Illustration by Ed Johnson.

Friday was a day of horror, Saturday a day of shock and Sunday a day of mourning. President Barack Obama hewed to that script when he showed up in Newtown and gave a stem-winder about God and our duty to our children without uttering the word ‘gun’ or stating exactly how he plans to lead us out of this national emergency.

The conventional wisdom said Sunday wasn’t the day, nor Newtown the venue, for policy. I disagree, but I get it. Now, having given his sermon, Mr. Obama should not wait one more day to explain his earthly plan.

That plan should start with the appointment of a Gun Czar. A red state, red-meat Republican with hunting cred, a gun lover who isn’t a gun nut, who can start the serious work that our nation, with 300 million guns in private hands, needs to begin right now.

The Gun Czar should gather a bipartisan room full of the concerned and powerful, from Mayor Michael Bloomberg to pro-gun moderates like New York’s Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and even the NRA, and together map out a national strategy to stop these regular community bloodlettings.

The Gun Czar will have his or her hands full dealing with the traditional entitlement of the gun lobby, but must forge on and ignore those who claim it is a joke to try to take on National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre. The conditions are right today to send him the way of Grover Norquist.

The challenges to be faced are political, societal and psychological, and regulatory, and they must be addressed separately and directly.

The political moment is now. Timing is everything in Washington, and there is not a minute to waste. The massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School is so horrific that even Rupert Murdoch has been begging Mr. Obama to show some leadership on assault weapons. The gallery of dead children has temporarily wiped the smirk off the faces of the NRA lobbyists and sapped the gloat from the weapons dealers.

President Obama should address the nation this week, from the Oval Office, not from a pulpit in Newtown.

His Justice Department has already studied the regulatory part of this conversation, but has so far only whispered about it. According to The New York Times, the Justice Department commissioned a study last year on how to rein in the violence, starting with a stronger background-check system. It recommended things like synching Social Security databases of people receiving mental health disability benefits with the FBI’s gun background check, and increasing to $100 million federal grants to states that share private information with the FBI. The study also suggested that private gun sellers be required to obtain background checks on buyers.

Simple, rational ideas—not even prying the machine guns out of any gun-lover’s cold, dead hands, just trying to make sure they don’t wind up in the hands of maniacs. Who could object? Yet the study was shelved, a piece of election-year cynicism that must weigh heavily on the minds of those who made that decision.

Mr. Obama’s reluctance to say that Second Amendment rights must stop at the doors of our malls and schools is the simpering inverse of the evil Rovian calculus that destroyed the art of compromise for so many years. It is just as shameful and regressive.

There was exactly one single mention of guns in the presidential election debates. During the second debate, Mr. Obama said, “What I’m trying to do is to get a broader conversation about how do we reduce the violence generally. Part of it is seeing if we can get an assault weapon ban introduced.”

President Clinton introduced that ban in 1994, but it expired in 2004, and Congressional Republicans refused to renew it. The conventional wisdom on it is that it didn’t work anyway. And the gun lobby used the fact that it had ever even existed to sell more guns.

And sell they did!

Here is where we come to the social-psychological public health part of the challenge. Daunting, maybe insurmountable, but we have no other option than to try.

Nancy Lanza, the laughing, blond suburban mom whose gun collection enabled the Sandy Hook massacre, participated in a national gun ownership surge that, curiously, dates to Mr. Obama’s first election. In the year of the 2008 election, the numbers of American who applied for weapons background checks jumped by more than 1.5 million. In the single month before the last election, in October 2012, the number of Americans applying for background checks, leaped by more than 18 percent.

One reason for the surge is the gun lobby has whipped up its followers to believe President Obama intends to take away their guns. That didn’t happen in his first administration, but with this crowd, paranoia is never far from the surface.

In my humble opinion, there is another, uglier reason why Mr. Obama’s elections have coincided with gun-buying sprees among white Americans, but I leave a discussion of that to another time and place.

Mrs. Lanza is no longer with us to explain what provoked her to start stockpiling weapons in 2009, but one relative and one friend cited fear and insecurity. “She prepared for the worst,” her sister-in-law Marsha Lanza told The Chicago Sun-Times.

The worst happened, and she was most certainly not prepared.

Mrs. Lanza liked board games and craft beer and shooting, but also seems to have been afflicted with a need to arm herself to the teeth. When and how the bug hit her, we don’t know. Reports say she started buying guns after her divorce in 2009. She stocked up on so-called tactical weapons. Cop weapons. A Glock. A Sig Sauer. A semiautomatic rifle called an AR-15, the gun of choice for mass killers of late.

