Obama
Maybe it's the euphoric high I've been on for the last week or so, but this is so big to me. I feel like I need to document this a little.
I spend all day reading all the same blogs I did before the election. All the political ones, all the interesting ones. All the websites, everything.
But it's so different. I'm not looking for things that make me angry anymore. No more Sarah Palin stories or things that the Bush Administration has fucked us on again.
I'm looking for more opinions on what Obama's Presidency means. They are some of the most inspiring political rhetoric ever written. And everyone just seems so hopeful.
Maybe I'm off the deep-end here, and I think it's okay if I am, but this is so good. He's a man, and a flawed one for sure, but at least we, as a people finally elected a President who's main qualification wasn't that we thought he'd be fun to grab a drink with.
We returned, for maybe the first time since Eisenhower, to electing a man truly curious of the outside world. Eisenhower was no intellectual, but was a stunning pragmatist, and in my opinion one of the great Presidents. He understood the world like few before or after him, and there's a reason we make fun of the 50's for being so bland. Eisenhower had his foot off the gas, had us in cruise control, and made the world a better place.
Obama can do the same, but with much more challenges. He doesn't have the benefit of cruise control. We're at least 40 years past that possibility.
He must be an aggressive man, someone who will take the calculated risks that made Eisenhower such a fantastic general, and show the compassion that has defined Obama so far. He's got the chance to remake the world, in a way that we'll never forget.
Bush can never be forgiven for what he's done to our generation. We will be forever saddled with the mistakes of our fathers. We already are 10 trillion dollars in debt, debt that by my calculation I have only been alive for around 30% of it (and I promise I didn't vote on any of it until the Bush years). Adding unfunded Medicaid, Social Security, Medicare, veterans' pensions, and similar obligations, this figure rises to a total of $59.1 trillion, or $516,348 per household [Wikipedia]. We owe great debts to our parents and grandparents. Our grandparents suffered immensely for 20 years through depression, famine and war. We owe them.
But they owe us too. More than any generation before, and hopefully any following, they have taken advantage of that debt owed to them by their children. Their righteous anger and frustration with the world is justifiable. What is not is passing the costs on to us.
Our parents are still more to blame. In a world where suddenly the United States was the most powerful and impressive nation on the planet, they shied away from the real problems. They let Roosevelt's programs fester, with successive Band-Aids on them to cover up their irresponsibility. They ignored the outside world and our relationship with it. They declared us the greatest nation on earth and challenged all who defied that. They ignored the planet, focusing on getting rich now as opposed to protecting things for their children. The beginning of Reagan's Presidency signaled this great shift.
Yes, they did good things. Reagan brought down the wall. Bush worked hard in the Middle East to bring peacce. Clinton took on the genocides of the 90's. Even Bush Round 2 brought some sense of hope to Africa (perhaps the only place on Earth that still views him even a little favorably).
But they didn't care about that, really. They focused on abortion, on drugs, on gays. So many times I want to just scream "Who FUCKING CARES?" And then I look at these "Baby Boomers". They do. They created this cultural war. Maybe it was inferiority complex, unable to affect the world their parents had. But they did nothing for 30 years except bicker and argue and pass all their problems on.
They ruined the world for us. They passed it all on to us.
I have great trust in Obama, and hope he is all that I think he is.
It seems impossible to cut off the senior citizens who paid into SS and Medicare for so long. But, at the same time, these same people bled their world, and are about to bleed their children dry. Everyone acts like this whole mounting Baby Boomer retirement is no big deal. It's going to destroy us.
This is our last chance to change that. Even if this is wishful thinking, I think the youth finally grasped the gravity this time. It wasn't just about Obama. Our parents will be retiring, and bleeding us out.
Because they refused to deal with the problems they created themselves.
Go, Barack, go.
I spend all day reading all the same blogs I did before the election. All the political ones, all the interesting ones. All the websites, everything.
But it's so different. I'm not looking for things that make me angry anymore. No more Sarah Palin stories or things that the Bush Administration has fucked us on again.
I'm looking for more opinions on what Obama's Presidency means. They are some of the most inspiring political rhetoric ever written. And everyone just seems so hopeful.
Maybe I'm off the deep-end here, and I think it's okay if I am, but this is so good. He's a man, and a flawed one for sure, but at least we, as a people finally elected a President who's main qualification wasn't that we thought he'd be fun to grab a drink with.
We returned, for maybe the first time since Eisenhower, to electing a man truly curious of the outside world. Eisenhower was no intellectual, but was a stunning pragmatist, and in my opinion one of the great Presidents. He understood the world like few before or after him, and there's a reason we make fun of the 50's for being so bland. Eisenhower had his foot off the gas, had us in cruise control, and made the world a better place.
Obama can do the same, but with much more challenges. He doesn't have the benefit of cruise control. We're at least 40 years past that possibility.
He must be an aggressive man, someone who will take the calculated risks that made Eisenhower such a fantastic general, and show the compassion that has defined Obama so far. He's got the chance to remake the world, in a way that we'll never forget.
Bush can never be forgiven for what he's done to our generation. We will be forever saddled with the mistakes of our fathers. We already are 10 trillion dollars in debt, debt that by my calculation I have only been alive for around 30% of it (and I promise I didn't vote on any of it until the Bush years). Adding unfunded Medicaid, Social Security, Medicare, veterans' pensions, and similar obligations, this figure rises to a total of $59.1 trillion, or $516,348 per household [Wikipedia]. We owe great debts to our parents and grandparents. Our grandparents suffered immensely for 20 years through depression, famine and war. We owe them.
But they owe us too. More than any generation before, and hopefully any following, they have taken advantage of that debt owed to them by their children. Their righteous anger and frustration with the world is justifiable. What is not is passing the costs on to us.
Our parents are still more to blame. In a world where suddenly the United States was the most powerful and impressive nation on the planet, they shied away from the real problems. They let Roosevelt's programs fester, with successive Band-Aids on them to cover up their irresponsibility. They ignored the outside world and our relationship with it. They declared us the greatest nation on earth and challenged all who defied that. They ignored the planet, focusing on getting rich now as opposed to protecting things for their children. The beginning of Reagan's Presidency signaled this great shift.
Yes, they did good things. Reagan brought down the wall. Bush worked hard in the Middle East to bring peacce. Clinton took on the genocides of the 90's. Even Bush Round 2 brought some sense of hope to Africa (perhaps the only place on Earth that still views him even a little favorably).
But they didn't care about that, really. They focused on abortion, on drugs, on gays. So many times I want to just scream "Who FUCKING CARES?" And then I look at these "Baby Boomers". They do. They created this cultural war. Maybe it was inferiority complex, unable to affect the world their parents had. But they did nothing for 30 years except bicker and argue and pass all their problems on.
They ruined the world for us. They passed it all on to us.
I have great trust in Obama, and hope he is all that I think he is.
It seems impossible to cut off the senior citizens who paid into SS and Medicare for so long. But, at the same time, these same people bled their world, and are about to bleed their children dry. Everyone acts like this whole mounting Baby Boomer retirement is no big deal. It's going to destroy us.
This is our last chance to change that. Even if this is wishful thinking, I think the youth finally grasped the gravity this time. It wasn't just about Obama. Our parents will be retiring, and bleeding us out.
Because they refused to deal with the problems they created themselves.
Go, Barack, go.