A week after the 2012 election, things feel back to normal. There
are no more TV ads telling us the other guys are all awful, no pollster phone
calls or political e-mail blitzes (Don’t worry, Black Friday is coming soon!),
no more Facebook virtual throw downs and no more questions about how much we
love America.
But in one important respect, I think things are really
different. For the past four years, I’ve had people telling me that Barack
Obama’s election was a fluke or an accident or a bizarre mistake. Yes, lots of
things went Obama’s way in 2008. Yes, he had some good luck. But I’ve tried
convincing folks that electing a Black man named Barack Hussein Obama President
of the United States went way beyond any Providence. I have always believed
2008 was a harbinger of things to come. I think that’s even clearer now.
For four years, Obama has been lied about, ridiculed,
threatened and slandered more than anyone could have reasonably anticipated. Questions
about every aspect of his life have been raised and accepted as fact by large
swaths of the public even when the questions were internally inconsistent, even
when they literally could not have been true. Americans had to see their
President demeaned and belittled, not because of what he did but because of who
he is.
The easiest, simplest way to stop all that would have been to elect Mitt
Romney last week. America could have gone back to having a President who looks
all the other Presidents. We could have stopped the hate parade in its tracks
and breathed a sigh of relief that the vicious, race based attacks would go
away for awhile. We could have said, ‘Okay, enough.’
Instead, we re-elected Obama. Despite the dire predictions
from the left and the overwhelming confidence
of the Romney campaign, Obama won a decisive victory. (I call it a Nixon
landslide.) America chose to go in the direction of the man who sings Al Green, embraces
gay marriage and welcomes
the children of undocumented immigrants. I am convinced that this election was
about more than Democrats and Republicans. It was about more than changing demographics
and the 47%. It was even about much more than Romney and Obama.
This election was about the future of America. A future of less
division and more integration. A future of fewer lies and
harder truths. A future of holding hands but not clenching fists. This is the
future we need. This is the future we want. And this is the future we are
choosing.
So no, thank God, things are not back to normal. But I think
I’m gonna like the new normal a whole lot more.
FDO
The WhoDeannyPod 