Freedom!!!

Can you feel it? There's a fresh breeze blowing across the country and rippling across the world. Complete strangers are smiling at each other and finding an excuse to talk, feeling an unspoken bond. That's called American spirit. That's called freedom.

The freedom of black people in this country began when Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and ended on November 4, 2008 with the election of President Barack Obama. It has taken us 145 years to become free. Here's the thing that most people don't know, but rather they feel it in their spirit: as long as all Americans weren't free, none of us were free.

When I look into the eyes of the people who voted for Obama, whether they are black, white, Asian, Hispanic or Native American, I see freedom. I see release. I see equality. One step closer to freedom for one of us is one step closer for all of us. When I look into the eyes of the people who voted for John McCain, that is, when they will actually look me in the eye, I see disappointment, but I also see something else, something I never expected to see. I see relief. I see that they are relieved that a racial barrier has come down and they didn't have to compromise their religious principles and their values and vote for a Democrat in order to make that happen. For most of them, it isn't that they were racist (well, no more than most of us), it's just that their side didn't have a black man running. So they get to live in a country where a black man can become president without having to participate in the process of making it happen. Now THAT's Freedom!

President Barack Obama was right: He's YOUR president too. You're Welcome.

Why Intellectual Women Don't Like Sarah Palin

Like the previous post, this post began as an email discussion with one of my friends, this time a female friend from Alabama. We are having a discussion about how intelligent, college-educated, otherwise articulate women descend into an inarticulate rage, eyes narrow into slits, breathing becomes ragged, and a dirge of insults begin to spew of which "moron" is the one most frequently used...all whenever the name Sarah Palin is mentioned. Allow me to explain why.

First, it's not just because she's not qualified. Palin initially declined the offer to be Vice President. Why? Because she didn't know what the job involved and hadn't been preparing for it. Most professional women and candidates for office, male or female, have been preparing since they were in college at the very least. You don't accept the job of running the country as an afterthought. But we don't hate her for that. After all who in their career hasn't done that? It is a commonly known fact that in order to be successful and climb the ladder you have to accept positions that (a) are slightly uncomfortable and feel perhaps a little over your head and (b) you know you were chosen because someone likes you (or your influential friend or relative) and (c) someone asked you out of the blue.

But what kind of woman shamelesly and scrupulously benefits from the hard work and long, long years of preparation of another woman and, more importantly, from her failure? It's as if Hillary Clinton was in a wedding and when the preacher asked if anyone had a reason this woman and man shouldn't be joined please speak now, and when the American people spoke and Hillary was out, Palin stepped up, linked arms with the groom and said "I'll marry ya!!" Palin doesn't seem to feel any remorse for hopping into a bed that Hillary Clinton spent years making. That brings me to the third point. She is allowing herself to be used as a political tool.

McCain picked her to create the illusion that the Republicans were having a historical election of their own. That reason alone makes her selection a slap in the face to every highly qualified woman in the country.

But someone's gotta be first and isn't it true that the best way to change an establishment is to first become part of it and then change it from the inside out? That brings me to my fourth point.

She's using her newfound celebrity status to promote the idea that Barack Obama is a terrorist, a muslim, dangerous to the country and all sorts of other negative and irresponsible claims. I'm surprised that so many people don't understand how she evokes such emotional responses. I understand it and so does every woman who's ever used her beauty, feminity and sunny, outgoing personality to win friends and influence people. In the south for centuries the surest way to get a black man in trouble was to have a white woman accuse him of something. But I'm sure she doesn't know anything about that. Which leads me to my fifth and final point.

She's out of touch and not just because Alaska is so far away it could be another country. She actually believes that America is full of "hockey moms" and "Joe sixpacks". She's running for the American people, not as the diverse, multi-ethnic, multi-talented, religiously tolerant melting pot that we are and that our founding fathers intended us to be, but as the American public that she'd like for us to be. As a consequence she's not going to be president of the people who live in the housing projects or of the people who live in upscale condos downtown in large cities because she's never done that and she doesn't know them. She will take an oath of office to serve only the kinds of people she's seen and lived with and whom she thinks represent the entire country.

