Making the Case for Obama

This has been a most extraordinary election season, more so than any in my lifetime and one that as a political junkie and a patriot, I hate to see end. I am incredibly excited to be voting on Tuesday, I will be there well before the polls open at 6 a.m., and then will be working my local polling places all day as a representative for a candidate whom I support for the State House of Representatives, Jack Doody. Go ahead and make all your Howdy Doody jokes now, I already have gotten it out of my system. Ok, back to the big decision, which of course centers around who will become our 44th president. I am an unabashed and proud supporter of Mr. Barack Obama, and before I get to the case for his presidency, I would first like to commend the American people for their level of passion and interest in this election.

The level of interest has been unprecedented, and if the lines at many early voting sites are any indication, voter turnout should approach or surpass previous high water marks. In a society that is often viewed, both from outside as well as from within, as hopelessly apathetic and borderline illiterate, it is heartening to see our democracy thriving as it has over the past couple years. I hope that the countless Americans citizens who have partaken in this campaign by watching, listening, reading, and most importantly discussing and debating, will stay involved in the process. Regardless of which party controls the levers of power, our system is best served when the citizens are involved and active, it is quite simply the greatest check on government power that exists.

I also hope that we can agree to expand citizenship to the tens of millions of Americans who would like to join our great society. Incorporating them into our system is the next great civil rights challenge that we face as a nation, and my hope is that we will be up to the task, just as our predecessors were in granting rights, albeit slowly but eventually, to women and blacks.

Barack Obama is the right person for the job of leading our country out of the massive hole we are in, and to lead us to a brighter and more prosperous future as a nation. His leadership style strikes me as one that will unite, involve, and inspire the American people to step up and take responsibility for doing the hard work that is needed to get our country back on the right track. Critics often point out that Obama is arrogant, an elitist, a celebrity, a Messiah like figure who can wave a magic wand and set things right.

Those who support him vehemently know this not to be the case, because a major reason why Obama has received such support is because he makes us believe in our own ability to effect change. We are not waiting for that one to do the job, we expect him to lead and will hold him very accountable, but we realize that it is the people that must lead if the leaders are to follow. We want to be united and involved, especially those in society who have been the most disconnected historically, namely young people and non-Whites, especially Blacks. To have a leader that gives people a sense that not only do they belong but that they are valued members of society has enormous value in making the society stronger and more fundamentally sound.

Obama is on the proper side on the major issues of the day, which are the big E, the economy, the Iraq War, healthcare, and the three little e’s, the environment, energy, and education. As a policy wonk I could go into detail here on these issues, but as I believe most people are already well versed enough at this point to make an informed voting decision, I will save that commentary for after the election. We’ve got to have some politics to discuss after this is all said and done after all. Suffice to say that if you support economic policies that favor the working and middle class, if you favor a responsible withdrawal of troops from the five and half year Iraq occupation, if you feel that the richest nation in the world has a moral obligation for the health and well being of its people, if you care about the high economic, environmental, and security costs of continuing to rely on oil, and if you believe that global climate change is a real issue that can and must be addressed, then Barack Obama is your guy.

If you are a rich person, which I would define as someone making at least a half million dollars a year, then Obama probably isn’t your guy. Your taxes will increase, there is no doubt about that, he has been very up front about this. Of course not all rich people are of the mindset that this is a bad thing, you may have heard of Warren Buffet, the investor from Omaha, Nebraska who is also ranked as the wealthiest individual in the world. He is in the Obama camp because he realizes that a society cannot long thrive when only a handful accrue the wealth while the majority scramble for the crumbs left behind. When I go to the track to bet on the ponies I have a theory that whoever the big money players are going for is the smart bet. Those with the most at stake generally have the best idea of what the stakes actually are. You won’t find a bigger money player than Warren Buffet, and we know who he is putting his money on. Just a little food for thought for those of you who may be inclined to listen to Joe the Plumber instead.

But you may ask, what about the claim that Obama is a Socialist. Surely he means to take away my hard earned wealth and give it to other people who are less hard working and are therefore less deserving? First off, anyone who has ever worked on a factory floor or done manual labor as many of our immigrant ancestors did, can attest that how hard you actually work is not generally reflected in the amount of money that you make. Neither is income reflected in the value your work has to the company, as any cubicle worker can attest, nor to the value your work has to society, as any teacher, police officer, soldier, or firefighter can vouch for.

