Yes we can!
Hubby and I watched Obama speak at the 2004 Democratic convention. After Obama finished his speach, we both sat there, with tears in our eys. Hubby turned to me and barely able to speak, was able to cackle out "He's going to be our next president." I returned with "yup". That's all I could manage. We have followed him ever since, doing whatever we could do to help his campaign.
I am so proud of our country tonight. Tonight we stepped up to something much greater than ourselves.
Cindi
I was watching that same speech this morning. Wow but the man ... arresting. Charismatic, intelligent, compassionate - if he only achieves half of the things it seems he wants to attempt, wow.
~Simone.
if he only achieves half of the things it seems he wants to attempt, wow
I think - and you Lady A might be one of the few who are not Americans to really understand how deep, how profound and how symbolic and how epic a sea change he has already achieved.
When I recall all the hopes dashed and the time we've spent wandering in the wilderness ... O, this is real, isn't it? O Goddess, I can't stop crying! Over twelve hours now and the tears just keep coming.
Please, Mother, don't let the hope be dashed again, we are so very close. So close I can taste it!
Perhaps, Simone, we can take a lesson from that other USA in Africa. Perhaps Reconsiliation Commissions are not such a bad idea at all, but a way to the future that can be, hopefully, better for us all.
Goddess! This seems so very B-I-G.
Nikki
QuoteWow but the man ... arresting. Charismatic,
So was Hitler, we need to be just a vigilant in monitoring his moves we did as Bush.
Quote from: lisagurl on November 05, 2008, 09:54:06 AM
QuoteWow but the man ... arresting. Charismatic,
So was Hitler, we need to be just a vigilant in monitoring his moves we did as Bush.
Well... Thats our job, basically.
I think you should always think that way.
We are all happy.
Barbie~~
Quote from: lisagurl on November 05, 2008, 09:54:06 AM
QuoteWow but the man ... arresting. Charismatic,
So was Hitler, we need to be just a vigilant in monitoring his moves we did as Bush.
I have to agree with Lisa, must be a gurl thiggy LOL we have to watch him as if our life depends on it, cause it does. I wish we could save these post and review them in 4 years.....
Quote from: tekla on November 05, 2008, 08:30:54 AM
if he only achieves half of the things it seems he wants to attempt, wow
I think - and you Lady A might be one of the few who are not Americans to really understand how deep, how profound and how symbolic and how epic a sea change he has already achieved.
I disagree... a LOT of non americans understand that.... and a fair few americans DONT understand that if you watched Mccain's concession speach....
Quote from: Starbuck on November 05, 2008, 10:36:06 AM
I disagree... a LOT of non americans understand that.... and a fair few americans DONT understand that if you watched Mccain's concession speach....
Newspapers in my country (S. Korea) reported that many Koreans were moved by MaCain's concession speech. They commented that it is the best among speeches McCain has ever delivered during the campaign.
Barbie~~
Quote from: barbie on November 05, 2008, 10:40:24 AM
Quote from: Starbuck on November 05, 2008, 10:36:06 AM
I disagree... a LOT of non americans understand that.... and a fair few americans DONT understand that if you watched Mccain's concession speach....
Newspapers in my country (S. Korea) reported that many Koreans were moved by MaCain's concession speech. They commented that it is the best among speeches McCain has ever delivered during the campaign.
Barbie~~
Until you see a few skinheads with a pissed off expression and Sarah Palin crying... Then you are moved to fits of intense laughter.
Quote from: Starbuck on November 05, 2008, 10:36:06 AM
Quote from: tekla on November 05, 2008, 08:30:54 AM
if he only achieves half of the things it seems he wants to attempt, wow
I think - and you Lady A might be one of the few who are not Americans to really understand how deep, how profound and how symbolic and how epic a sea change he has already achieved.
I disagree... a LOT of non americans understand that.... and a fair few americans DONT understand that if you watched Mccain's concession speach....
And I suspect that tekla is right. Simone grew up in a place that experienced very profoundly this change, this movement. For the time and place South Africa showed a brilliant way through, at least so far, that Great Britain would do well to emulate.
Racial divides don't simply exist in South Africa and USA. To ignore or congratulate one's self and one's nation for what has yet to be experienced seems a bit foolhardy to me. Parliament seems filled by a lot of white faces while there's a dwindling percentage of white faces demographically in Britain.
As someone who has grown to despise the rhetoric and means of Mr. McCain during this contest, I found his concession speech was quite different than the crap he's been spouting for the past three months. I thought that he had finally found the better angels of his nature and allowed them to inform his words.
His rancor seemed gone as I listened to him.
In other words, I find your critique unconvincing given the realities I saw displayed last night. But, as has been pointed out, there is the task now of walking into the future and we shall see. Can we bind the nation's wounds.
