I’ve been so caught up in my rage at the outgoing government and my worries about the state of the nation Obama has been handed that I’ve forgotten some of what this election has actually been about. These kids posed for this picture at their school in Kenya, but when the camera wasn’t pointed at them, the yelled out "Obama, Obama!" I guess visitors are pretty identifiable on the roads there, because the school kids in their colored uniforms on the side of the road waved and cheered as we drove by – "Obama, Obama!" Our trip was in the fall of 2007, and when we got back, the Iowa Campaign fight between Clinton and Obama was getting hot. It was about that time that I found myself leaning. Prior to that, I didn’t care which Democrat won – any non-republican would’ve done for me. I don’t know if the cries of the Kenyan kids had something to do with my leaning, but it would be fine with me if they did.
Before the modern weblog came into its current dominance in the arena of communication among and between persons, “bloggers” used newspapers and magazines to accomplish similar objectives. John Steinbeck distinguished himself as a blogger as well as a novelist. Herewith, a timely park bench contribution:
“…let me bring it down to cases.
I have children, as many of you whites who read this have. Do you think your children would have the guts, the dignity, and the responsibility to go to school in Little Rock knowing they would be insulted, shoved, hated, sneered at, even spat upon day after day, and do it quietly without showing anger, petulance or complaint? And even if they could take it, would they also get good grades?
Now I am a grown, fairly well-educated – I hope intelligent – white man. I know that violence can produce no good effect of any kind. And yet if my child were spat on and insulted, I couldn’t trust myself not to get a ball bat and knock out a few brains. But I trust Negroes not to, and they haven’t.
I think so much of those school children in Little Rock – a small handful who carry the will and the conscience, the hopes and futures of millions in their arms. They have not let their people down. I think, what quiet pride their grandchildren can have in them knowing they came of such stock.
And then I think of the faces of the mob that tried to keep them out, faces drooling hatred, cursing and accursed faces, brave only in numbers, spitting their venom at children. And some of those faces, masked, sneaking in the night to plant a bomb – the final weapon of a coward.
What pride can their descendants take in their ancestry? But of course, the will forget, or lie, or both.
When Martin Luther King was stabbed by a hysterical woman, he might well have felt some anger or hurt or despair. But his first words on coming out of the anesthetic were: “Don’t let them hurt her. She needs help.”
Perhaps someof the anger against Negroes stems from a profound sense of their superiority, and perhaps their superiority is rooted in having a cause and an unanswerable method composed of courage, restrain, and a sense of direction.”
Amazing quote from a favorite author! Over the Bush years, I’ve thought periodically that maybe I’d like to move to the simpler life on Cannery Row – just find me a rusty old boiler and move in for the duration…