…for bringing joy

…for reviving patriotism

…for renewing our belief in ourselves and our country

…for reminding us that we CAN work together toward a common goal.

As you take the oath of office this morning, my faith in our democracy, our country, and my fellow citizens has been affirmed and renewed.

This is a day to remember always, especially in the days ahead, which will not be easy and won’t have instant cures. Yet, the fact of your election confirms that we can find a way out of the current difficulties and begin to find our way back to the road that leads to peace and prosperity.

We can, we did, we will.

I have struggled to articulate what races through my head (and has since November 4th) as we approach the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States.

I cannot find the right words to say how I feel, what this means to me, what I hope for.

As I watched today’s concert at the Lincoln Memorial with tears streaming down my face, all I could think of was: Yes We Did.

We ARE the new American Majority. All of us. With voices, and tools and communities and a will for change.

Yes we did. Yes we can.

May God bless Barack Obama and his beautiful family and keep them safe.

May we begin the arduous process of rebuilding this country one citizen, one family, one small spark of hope at a time.

Hope is a powerful and amazing motivator. We can, we will, and we did.

Progressives, you’re missing the point and the boat. Didn’t you hear anything Barack Obama said during his campaign?

In the Bush years, all was dogma, rigid, unbending (among other things). Barack Obama spent 11 months telling us that change is coming, change we can believe in, change we NEED.

Change isn’t something that happens with the stroke of a pen. It emerges out of need, dialogue, and consensus.

I understand the anger over Rick Warren’s selection to give the invocation at the inaugural. But what you aren’t getting is that Warren represents a large chunk of our country — evangelical Christians who believe that the Bible prohibits gay marriage.

I disagree with them. You disagree with them. I wrote extensively about how hurt I was to see the hateful speech coming from them during the Proposition 8 campaign. That hurt hasn’t gone anywhere, but it seems unproductive and useless to shout Warren down, call for him to be disinvited, and in the process, alienate that segment of the population YOU all need to move the agenda forward.

I want you to consider Lee Stranahan’s viewpoint here. It’s worth thinking about.

Rick Warren has laid out arguments and views that you may not agree with but they are actually shared by millions of people. The majority of people, really. They’ve been quoted all over the place and that’s part of the gift.

There are weeks to listen to his arguments and not just quote them but actually refute them in an organized way. You could try out your counter-arguements on people who disagree with you, rather than just nodding in agreement at the people who you already agree with. You can try to answer the arguments with civil discourse and without the use of any broad generalizations meant to obscure the other side’s position. You could answer without insults. I mean – without a single one.

It’s harder, no doubt. It’s easy to wave your own team’s flag while sitting comfortably in your own team’s bleachers. But Barack Obama has been argued for doing the easy thing. The challenge is to do the right thing and that means actually trying to win by fighting well and fairly in the marketplace of ideas.

Barack Obama is handing the country the gift of civil discourse on difficult and emotional subjects. Happy holidays.

If you want change, start by changing the tone of discourse. I agree with Lee. We’re not used to it, but Barack Obama is offering an opportunity for an exchange of ideas in a civil tone. We don’t have to shout at each other anymore. That’s a hallmark of the past. We don’t have to suffer rallies shouting down opposing views, but can come together and try to get a clear understanding of what exactly the issues are.

It takes one voice in a room. Are we going to use that voice to try to persuade, or alienate?

As an aside, I have met Rick Warren and talked with him. He is not a raving homophobe nor is he a dogmatic type who has to be right. He is thoughtful, bases his beliefs on what he understands the Bible to say, but is open to discussion and debate. Further, he is a man with heart for all people, gay, straight, rich, poor, and otherwise. He is not a hellfire and brimstone preacher and has angered the diehards on the side of the Religious Right far more than he has you.

The man is saying a prayer. He is not shaping policy, nor is he running for office. Let him pray. And listen. And talk. But do it with the goal of persuasion and openness, not exclusion and anger. Please. Let’s be the change we believe in and voted for.

On January 16, 2008 I chose to support Barack Obama for President. Today, my reasons ring as true as they did back then, but this one particularly stood out for me:

But Barack Obama has something more. He has the ability to transform the attitudes in this country from mistrust and fear to community and participation. He has the ability, more than any other candidate, to inspire the best in us, to call the GOOD in people out for the bettering of our country.

Now we are here. Tomorrow is Election Day. This is our moment. This is the time where we can stand up, stand in line if we have to, be vigilant and be patriots. Barack Obama has organized and run a transformative campaign. I have seen the transformation with my own eyes. I watched my oldest son, a veteran, change from a cynical and disenfranchised voter to one who is engaged and enthused. He was checking the poll opening times last night so he could be sure to be there first thing in the morning to vote.

This was a young man who swore he’d never vote again after 2000 (his first national election) and 2004.

Transformative.

I wrote this in February:

The foundation of this movement is NOT a cult of personality. It is the cry of people who have been disenfranchised and disconnected from the governance of this country. We are governed, but not represented. We are spied on and not defended. Our sons and daughters are sent to die or be maimed in Iraq but not cared for and abandoned by the very Administration that sent them there when they return.

We’re tired of what the politicians say “they” will do and are ready to show this country what WE can do as a collective group of energized voices ready to put our wallets, our voices and our feet on the line.

