April Reign

Speak your mind even if your voice shakes

election

A Historic Moment for America

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November 4th, 2008 a history making night for the United States of America, as for the first time ever Americans elected a black man to the highest office in the land. News footage showing tears steaming down the faces of those who never thought they would live to see such a thing could have failed to touch only the hardest of hearts.

President Elect Barack Obama gave an acceptance speech with a message of hope, of inclusiveness, of an awareness that he represents all the people not just those that voted for him, that has not been seen for some time.

Of course the American economy is tanking, there are wars, there is a level of hatred toward those not seen as “true Americans” reminiscent of the McCarthy era and so President Obama faces a great many challenges. He may not wholly live up to the hopes and dreams that have been pinned upon him. For now though there is joy and celebration. Hope for an end to blatant corruption, abuses of power and an almost sociopathic disregard for the well being of the people.

Congratulations to Barack Obama, his family and all the black families in the U.S. who can now say to their sons and daughters that one day you too could become President.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

Harper’s Full of Ship Again

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An article today in the Ottawa Citizen has this quote from Harper

Harper’s platform speech was billed as the most important of the campaign, but he might want to think about firing his analogy writer. “As the saying goes, it wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark. Which is why, when the rain came, Noah didn’t need to panic and he didn’t switch boats,” Harper said. He stopped short of saying that, like Noah, God speaks to him.

Seriously? Noah’s Ark?! That’s the image he wants to impose.

as brebis noire pointed out

“Any leader who brings up Noah’s ark at a time like this not only has an empathy deficit, but a deficit in political instincts as well.
Noah saved his family and two reps from every species. Everybody else drowned.”

Well at least we now know what his platform is.

The Debate

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Tonight’s leadership debate was much better than I expected. While I didn’t see a clear winner I did see more honest talk than there has been for some time.

May was fantastic and a real asset to the debate. Duceppe was hilarious when asked what his first order of business would be as PM he said he wasn’t going to be elected PM but this is what he would lobby the others to do.

Layton was articulate, on message and got some lovely digs at Harper including asking Harper if he was keeping his platform under his sweater.

Harper slipped a couple of times with Dion proving how he is misconstruing Dion’s words to put forth his own agenda.

As far Harper I’ll quote my son;

he really showed obvious signs of “fight or flight” instincts any time he was asked a direct question from one of the other candidates or whenever they called him on something he said that wasn’t true. His eyes were darting, he shifted multiple times in a small time period and he hunched down making himself as small as possible. And all I could think is if he can’t stand up strong during a simple debate was: How, if he ever actually got elected, could he stand up to his opposition (excluding underhanded tactics.) And if he can’t do that, how would he be able to stand up to other world leaders, especially those who he already seems to have a weakness to? (Bush, McCain if he somehow gets elected.)
he just seemed like a very weak leader in that, he couldn’t stand up to any of them strongly, and could do nothing but evade any straightforward question. He showed clearly his policies are based on lip service to ideology.

It will be interesting to see how the media spins it.