Big News for Barack

AOL online reported two major turn of events in the 2008 election for president. The first came a few days ago in an article that revealed the endorsment of Barack Obama from both the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune, both unexpected allies. Then, just today Gen. Colin Powell, a Republican, announced he would be voting for Sen. Barack Obama for president. This was the final nail in the coffin for McCain I believe, though I'm sure that's not what Gen. Powell intended. I've also researched as list of Newspaper endorsements for respective candidates as reported over AOL. com and out of eighteen, only three endorsed Sen. McCain. I think it's pretty hard to not make something of these events. It's damn near impossible to not think this is a clear indication of were our country is leaning, and wanting to go. I've found that in the many people I speak with about the election, the ones who are undecided, they really don't want to trust Obama, they say for experience reasons, but I think it's deeper. I believe people find Obama hard to believe, as in it really isn't possible for someone like him to have come along. As is difficult in all circumstances where a human that is in fact a little more special than most of us comes along and actually exists, like in the flesh and blood and not just in stories or history books, denial is a natural reaction. We're so prompt at excepting bad news, or negative energy into our lives that seeing something positive come true becomes offensive to us. It hurts that we're not more closely a part of it, or perhaps we're all just too skeptical to believe it could be true. We don't want to believe in something and then suffer disappointment, so it's better to decide to not believe in the first place. This is where faith has to take over. This is when that little urge in your gut has to win out and lead you in a direction that isn't so sure, but is absolutely positive. We've starved for positivity for so long that it's natural our minds and bodies would reject it, like a five course meal to a prisoner, it makes us sick as opposed to happy. We're in no state to take it in yet and so we shove it away. But some meals are just too enticing, like someone read our minds and prepared our absolute favorites and some how, those smells and those colors, though churning our stomachs, are also bringing up memories of better days, when safety and happiness surrounded us every day. And we can't shake that feeling. The remembered feeling of that long ago time when we really felt important, like dreams could come true. That certainty that existed because we'd never been hurt or disappointed or over looked before. Prior to being jaded by life's many disappointments we began as wide eyed kids open to the possibility of something great happening to us EVERY day and all the time. The whole world was surprising and beautiful. We can have those things again. Not actual material trophies, but faith and hope and wide eyed interest. Those are the things most precious any way.

Now I realize Obama is a man, not a messiah. He's not even as impressive as Martin Luther King Jr., but he's something more then we've see in a long time. A new hopeful approach to a country actually stinking with disappointment. He dares to say hey, things can be different, but in a way unoffensive enough for us to want to listen and our stomachs to hold out while we do so. He's calm, cool and collected. He's not cocky or aggressive, but he is assertive and constant. He's open minded and he actually likes to listen, but his own ideas are well formed and well communicated. This kids just got it all, despite lacking the "experience". Which I believe galls people all the more, because how could this new guy have something that nobody else does??? We were here first. But maybe you never really deserved to be and that's what offends you most about the new guy. When he stands next to you, it's obvious. And the "experienced" guys get angry instead of honest and defensive instead of relieved that nobodies trying to expose their skeletons or belittle them for being who they are, of having done what they've done. All that's happened is the right man has finally come along. It's not an insult, it's a changing of the guard. Everyone still has their helmet and pins.

I can't help but feel that Obama will change. That in achieving his child hood dream of becoming president of the United States, he will loose all the innocence and newness that he has right now. The saddest part of seeing Obama being president will be the greying of his hair and the loss of his own innocence. Being a new comer has it's advantages and over the next four years, he won't be a new comer any more. But his intellect and rational will hold him out. He's no dumby and despite what I just wrote, he's no ingenue either. I believe he knows what he's in for, but might not know the full extent of what it will do to him personally. How could he? Could any of us plan that far ahead?

What ever does happen over the next few weeks there is something I am certain of. Barack Obama will be president of the United States of America. And the world will get a whole new picture of what an American is. We'll surprise everybody, as if for the first time, because it's been so long since we've delivered anything new and interesting to them. We'll catch them off guard, and they'll like us for it and we'll all have something to be giddy about for a while. After over 200 years of the world deciding what an American is and what to expect from us, we're gonna throw 'em a curve ball. And yes, they may be pissed that where a hit should of been, they just got a strike, but it's such a damn good pitch, they'll have to be impressed anyway. That's when being wrong feels really right. When you've been beaten by someone who REALLY deserved to beat you. There's no shame in that. In fact, that innocent kid deep down inside of us can't help but being really impressed.