We are the new American majority. We have a voice. We walk streets, we make phone calls, we give what we can, even if it’s just $3.01 at a time. We are speaking for ourselves rather than waiting for someone to speak for us. We want our country back, and we want our standing back in the world. We’re tired of the naysayers who leave our fates in the hands of Wall Street and the Halliburtons, Diebolds and Blackwaters of the world. We are no longer going to stand idly by and have our lives and quality of our lives dictated to us by lobbyists and corporations.

This is not hate. It is democracy..

This is our time. This is our moment. We hold our democracy in our hands. Please, vote. Take tomorrow off, and make sure others vote. There are organized GOTV efforts in every neighborhood. Help where you can, but vote, foremost.

Democracy is coming…

And believe. Yes. We. Can.

Hope. And believe.

In response to McCain’s latest: “Yet”.

H/T Lee Stranahan (Don’t miss his 30 days, 30 reasons series on why he’s voting for Barack Obama)

Today Colin Powell stepped across party lines and endorsed Barack Obama for President. As part of his endorsement, he strongly criticized the tactics of the McCain/Palin campaign, particularly with regard to their current effort to paint Barack Obama as a terrorist.

One of the tactics that Powell strongly objected to was the current spate of robocalls being used by the McCain campaign to stir up fear and hate among the base. Here’s the text. I won’t post the audio here because it is visceral and hateful:

Hello. I’m calling for John McCain and the RNC because you need to know that Barack Obama has worked closely with domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, whose organization bombed the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon, a judge’s home and killed Americans. And Democrats will enact an extreme leftist agenda if they take control of Washington. Barack Obama and his Democratic allies lack the judgment to lead our country. This call was paid for by McCain-Palin 2008 and the Republican National Committee at 202-863-8500.

Josh Marshall summed the McCain campaign up this way:

Stripped down to its components McCain’s message to voters is this: “Don’t forget. He’s definitely black. And he may be a terrorist.” That’s the message.

In light of these hateful tactics, I found it useful to go back to Barack Obama’s historic speech on race, delivered 3/18/2008 to see what he predicted. As usual, he was remarkably prescient:

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America – to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we’ve never really worked through – a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.

After acknowledging the anger of blacks and whites, he calls us to move beyond the old racial wounds:

This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.

He even has ideas for how to do it:

It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

The McCain campaign wants us to believe that Barack Obama is a scary black guy who will wreck the country. They need to leave this impression because they hope beyond all logic to erase the truth: The last 8 years have wrecked this country more than any of us could have imagined, and John McCain stood right next to George Bush and the Republicans while the wrecking ball slammed into the walls of our banks, insurance companies, Wall Street, social institutions, FEMA, New Orleans, Iraq and the national budget (not to mention the national debt).

We have a choice. Obama knew we had a choice back in March, when he said this:

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.”

Colin Powell understands this. He spoke out so forcefully about what President Palin, the RNC and John McCain are doing with their robocalls, their mailers and their ads as his way of saying NOT THIS TIME.

When Gen. Powell spoke of Barack Obama as a transcendent and transformational leader, who represented generational change, he made a choice to put his country first, to move us toward a more perfect union.

That’s the same choice we all have on November 4th. We can get stuck in all of the distractions that make absolutely no difference to our wallets, or our kids, or our health, or we can stand up and say “not this time”. This time we’re choosing to push past the fears and the wedges, the division and the hate, and say:

Not this time. Say it with me. Stand up. Make your voice heard; say that it’s time to reconcile, to put our country first, ahead of our fears, ahead of ourselves.

Not. this. time.

VOTE. Fight for change.

MP3 of “A More Perfect Union”

Amazing. More than Qualcomm Stadium. Missouri, I love you.

Yes. We. Can.

Text of Senator Obama’s speech

Dear Senator McCain and Governor Palin,

Time and again in America, people of all races and backgrounds have overcome division and fear, and come together to uplift the country and create a more equal and just society. It’s part of what makes this country great.

With an African-American nominee running on a major party ticket and a woman on the Republican ticket for the first time in history, this campaign has seen Americans–men and women of all races–inspired to continue that great tradition, coming together to bridge the gaps that history has set between us in service of our national progress.

But let us be clear: while we have made great strides in this country when it comes to racial equality, we are not finished. Now, more than ever, we need leadership that understands that we live in complex times where too many are quick to judge another by the complexion of their skin or the sound of their name.

In the last few weeks, Senator McCain and Governor Palin, rhetoric at your campaign events has taken an increasingly dangerous tone that seems to ignore the precarious state of our progress when it comes to race and ethnicity.

Supporters at your rallies and other events have used hateful language and called for violence against Sen. Obama yelling “kill him!” “off with his head!” and “bomb Obama.”

For the most part, you have stood by in silence. In addition, you have also repeatedly made statements that somehow connect Senator Obama with terrorism. Your surrogates have emphasized his middle name. This is problematic and dangerous, and we believe helps create the conditions that have given rise to these incidents of violent rhetoric from some of your supporters.

Today, we’re standing together as Americans of all political persuasions to express our deep concern that the decisions of your campaign are contributing to a dangerous atmosphere of paranoia, division, and hate that, as we have already seen, has the potential to seriously harm our country and its progress.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”

In these trying times, candidates seeking the highest offices in the land must call on the best in each of us, and call off the worst.

We urge you to join people of conscience from all races and backgrounds to reject the politics of division and fear, and come together to uplift the country and create a more equal and just society.

– The undersigned —

Sign the letter here