Nichole
I think the racial divide, as it existed in the US, was something unique in the modern world, born, as it was, from the brutal nature of slavery, of the Civil War, and of Jim Crow. Brittan never has faced that, and SA only had the big time Jim Crow deal. SA is close in both its Civil Rights movement and the eventual liberation, though I hope our maturity will pull us through this in a different manner that has happened in SA.
Quote from: tekla on November 05, 2008, 11:27:23 AM
I think the racial divide, as it existed in the US, was something unique in the modern world, born, as it was, from the brutal nature of slavery, of the Civil War, and of Jim Crow. Brittan never has faced that, and SA only had the big time Jim Crow deal. SA is close in both its Civil Rights movement and the eventual liberation, though I hope our maturity will pull us through this in a different manner that has happened in SA.
I must have missed that one, If I recall history correctly didn't slavery begin in African, by Africans against there own people? seems I remember reading about how African slave ships brought there African slaves and sold them to the white man, the racial divide was around long before the civil war and all that, the civil war was just a continuance of what had already occured by there own people in there own country.
Quote from: Cyndigurl45 on November 05, 2008, 12:21:37 PM
Quote from: tekla on November 05, 2008, 11:27:23 AM
I think the racial divide, as it existed in the US, was something unique in the modern world, born, as it was, from the brutal nature of slavery, of the Civil War, and of Jim Crow. Brittan never has faced that, and SA only had the big time Jim Crow deal. SA is close in both its Civil Rights movement and the eventual liberation, though I hope our maturity will pull us through this in a different manner that has happened in SA.
I must have missed that one, If I recall history correctly didn't slavery begin in African, by Africans against there own people? seems I remember reading about how African slave ships brought there African slaves and sold them to the white man, the racial divide was around long before the civil war and all that, the civil war was just a continuance of what had already occured by there own people in there own country.
So the african tribes had not just slave ships but a
country? Color me impressed.
It's true that some tribes captured people from other tribes and sold them to the white slavers, but I fail to see how that has any relevance to the US racial divide or the Civil War.
Slavery didn't start in Africa, you don't actually recall history correctly, it's a
human vice practiced by pretty much all old cultures; although yes, I guess that if Homo Sapiens came from Africa, then slavery started in Africa (as well as democracy, art, and donuts).
Actually, the "African tribes" didn't simply have countries but had empires like Mali, Songhai, Benin & Soninke that were in existence well before there was any real political unity in Europe.
But, yes, the slave trade in Africa reached back at least to 700 BCE and in terms of human history has been part of us since before the Stone Age, I imagine.
Were there "African" slave ships hauling African-slaves to the Americas and the Caribbean? No, those were Portuguese, Spanish, English, French, Dutch barques. The slave-trade running to Asia from Africa was facilitated by Arab traders.
Those African empires were not primarily sea-faring at all. Thought they did a remarkable slave-trade in land-routes across the Sahara, up to Morocco and down to Benin and "the Guinea Coast."
Slavery was and has been endemic to human populations. However, it's rise to the level of a "world leader," economically, was made by European traders.
If you read-up a bit on "indentured servitude" you'll discover that black slavery was not the only variety of slavery practiced in the New World. Whites were in fact subjected to it as well. The major difference was that whites could and did escape by running away and our skin color didn't mark us out as being "slaves," or in fact "indentured servants."
Nichole
QuoteSlavery was and has been endemic to human populations. However, it's rise to the level of a "world leader," economically, was made by European traders.
Ah, all hail the Dutch East India Trading Company and their contemporaries.
~Simone.
All of those "global economic corporations" took part in that aspect of "the global economy" of the time though, Simone, not just the DEITC.
Nichole
Yeah, but I especially like to pick on them since they started all the crap down here in my neck of the woods.
~Simone.
Quote from: Nichole on November 05, 2008, 01:32:07 PM
Actually, the "African tribes" didn't simply have countries but had empires like Mali, Songhai, Benin & Soninke that were in existence well before there was any real political unity in Europe.
I was objecting to the use of "
there own people in there own country", which implies black slaves all belonged to the same people and came from one single "country".
Read "Nobodies" by John Bowe. Slavery is still alive and well even in the United States. Some well known brands have some labor done by slaves on U.S. soil.
I read somewhere that there are more slaves in the world today than at any other point in human history. Granted, in a population pushing 7 billion it's a tiny percentage, but the fact that there are still people trafficking in human beings, not to mention the a**eholes who buy, that makes me want to vomit. If you add wage slavery in the third world, child labour, "debt slavery" and all the other miseries we inflict on one another, and look at how that percentage blooms then, I just sometimes feel like saying "roll on apocalypse".
~Simone.
This rush to see who can toss the deepest cynicism and best water onto the celebration is certainly a hopeful sign!
Oooooo, maybe we should just make bonfires of ourselves so everyone can prove just how cynical they truly are.
