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Today Asylum's Caleb Howe looks back on the first year of Obama's term from a conservative perspective. Be sure to read Tommy Christopher's run-down on the last year from a progressive point of view.

It's the one-year mark, the anniversary of the election we are told was the most important one ever. (Well come on, they always exaggerate the night before.) But now that we're in the bright light of day, a quick review of events is in order.

Phase One:
Ahh, January. Literally hundreds of millions of hopebaggers descended upon the National Mall and nearby tunnels to watch each other listen to small radios and TVs broadcasting the inauguration taking place somewhere close. When night fell, and the excitement of our national moment had passed, mobs of the lost wandered in the barren dark, surrounded by endless piles of garbage and miles of fences preventing progress. Life has such an ironic sense of humor, doesn't it? To kick off his new administration, post-partisan Prez extraordinaire adopted the first of many message strategies. We're sure this will bring back fond memories:




Phase Two:
Happy times, phase two, happy times. Democrats were feeling the power of power. This was the moment when the rise of the oceans would reverse. Change had come to America. Time for a new tone. Respectful. Friendly. Not too fat. Which is why in the spring the administration rolled out their second major message push:


Phase Three:
In phase three, the administration knew it was time to get cracking overseas. There were images to repair, cowboys to make fun of, and DVD collections to be delivered. This was no time for unpreparedness, and President Obama was up to the task. In a whirlwind tour, the president apologized to the world for America's audacity and incorrect wall plug configurations. The stunning array of apologies, for everything from unilateralism to loud music, was part of the next big message push:


Phase Four:
Autumn. The smell of burning wood, the fiercely colored trees, the swiftly falling leaves and approval ratings. Can't you just smell it? The Obama administration could. With the health-care plan foundering, town halls raucous, and tea parties nationwide, the president needed to change the message. They called on Snark Czar Anita Dunn and came up with a plan. The War on Terror was now an "Overseas Contingency Operation", freeing up the "wars on things" concept for a much more entertaining endeavor: war on Fox News! Alas, the best laid plans of mice and Anita Dunn can sometimes fail, and the war became nothing but a quagmire of:


Phase Five:
So now here we are. It's the one-year mark. And after all the peace prizes, Olympic snafus, pirate glory-hounding, more rounds of golf than Tiger, and an SNL-enshrined list of unfulfilled promises, we are left to wonder where we are, how we got here, why we are wearing different pants, and what was in that blue pill anyway.

But it hasn't been haphazard.

No, you see, though the message has changed many times, the core has remained the same. The most important thing to President Obama. Those two little letters that all the other messages were built on. Because in the end, for President Obama, it's really all about: