administration is so far from my sense of right that no amount of gilding will disguise that the silk purse is really a sow's ear.  I don't get cheesecake, I get lima beans, unseasoned, and undercooked.

WIWMB = What I Want, My Bad.  My preference was either to myopic or too visionary; too based on ignorance, too apocalyptic, or too wrongheaded.  Many times in my life I've been blessed by not getting my heart's desire, and I need to take that into account in the political sense.

WOPW = What Other People Want.  This is shorthand for WOPWALCOOAW (What Other People with a Legitmate Claim On Obama's Attention Want).  (I'm not blessed with the ability to make melodious acronyms).  Other people have a legitimate claim on Obama's attention, to a greater or lesser degree.  Obama presides over a country of diverse people.  I would bias this number in favor of those who actually voted for him: some of whom have views different from my own, but held as legitimately as mine are.  But I have to realize that the WOWTB factor also kicks in.  Others as as likely to be as wrong as I am on occasion, for the same reasons, of for others I haven't thought of.  I apologize for not having thought of them: my bad.  

Arranging these factors into a algorithm should make it possible for me to measure whether or not any given moment of ire is valid or ire-rational.  Those more mathematically inclined can shape this up into a nice tidy formula for me, or not: the sun will still rise tomorrow either way.