(This is my second addendum apologizing for length. I do not have the time to edit this thing down. If it is incoherent at parts I am sorry. Even my wrap up (2nd "paragraph") that I wrote when it got ridiculous is too long. Gist .. Obama won. I am happy because we need a culture change and renew faith in the government, faith that has been lost in the last however long hence the need for an "outsider" not a "maverick" who has been in the system for decades no matter your thoughts on if they are establishment or not. I do not know if he will do well, but from great adversity great heroes are made. If he creates a Lincoln-esque cabinet to make decisions he will do well. If he surrounds himself with like thinking individuals he may or may not succeed. We need him to do very well.)
The person of the week this week is Barack Obama. Like it or not he is our next president of the United States. I try to avoid political things as much as possible on here, because people either don't care or care too much (also, when all things are added up I am more Libertarian than anything). Mr. Obama is the person of the week for a completely bipartisan reason (at least I think so).
(This is very long ... the gist is we are at a point where we needed everything Obama has represented. We need hope and change to rejuvenate the pride and swagger of the common American. We need someone who is able to instill confidence and pride through rousing speeches, even if they are all style an no substance. When it is time for him to finally act, we need him to accept his lack of experience and use it as an advantage: to surround himself with experts of the different issues, experts of differing thought processes and viewpoints, and he needs to use the experience he does have (such as a lawyer who is drilled in logic and the constitution) in order to take these expert opinions (some of varying ideas or execution of ideas) and make his decisions. We need him to continue to boost America's confidence with his words and before that confidence deflates he needs to have given our confidence something to stand on by showing us the type of leader he will be. We have to wait for that day. We will get a hint when he announces his cabinet. A bigger hint when we see what his first pet projects are. America has trusted him with its future in a dark moment in our history and we can only wait and hope he is the leader that we want him to be. Disclosure: I voted for Obama and like the idea of him a lot. We just cannot afford him having a slow start. Nor can we afford to see him falter early in anyway ... hope and confidence is too high in many places where it has been trodden upon for generations. He must succeed, and quickly, for his victory to have any lasting meaning. If he falters he will go down merely as a footnote as "first African-American president" and forgotten other than that fact. If he puts ego aside, tackles the real issues, and does what is best for American (and not necessarily what he (or we) may want) he has the potential to go down as one of the best ever. That fact more so lies within the times that we are in than he himself "Great times make great men.")
When Obama gets sworn in as president in January it will be the start of a new era. Scratch that. A face will be put on a new era that is already beginning. This is a new era of American vulnerability. A time when American bravado ... our greed, our confidence, our swagger, our faith that we were infallible and always right ... finally failed. I am not knocking those things. It was our greed that allowed America to become the strongest capitalist nation in the world. It was our confidence that saw us through World Wars, economic downswings, and human tragedies throughout our history. It was our swagger and our faith and our belief we were doing the right thing that got America to the top of the heap of humanity and let it continue to dominate for decades.
However, all of those things hit in just the wrong notes in succession. This has left America at a crossroads. It is why Obama was elected.
America in 2000 was very different than it is in 2008. The economy was strong. We were not at war. The presidential election was a toss-up. Then shit began hitting the fan ... over and over.
First, Bush became president over Gore in a presidential election so heated it was settled by the Supreme Court. So we start 2001 with half the voting population feeling like their president was not their president. Many of those people felt disenfranchised because of the whole process. Not a good way to start a presidency.
Then September 11, 2001 happened. A tragedy unseen before on American soil. America began to be united. Decisive, quick efforts were made to retaliate in Afghanistan. The country began to seem like it would unite again in response to this tragedy. However, America had changed. Vietnam had changed its view on wars. Made it real. Hell, we even lost. So when we decided to invade Iraq not everyone was on board.
Even when our government gave evidence of WMDs, the country did not unite behind the war effort. It happened anyway. As time went on it became evident that there were no WMDs in Iraq (at least that we could find). Evidently we trusted the wrong intelligence. Many people felt the government lied to them. As time went on in Iraq the public lost focus on Afghanistan. The highlights of Iraq -- someone captured or killed, Hussein himself caught, tried and hung -- never seemed that high for many Americans.
Our faith that we were always right turned the ripples under the surface from Vietnam or Tuskeegee or Montgomery or anywhere else someone has been disenfranchised by the government became a ripple that spread from the cities into the suburbs. For the first time in a long time a large large percentage of Americans had lost faith in their country and their government.
