I stopped by the Google Ball last night. Wanted to be able to say I went to one of them. It was at the Mellon Auditorium which sounds like a classroom but is one of the more grand facilities in Washington. They filled the place and, of course, had high-tech tickets with barcodes. The company, as I told one reporter last night, has remarkable clout in D.C. It's stock may be down from its peak but it has the kind of cache that few other companies do both because of its enormous market capitalization and the fact that everyone uses it. It's probably telling that today is also the day that Toyota passed GM in worldwide sales. Lots of economic despair in the room after yesterday's market drop and very good buzz on the speech. A former Democratic White House speechwriter who was there had a very positive reaction and was taken by how Obama stuck it to Bush while he was sitting there. The speechwriter liked that and I must say, although some readers yesterday thought I was dissing that part of the speech, I thought it bracing in a good way. Favorite aspect of party: A game room complete with Wiis.