These weapons are not intended for bagging deer and squirrels. There’s only one target for a facsimile of a machine gun, and it walks on two legs.

Soon she was taking her guns and her two sons, one of whom she knew to be mentally ill, to the firing range, donning the goggles, taking aim at paper targets on human figures, living the Rambo fantasy.

The shooting ranges up in Connecticut, which welcomed Mrs. Lanza and her child-murderer-in-training, are scurrying for cover now, refusing to talk to reporters, pretending they never saw the smiling blonde and her twisted kid blasting away.

Collecting and shooting these guns, she joined millions of Americans who are not hunters, who live in a nation defended by the greatest killing machine ever invented by mankind, who are mostly well-housed and -fed, and who yet feel so personally threatened that they stock their homes with weapons of the sort found on remote bases in Afghanistan.

At some point, gun ownership in America tipped from being an outdoor hobby for men and the occasional woman who like to hunt deer and blow away skeet, to a pastime as black as the costumes young male maniacs don before they enter malls, schools and theaters.

The growing popularity of tactical weapons is such that within 100 miles of New York, we now encounter giant billboards on highways advertising shops that sell to civilians weapons that by rights and rationality belong only in the hands of trained soldiers and law enforcement personnel—if that.

Not 10 miles from our house in upstate New York, a new tactical weapons shop opened this year, advertising itself on the highway as “Not Your Father’s Gunshop.” The owner, John Kielbasa, an emigrant from New York City, recently told CNN that Mr. Obama’s election was “good for my business,” and bragged that the morning after the election a man walked in and bought two AK-47s.

A half hour away from Mr. Kielbasa’s establishment, on a back road that leads to the local Walmart, another giant billboard advertises yet another shop selling tactical weapons.

These billboards—nestled among roadside ads for real estate and insurance, barely an hour’s drive from New York City—are signs of dark times, to be sure.

Has it gotten as dark as it will get?

The gun control backlashes in the wake of attacks by Jared Loughner and James Holmes and their analogues over the last decade achieved nothing. But now there's hope for real change.

The 2012 election is over and 20 first-grade children are dead, shot multiple times with a gun and bullets that no civilian in America needs in his or her home.

A Gun Czar won’t bring back those children and their teachers, no more than any man or woman or government policy can bring back to life the dead in Aurora or Tucson, or restore the bright, shining abilities of Gabby Giffords, forced by a bullet to the brain to resign rather than represent the people of the great state of Arizona, who so desperately need a leader to help them out of their open-carry Death Cult madness.

A Gun Czar can’t cure the American gun sickness. But like any public health campaign, airing the problem with strong leadership makes people think about and recognize it, and slowly, over time, change their habits.

Think smoking, think AIDS, think obesity.

We can do this.

Please Mr. President: Try.

editorial@observer.com

Those numbers, however, may not be a ringing indictment of President Obama's second term: according to Bespoke Investment Group (hat tip to Sam Ro at Business Insider), today's losses appear to be an amplification of a recent trend:

In a note to Bespoke Premium clients yesterday, we looked at the performance of the S&P 500 on Presidential Election Days and the day after since 1984 when the equity market was first open for trading on the day of Presidential elections.  What we found was that while the day of the election has historically been positive for stocks, the day after has been notoriously weak.

U.S. stocks have lost an average of 0.9 percent on the day after presidential elections since 1984, according to Bespoke. And while today's market tumble exceeds the average losses, they're not as bad as the day after the president's election in 2008, when the Dow Jones fell 5 percent on the day after, its worst post-election day performance since 1900.

The second and third worst day-after markets? Stocks fell 4.5 percent after Franklin Delano Roosevelt's 1932 election, and 3.8 percent after Harry S. Truman's re-election in 1948.

In 2016, Barack Obama will have more wrinkles, more grey hair and what appears to be larger ears (or maybe they are just floppier?), according to the Businessweek art department. And that's just on the outside. On the inside, it may even be worse. Because the photoshop job is actually a metaphor for the difficulties that the president-elect faces.

"This issue of Bloomberg Businessweek reports on the road ahead for President Obama as he faces the fiscal cliff and crucial decisions for the future of the economy, business, and defense," the magazine wrote. "The opposition remains considerable, and no matter how successful he is, the hardest job in the world will take its toll."

So celebrate and be happy now, Mr. President. Because the rapid aging process is just beginning. Oh yeah, and all the other difficult challenges of running the country. But mostly the looks things.

Businessweek ran a similarly photoshopped cover of Mitt Romney that they had in reserve in case the election had turned out differently. The republican candidate may be disappointed that he didn't win, but he can take solace in the fact that he won't look like this in four years.

