Remember honest Abe? Most everyone does remember him and holds him in high regard. While he is admired, few can live up to the standard he set.

Yesterday as our new president Barack Obama took the oath of office with his hand on Lincoln's bible, the stock market was tanking and the financial stocks were taking the worst of it. The overall market was down about 3.5% and one of the stocks included in Chasing Value: 9 picks for 2009 -- APC, GE, ISRG, WFC and more, Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC), dropped about 20% -- yikes!

Lincoln served during our nations most trying times and President Obama will not be having an an easy time either.I was pondering some of our many problems this morning, and one that caused me to think about the subject of this post was the gargantuan government budget deficits that know no bounds in our current economic turmoil. That deficit is likely going to be higher than anyone thinks, because the government will be collecting less in taxes based on business and personal financial losses that have grown larger after each budget estimate.

I just had to share this tidbit from Barrons which some of you may have read but Barrons is expensive, so many have not. For those of you that missed it or did not see it elsewhere here is an anonymous quote summing up this years election: It pits a candidate who should have been president eight years ago against a candidate who should be president eight years from now.

Credit is due Alan Abelson (September 1, 2008) and in turn Tom Gallagher of ISI Group for sharing with him.

Ah yes, timing, is so very important. If you were buying stocks last July you probably were getting into the market too late as it hit its highs and right before optimism slammed its big grin smack into a brick wall -- the demise of housing and the subprime market, derivitives with "Triple A" ratings and all. This was rapidly followed by billions and billions of dollars of mark-to-market write downs by most major finanical institutions that left the whole finanical world in dire straights.

This included the collapse of Bear Stearns early on and the current basket cases Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) as discussed by my colleague Peter Cohan yesterday.

So if last July 2007 was a bad time to get into the market at its highs, was this past July 2008 also a bad time to get into the market at its recent lows? Perhaps we will not know until next July 2009 when either the slow starter John McCain or early riser Barrack Obama occupy the White House and the first 100 days (that timing thing again) are old news.

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money.

Remember in 2004 when Sean Combs Puff Daddy P-Diddy Diddy helped champion the "Vote or Die" campaign? Yeah, me neither. But for decades, attempts to get the younger generation to the polls have been critical parts of our major elections. I still remember watching Bill Clinton on MTV in the summer of 1992, lamenting the fact that I was only 18 and unable to vote.

A new President will be elected in about 50 weeks, and Walt Disney's (NYSE: DIS) ABC Networks is planning on using new media to help educate the social-networking crowd about candidates and news along the campaign trail. The network has inked a deal with Facebook -- in which Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) owns a small stake -- to provide news reports and video for the nearly 60 million members of the website. Facebook members will also be able to participate in polls and debates.

ABC and Facebook have announced plans to jointly sponsor Democratic and Republican Presidential debates in New Hampshire on January 5, three days ahead of the critical primary election in the Granite State. Dan Rose, VP of business development for Facebook, told The New York Times that "Through this partnership, we want to extend the dialogue both before and after the debate."

The agreement was not of a financial nature. ABC News will have exposure on an increasingly popular site; Facebook gets free, fresh content for its political section.

Beth Gaston Moon is an analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research.

Congratulations to former Vice President (and woulda-coulda-shoulda president) Al Gore on receiving half of the Nobel Peace Prize this week for his strident work in the area of global warming. The news added fuel to the fire that Gore might insert his name on the long list of presidential candidates, even this late in the game.

If he enters the race, he would do so challenging Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton for the nomination, after serving as vice president under her partner and currently greatest supporter President Bill Clinton. Can you hear the backroom politics going into full swing at this very moment? No doubt there are phone lines on fire in Washington, New York, and California as I type.

Hillary wants to be president so bad she can taste it. If not for her ambition, Mr. Clinton might have been lodging with some foreign legion in a remote part of the world many years ago. Gore does muddy things up a bit for a lot of hopeful folks. If he ran it would add a lot of excitement to what is getting to be a more and more boring presidential campaign. Meanwhile after winning the "Prize," Gore passes Obama for Democratic nomination. Another twist if Gore runs (50/50 odds) is that polls still show him as a long shot to receive the nomination over Clinton. Perhaps Barrack Obama and Gore joining forces (a Gore/Obama ticket) might make some advances if they announced early -- but this would burn some bridges neither wants to burn.