<table> </table> During every presidential transition, the news cycle slows just enough for the American public to gain valuable insight into their next commander in chief.</p><p>For instance, during a recent lull we learned that Barack Obama often wears powder-blue neckties!</p><p>More than that:</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s the color attached most to dependability and constancy,&#8221; one expert was quoted as saying in a wire story that ran in this paper the other day.</p><p>Blue, the expert said, sends &#8220;a message that Americans want to believe in in troubled times.&#8221;</p><p>Well sure. When you&#8217;re blue, blue is for you &#8212; I guess.</p><p>But hold on. Obama isn&#8217;t married to blue ties.</p><p>&#8220;The red and silver striped necktie Obama wore at his news conference in Chicago on Monday looked conspicuously like the one he wore on the night he won election as the first black president of the United States.&#8221;</p><p>That was from politico.com under the headline, &#8220;Lucky tie? Or just fashionable?&#8221;</p><p>We&#8217;ll probably have to wait for Bob Woodward&#8217;s next behind-the-scenes book to get an answer.</p><p>Likewise, there was no mention of how Obama knotted his tie the other day when he announced Cabinet picks. But it sure looked like a four-in-hand to me.</p><p><em>Newsweek</em> expended several hundred words in October, disclosing that Obama nearly always cinched his neckties with the workmanlike four-in-hand, rather than the fussy Windsor.</p><p>Obama&#8217;s people would not speak to the issue, even after a spokesman for John McCain acknowledged that his boss was no maverick when it came to neckwear. McCain is a Windsor man, like many others in Congress.</p><p>Still, the stonewalling from the Obama camp would not keep <em>Newsweek</em> from the truth:</p><p>&#8220;Based on an unscientific sampling of recent photos &#8212; including the <em>Men&#8217;s Vogue </em>cover &#8212; (Obama) most often wears his necktie with a four-in-hand knot, an awkward and asymmetrical cinch invented by 19th-century carriage drivers (who held four reins in hand) and popularized by Dilbert-types looking for a no-hassle way to spruce up for work.&#8221;</p><p>Or as someone from the New York Fashion Institute of Technology said, &#8220;It&#8217;s a knot for someone who has 30 seconds for his tie in the morning &#8230; a knot for the masses.&#8221;</p><p>As somebody who used to wear ties to work all the time, I couldn&#8217;t agree more. But clip-ons are even less of a hassle. And no tie at all, why, that requires the least effort of all.</p><p>You don&#8217;t even have to decide between blue or red.</p><p>Which brings up another point: What masses are they talking about?</p><p>Maybe the national news media haven&#8217;t noticed, but nobody outside of Washington and Wall Street wears ties anymore.</p><p>In business, no one under the rank of vice president ever puts one on, unless he&#8217;s bagging groceries.</p><p>A recent Gallup survey found only 6 percent of American men regularly wear ties to work these days.</p><p>And 5 of those 6 percent would rather not, I&#8217;m betting.</p><p>The tie business is in such decline that the industry trade group, the Men&#8217;s Dress Furnishings Association, shut down for good last summer.</p><p>It&#8217;s sort of sad. But fashion, like time, moves on.</p><p>Styles change, and isn&#8217;t change what Obama&#8217;s all about?</p><p>I sense an opportunity here.</p><p>Wasn&#8217;t it the inauguration of another Democratic president that almost single-handedly sent the men&#8217;s hat industry into its death spiral?</p><p>And aren&#8217;t ties even less popular with the men of today than hats were before JFK appeared bareheaded at his swearing-in?</p><p>So how hard would it be? Were Obama to show up for his inauguration with an open collar or a fancy T-shirt under a suit jacket, could he not at least claim credit for finishing off the necktie once and for all?</p><p>And would he not receive the undying gratitude of those poor slobs still forced to show up for work every day with a silk noose around their necks?</p><p>Could America accept a president who rarely if ever wore a tie?</p><p>Yes, we can.