On Friday, Obama held a Q&A with the House Republicans. It was a beautiful thing to watch. He finally called out the GOP for their political tactics and challenged them to actually sit down and work towards actual compromise. It was refreshing to see Obama show some spine. Did Michelle give him a pair of brass ones for Christmas? Whatever the reason, let’s hope he keeps it up. GOP talking points aside, he’s trying to achieve a bipartisan centrist policy, and he’s no longer quietly accepting the obstructionist antics from either party that are paralyzing the government. He’s leading… finally.

It’s too early to say this session will have any lasting impact. It may just cause the political ideologues of both parties to dig in their heels rather than show up to play. But I do think the culprits feel they’ve been spanked. In what may be the most telling admission, Fox News cut its live coverage of the event 20 minutes early to begin breaking out the reasons why none of this was Conservative’s fault. Meanwhile, the other networks continued their live coverage, and CNN and MS-NBC re-ran it several times over the weekend.

I don’t know where this guy has been hiding for the last year, but I like him, and I hope this is a harbinger of things to come. We can’t possibly tolerate any more of how things have been.