Nov 05, 2008 12:04
the most memorable and poignant moment for me was when the news camera panned the crowd in chicago and landed on jessy jackson. he had a thousand-yard stare, and was completely inside himself. and then his eyes pulled tight and his lips pulled apart in tears, and i could see him thinking about his friend who'd been to the mountaintop and had died to make this night possible.
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isn't obama not only the first black US president, but the first black head of state in the Global North?
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i think we are not seeing a "shift to the left." bush was the worst president in modern memory. mccain was an awful, mean-spirited candidate who chose an ignoramus for a running mate. the economy has crashed and the republicans have no credibility in the area of governance. and yet obama's electoral landslide was still in the 50th percentile of the popular vote, california prop 8 passed even while they elected obama, and palin is widely viewed as the face of the next republican wave. i think we remain - and will remain for at least another couple of generations, and probably longer than my lifetime - a sharply divided nation with a strong tendency toward hypocritical sanctimony and belligerent ignorance.