Well, I now know that at least one person has read at least one of my posts. I’m pretty excited about this, especially because the first reader was one of my daughters. As I knew she would if she stopped by, she gave me some insight (I’m using that word instead of maybe constructive criticism). First, I need to make some paragraphs, or as she put it “hit the return key once in a while – it’s a bit hard on the eyes.” That one brought a smile to my face, not only because I know she was right on, but because I also know that I have a tendency to get verbose and carried away when I’m emotionally charged about something. And if you read this blog you should be able to figure out that, whether you agree with my thoughts or not, I’m pretty emotionally charged up about the 2008 presidential election and the direction of our nation in general.

In addition to that insight, she made another point that I responded privately to her via email, but I thought I needed to write about here. If you’ve read a couple of my other posts you will know that I have really had to struggle with the thought of how could any democrat, or any voter who supported Hillary Clinton, possibly vote for john mccain. I have lost all respect for mccain during this election while at the same time I understand why the democratic leaders are trying to show respect for his service to the country and the ordeal he had to endure during Viet Nam. However, the truth as I see it is that he has been and will be saying anything, regardless of the validity of his remarks, advertisements, or whatever, to win this election. His lying and cheating is going virtually unchallenged by the so-called mainstream media and he has the audacity to pander to bush’s “base” while saying he is the candidate of change – but anyone who’s been paying attention for the last 8 (really the last 28) years must realize the significance of what another republican would do to our country at this point in time. I mentioned in my previous post that, in my mind, the only reason I can see for a disillusioned Hillary supporter to vote for mccain considering the damage his presidency would do to this county would be because Obama is black.

My daughter found this to be a slam against women. She pointed out that she has been supporting Hillary for 15 years, she voted for her in the Washington caucuses because just the thought that a woman might become president was extremely exciting for her and the idea of a woman president, even the possibility that it might happen, was inspiring for her as she relates to her own daughter (my beautiful granddaughter). I went back and re-read the post and can see how I probably wasn’t as clear as I should have been, so I want to try to be more clear, although I still feel my point is valid.

I do not see Hillary Clinton’s supporters as just women. While, after a little more thought, I’m sure that a majority of them are women – I believe there were a lot of men supporting her during the primary process as well. So my first point is that I wasn’t talking about women or men – simply people who supported her. In fact, it makes more sense to me that the so-called 10% of her supporters (if you believe the polls) who may switch to mccain would come from the men. Hillary was very strong in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and other places with lots of rural areas which have been negatively affected by the “trickle down” economics of the last 28 years of republicans. There is no good reason why any of these people would support another republican, let alone mccain who has nothing to offer them – he even continues to be a proponent of NAFTA, GAT, etc. However, during the Pennsylvania primary I remember people – leading politicians from Pennsylvania itself – saying that Pennsylvania is essentially Pittsburgh and Philadelphia along with the rural areas which are more like Alabama when it comes to the issue of race.

For us, as Americans, to fail to address this issue is to me like the ostrich hiding its head in the sand and thinking no one can see him/her. I just can’t see how any progressive thinking person – and keep in mind that about 80% of Americans think the country is going in the wrong direction and only 28% approve of gw bush – could vote for a person who thinks that the fundamentals of this economy are “strong,” wants to stay in Iraq until we get “victory,” (whatever that is) wants to “drill, drill, drill” to solve the energy crisis, wants to privatize social security, has repeatedly voted against women’s rights, worker’s rights, and civil rights, says he’s against special interests controlling Washington yet has a campaign run almost 100% by lobbyists, has promised to turn the Supreme Court even farther to the right, lies about Obama and lies about his own accomplishments, and who cheated right in front of “God and everybody” at Saddleback Church just a couple weeks ago – against an extremely intelligent and thoughtful person who has worked his way up from incredibly modest and challenging beginnings, has dedicated his life to service, who is a strong honorable family man, who has been proven right on one judgement after another, who has proven his management skills in running a campaign that I believe will change the course of politics for the forseeable future in this county, who has the attention of people all over the world, and has shown a level of energy that will be a requirement in the daunting task of restoring this nation to its core ideal as president while his own life story is a true reflection of that ideal – I’m sorry but the only thing I can come up with is that he is black.

I can say this – had Hillary won the nomination and we were looking at the same dilemma – I would have to say that there would be people not voting for her because she’s a woman. I have to admit that I got pretty upset with her “kitchen sink” strategy in trying to derail Obama. There was a point in time when I probably would have been cast into the anger camp had she won. But I can’t picture any scenario that would have caused me to vote for mccain. I can somewhat accept her supporters not voting or voting for Nader or someone else, I guess, but mccain? No way!!! Every time I think about it, what would drive someone to do that I come back to the same place. I listened to Hillary Clinton’s speech at the democratic convention. I have to say that it gave me chills on my spine. When she was finished I said to myself that had she followed that tact during the primary campaign from the outset, I believe she would be the nominee – it came to my mind that the people who were advising her led to her loss. She was like the Hillary Clinton I remember in the early years of Bill Clinton’s presidency – not the Hillary Clinton who refused to admit that she made a mistake in voting for the Iraq war or the Hillary Clinton who miscalculated about the aftermath of “Super Tuesday” or the Hillary Clinton who stooped to the level of Karl Rove in an attempt to “win at all costs” during the latter stages of the primaries. She certainly gained my forgiveness and vaulted herself, in my eyes, right back to the top as far as leaders in this country are concerned and I hope her voters follow her lead from that speech and line up behind Obama. But for the ones who can’t bring themselves to do so – I’d like for someone to give me a rational explanation as to why they could ignore the plethora of reasons to vote against mccain in order to try to bring Obama down – other than the conclusion I have reluctantly come to.

The end result of this election, I hope and pray, will be an historic occasion when we have, as a nation, maybe taken a huge step toward genuinely showing that a person of color, or anybody for that matter, can make it all the way to the top in this country. All my life I have hoped to live to see the day when an African American could hold the highest office in this land. And, as the father of two beautiful daughters, of course I also long for the day when a woman can occupy the White House as the president of the United States. The tough thing this year is that after so many years of frustrations in this regard, two historic candidates show up at the same time – of course they would have to both be democrats because the reality of the republican party is that it wouldn’t be possible for either circumstance under their watch – and, of course, only one of the two could win. At this point in time it is imperative for Hillary’s supporters, all of them, to get behind Obama because even though she is not going to be president, at least this year, 2008 will always have an important part in the history of this great nation, from the standpoint of a radical change from the WASP approach to politics in this country, 2008 will always be remembered as an exciting first!!!!