Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Monday, November 3, 2008
How does this happen?
How does it happen that a white woman is born in Kansas in the 1920's, has a daughter while her husband is serving in the Second World War, eventually moves with daughter and husband to Hawaii, welcomes an African college student into her home in the early 1960's, tolerates the young man's wooing and impregnation of and eventual marriage to her teenage daughter, welcomes and helps to raise her mixed race grandson after his father abandons the family to attend school and eventually return to Kenya, later takes a more full time roll in the raising of her outwardly black grandson and mixed race granddaughter while their mother is attending school and living overseas, sends her grandson to Columbia and eventually to Harvard Law, seeing him elected to the State Senate then the US Senate, along the line watching her husband and her daughter die, and finally watching her grandson become the first African American to be nominated by a major party to the presidency of the United States only to die the day before he's likely to win the election?
How does that happen? It's not that she never knew the fruits of her labor. She most certainly did. But what kind of sick irony is it that this woman passes the day before the grand affirmation of her family's existence? That may be crass. It most certainly is not meant to sound that way.
I'm just amazed that this sort of thing happens. How many old black people are going to die tonight never knowing the outcome? How many have died this year knowing the opportunity to vote for a black man for president was finally upon them if they could only make it to November?
How does this woman die the day before her grandson is elected president?
How does that happen? It's not that she never knew the fruits of her labor. She most certainly did. But what kind of sick irony is it that this woman passes the day before the grand affirmation of her family's existence? That may be crass. It most certainly is not meant to sound that way.
I'm just amazed that this sort of thing happens. How many old black people are going to die tonight never knowing the outcome? How many have died this year knowing the opportunity to vote for a black man for president was finally upon them if they could only make it to November?
How does this woman die the day before her grandson is elected president?
The day after tomorrow (cont.)
They say you're either a Leonard Cohen guy or a Tom Waits guy. I used to be a Leonard Cohen guy, but I don't think I am one anymore. He's basically a lounge singer. He's a fair lyricist, but he's no Tom Waits or Dylan.
Over at the Daily Dish, Sullivan posted a performance of Democracy. Go look at it if you want. There are a couple nice lines, but I can't bring myself to embed a song in which a Canadian talks about democracy coming to the USA. I've got a little Hacksaw Jim Duggan in me, too. Sullivan is British, so he can do what he pleases.
Me, I'll take an American bar singer over a Canadian lounge act any day of the week. In that light:
Over at the Daily Dish, Sullivan posted a performance of Democracy. Go look at it if you want. There are a couple nice lines, but I can't bring myself to embed a song in which a Canadian talks about democracy coming to the USA. I've got a little Hacksaw Jim Duggan in me, too. Sullivan is British, so he can do what he pleases.
Me, I'll take an American bar singer over a Canadian lounge act any day of the week. In that light:
Beware of Foreign Objects
Okay, quickie post. A Sarah Palin rally is on CNN. She was introducing a bunch of people behind her. At some point she asked all the veterans to raise their hands. She thanked them, and then she did the silliest thing I've ever seen: She started a USA chant from the podium!
The video is not online yet, but I went onto Youtube and found the next best thing:
The video is not online yet, but I went onto Youtube and found the next best thing:
The day after tomorrow.
There's going to be an Obama rally at UNC-Charlotte this evening. It's really only a three hour drive from here, so I spent an hour or two yesterday thinking about making the drive. Tomorrow is the day, and the guy will be about 24 hours from being elected president when he walks on stage tonight. No matter how you look at it, that's a pretty historic event, and a three hour drive is not reason enough not to go.
Unfortunately, I have other reasons. I've been beating back a cold for days, Nate has a cold, and Sarah is too deep into her pregnancy to try and stand in a field of tens of thousands of people or have me three hours away, so I will not be in attendance of history tonight in Charlotte. Ho-hum. Parking would have been a nightmare anyway, and I can only imagine the line has already begun to form at nine in the morning for an event that starts at 5:30.
I do have other things to do today. I have to submit to a drug test, so that I can start a new job the day after tomorrow. Today was supposed to be my first day, but they lost my application materials and HR didn't send out my employment packet until the end of last week, so instead of it being the day before the election, it will be the day after.
I actually have an interview at another place tomorrow morning. Unless I can figure out a way to be offered a job I'm not interviewing for--one with benefits--it'll be just a formality. Either way, I'm more than likely going to have my first day of work since August on November 5. I will likely be sleepy. Hopefully, I will not be depressed.
