Lilith Saintcrow

Still sick but getting better. Coughing a bit, but the nose has largely stopped trying to flood the rest of my face. Fever gone down. Today is my last day of rest before I go back to my regular workout schedule–I’ve been shovelgloving the past few days to keep myself together, and to get myself moving and get the crud worked out.

I feel like the sickness has broken in more ways than one. I listened to both speeches last night–McCain’s concession and Obama’s celebratory. Do not read further unless you want to hear my opinion. You’ve been warned.

I know a lot of people say McCain was “classy” in his concession. That if he’d been that way all through the campaign they wouldn’t have minded him as President.

That’s awful nice.

But I grew up in a conservative, xenophobic household. I know what McCain was saying on the surface, and I know the code words he was using to reach the hate-filled basket of idiocy that is all the Republican Party has left. McCain’s message was not gracious. It was, “Sarah will redeem us in 2012. Until then, make it impossible for this interloper to make any real change. Clinton him if you can–scream long and loud into the Faux News echo chamber we’ve built, and make him pay. Make it impossible to get any real work done.”

You may not have heard it, but for someone who grew up in the kind of household that would vote for McCain without question, both because he is conservative and because he is white and his opponent was not, there were two messages in that speech. It’s like a cult–one message is for the uninitiated, and another is for the True Believer.

Furthermore, McCain had plenty of time to be the man who ran against Bush–or the man who was portrayed running against Bush. I am not so sure we didn’t see the real McCain this time around. He did not take the crowd to task for booing Obama’s name. Did you watch that? Did you see the hatred shining on those faces when he gave them the cue to boo and then just held up his hands like he was trying to calm them down? This is part of the Script. The Script says that the conservatives are a downtrodden minority instead of a well-funded party that had both in effect both House and Senate (thanks to “Democrats” who aren’t) AND the Presidency and multimillionaires and billion-dollar companies bankrolling them. It is like the Script of the fundie Christian. They are always playing themselves as an “oppressed minority”, because that is the only way to get their followers to march in lockstep. It really is a cult.

But enough of that. Did you hear Obama?

Just think about it. A President who believes in peace and science instead of hate and fear. A President who says, “Yes, we can” instead of “Bomb Iran!” A President who has an actual education his daddy didn’t buy for him. A President who can speak clear American English. A President who acknowledges that people might not agree with him, and will listen when people don’t agree, instead of being The Decider who listens to nobody because his “gut feeling” tells him whatever instant gratification he’s looking for is divine will.

Did you HEAR Obama?

I know you didn’t do this just to win an election and I know you didn’t do it for me. You did it because you understand the enormity of the task that lies ahead. For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime – two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century. Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us. There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after their children fall asleep and wonder how they’ll make the mortgage, or pay their doctor’s bills, or save enough for college. There is new energy to harness and new jobs to be created; new schools to build and threats to meet and alliances to repair.

The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America – I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you – we as a people will get there.

There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as President, and we know that government can’t solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And above all, I will ask you join in the work of remaking this nation the only way it’s been done in America for two-hundred and twenty-one years – block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.

What began twenty-one months ago in the depths of winter must not end on this autumn night. This victory alone is not the change we seek – it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.

So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. Full text of Obama’s speech, Daily Kos

No threats. No fearmongering. No hatred. Instead, a call to unity. I keep hearing that speech in my head. I keep remembering hugging my daughter as we listened to it and thinking, the nightmare is over. Finally. I remember thinking that America was waking up from a deep and bitter dream of divisiveness, hatred, fear, and greed. That yes, what comes next is going to be hard, because a lot of people are invested (financially and emotionally) in an America that is afraid, full of hatred, divided, and blindly led by corporate whores eager to pillage her. It’s going to be hard work to pay attention, to watch out. To protest when we must. To not relax our vigilance.

But my God, it’s worth it. Because my daughter will inherit a country I am proud of and a planet that is not dying because we’ve filled it full of shite.

I heard “Yes, we can. Let’s do this together.” Instead of lies. Instead of fearmongering. Instead of hate.

And my God, but it made me proud to be American all over again.

Related posts:

1. Election Day
2. Post From The Wild
3. One Last Post Before The Storm

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 at 9:50 am and is filed under Deep Thoughts, Real Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.