"President Obama!" Say it loud and it's music playing....

There are so many reasons to be excited and hopeful about electing Barak Obama our next president. Even as we bite our nails til election day, hoping those voting machines aren't Republican, we can taste his victory. A man of color leading and representing the U.S. after 232 years.....how awesome is that milestone? And after 8 years of a man who can barely put together a coherent sentence, we so deserve a man who speaks eloquently, thoughtfully, and genuinely. After 8 years of marching to a neoconservative script, our soldiers fighting and dying in the wrong place for the wrong reasons; our planet withering as we were afraid to stop stoking our economy that sullied it........we are so close to having a leader who will know better..........a leader whose values will connect US policy to the planet we live on and the many peoples we share it with. It's been so long since I didn't rush to change the channel whenever I saw the president speaking.

I know there will be plenty of work for those who want to see progressive change during an Obama presidency. I know there are things in his platform that worry me. But I trust in his leadership qualities more than I have ever trusted before in a U.S. president. It just has to happen this Tuesday.

Presidential Decisions

In June of 1965, President Johnson had a phone conversation with Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara stating that he saw "no way that there could be a US victory in Viet Nam either militarily or diplomatically." Speaking of the North Vietnamese, he said, "I don't believe they ever goin' to quit."

At that point, fewer than 2,000 US soldiers had been killed in action. The following 3.5 years of Johnson's presidency saw a steady escalation of troops and bombing, continued by Nixon who pledged "peace with honor" in his winning 1968 campaign. Nearly 50,000 US soldiers and 3,000,000 Southeast Asians were killed by the end of the war, ten years later.

How often do presidents lead us down a disastrous path because they do not have the imagination, courage, or advice to do something radically better?




(You can listen to the LBJ phone call at the 25:16 mark in an 8/19 edition of "Fresh Air" when Terry Gross replays an interview with historian Michael Beschloss.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93735223)

(casualty statistics are at: http://www.rjsmith.com/kia_tbl.html)

President Bush's Blood Brother

One of my sons had lunch with President Bush a few weeks ago and understands him less than ever now. Zac, my 23 year old son, works for Habitat for Humanity in New Orleans. President Bush decided to come to New Orleans on the first anniversary of Katrina. They set up a tent for lunch near the Habitat project Zac works on - building 81 homes for displaced musicians. There are about 20 Habitat Staff and 40 volunteers who were joined by Bush and some other important people. Zac sat with Chief of Staff, Andrew Card and two female staffers. At some point, somebody noticed that President Bush had some blood on his finger and asked him if he would like to have the Habitat medic clean it up and put on a bandage. Bush smiled and said he'd be fine. Then he wiped his bloody finger off on the astonished volunteer medic's shirt. The medic turned to Zac who was standing next to him and said, "what the fuck did he just do?" Wherever he goes, whatever he does and says, President Bush just keeps leaving people with that same question on their lips.