Open Letter to Sen. Barack Obama
Dear Senator Obama,
Since January of this year, I’ve been absolutely committed to getting you elected. I’ve donated to your campaign, I’ve canvassed for you, I’ve volunteered to work in the office around the corner, and I’ve even put my marriage into severe stress by refusing to sit idly by and once again allow my Republican spouse to cancel out my vote.
But I need your help. And I need it now.
I knew it was going to be a rough campaign. I even suspected that Sarah Palin would be the choice for their ticket after seeing her profiled earlier this year. Why didn’t you?
I also suspected that the Republicans would use every single weapon at their disposal, including the financial markets, race, war, and terrorism (their little deck of fear) to intimidate voters into electing them.
But I believed you when you called upon us to be the New American Majority. This is what I wrote in February:
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.
But Senator Obama, we can’t do this by ourselves. When Bill Clinton gives an interview praising Sarah Palin’s political acumen and you fall silent, what am I to think? When Hillary Clinton won’t come out with both guns blazing against her, I can only assume that your choice of Joe Biden so offended them that they plan now to toss the election over to McCain — their Plan B.
The fierce urgency of NOW isn’t just a phrase to inspire voters, Senator Obama. You have to get it, too.
This week has just about snuffed out the hope. That’s what McCain and the Republicans want. They want us to be afraid, to believe in nothing, to be emotionally and financially bankrupt, bent and spent, looking up and reaching up for them to rescue us.
We don’t need rescuing; we need your voice. We need you to get down on their level, to tell the voters the truth just like you said you would. Tell them that Sarah Palin is no more qualified to succeed McCain as President as she is to be dogcatcher. Ask them if they want Vice President Palin to be in contempt of Congress the same way Vice President Cheney is now. Point it out, shout it out! Ask the voters if they really think it’s a good idea to surrender to snark.
Did you learn nothing from the primaries? Hillary Clinton won by snarking her way right past you. And now she and Bill are handing a victory to McCain by signalling permission to their supporters. What Bill Clinton said in that interview was that Sarah Palin was competent because she could play politics.
I’ve seen Sarah Palins in my lifetime. They’re the cheerleaders that steal boyfriends because they can, the antagonists that walk into healthy groups and leave them shattered and broken with their backbiting and gossip, the women who stand up and preen their righteousness while their kids flip them off behind their backs. They’re the ‘beautiful ones’, the ones with enough bite to keep honesty at bay, just enough brains to convince everyone they’re right, and two-faced enough to tell everyone else you’re wrong. (For even more examples, read this)
Sarah Palin is dangerous. Until you neutralize her, you risk losing this election. And it must be YOU. Not Biden. Not Clinton. Not Michelle. YOU.
You are the one who has to call her what she is. Ambitious and incompetent. You are the one who has to point it out, and once you do, then you can call McCain out for taking such a dangerous risk with our country. Did you hear her yesterday, calling it the Palin-McCain administration? Where were YOU? Why weren’t you on it?
You have said you are running on change. As Steve said on NewsGang yesterday, the only thing that has changed since the convention is the selection of Sarah Palin. As the change candidate, it’s up to you to address the change, take it out, neutralize it.
Because as much as I want to be all hopey and stuff, after this week I’m as pessimistic as I’ve ever been. People will surrender hope to fear. They do it all the time. It’s a crisis of courage. And I guarantee you that if you don’t stand up and lead the way on this, they will falter. If they falter, you will fail. And if you fail, we will not have a country left to stand for. We will be a burned-out husk of our former glory, owned by China, loathed by all, and quite possibly vulnerable to far, far worse than we’ve seen so far.
Do you want to win? Do you want the opportunity to actually do what you’ve said you’ll do? Do you want my support?
Stop with the wonkitude and stand up to Palin. She’s your threat. Not McCain. She’s who they want in office, not McCain.
Just. do it. Now. Because there is an urgency to now. Because we need you to show us that you can lead, and that you can push our enemies out of the way to do it.