Yes, the world is now and has always been full of more than enough wrongs we can right. But occasionally it seems to me that we should celebrate the bits of hope we do find rather than to blow them off as meaningless in the grand picture.
I sometimes find the blindness to "joy" in "big-picture" folk insufferably chic and self-defeating.
Nichole
Sorry Nichole, you're right. Today is a hopeful day and we should accept it as such. I do have a tendency to get carried away with things.
~Simone.
The joy will come when the inspections at the airport are lifted.
Quote from: lisagurl on November 05, 2008, 03:03:56 PM
The joy will come when the inspections at the airport are lifted.
For all the time I have known you and for all the respect I have for you, I find it difficult to believe that the absence of airport inspections will substanially affect your ability to feel joy, Lisa.
But, I'll try to remember that pledge and see what might occur in future! :)
If I'd bet, I'd have to bet against the occurrence in your case. Luckily I'm not a bettor.
Nikki
Quote from: Nichole on November 05, 2008, 09:40:26 AM
When I recall all the hopes dashed and the time we've spent wandering in the wilderness ...
Quote from: Martin Luther King Jr.
We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.
And I don't mind.
Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!
I simply can't read, much less hear those words without tears.
Martin was Moses. Barack, it's time for you to be Joshua.
After last night I am very proud to be an American. I think that my President will do great things with this country. And is it to early to say 'Four More Years'?
It is going to be an exciting four years to come. ;D
This is far more profound for both America as well as the world that we have not even begun to understand what a mind blowing change it is.
I think a lot of people agree, tekla, which is why so many people, white and black alike, who said that race was an important factor voted for Obama.
A Democratic (i.e, blessedly dysfunctional) Congress and Pres. McCain (i.e, not nearly as reckless as Bush) would probably produce policy not terribly disticnt from what we'll get with Obama -- though granted that Obama is better in many ways that are important to me.
The symbolism, however, is enormously important, and will have an enduring impact. This election by itself does so much to restore the moral authority that America had and Bush squandered after 9/11 -- and that by itself could mean countless lives saved.
~Alyssa
And, as far as I'm aware Obama has no relatives, as in Mom or Dad, who've been threatened with assassination by the leaders of Kenya or Indonesia, so we can probably rest assured he'll not feel the need to invade anywhere in the world for that reason anyhow.
And I'm not so sure that McCain wouldn't have been more reckless than Bush, Alyssa. Guy seems to have some real anger issues and admits he likes to make spur-of-the-moment decisions. I think we probably have someone way more stable than either the Repug nominee or the Repug sitting President.
Nichole
What funny, is the place Palin called 'the real america' Gillford County, SC, went for Obama.
Quote from: tekla on November 06, 2008, 07:03:34 PM
What funny, is the place Palin called 'the real america' Gillford County, SC, went for Obama.
She also said that Africa was a country not a Continent and could not find it on a map.
Yeah the 'Pubs are hanging her out to dry and gutting her like a trout. I think Obama has at least two years of relative peace as the Pubs infight and try to blame each other for having lost it all.
New Matercard Commercial......
Shopping spree at Zaks........ $150,000
Traveling with the family on tax payers dollars.........$56,000
Unpaid back taxes........$1,200
Plumbing business you really can't afford ........$250,000
Seeing Sarah Palin go back to Alaska and Joe the plumber disappear from the media, PRICELESS!
Oh no, there is a reason the 'Pubs are savaging her so. I want here out there everyday reminding people of what the other option is. The more she talks, the deep she digs herself in.
And the more bitter and recriminatory the Repugnants are the more fun it'll be to see what the Dems have looked like in the past.
The problem with parties in USA is that they seem to think that the success of an FDR or a Ray-gun means they have a divince-right forver after to be in-power and they literally rips themselves apart when that fails to occur. You think waht they did to themselves during Clinton was fight? Nope, two years later they were running the show with the Contract On America.
Now this is gonna be fun, because I think if they could have made some sort of mincemeat of Barack they'd have turned on that machine already. What they've found hasn't stuck and I am not buying just yet that the man has some horrible secret in his past and current life that's going to be useful to them.
Clinton wanted to "protect his political viability." Obama has shown him how it's done. A bit late for Bill, but a pretty good outcome for Barack.
Nichole
Well Clinton he is not. Clinton was still appointing key people just a few weeks out. I think the O people have already thought this through and they know most of who they want.
Clinton, and Carter too, both ran as 'outsiders' they ran kind of as anti-democratic Democrat, and, in that, they both walked into a world of hostility when they got to DC. I think a lot of people want to see this succeed, and he is going to have a much easier time with Congress then C&C did. There are also quite a few moderate Repub Congress Critters who just saw their red state go blue. That ain't going to be lost on them. So I think he gets a bit more cooperation there too.
And yeah, if there was some big smoking gun, they would have shot it by now.