Until this election she hasn't given a thought to anyone beyond Alaska and people like her. And who can blame her? She seems well prepared for the job she was aspiring to, governer of Alaska. She just wasn't preparing for this job.

Guest Blogger: Dave on "Media-logical Myths"

The post below was written to me in a note by my friend Dave. He read my blog post "Dear Media" and had some particularly interesting insights. I asked him for permission to post it and he said yes. I think you'll enjoy reading this as much as I did:

Dear L/L,

Sounds like you are almost as excited by the election hoo-ha as I am. I find myself unable to watch any of the debates or election coverage because it is all so trivialized with people yelling at each other and trying to make something meaningful out of things that are frankly insignificant, meanwhile ignoring the important elements. We did this twice when George Dubya ran and the mess today is our deserved reward. If we make a better choice this time it will be largely serendipitous since none of the main stream media seems willing to do good old-fashioned reporting. Worst of all, the media seems to have generated certain myths or plot lines, for example "John McCain is a maverick" , that they can't seem to rid themselves of despite a preponderance of evidence to the contrary.

What I find absolutely most intriguing is how the media buys into republican representations of democrats for being "elitists", key evidence being that John Kerry drinks green tea and Barack Obama eats arugula although both of those are on the menu at most mainstream casual dining restaurants these days and are available at wal-mart and every other grocery store I've visited.

When I think of "elitists", I think of someone who went to an elite private high school and then got admitted to Yale despite his weak high school academic record , getting admitted only because he had a father and a grandfather who created a legacy for him at Yale, and then was admitted to Harvard Business School despite a weak academic record at Yale. He then used his family connections to get a variety of postions in the family businesses of oil and politics proving largely incompetent in most of those positions.

When I think of "elitists", I think of another someone who managed to be admitted to the Naval Academy, an elite publicly-funded academy, despite his own self-described "undistinguished" high school academic record, perhaps getting admitted only because he had a father and grandfather who were four-star admirals and who created a legacy for him at the Academy. He succeeded in compiling a dismal academic record in which he graduated 894th out of 899 in his class. (As an aside, do you suppose being the legacy of two four-star admirals might have been a factor in the Academy graduating him at all?).

He ultimately divorced his first wife to marry an exceptionally wealthy trophy second wife, hobnobbing with the rich and famous, even being reprimanded by the United States Senate for his inappropriate relationship with a central criminal from the savings & loan scandal. Yes, according to the media he was a "war hero" forty years ago, having achieved that status for being shot down over VietNam and abiding by (most) of the military code of conduct although he himself acknowledges that being shot down doesn't make one a "hero" . One might also question how many Naval pilots were allowed to continue flying after destroying four military jets in non-combat duty, perhaps raising the question as to how much influence his father and grandfather, the aforementioned four-star admirals, had to exert on his military career.

When I think of elitists, I don't think of someone who came from humble beginnings, growing up in a single parent household, living with his maternal grandparents for much of his life, starting his college career at lowly Occidental College, and EARNING his way into Columbia and Harvard. I don't think of someone achieving sufficient academic success to be selected as editor of the prestigious Harvard Law Review and then going on to teach at the equally prestigious University of Chicago before launching a career in public service. Rather than "elitist", I would see this type of individual as the star of a Horatio Alger dime novel; a rags to riches achievement of the American Dream and someone who pulled himself up by his own bootstraps while gratefully acknowledging all the support and assistance he received from many people along the way.

Two men who largely squandered the special opportunities they were afforded by their respective powerful influential families and another man who earned his way from the bottom to the top. Which of these would you be most likely to describe as "elitist" ??

Ah, but when the facts don't fit with the preconceived story as told by the media elite then the facts must be ignored for mythology is more powerful than reality.