Madonna, doing what she does best: rabble-rousing.(YouTube)

This is how Madonna endorses political candidates: by playing on a widely-held falsehood about his religious upbringing. During her second night in D.C. on her already controversial MDNA tour--what with all the pub(l)ic nudity and swastikas superimposed over heads of state--she encouraged voters to support Barack Obama, "the black Muslim in the White House" who's "fighting for gay rights." Then she said "You all better vote for f---ing Obama, okay," before promising to take her clothes off if he wins.

This will definitely play well in the red states.

(Quote start at 1:50)
http://youtu.be/i7R78LOpyM8

With celebrity endorsements like hers, who needs invisible chairs?

Jay-Z and Beyonce (Getty Images)

Probably not, seeing as the Vogue editor in chief was just announced as being the fourth-biggest fund-raiser for Barack Obama's re-election campaign in a document released to The New York Times. But this was due in no small part to the $40,000-dollar-a-plate dinner she held over at Sarah Jessica Parker's house back in June: that event raised approximately $2,000,000 on that night alone.

Now the president and first lady of hip-hop want to give the editrix a run for her money.

On September 18, the duo will be holding a fundraiser for President Obama at Jay-Z's 40/40 Club in the Flatiron District. The event will also charge $40,000 aplate, but the scoop from Page Six says that they will cap the number of guests at 100 ... meaning that they expect more than that to try and show up. If they reach their capacity, the duo could end up raising $4 million for the president's re-election campaign, putting him leagues ahead of Anna Wintour, or even Andrew Tobias for that matter.

Nicki Minaj/ President Barack Obama.

Last week, Nicki Minaj caused whiplash, turning our heads with her verse on on Lil Wayne’s latest mixtape, Dedication 4. "I’m a Republican voting for Mitt Romney/You lazy bitches is fucking up the economy,” she rapped, causing us to wonder whether this would hurt her chances for judging American Idol ... even if she was joking.

Now the hip-hop star is claiming that yes, she was just joking, especially when the POTUS gave her the benefit of the doubt on a recent radio shout-out.

When asked what he thought about Ms. Minaj's music, President Barack Obama told Orlando's Power 953, "I think she had a song on there, a little rap that said that, but she likes to play different characters. So I don’t know what’s going on there."

Ms. Minaj took this full-fledged support of her tunes, tweeting: "Ha! Thank you for understanding my creative humor & sarcasm Mr. President, the smart ones always do… *sends love & support*"

She followed this with several updates:
"Awesome! Now I can tell my grandchildren that the 1st black President of the United States took the time to address a Nicki Minaj question."
"My president is BLACK and my Fav is WINNING..... FUCKKKK YOUUUU!"
"Thanks haters! Lmaoooooooooooooooooooooooo. #BarbzWinAgain"
"ahahhahaahhahahahahhahahahhahahahahhahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Jesse Eisenberg, yurt-dweller (90days90reasons.com)

As we have previously noted, The Social Network star Jesse Eisenberg is now a full-fledged member of McSweeney's disciples, worshiping at the feet of Dave Eggers at 826Valencia. So it's not that surprising to find the actor stumping for President Obama over at 90 Days, 90 Reasons, the McSweeney's offshoot nonprofit which serves to "re-inspire the grassroots army that got Obama elected in the first place."

So why does Mr. Eisenberg think you should vote? Because he's currently living in a yurt in Mongolia, that's why.

It's a short essay, but it reads like a college application, making it just shy of impossibly unbearable. Here is most of it:

I'm traveling through Mongolia and currently staying in a yurt. This was not by choice; I'm with persuasive friends. If it were up to me I'd never leave my apartment and, more specifically, the bedroom area. But my comforts have given me a nagging sense of discomfort. I think traveling and seeing how other people live, even if I’m not totally immersing myself, assuages some of my unease because it re-sensitizes me to the difficulties and existential inconveniences that most other people face. In this way, I think Barack Obama is a good leader for our diverse country because he's seen how the world lives.

This essay raises several questions, not the least being, "How did Jesse Eisenberg get to Mongolia so quickly when he was just spotted and identified as Mark Zuckerberg at the London Olympics on Sunday?"

Also: Who has wifi in a yurt?

Also: What qualifies as an "existential inconvenience" in Mongolia, as opposed to an actual inconvenience, like steep drops in fertility, a straining economy and lowered life expectancy?

Also: Who is going to vote for President Obama again just because a jet-setting actor is currently yurt-sitting?

