410. Thursday Thoughts

It is early-morning - no sun has risen over the eastern skies as yet. I'm still more than a little awestruck by my fellow American citizens' actions on Tuesday. Awestruck in a good way. We elected Barack Obama to be the 44th President. It will take me a few entries to come down from the mountaintop.

It was difficult yesterday to get through a conversation about anything without tearing up with joy. I closed my blog entry early yesterday morning saying how good it was and is to be an American. I cannot tell you how many times I heard that refrain during the course of the day. I've always cynically said the biggest advantage of a democracy is that people get to vote, while its greatest weakness is that people get to vote. But, now and then, the choice isn't a lesser of two evils. Tuesday was like that. People got to vote and they voted for change in a big way. I could actually hear in the back of my head President Ronald Reagan talking about the "shining city on the hill," a phrase he used in his "going away speech." For me to quote Reagan in a good way is evidence of how good I am feeling about America right now. President-elect John F. Kennedy had used similar phrasing a generation earlier in a speech eleven days before taking office in 1961, borrowing from the Reverend John Winthrop's sermon in 1630 to the Puritans en route across the ocean to the New World. Its source is ultimately from the Gospel of Saint Matthew, Chapter Five, a part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount.

Another thought on Tuesday night. I was with the Yarmuth after-party after the Democratic Party celebration at the Marriott on Tuesday night. We sang some fun songs making fun of a few things from the congressman's first two years in office, followed by America The Beautiful and closing with My Old Kentucky Home. Then Senator John McCain gave his concession speech on the Tee-Vee, as Jacob Payne would say. The room got very quiet and attentive and applauded him afterward. It was a very serious and moving speech, one that began to restore the image of the once-very popular Republican from Arizona. Senator McCain's speech was a class-act without reservation.

Then came President-elect Obama's speech at midnight to 150,000 people waiting in Grant Park in Chicago and another 500,000 throughout the streets of Chicago. Like nearly every single aspect of the Obama campaign, it was flawless. Just flawless, David Plouffe thank you very much. And awesome, and inspiring, and serious, and hopeful. We are in for a serious and intelligent presidency. And at this point in the history of our Republic, we need nothing less than greatness. Of the four candidates running for the top two offices, none of the other three could have offered such hope and determination as President-elect Obama did in his victory speech. [And to even think that Governor Palin should even be considered in such thought is ridiculous, but I didn't choose to bring her onto the national stage. That Senator McCain did was proof enough he wasn't prepared to make the good and necessary decisions to lead our country back to its position of hegemony on the world stage and peace and prosperity at home]. The question now is how will President Obama improve upon that speech when it is time for his inaugural on January 20th?

Perhaps it is his audacity of hope that leads me to know I shant worry. It will all be good.

Thanks Be To God.