Unfortunately, I have other reasons. I've been beating back a cold for days, Nate has a cold, and Sarah is too deep into her pregnancy to try and stand in a field of tens of thousands of people or have me three hours away, so I will not be in attendance of history tonight in Charlotte. Ho-hum. Parking would have been a nightmare anyway, and I can only imagine the line has already begun to form at nine in the morning for an event that starts at 5:30.
I do have other things to do today. I have to submit to a drug test, so that I can start a new job the day after tomorrow. Today was supposed to be my first day, but they lost my application materials and HR didn't send out my employment packet until the end of last week, so instead of it being the day before the election, it will be the day after.
I actually have an interview at another place tomorrow morning. Unless I can figure out a way to be offered a job I'm not interviewing for--one with benefits--it'll be just a formality. Either way, I'm more than likely going to have my first day of work since August on November 5. I will likely be sleepy. Hopefully, I will not be depressed.
One Day More
Since I know how much you all love Les Miserables.
Let's hope it's not the blood bath the Student Revolution was.
Let's hope it's not the blood bath the Student Revolution was.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Fucking Georgia Rednecks
So both Sarah and Nate (and to a lesser extent me) spent last night battling sore throats. Sarah woke me up at 7 this morning, and said she was going to Kroger to get some liquid Tylenol. I'm a good husband, so I went instead. When I left the house, it was still pretty dark out, but the sun was rising and there was a fair amount of light by the time I returned.
Yesterday I linked to all those images of black people standing in impossibly long lines for early voting. Those people were in Fulton, Dekalb, and Gwinnett counties where there is a large black population. When I was growing up, we lived in Gwinnett county; this was before the mid 1990s when there was a migration in which many of the black families left the city for some of the more suburban, white counties. Not to be integrated, a lot of the white families moved north to the less developed parts of Fulton, the more conservative Cobb (Newt Gingrich country), and the far less densely populated hill country of Cherokee, where I live today.
Last night, Sarah and I took Nate trick or treating through half of the neighborhood. It's an overly white neighborhood. There are a lot of McCain/Palin signs, especially near the entrance of the development. I learned last night that there is a Latino family that lives a couple of doors down from my parents. There's also an older Asian woman who was giving out candy a bit farther away, and a black family that lives a couple doors down from her.
A black family!
Anyway, the guy seems to get really in to Halloween. He had a bunch of lawn witches, a smoke machine, and he piped out spooky music to get the trick or treaters. Anyway, surprise, surprise, he seems like a perfectly nice fellow: a wonderful black ambassador to a bunch of McCain supporters who would rather live an hour out of town than to live in a neighborhood with more than one black person.
Apparently, his good nature is not good enough. As I drove home from Kroger this morning at dawn, I saw what I had not seen when I left. The dude's house had been rolled (or TP'd or toilet papered, depending on your regional dialect). Not only that, but his was the ONLY house in the entire development that had been rolled. I don't want to call anybody racist or anything, but when I got home, I saw that my parents's Obama lawn sign was also gone.
Yesterday I linked to all those images of black people standing in impossibly long lines for early voting. Those people were in Fulton, Dekalb, and Gwinnett counties where there is a large black population. When I was growing up, we lived in Gwinnett county; this was before the mid 1990s when there was a migration in which many of the black families left the city for some of the more suburban, white counties. Not to be integrated, a lot of the white families moved north to the less developed parts of Fulton, the more conservative Cobb (Newt Gingrich country), and the far less densely populated hill country of Cherokee, where I live today.
Last night, Sarah and I took Nate trick or treating through half of the neighborhood. It's an overly white neighborhood. There are a lot of McCain/Palin signs, especially near the entrance of the development. I learned last night that there is a Latino family that lives a couple of doors down from my parents. There's also an older Asian woman who was giving out candy a bit farther away, and a black family that lives a couple doors down from her.
A black family!
Anyway, the guy seems to get really in to Halloween. He had a bunch of lawn witches, a smoke machine, and he piped out spooky music to get the trick or treaters. Anyway, surprise, surprise, he seems like a perfectly nice fellow: a wonderful black ambassador to a bunch of McCain supporters who would rather live an hour out of town than to live in a neighborhood with more than one black person.
Apparently, his good nature is not good enough. As I drove home from Kroger this morning at dawn, I saw what I had not seen when I left. The dude's house had been rolled (or TP'd or toilet papered, depending on your regional dialect). Not only that, but his was the ONLY house in the entire development that had been rolled. I don't want to call anybody racist or anything, but when I got home, I saw that my parents's Obama lawn sign was also gone.
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