But it isn't the universality of the photo that gives me pause. It is the look of the movers. They're schleppy guys, paunchy, wearing T-shirts, jeans, and gimme caps. They look, in other words, like moving guys. So much so that the name of the moving company is clearly visible on the guy whose back is to the camera. What, I wonder, is the soon-to-be most powerful person on the planet doing using a regular out-of-the-Yellow-Pages moving service? The move happened back in January, so you may be wondering why I bring it up now. Basically, it's because of all the things that happened in that wacky election, nothing was quite so surprising - not the closeness of the race nor the partisan bending of law - as the fact that in the end the guys who move the soon-to-be most powerful person on the planet into the White House are the same guys who might move me into my house.

Here's what I thought. I thought that the government employed a crack unit of specially trained moving guys. I thought that this unit probably had a name, something no-nonsense, like Eagle One Rapid Response Transport Team. I thought these Navy Seals of the moving world did such difficult training exercises as carrying dressers through tight doorways and negotiating sofa beds down winding staircases. I thought the men in the unit wore matching uniforms and sat around in a high-security room in the White House basement waiting to be called into action, killing time playing cards and making wisecracks until, finally, a little red light and a shrill bleeping sound went off.