Lincoln

Not only has Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich stolen the political moment from Barack Obama, he’s taken a crowbar to the president-elect’s mantle as wordsmith-in-chief and orator for our times. Once Blago’s cussed, illegal schemes got taken down by the FBI and disseminated by the Justice Department, the nation took notice of a new literary lion rumbling from its midsection. Blagojevich’s words have also inspired Americans to take up their pens to compose a new musical (or fragment thereof) and a flattering Daily Beast quiz that compares lines from “The Sopranos,” a show that won six Emmys for the best writing on a television, to lines from the FBI affadavit.

For a guy who can turn out a three-page demand for $700 billion (make that a trillion) on a dime, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has shown he hasn’t forgotten about pennies. And neither has his U.S. Mint, which this week announced four new designs from the life of Lincoln for the one cent coin’s flipside, which next year will join new series of coins honoring U.S. Presidents and their wives — all meant to delight Americans in their daily transactions.