October 2008

Publishers View: Obama Wins, But Only If You Help Him

Steven J. Moss

If President-elect Barack Obama runs the country as well as he ran the Democratic National Convention (DNC), America will be blessed with peace, unity, substantive dialogue on pressing national and international issues, with no small amount of joyful partying along the way.  The memory of the August convention was almost extinguished the day it ended by Senator John McCain’s deeply cynical choice of Sarah Palin as his Vice Presidential running mate.  But the convention’s show of unity, not just by Bill and Hillary Clinton, but by a deep bench of Democratic governors, senators, and common folk, many of whom were lifelong Republications, should not be forgotten.

As in years past, DNC-goers included a diversity of ethnicities, races and sexual-orientations, reflecting a nation in which European-Americans will represent less than half the population by mid-century.  The DNC stood in stark contrast to the Republican National Convention – which essentially served as Palin’s coming-out party – in which virtually the only person of color to be seen was the McCain’s Bangladesh-born adopted daughter.  Gays, who were certainly present, remained firmly in the closet or, if The Daily Show can be believed, partied in nearby bathroom stalls.  

The Democrat’s rainbow is notable.  America is a nation of interest groups, consisting of collections of individuals fighting for civil rights, better care for war veterans, reproductive choice and other heartfelt issues.  We dream 300 million individual dreams, which are conjured by African-American women who fled Hurricane Katrina, World War II veterans who liberated Nazi concentration camps, and young women and men whose mothers slept on the floor when they grew-up because they couldn’t afford, or didn’t have room for, another bed; whose sacrifices enabled them to attend college.  Sometimes these dreams collide, or change shape as a result of our interactions.  Other times they’re morphed into nightmares by harsh realities or ghost stories told by power-hungry politicians to scare us into jumping into their arms.  

Significant public policy is created when multiple dreams find a way to dance together.  This election is about whose dreams – or night terrors – and which dreamers, will become America’s dreams for the next four years.  

I’m sleeping with the Democrats.  It’s the Democrats who have the courage to tell us that, when they think of their “beautiful wife” that “the thought of denying anyone that joy is repulsive.”  It’s the Democrats who know that sexuality is not something to be hidden in shame, but celebrated:  “If your sexuality is not a big deal to you, you have my sympathy.”  It’s the Democrats who nominated an African-American family man as their presidential candidate, prompting the 85,000 people present – and tens of millions more listening or watching elsewhere – to cheer wildly for a black man who isn’t a rap star or a football player.  It’s the Democrats who energized a Hispanic boy, upon seeing my freshly-minted DNC t-shirt a day after the convention, to walk up and ask me, wonder in his eyes, “Did you see Obama?  And the Vice President?”

  America can continue to act like a solitary tyrannosaurs, terrorizing other nations.  Or we can revert back to being more akin to a brontosaurus, traveling in herds, gently pushing aside the “evildoers.”  It can be morning in America again, a morning different from those advertised during the Reagan years, in which hope has that only-in-America tang of can-do optimism, tolerance, and eager patience for the future.  Or it can be our late-afternoon, in which China stuffs us full of cheap-plastic goods, which we excrete into the oceans and landfills; Saudi Arabia mainlines us oil; and Russia treats us like we treat others:  with disdain, disrespect, and arrogance.  

The Democratic campaign for the presidency is not without its weaknesses.  Many of Barak Obama’s promises are more hype than hope.  He promises to “end our dependence on oil from the Middle East” within ten years, which is probably not possible, even if as president he taps “…our natural gas reserves, invest[s] in clean coal technology, and find ways to safely harness nuclear power…and…invest[s] $150 billion…in affordable, renewable sources of energy - wind power and solar power and the next generation of biofuels.”  He wants to provide “…every child a world-class education,” even though federal spending on kindergarten through 12th grade is currently miniscule.  He promises to ensure that all Americans have “…affordable, accessible health care,” when national expenditures on medical care already exceed $2 trillion.  And he wants to pay for these ambitious programs “…by closing corporate loopholes and tax havens that don’t help America grow” and going “…through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less…” an exercise that every president since Carter has engaged in, with modest results.

“For Pete’s sake, who can believe all of that?” retorted one Republican after hearing Obama’s convention speech.  But believers had a different response:

“How was it?,” asked one elderly gentleman to another, on the bus ride from the stadium back to Denver after the speech.  

“Fantastic!”

“It was unbelievable!”  

“Yeah, I’m going to go home and check to see what drug I accidentally took.”

Presidential candidates always spin tall tales.  But the characters in these stories matter.  Is the tale being told about a past in which America stood tall against all adversaries, everyone had a job, and the bad things visited on Native Americans, African-Americans, and many others never happened, because, in these stories, these people never actually existed?  Or is it about a future in which smiling children run through tall grass to the finest educational institutions ever seen?  

Obama is at least facing in the right direction.  In may take two decades to cut our oil consumption in half, but if we get there it’ll be time well spent.  Garnering broad acceptance of, and taking specific actions towards, the notion that every child deserves quality education, and every American should have access to decent health care, would be revolutionary in an era in which upper income parents spend more than $32 billion on private elementary and secondary schools, and one in five Americans have no health care insurance at all.  And many of Obama’s goals are obtainable and necessary.  He wants to change federal bankruptcy laws, which under the Bush Administration were altered to tilt heavily towards credit card companies and away from individual rights.   He wants to provide “…families with paid sick days and better family leave,” and calls for a national service corps:  “…we will keep our promise to every young American - if you commit to serving your community or your country, we will make sure you can afford a college education.”   

Perhaps most importantly, he’ll end the war in Iraq, and turn America’s attention to creating responsible diplomacy.  “You don’t defeat a terrorist network that operates in eighty countries by occupying Iraq. And I will restore our moral standing, so that America is once again that last, best hope for all who are called to the cause of freedom, who long for lives of peace, and who yearn for a better future.”

To follow any of these dreams Obama has to win the election.  To do so he needs your help.  “Wake up, America,” shouted Dennis Kucinich, the lefty U.S. Representative from Ohio and perennial presidential candidate, at the DNC, “Wake up!”  Wake up, and get up.  If you have a relative or friend in a state in which the election is likely to be decided –  Oregon, Nevada, Montana, Colorado, New Mexico, Missouri, South Dakota, North Dakota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, or New Hampshire – call them up and encourage them to vote Democratic.  If you’ve got the time and resources, spend a week or two in one of these states helping to campaign.  Or just show up at your local Democratic Party headquarters and start licking envelopes, making telephone calls, and sending email messages.  And of course, on election day, vote, and bring a friend or a relative with you.  

With a cratered economy and an unpopular war there’s no reason the Obama-Biden ticket shouldn’t win by a landslide.  The election is ours to lose; a loss we cannot afford.  “This election isn’t about me, it’s about you.  Change doesn’t come from Washington, it comes to Washington,” shouted Obama.  Let’s shout back, loud and clear, that we want that change, and we want it now.  

 

 

 

 

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