Last year, when the latest "Star Trek" movie came out, Newsweek published a cover story explaining the series' enduring popularity in the context of the then-new presidency: in troubled times, we needed a cool, logical, Spock-like president like Obama to guide us through our national troubles. So the reasoning ran back then. Fast-forward to today: in the wake of last months' electoral setback, everyone is telling Obama that he needs to, in effect, become more like Dr. McCoy. Mr. Cool needs to become Mr. Hot in order to survive the change in the national temperature.
There may actually be something to this. After all, in one early episode, even Mr. Spock himself learned the limits of logic, and found a justification for having "a nervous breakdown." I don't think that a nervous breakdown--or "spite" is the answer. But I do know that, when the national dialogue turns into a fistfight, you'd better be armed with something more than good ideas and intentions.
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