Post Partisan Depression

There is a newly described psychiatric malady sweeping America these days known as Post Partisan Depression. There are two distinct subtypes with subtly different manifestations.

Type D:

--Obsessive use of the term "President-Elect Obama"
--black & blue marks from pinching oneself to ensure that oneself is awake
--idiot/savant-like awareness of precisely how much time is left until noon on January 20th, 2009.

Type R:

--Obsessive use of terms such as "Socialism," "Marxism," and "Goodbye to my hard-earned paycheck."
--Compulsive waving of the book Atlas Shrugged while commanding everyone to read it and exclaiming, "Who is John Galt?"
--idiot/savant-like awareness of precisely how much time is left until noon on January 20th, 2009.

Manifestations common to both subtypes include tachycardia, sweating, restlessness, insomnia, tendency towards assorted spontaneous verbal outcries (specific to each subtype) and generalized activation of the sympathetic nervous system.

There appears to be no predilection for one sex or the other; reported male to female incidence is 1:1.

There is some question over whether or not age is a relative risk factor. In some parts of the country there seems to be an increased incidence in younger populations, but this is not borne out globally.

Treatment is mainly supportive, as the condition will likely subside with time. Both types respond to sympathetic head nodding and utterances such as "You betcha!" (albeit with different inflections.) Hugs should be administered liberally to both types.

(Credit to my brother, RFS MD for coining the term, and my sister, MSD Esq., for the first set of diagnostic criteria.)