Midweek makeover? Forget that, today is a milestone makeover, and that’s probably underselling it. No covers, either. It’s the real thing.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rhKJcTgmgI[/youtube]
Category: Personal Page 28 of 59
The less I say about it right now, the better. It’s a bitter edge on a day of great joy. Not everything is counted, there will be various legal challenges, but it doesn’t at all look good. This is one of many things we need to address in an America that just expressed a renewed committment to decency, and it should be right there near the top of the list of priorities.
There remain many things to be said about the politics that resulted in yesterday’s massive vote for change. And I’ll get to them. But taking everything in is leaving me rather circumspect, at the moment. Further, I’m very much looking forward to spending less time on politics, and more time on governing. We placed an enormous amount of hope on Barack Obama last night, and now it’s time to make sure he delivers. His election was not an end in and of itself. It is – if we all do our part – a means to a better country and a better world.
It’s real. It happened. We did it.
My own experience in this world causes me to reject the opening of Andrew Sullivan’s endorsement of Obama, but I am foursquare behind much that follows, especially his closing:
I had almost given up hope, and he helped restore it. That is what is stirring out there; and although you are welcome to mock me for it, I remain unashamed. As someone once said, in the unlikely story of America, there is never anything false about hope. Obama, moreover, seems to bring out the best in people, and the calmest, and the sanest. He seems to me to have a blend of Midwestern good sense, an intuitive understanding of the developing world that is as much our future now as theirs’, an analyst’s mind and a poet’s tongue. He is human. He is flawed. He will make mistakes. His passivity and ambiguity are sometimes weaknesses as well as strengths.
But there is something about his rise that is also supremely American, a reminder of why so many of us love this country so passionately and are filled with such grief at what has been done to it and in its name. I endorse Barack Obama because I will not give up on America, because I believe in America, and in her constitution and decency and character and strength.
I had hoped, at some point in these closing campaign days, to write up and explain my transition from Obama-skeptic and Hillary-voter in the primary to a full and genuine supporter of Barack Obama. But here we are, and I need to get on the road so I can go put in some final hours for the Obama campaign. Actions will have to substitute for words, at the moment. I’m okay with that.
Surely I am not the only one who wants to prod and taunt the fear mongers? The Obama’s a Scary! Black!! Muslim!!! Socialist!!!! crowd have been so ridiculous on their face that it’s never really moved me to engage them. It’s like arguing with a moon-landing conspiracy theorist. The only value in engaging with them is going to be entertainment value. But it’s kind of mean spirited, so you really ought not to.  So I’ll just allow myself this 1990 effort from Public Enemy (putting aside more tempting tracks from Paris or X-Clan):
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrHHAZFPmMY[/youtube]
Some of you may remember the context of this video. Virginia Beach, 1989. Tis a long way between there and here.
Here’s an excellent rundown of the state of things for Prop 8, which I am rather worried about. 2006 was a great year for Democrats nationwide (and even in Virginia), but it was hard to really enjoy it after it became clear that Virginia’s Marshall-Newman Amendment passed. Prop 8 doesn’t go as far as that measure, but it’s success would be a very bitter pill to swallow next Tuesday.
A reminder that California has a moral obligation, here:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oj-0xMrsyxE[/youtube]
All of the polling I’ve seen shows equal support and opposition to California’s Proposition 8. That’s not good enough, for something so very important.  Please talk it up not just amongst your CA friends (who likely already agree with you) but with your acquaintences, neighbors, and random people you meet.  The margin could be so thin that it makes a difference. This is just too important to hope someone else will carry the burden against it. More here.
I had no idea that Berlin’s Tempelhof airport was closing. Last flight out is tonight. Kicking myself for never having made it there.
(Tempelhof was many things, including being the airport that made the Berlin Airlift possible.)