Obama Finally Puts Race on the Table

Election 2008 | AlterNet

In case you can't tell, I'm in a lot of pain over this election. These are not the choices I hoped to have at this stage of the game, but here we are and choose we must.

There are salient arguments both for and against both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Logic isn't helping me. When I can't reason my way through a problem, I have to turn to my intuition and my intuition leads me toward Obama.

I've watched his More Perfect Union speech repeatedly. I want to believe he's the one that can move us into the 21st century. He may have been born for exactly that purpose. A Kenyan father and a white mother from Kansas. He's American and international; he's ethnic but multi-racial; he can see all sides of the problem because he has a foot in each world. He said exactly what I wanted him to say in that speech. He talked about the imperfect origins of our democracy and about the fact that the Founders fully intended that we would continue to build upon what they had started. That alone puts him miles ahead of the other two remaining contenders.

I've heard him compared to Jefferson, Lincoln and Kennedy. Whether he belongs in that exalted company remains to be seen, but I want to see him try to live up to those marvelous standards. I want him to succeed. I want the world to look at our young, erudite, multiracial president as a global representative for peace and democracy. I want to feel the chills I feel when he speaks for 8 glorious more years. I want to see if he really can get something done for us in DC. I want the United States to look sophisticated enough to elect a man like Barack. I want us to be the envy of the world again.

I get angry when I hear Chris Matthews harping on Barack's attachment to his minister - a man who said nothing all that objectionable, as far as I'm concerned. It bothers me when the people around me criticize him for nothing more than being a new kind of candidate. I want to scream at everyone to JUST STOP! Stop and listen to what he's saying. It almost doesn't matter if he means it or not. It almost doesn't matter if he can follow through. Somebody said what needed to be said. He's the right person in the right place at exactly the right time in history.

The elections after this don't matter. Even the stolen elections behind us might seem less painful if that was the path we had to take to get to the place Obama can take us. All that matters is here and now and he's the one. He proved it when he stood by his pastor and when he addressed the racial divide in America with unflinching honesty and courage. He didn't back down. He didn't capitulate. He stated his position, he acknowledged the tension everyone has been feeling and he dealt with it.

Yes, the campaign against McCain is going to get ugly. He can handle it. Yes, we still need to worry about the fact that the Republicans still own the voting machines. The Clintons aren't going to go gentle into that dark night, either. But we need to remake the very image of this country and Barack seems tailor made for the position. I'm in.