When I was younger I used to dream of moving to America, I even went so far as to write to the embassy when I was 12 years old to enquire as to how I might get citizenship.
America had always been to me a land of freedom, justice and promise. Maybe that was just wishful thinking brought about because I grew up during the Clinton years when the world was a little more peaceful than it had been before and has been since.
Then George W Bush got in, and I personally felt like he had stolen MY America. The beacon of hope was extinguished and I began to realise that behind the thin veneer of freedom there lay a dark heart in America filled with fear, ignorance and hatred. I began to thank my lucky stars that my direct ancestors had resisted the urge, unlike many in my family, to immigrate in the 19th century. Even my ever growing group of American friends, who I love dearly, didn't dissuade me from believing that most of their countrymen had taken leave of their senses.
With the election of Barack Obama, I realise I was being too cynical. That every country has it's dark side but that the American people were not all raving mad, fundamentalist Christians or, worse still, stupid. That in fact most are sensible, hard working people who still have, perhaps unlike me, hope in the future and joy in their hearts. My beloved America is back. I like being shown how wrong I was to ever doubt our American cousins.
The President is soon to retire, may the next one rule for at least 4 years!
(The Queen is dead! Long live the King! is snappier...)
Although I'm saddened to see Proposition 8 has been passed in California. Heterosexuals, when will you learn you have no right to deny us our freedoms. When will our Rosa Parks arrive? Will we have to wait another 50 years before there's a chance a gay man might become a President?
thelondonpaper, showing excellent journalistic thoroughness (obviously far more than any other news outlet in the world) called the Dakotas for Obama today. Well either that or they made yet enough stupid mistake when drawing the map. One of the two...
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