Kit, from Louisville, CO, is a regular reader of the blog. Do you agree with Kit? Disagree? Is she spot on, or not appreciative enough of the good things the Obama administration is doing?
John,
Half of me says this’ll end up in your junk / trash bin, but the other says you seem to care how and what regular folk think and feel about Obama’s work thus far. Either way, I apologize for filling your box, and also think it’s rather telling that people, myself included, are again feeling this way.
After reading your post on the underground garage concert in France, and the more politically minded post about public ire towards Obama et al should the Baucus bill pass, I found myself reflecting on my reaction to Bush winning his second term. I wanted to leave the country – period. See, I lived overseas as a teenager for a couple years, and sandwiched that between years spent living far below the poverty level. Having grown up seeing both sides of the aisle so to speak, I tend to get nostalgic over my time in Europe and Japan.
When Bush defeated Kerry, my son (then 8) cried himself to sleep, and I seriously contemplated moving my family overseas. My nursing career made this a viable, though difficult and un-American, option. It was particularly appealing given that I barely made ends meet on a daily basis given my children’s chronic health issues, the cost of living, and the cost of daycare in our country. Instead, I found myself at a local DfA meeting, listening to Howard Dean’s post election call to action via conference call. I re-evaluated my urge to flee, and realized I had a duty to myself, my family, and our country to fight for progressive ideals, social justice, and true equality.
So, I put that urge to rest and threw myself into volunteering and advocacy work. I started volunteering for the Obama campaign as soon as there were means to do so in our area. In my precinct we raised democratic primary attendance from 17 people in 2004 to 120 attendees in 2008, from barely 50 people at our ten precinct super site to well over 1000. We didn’t stop there, and even though my family hovered near homelessness due to an unfortunate work injury, I kept working and fighting to see Obama elected.
Today, in a rather puzzling change, I find the urge to leave this country returning stronger than ever, and it’s more difficult to quiet.
When Bush won his second term, I reached deep within for the small bud of hope that remained, and built on that. Throughout the primary and general elections, many of us within the Obama volunteer team felt we’d proven that one person truly can make a difference. Now, after merely 10 months in office, the lack of action on the part of team Obama (DOMA, DADT, etc.), the bizarrely run health care reform effort combined with the subsequent willingness to kill the public option, the Obama administration’s approach to education have led me to a breaking point.
I sense that they don’t uphold any of the progressive ideals for which we fought, or on which he campaigned. That hope he told us to find, to rekindle – he and his administration have killed it more fully than Bush and his cronies ever did. Moving out of this country, where it appears a select few ‘haves’ control the outcome regardless of public opinion, suddenly presents a most palatable option. I’ve asked around, and it turns out that applications for nurse abroad and teach abroad programs are up over 300% in Colorado. That isn’t the least bit surprising to me, and I don’t think it’s economically motivated.
In terms of public ire, sure people are going to be angry; more worrisome though is the idea that many will simply give up on ever restoring our nation or on effecting meaningful change. I’d love to dig in and work hard towards that, but I just tried that, putting energy and time towards Obama’s election that I should have put toward protecting my family’s livelihood. I did so because of the implicit promise by him and his to protect and improve the livelihood of our nation’s citizenry – a promise many wonder if he ever intended to keep.
Until recently, I was one of those who argued for people and blogs to give Obama a chance. For me, between health care, equality issues, and education he’s blown that chance. Obama may have built on Dean’s bottom up volunteer / work for change corps., mobilizing hundreds of thousands of us to give of ourselves financially and otherwise, but the truth is he’s losing us faster than he managed to build us up.
Kit
Louisville, CO
