"If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.
It's the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen, by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference.
It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled. Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states.
We are, and always will be, the United States of America.
It's the answer that led those who've been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day." - Barack H. Obama
I was working the front door when someone casually walked by me and said "He did it." I stopped in my tracks and was overcome with this feeling of happiness. I couldn't express myself because of being at work, which was horrible because I just wanted to do cartwheels down the street.
When I got home I watched McCain's concession speech, and was impressed with what he had to say. I was also impressed that he turned a booing crowd into one that is hopeful for the future.
Then I watched Obama's speech. The part I have up top is how far I made it until I started to look like Jesse Jackson. I couldn't control it at all. I was so overwhelmed by joy and hope for this country. I was filled with the pride I had when I cast my first vote at 18 and had nothing but complete trust in the system.
God Bless Barack Obama, and God Bless this country.
At 5:50am I left my house and walked over to the library which was my polling place. I walked up while a about 25 people were heading to the doors, a few cheering. As I headed through the doors, a poll worker who was holding the door open, said I have never seen a line here. Intrigued, I asked how long he had been working the polls. "About 30 years" he told me. 30 years and this is the first time he's seen a line. That gives me great hope that people care again, that people have regained confidence in the process again. This has to be one of the best feelings in the world. I LOVE VOTING!
Like a long lost relative coming home, the elections are here. Most people suffering from election fatigue will finally have relief.
At 12am Eastern polls open in the little village of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire. Their vote isn't necessarily a tell tale sign of the rest of the country or even the state, but it will be neat to see which way the 21 registered voters will go.
I can't wait to see this country finally head in a new direction, with a Democrat leading the Senate, the House and in the Oval Office. I am not a Democrat, I'm actually a
Green which is a little more down-left than a Democrat but not as far as to call me a socialist. This is a chance for the Democrats to make a difference. If they fail to do so, I believe the country will finally see that the two party system and it's parties have been outdated. Most of us already know that the "typical" Republican is outdated, shown by the fact that only 25% of Americans are "card carrying" members of the GOP. The other fact is that the rest of the world sees our Dems as right of center and our Repubs as extreme up-right.
By the way this is the new
political compass.
This is my
Compass.
Find out your place on the Compass.
No it's not gibberish, it stands for
National Blog Posting Month. NaBloPoMo is a website for bloggers who want to take on the challange of blogging for an entire month. It is practiced all year long by the site but November is the "official" month.
I want to blog more and have been trying lately so I figured what the hell I'm always up for a challange. The problem is I useually don't finish what I start. Which is funny because my mom tells me about when I was young and got mad at my playmates about not finishing a coloring book page before starting another. So here goes, I am blogging at least once a day, including weekends and holidays for 30 days.
Mom sat in the car to wait while Dad took his four sons up to a house with a lit porch to do some final trick-or-treating. The neighbor hears what he believes to be fireworks, some Halloween mischief. The reality was that 22 year old Quentin Patrick fired at the family approaching the home in Sumter, South Carolina, about 40 miles East of Columbia.
One of the boys, age 12, was fatally wounded and later died in the hospital, while his father and brother sustained non-life threatening injuries.
Patrick, is charged with murder and assault and battery with the intent kill. He is currently in police custody.
"The investigation is continuing into what has been a very tragic evening," Ms Patterson was quoted by the AP as saying.
"Our sorrow and sympathy goes out to this family."
She said there were other people inside the house at the time of the incident, but she did not expect any of them to be charged.
What the hell is going on is this world when someone shoots a children trick-or-treating in South Carolina, when someone shoots a pregnant woman in the head at a stop light in Chicago, when some coward shoots an innocent 11 year old twice in the head after he's been kidnapped and probably seen his grandmother and uncle killed in Chicago, when a moron doesn't put a safety lock on his hunting rifle and a 9 year old is killed in St. Clair, or when gang members get involved in someone else's business and a stray bullet kills a 3 year old in LA? Why is it that when gun violence has consistently killed small children that people advocate the present standards to the ownership of guns? Why do we as intelligent adults want to have automatic rifles legal in the United States? Why is a poorly written amendment to our Constitution held to mean what it wasn't intended for? If you can answer those questions reasonably, you obviously know something I don't.
Next time someone tells you that guns don't kill people, trigger fingers do, ask them to attempt to bury that finger through a human skull or through a breast bone. When they tell you that it is impossible, remind them of their prior statement.