Newark Mayor Cory Booker should offer neither an apology nor an explanation for the truth he spoke during a television interview over the weekend. Speaking with David Gregory of NBC’s Meet the Press, Mr. Booker criticized the campaign tactics of both Mitt Romney and President Obama. Now, it was hardly a surprise that the mayor found Mr. Romney’s campaign flawed. But the attack on Mr. Obama’s campaign has caused a gigantic stir. And that’s a good thing—because the mayor spoke the truth about the president’s divisive re-election rhetoric and strategy.

Mr. Booker compared the president’s bashing of big business and affluent Americans with the Romney campaign’s attacks on the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the controversial Chicago cleric who was Mr. Obama’s pastor for several years. “This kind of stuff is nauseating to me on both sides,” Mr. Booker said. “It’s nauseating to the American public. Enough is enough. Stop attacking private equity, stop attacking Jeremiah Wright.”

Absolutely. Will Mr. Obama and his surrogates heed the mayor’s advice? One can only hope—but it doesn’t seem likely. Mr. Obama appears determined to win re-election by portraying business leaders and corporate America as the enemy, rather than the partner, of the middle class. The Obama campaign no doubt realizes that with the economy still stagnant, the president can hardly run on a record of job creation and prosperity.

Instead, then, the campaign will focus on the politics of envy.

Mr. Booker’s denunciation of these tactics has won him praise from national Republicans—in fact, the Romney campaign has released a web ad featuring the mayor and his words (never mind that Mr. Booker also criticized the Romney campaign’s Wright-baiting). But Mr. Booker’s comments should not be boiled down into a campaign sound bite. His analysis of the Obama campaign’s strategy speaks to a wider and corrosive assault on the creators of wealth in the United States and, indeed, around the world.

The global economic crisis has angered tens of millions, from New York to Athens. Posturing politicians have been quick to blame corporations, or banks, or CEO’s. The energy consumed by mindless finger-pointing actually has prolonged hard times for many. Rather than work together to find a solution and to create a stable environment for investment, demagogues have sought to stir envy and even hatred.

Mr. Obama’s campaign has given into this sort of rhetoric, and that is a bitter disappointment for many who supported him in 2008. Mr. Booker was right to call out his president for this damaging strategy. Let’s see if Mr. Obama is listening.

Middleton.

Historically, Memorial Day is a somber holiday—we all take off of work to commemorate fallen soldiers. But since we already celebrate our men in uniform on Veteran’s Day, the long weekend at the end of May is also an excuse for a bacchanal to celebrate the upcoming summer. Pools open, grills are dusted off and white tennies are spit shined for the courts.

And since this is the weekend of rebirth, what better chance for us to sit down and think about what really want out of this summer? Pippa Middleton moving to New York (or better yet, Brooklyn!); an Arsenio Hall comeback tour post-Celebrity Apprentice; the cancellation of Jersey Shore; the rise of Facebook stock; and the fall of John Travolta.

While the elections may be time for cautious optimism and a rally for action, we’re much more interested in keeping track of the issues addressed on James Franco’s Huffington Post blog. Between tackling the major interests of the day—like ghost tours, what it’s like hanging out with Nicolas Cage, commencement speeches written by friends and that time he met President Barack Obama—the auteur and man of (too) many words has been using his platform to take potshots at The New York Observer.

Not that we’re knocking his new career. If anything, Mr. Franco is an inspiration to graduates: work hard, study and collect Ivy League degrees like they are Pokemon cards, then one day Arianna Huffington may let you write for free on her website.

That’s the kind of sunny future we wish for all of you this Memorial Day.

Man bites dog (NYPost.com)

Does President Barack Obama chow down on family pets in the Oval Office? That would be the implication in a new cartoon in the New York Post today, part of the paper's claim that the POTUS' stance against Republican candidate Mitt Romney leaving his dog tied to the roof of his car was hypocritical.

You see, President Barack Hussein Obama himself once ate dog 17 years ago, and then had the gall to gloat about it in his memoir, Dreams from My Father.

(Click photo to enlarge)

Since he once sampled the native cuisine provided by his Indonesian step-father as a boy, it's now fair game to assume that the savage President would go so far as to eat the family's dog, Bo.

Sure, it's meant to be satirical to show the leader of the free world--who, despite his birth certificate, can never really scrub 'Otherness' from his record--but even the Governor Romney was smart enough to stay away from the touchy subject.

"I think the campaign is ultimately going to become about jobs, not dogs," Mr. Romney was quoted in the Post piece. He'll leave that smear tactic to his campaign advisor Eric Fehrnstrom's tweets and the New York Post, and let the American people be the judge.