The issues we fought about became issues that were more religiously oriented in nature as people lost control over other aspects of their lives. Debates stopped being about education and economics and whatever else and became dominated by abortion, gay marriage, etc.
Kerry ran for president and lost. He did not capture the spirit of the moment. That people needed something from a leader. A confidence. A swagger. Someone who when you look at them you think, things will be alright. Bush has the confidence and swagger, but for most Americans he doesn't make you feel like things will be alright. Not anymore at least. For many, not ever. I digress.
So now we are at war on two fronts. Our soldiers, who we call the backbone of our freedoms and liberties, are stretched too thin. Their supplies are not adequate. In Iraq they are fighting a war the rest of the world still is peeved we started, even though it is hurting us more than anyone. We have done the one thing you should never do ... we used our soldiers as toys. We dropped them in an area without an escape plan and spread them too thin. We needed to respect them more than that. Those in Afghanistan have highs and lows, but would benefit from more soldiers there. I am not a fan of war in anyway, shape or form, but at least in Afghanistan we have a chance to go after Bin Laden (or we did at one point). (Digression: it is about time the Afghani's had some peace don't you think ... too much war in that country)
On top of all that the economy tanked. Gas prices were soaring (dropped recently thank goodness). We have the potential to be in a crisis worse than any others in US history but the Depression. Even then we didn't get out of that fully until we were dragged into a world war and turned all of our factories into war producers and the economy got jumped started that-a-way (not to give ideas).
So here we are after the election of a new president. He has been slammed for having little to no experience. It depends on how you define experience, but he is certainly lacking in national political experience and executive experience. He does know the Constitution very well and has life experience as a lawyer and grass roots organizer. Will those things help? Who knows.
The reason why Obama was elected is simple and it is the same reason why he is the right person for the job. What America needed now more than anything was, and this will be cliched because it was his motto but, hope.
We needed a fresh face who isn't someone of the "old guard" because people are losing faith in the "old guard". We needed someone who gives brilliant speeches, filled with rhetoric or not, to pump confidence back into this country. Most importantly we need someone who looks at us as Americans and tells us we deserve better than what we have been getting and that they will work to get us what we deserve.
What will an Obama presidency mean? Superficially it boosts many people of color, any color/minority. Half-white or not, Obama is viewed as a black man and he reached the pinnacle of American politics. What other glass ceilings are ready to break for you the individual now? Long-term? Who knows...
People fear him turning us into a Socialist country. I find that fairly ridiculous, but he did use the term "redistribute wealth" so it means he put himself in that position to get criticized in that way. Could he make us Socialist? No. He could push us closer that way on the sliding scale. Much like many of our European friends who have slid over bit by bit as well. However, that already began when we bought out the banks, etc. Possible .. yes. Likely? No. I don't think you'd even get the partisanship needed to make it close on those issues. That is if he even wants to do anything like that.
My hope is this: he becomes the best president we have ever had by using his inexperience as a strength. As a leader, you fix weaknesses by surrounding people with strengths in the areas where you lack strength. Obama is smart enough, and I hope/think he does this, to realize that 1) he does not have any experience in executive office at any level or much national experience and 2)he will best lead America by having an amazing cabinet. He talked about reaching across party lines. Do it now. Pick the best of the best of America in each individual aspect of government. Put them to work on their specific issues. Let them present to you their expert analysis.
The job of the president is, as Bush once said, to be the decider. "The buck stops here" was a motto of another president. Obama's job will be the same as the rest of the presidents we have had. You get the best information possible from experts and make the best logical choice. As a lawyer he is used to logic.
This is his job for the next 4-8 years: appoint the best of the best to his cabinet. Screw partisanship (Kerry would be a horrible Secretary of State) and create a Lincolnesque cabinet. Put people together with opposite view points. See every aspect of an issue, not just the one you want or the popular one. Then make the decision with confidence based on logic and what is actually best for America. Then get in front of America and give the speeches he is so amazing at giving and install this confidence.
Obama was given a mandate by the American people, myself included. His mandate is to take the HOPE he has given us and turn it into results. Will it happen? I HOPE so. It just depends on how big his ego is ... the more he listens and knows his limitations, the better he shall be. If he tries to tackle issues all by himself or with a small group of the same type thinking people then we will have the same problems of the last 8 years.
You ran on hope Mr Obama. Now go be the president we need you to be.
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