Tag Archives: Obama

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A letter to the president

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Dear Mr. Obama,

Congratulations on making it into office! I voted for you.

Now, here’s my concern. It’s nice that you believe that it’s important to reach across the party line and try to unite people, but honestly, your own party has interests that should be as important or even more important than the other party’s. The Democratic party hasn’t had a president for almost ten years, and those were long years. It was time.

People voted for you for a reason. They like your policies, they like what you stand for. They like that you’re generally more progressive than other Democrats. And a lot of them were pissed off when you catered to the religious right with your choice of Rick Warren to give the invocation at your inauguration. Even you have to admit, his speech was pretty lame compared to the rhyming benediction given by Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery. I know you’re a Christian, but I’m not and I even I thought Lowery’s speech was so much more beautiful and spiritual than Warren’s claptrap. You don’t get much better than this as spiritual things go:

Help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid; when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around — when yellow will be mellow — when the red man can get ahead, man — and when white will embrace what is right.

You have so many things you can do for those of us who are true blue liberals and have been waiting years for someone like you to come along and do or reverse the doing of. It is our turn and you cannot deny us those things we have long been waiting for, especially in:

  • Reproductive health (thanks for the repeal of the gag rule, by the way)
  • Environmental protections
  • Governmental responsibility/accountability (this is the “government of the people and by the people” after all)
  • Corporate responsibility
  • LGBT rights (we’re waiting…)

It is time for you to live up to your promises, not to pander to the right, who didn’t vote for you, and would never vote for you.  Pander to us, your constituents, the people who put you in office.  We know what we wanted and we told you.  You promised us liberals (and moderates) that if we voted for you, you would give us the world.  Now I’m not stupid, so I know that the number of campaign promises that presidents usually fulfill is negligible.  You’ve been doing wonderfully so far.  Please don’t flake out on us.  But there is so much left to be done and you know it.

Sincerely,

QueerLady

P.S. I will be later posting what I personally want from this presidency.  I just didn’t think it had any place in this letter.

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Throwing my shoe at Bush

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This is the shoe I’m throwing at Bush, the same ones I wore to watch Obama take office. May these next four years be glorious!

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Inauguration Day

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Goodbye George Walker Bush!  Hello Barack Hussein Obama!

I was so overjoyed to watch the inauguration of the first president I ever had the opportunity to vote for.

I turned my back on Warren, cheered on Lowery, and teared up when Aretha Franklin sang My Country ‘Tis of Thee in that gorgeous hat.

What more is there to say?

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We have tonight, but what about tomorrow?

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Let us celebrate tonight.  Let us scream our heads off in pure unadulterated joy.  For today we have this moment, this feeling of ultimate satisfaction that we have elected someone to break the Bush reigh of terror and lead this country in a new direction.

But what about tomorrow?  What about the days that Bush still has in office?  What will he do to make life difficult for our president-elect?

My roommate told me she was afraid that someone was going to try to shoot him while he was on stage giving his beautiful speech; “Now that he’s off stage he’s safer”, she says.  But what about tomorrow?  Will he have to be constantly protected from the masses of people, racist, bigoted masses who want nothing more than to see him gone and someone safe (to them), old, and white in office again?  What about his daughters, his two little girls and his wife?  Will they be safe?

Will Obama be good to his campaign promises and speeches he’s made across the country about supporting the poor, equal protections for GLBT people (although not marriage, unfortunately), and his commitment to the education of children?  Or will he bow to pressures from the other side in the name of bi-partisan politics and being more centrist?

My hopes for his presidency:

  1. He appoints Supreme Court justices (some are due to retire in the next four years) that uphold a woman’s right to choose and maintain that GLBT people are due those rights and privileges straight people have had for years, should cases of that nature come to the court.
  2. He does not bow to pressures from conservatives to become more centrist, while still recognizing that he needs to keep as many people as he can happy.  No, I don’t think these are mutually exclusive.
  3. He makes sure that his daughters get a good education, because there is nothing more precious in this world than knowledge and with knowledge comes power.
  4. He looks back and learns from history, and is not doomed to repeat it.  In other words, that he isn’t swayed to believe that continued or new war is the answer to any question other than what w-a-r spells.
  5. He entertains bi-partisan efforts to rebuild and restrengthen our economy, and realizes that we can help the world’s countries strengthen theirs as well.

I know we all have hopes and dreams about this.  My hope is to see a world where I feel safe and secure as both a LGBT person and a young woman.