I thought John McCain gave a gracious concession speech last night. I thought Barack Obama gave a brilliant victory speech.
Nevertheless, I agree with the old maxim, "Actions speak louder than words." I agree with those who say that Obama's actions as president over the next four or eight years will define his presidency far more than will the sum total of his speeches and press conferences. I predict that his actions will serve him and this nation well, even though I realize that my predictions aren't worth much. After all, I predicted after the Republican convention that McCain would win the presidency. But we will ultimately have to wait and see what Obama does and how we the American people and the rest of the world respond.
Yet, I know that, whatever else happens, I will now look forward to presidential speeches and press conferences, and I will no longer feel embarrassed when our president meets with foreign leaders and represents us on the world stage. And I will no longer cringe over our president's mispronunciation of the word nuclear.
This may not seem very important. Who cares whether our president acts and sounds like a simpleminded ignoramus? Who cares whether foreign leaders and peoples laugh at him and look down on him and on us for electing him not just once but twice?
I do.
Now we at the so-called "left" and center of the political spectrum have our own "Great Communicator," and while that doesn't mean everything to me, it sure means something.
McCain concedes
Obama Declares Victory
2 comments:
Hi Nagarjuna -- been a while. Congratulations, America!
The integral yoga community has been praying for Barack Obama's election. In fact, we had a visitor come from Auroville -- a wonderful lady who grew up in the Ashram under the tutelage of the Mother -- who meditated with the New York devotees yesterday in Manhattan to pray for Obama's victory.
We're very glad that this historic election outcome has taken place. While I'm pretty cynical about politics in general, seeing it largely as nothing more than a play of human egoisms, I do sense that this victory has the potential to really turn the tide for America -- IF Obama can live the promises he's made with integrity. American friends of mine have been saying: "Today we are once again truly proud to be Americans!"
McCain's concession speech was probably his best one yet. Perhaps Obama can start a new era of bipartisan politics for America, without this childish division into liberalism and conservatism (a divide based on what in my opinion are non-issues that totally miss the point).
Ned--
I'm happy to hear from you. I hope all is well with you.
I share your cynicism about the "egoic" nature of "politics in general," but also your hopefulness that Obama can transcend it and put the needs of the nation above himself. I also hope he realizes, as I think he does, that this nation and its people are ultimaely inseparable from the rest of the world and its peoples, and that he consequently seeks to bridge the divides that our foreign policies of the past eight years have exacerbated.
Finally, I share your hope for a bipartisan or integral politics for America that transcends what is, in my opinion as well as yours, the simplistic obsolescence of "liberalism" vs. "conservatism" and of the view that government is either the solution to or the cause of all of our problems.
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