Yesterday, I Voted

Thursday morning I woke up mentally preparing to go to work. But before I could get out of bed something inside nudged me and reminded me that I had something important I needed to do today. I had been toying with the idea of voting early for weeks. With my job and the way I travel I never know what could happen on Nov. 4th and I didn't want to end up missing election day, and especially not such an important election. I knew today was going to be my best chance to vote hassle-free.

As I got dressed, something inside me said "Wear your best...for this is an important day, as important as a wedding". So I took extra care getting dressed. I wore nice (although still appropriate for work) clothes and I carefully applied my makeup and wore my pearl earrings and my diamond and pearl necklace. This was a special day. Today I was going to become "an equal". Maybe I have always been an equal on paper and legally but, for some reason that I had not yet worked out in my head, I felt more equal today than others.

I looked up the address for the election commission in my blackberry. I've only lived in Omaha for two years so I knew I'd have a little bit of a challenge finding it. As I drove down 120th and crossed Fort street, I thought of my home in Carbon Hill, Alabama and of my grandma voting. I remembered how she had taken me with her to vote, standing proudly in line and how, as a little girl, I had wondered what there was to be so proud about. I would often have moments like that, like when I was eight years-old and I finally got to walk to Dee Wright's Cafe by myself. I was surprised to see a sign in his window that read "We serve people of all races and colors". "How odd" I thought in my eight-year-old mind, "why would anyone need to say that?" He might as well have had a sign announcing that the sky was blue.

"Wow" I thought. I was about to participate in the election of Barack Obama. I was about to bring him one step closer to becoming the first black president of the United States. The magnitude of what I was about to do finally started to sink in. Images flashed in my head: images of people marching in Alabama, arms linked, signs waving, policemen with clubs. Images of people hanging from trees, some of their bodies badly burned. I thought of the people who had been intimidated into not voting and of how much courage it took for them to even walk into the offices. That's why my Grandma was so proud. THIS, I thought, THIS MOMENT is what she had worked for. It was what they had all worked for. It was for ME TO HAVE THIS MOMENT.

That's when I gasped, realizing that I had never voted for anyone who looked like me nor had it ever ocurred to me that I would ever have the hope of doing so. And I had accepted it as my reality. "We have never been free before" the realization crept over me slowly, "because we have never been able to do this. None of us have ever been truly free. The possibility of becoming president, this is the last thing, the last step towards equality. The last step to freedom."

"I will not cry, I will not cry" I thought. But the tears fell anyway. They ran down my face from beneath my dark sunglasses. I wiped them away with my hand and wondered if people driving by would look into my car and see the emotional black woman, and wonder why.

As I expected it took me several attempts before I finally found the election commission office. First I had turned around at 114th and Dodge, then I circled back through West Corporation's industrial park. I finally gave in and called the office to ask for directions. "Two blocks south of Dodge and one block West of 114th" the young man had answered me helpfully, almost as if he wanted me there. Perhaps he didn't know I was black. "Stop that" I thought. I finally found the office tucked away on a back street off 115th and Davenport. People were lined up out the door and around the parking lot. Clearly I had to turn my attention to figuring out where to park. I drove across the street where I had seen people walking. "You here to vote?" asked the man in the white utility truck who had waved me to a stop. "Yes" I said. "Well you can't park here" he announced proudly. I smiled at him and said "Ok, thank you" as brightly and cheerfully as I could. He obviously enjoyed being an obstacle. But something in the back of my mind reminded me that relative to the history, this little delay was less than a speck of dust. I think he knew it too. He just wanted to help put it off for as long as he could.

I decided to try my luck at getting a space in the actual parking lot of the election office. It looked like people were leaving fairly regularly. Sure enough I thought I saw a space near the door but dismissed it thinking it must be handicapped. As if reading my mind the people standing in line in front of the door began to wave at me and point to the space. "What? really?" I looked again. "Yes! Come on! Right here!" they waved and cheered. It seemed somehow appropriate, even metaphorical, that there was one little man who wanted to get in my way but many more people welcoming me in.