Saturday, January 30, 2010

Curious / Watching / Listening



Three years ago:

"Don't let people talk you into doing what's easy or comfortable. Listen to what's inside of you and decide what it is that you care about so much that you're willing to risk it all."

Barack Obama
May 19, 2007
Southern New Hampshire University Commencement

In my eyes, he's holding steady with an impossible job. When I read The Audacity of Hope in 2007, I learned that he has ideas about nuclear energy and about war that I don't share. Reading Promises to Keep: On Life and Politics, by Joe Biden, gave me pause. For example, on the Vietnam War, “I wasn’t against the war for moral reasons; I just thought it was a stupid policy.” Still I voted for Obama and Biden. We can agree to disagree and still go forward together.

President Obama is a bridge builder. I don't feel that his love for the people of the United States of America is in vain.

Although I am one of the 5,000,000 Americans without a job, my heart is not heavy in the way it was before.






















Nocturnal downpour
Wakes the lovers,
Floods the valley.
(Deng-Ming-Dao, 365 Tao, p. 30)

4 comments:

Loren said...

I'm still supporting Obama, though, I, too, disagree with a number of his policies and have been troubled by how slowly he's implemented some of the policies he's said that he intends to implement.

Though I think he may be the most eloquent politician in my lifetime (my memories of Kennedy have been obscured over time) I can seldom listen to ANY political speech, preferring to wait to see what a politician actually does.

I'll agree that he has a Herculean task in front of him, especially when the greatest problem may be Americans' insatiable desire for THINGS, no matter what their cost.

Anonymous said...

the waterfall and its color make enough good sound to wash away so much poisonous talk the radio waves bring. the tone from you and loren shows the way these complications should be recognized and received. kjm

Dale said...

He's never claimed to be anything but what he is, a mainstream democrat: I've been a little baffled by the disappointment in him, as I was also by the excitement he generated. He's eloquent and civil and large-minded, all of which is very welcome; but he's no radical.

And ditto on what Loren says: as long as Americans persist in thinking, against all evidence, that happiness lies in accumulating lots and lots of things, it's going to be awfully difficult to make any significant progress.

robin andrea said...

I am waiting to see how it all turns out. He disappoints; he surprises. I read today that the White House was delighted by the response to the Q/A Obama did with the republicans. I'm hoping that means there will be more sunlight in the particularly dark void.