Jonah looks closely at Obama’s salute to the Navy Seals.

“At a time when too many of our institutions have let us down, they exceed all expectations. They’re not consumed with personal ambition. They don’t obsess over their differences. They focus on the mission at hand. They work together. Imagine what we could accomplish if we followed their example. Think about the America within our reach.”

The man who ran for the state legislature at age 34, who ran for a seat the U.S. House after four years in the state legislature, ran for the U.S. Senate at age 42, and ran for the presidency after two years in the Senate laments that America would be a better place if we weren’t consumed with personal ambition.

I haven’t choked on irony like this since Madonna complained that “a lot of our values seem to be materially oriented and so superficial.”