"Do you ever have small crowds in Denver? Goodness, gracious!"
They're saying today's crowd might be the largest US crowd this year, which is saying something. Barack Obama has energised people in a way no candidate during my lifetime has. We have a sense that he could be great, and so many of us want to be a part of that.
Were it not for my camera, I'd still be believing that I'd voted for a disembodied voice, as I didn't get anywhere near the podium. However, I did get a pic of a stick figure who will be (if the Republicans don't steal the election again) America's next president.
He's the dark-suited figure standing above the crowd in the lower right-hand corner of the picture. It ain't much, but it's mine.
And here is a pic of the crowd.
And here's a bit in which he left his prepared speech:
Maybe some of your parents or grandparents, they were born in another country without freedom of speech or freedom of worship, but they said, you know what, we know there's this land across the ocean called America, where it's a land of opportunity and a land of freedom, and we're willing to take the risk to travel to that place to create a better future for our children and grandchildren. In this audience, there are people whose parents or grandparents couldn't cast a vote, but they said to themselves you know, maybe my child or grandchild, if we march, if we struggle, maybe they may be able to run for the United States Senate, maybe they might run for the Presidency of the United States of America.
Having lived abroad, I have no illusion that we have it better in America than anywhere else (as most Americans still believe). From personal freedom to healthcare to the gap between rich and poor, we are woefully behind Europe, and the last eight years have made us more so. And yet, there is something America has that is uniquely our own: an eternal optimism, a certainty that each of us has the potential to be great. The past twenty-eight years of nearly continuous Republican rule has twisted that optimism; the idea that all can aspire to something better has become an excuse to eliminate the laws and programs that make that possible; the belief that we can do anything has been transformed into arrogant disregard for international law and the sovereignty of other nations. We have come to a watershed in our history: we will either make necessary sacrifices in the hope of a better future or, as The Nation put it, sink back into fantasy and edge ever closer to totalitarianism. I believe Barack Obama is not only the right choice in this election, but the right person at this moment in time.
"We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth."
Abraham Lincoln's Address to Congress, December 1, 1862
Were it not for my camera, I'd still be believing that I'd voted for a disembodied voice, as I didn't get anywhere near the podium. However, I did get a pic of a stick figure who will be (if the Republicans don't steal the election again) America's next president.
He's the dark-suited figure standing above the crowd in the lower right-hand corner of the picture. It ain't much, but it's mine.
And here is a pic of the crowd.
And here's a bit in which he left his prepared speech:
Maybe some of your parents or grandparents, they were born in another country without freedom of speech or freedom of worship, but they said, you know what, we know there's this land across the ocean called America, where it's a land of opportunity and a land of freedom, and we're willing to take the risk to travel to that place to create a better future for our children and grandchildren. In this audience, there are people whose parents or grandparents couldn't cast a vote, but they said to themselves you know, maybe my child or grandchild, if we march, if we struggle, maybe they may be able to run for the United States Senate, maybe they might run for the Presidency of the United States of America.
Having lived abroad, I have no illusion that we have it better in America than anywhere else (as most Americans still believe). From personal freedom to healthcare to the gap between rich and poor, we are woefully behind Europe, and the last eight years have made us more so. And yet, there is something America has that is uniquely our own: an eternal optimism, a certainty that each of us has the potential to be great. The past twenty-eight years of nearly continuous Republican rule has twisted that optimism; the idea that all can aspire to something better has become an excuse to eliminate the laws and programs that make that possible; the belief that we can do anything has been transformed into arrogant disregard for international law and the sovereignty of other nations. We have come to a watershed in our history: we will either make necessary sacrifices in the hope of a better future or, as The Nation put it, sink back into fantasy and edge ever closer to totalitarianism. I believe Barack Obama is not only the right choice in this election, but the right person at this moment in time.
"We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth."
Abraham Lincoln's Address to Congress, December 1, 1862