The second point is that Obama will not take away any of your hard earned pay if you are one of the 285 million Americans who make less than $100,000 dollars a year. We are the people who will benefit from having Obama as our president. And this will not lead to ruin and destruction in the economy as supporters of supply-side economics would have you believe. Rich people will still be rich, just as they were during the decades from the 1950’s through the 1970’s before Ronald Reagan introduced trickle-down economics and drastically lowered the highest tax rates.

So what about this socialism you ask, I don’t want to become a socialist nation like France. While leaving alone the question for now of what exactly is so bad about France, let me assure you that we are in no danger, now or at any point of becoming a socialist nation. Socialism is defined as the government controlling both the means of production, as well as the distribution of wealth. All governments control, to varying degrees, the distribution of wealth in the form of taxes. They collect taxes and decide who pays what and where the benefits go. It is a long established principle in our capitalist, free-market system, that those who make the most ought to pay a larger share of their income to benefit the society that allows them to achieve their wealth. This is called a progressive income tax system and has been in place for nearly a century, with pretty good results too I might add.

The first part of socialism has to do with the government controlling the means of production, in other words the government owning the businesses and industries that produce goods and services. On this count, I would challenge anyone to find me an example of an Obama proposal that fits this definition of what socialism is. In other words, while we are and always have redistributed income, we are not now, nor in the future going to become a nation where the government nationalizes industries.

In order for propaganda and rhetoric to work, people must be emotionally impacted by it. It took the McCain camp awhile to hit on something that would do that, but they finally got it with the socialism scare tactic. Propaganda requires people to have a lack of knowledge on a subject, and to feel embarrassed to admit that they don’t really know what it means, which is human nature. So the socialism claim goes out and even intelligent people may be a bit baffled, but they just know that it isn’t a good thing and they don’t want it.

But there is something more sinister at work here, and this is where the McCain camp has hit the jackpot. They rang up a few cherries on the slot machine with the Muslim rumors, using Obama’s middle name of Hussein to give him an un-American sound, and to suggest that somehow he would support the terrorists, or that he would side with the Palestinians against Israel. My middle name is David but that doesn’t mean I automatically support Israel in their conflict with the Palestinians. Then they added the hanging out with terrorists like Bill Ayers touch, to show that this was a dangerous man who would consort with the enemy. Of course last time I checked it wasn’t radical hippies from the 60’s who attacked the Twin Towers, but again, minor details. They resisted the Reverend Wright tact because that was too overtly racial, McCain may not be a B student, but he’s no dummy either. So how to remind voters that they are about to vote for a black guy, without coming out and saying it? Enter socialism.

The S word has replaced the N word in this election. Thankfully in our society today it is no longer acceptable for racists and those whose tendencies lean that way to come out with overtly racist language. But don’t be fooled into thinking that means that racism and racist tendencies have disappeared from people’s hearts and minds.

White people, many of them at least, like to pretend that racism doesn’t exist, and that those who play the so-called race card are whiners and excuse makers. Well here’s the real scoop, racism, while not as prevalent as in previous generations, is kind of like the Taliban, it doesn’t disappear it just hides out in the caves and recesses of people’s thoughts until it is called upon. And that’s what the socialist argument is doing, it is giving white people who would hate the thought of being labeled or even identifying themselves as in any way racist, permission to vote against the black guy. Not because he’s black mind you, but because he’s a socialist, or so the justification goes. If you start your sentences with, “I’m not trying to be racist but…”, and then proceed to say something racist, Obama might not be your guy. But if you can acknowledge your own prejudices, prejudices I might add that exist in all of us to some degree and are therefore not inherently bad unless you let them control your thoughts and actions, if you can admit that to yourself and look at the man, the issues, and the times we live in, then maybe you can vote for the black guy after all.

I have tried to make the case, as best I can, for the man whom I think has the potential to be the best person that Americans have had the wisdom to vote for since they put FDR into office back in 1932. He is not a perfect candidate, no candidate is, and he will ultimately be judged, both by his contemporaries and by history, for the job he does while in office. His opponent is an honorable public servant who has not always run the most honorable campaign, which as one who had always had mostly positive regard for Mr. McCain, is a disappointment. But the main point here is that in this race between two individuals, there is one, Senator Barack Obama, who is clearly the best choice to lead this great nation of ours, and whose policies will clearly benefit the majority of us, bringing about much needed change without altering the foundation of what our country has been built upon.

I look forward to meeting with people all day long on Tuesday and to being a part of this great experiment in democracy and a part of this historic election. While I hope that all of you that have stuck with this column for this long will go out and express your preference, and to encourage everyone you know to do the same, I ultimately hope that you will consider my arguments and explanations, and will help to elect Barack Obama as our nation’s 44th president.