Wednesday, December 7, 2016
Time's Man of the Year
There is much that disturbs many Americans about the Electoral College's selection of Donald Trump as President while the American Electorate voted for his opponent with a plurality of 2.5 million votes. There are those especially admirers of Alexander Hamilton that believe our government is not a democracy but a republic. Yet, our founders did show their wisdom in providing the means to amend the Constitution to reflect changes in American Society and remain consistent with the mores of a civilized state. Time magazine announced its 'Man of the Year' which it has done since 1927. Mr. Trump was interviewed by Matt Lauer of the Today Show on NBC. He told Mr. Lauer that it was an honor that he appreciated but denied the appropriateness of the subtitle of 'President-Elect of the Divided States of America'. The first aspect of this of Time's Man of the Year is for an individual who has made a fundamental impact on events and the international scene of that year. It is not a statement on the benevolence or malevolence of that individual. It is instructive to remember that the Man of the Year in 1938 was Adolph Hitler, in 1939 and 1942 was Joseph Stalin, in 1957 was Nikita Khrushchev, in 1979 was the Ayatollah Khomeini, and in 2007 was Vladimir Putin. Yet, there were also individuals such as Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Mahatma Gandhi, Dwight Eisenhower and Pope Francis. I am not saying that Donald Trump is deserving inclusion in either list of recipients that I have provided. Mr. Trump's actions once he becomes President will make it evident among which group of recipients he will deserve to be associated. Yet, I have concerns and I can feel my heart take a second beat each day when I hear of the most recent appointees made by Mr. Trump's Transition Team. This is only my opinion but there are far too many generals and billionaires to my liking. His association with the Alt. Right and White Nationalist is, I believe, is a potential danger to all of us.
Monday, December 5, 2016
Is the Electoral College Relevant
Today I had the opportunity to spend a good part of the afternoon with my wife and a good friend whom I have known since August of 1977. We live in Northern Virginia, very much a part of the Metropolitan Area of the District of Columbia. During the course of our conversation we were sharing both our lament and disgust at the failure of our electoral process in our recent presidential election. There is much I question about it yet I do not deny the legality of it but above every aspect that has brought Mr. Trump to a position of power that, I believe, it possesses no legitimacy in a truly democratic state. I have always been an ardent defendant of the U.S. Constipation as well as a supporter of the ACLU with both my voice as well as financial support. Why? Because it is an organization dedicated in the defense of the Constitution and the rights it guarantees to all our citizens. Yet, this election presents and faces each citizen with a constitutional dilemma that confounds us with our perceived wisdom of the Founders when the Constitution was written and approved in the 18th Century and the changes along with the realities of the 21st Century. Twice, now, in less than twenty years we have allowed two men to assume the awesome office of the presidency without receiving a majority vote of the American Electorate. We need to give considerable thought whether we wish to turn our backs to the concept of one person one vote in determining those whom we wish to serve in elective office.
When the Constitution was written in 1781, we were a nation of 3 million within 13 coastal states. Today we are a continental nation with a population of over 300 million. I can understand the hesitancy in amending the Constitution which has only happened 27 times in the history of our nation. We should also remember that the first ten amendments were agreed upon with the adoption of the Constitution in 1787. I agree with those who feel care and deliberative thought should be taken at anytime we consider amending the Constitution but I also believe that we have reached a point in our history where the Electoral College is no longer a safeguard to fair and equitable national elections for the highest office in our government. I believe that 2000 and 2016 have shown the fallacy in that assumption. If we wish to be the shining beacon of democracy to the rest of the world, the election of the president should be based on one person one vote. The Electoral College should be seen as an anachronistic period of 18th and 19th Century America and not belonging to 21st Century America. If we deny such a democratic concept as I suggest for electing our president, should we then rethink how we elect all our other local and national officials. I am sure there are some who would disagree with me but I believe that there are far more who believe in our democratic heritage as I do.
When the Constitution was written in 1781, we were a nation of 3 million within 13 coastal states. Today we are a continental nation with a population of over 300 million. I can understand the hesitancy in amending the Constitution which has only happened 27 times in the history of our nation. We should also remember that the first ten amendments were agreed upon with the adoption of the Constitution in 1787. I agree with those who feel care and deliberative thought should be taken at anytime we consider amending the Constitution but I also believe that we have reached a point in our history where the Electoral College is no longer a safeguard to fair and equitable national elections for the highest office in our government. I believe that 2000 and 2016 have shown the fallacy in that assumption. If we wish to be the shining beacon of democracy to the rest of the world, the election of the president should be based on one person one vote. The Electoral College should be seen as an anachronistic period of 18th and 19th Century America and not belonging to 21st Century America. If we deny such a democratic concept as I suggest for electing our president, should we then rethink how we elect all our other local and national officials. I am sure there are some who would disagree with me but I believe that there are far more who believe in our democratic heritage as I do.
Monday, April 22, 2013
Troubled Soul
What do I talk about today? I am not sure but I am watching a show on TV with Kiefer Sutherland called 'Touch'. He is the single father of son with Autism and the story line is about how this autistic child brings his father to moments of self discovery. To many the scenario of this story may seem quite implausible because the withdrawn autistic son leads the father to a point (of understanding without verbal communication) where the father is able to have an impact on stranger's lives through numbers. It takes me back to a period in the early to mid 70's when I worked at the State Hospital in Fort Wayne, IN. I was trying to put myself on a sounder financial footing so that even with the benefit of GI Bill support I could return to school. I had no concept of autism before working at the State Hospital but I encountered so many individuals who spoke to me through their eyes without a word spoken or heard. Most of these individuals, I believe, were placed at the State Hospital through a hopeless frustration of what to do and an inability of how to meet the immediate and emotional needs of such individuals.
My time at the State Hospital was difficult in knowing how to deal with the needs of individual residents and provide appropriate treatment though I was one having a hands on relationship with residents while taking direction from a staff that was aloof at the best of times. For right or wrong our government decided to close such institutions and there were those who could thrive in a healthier more unstructured environment than what had existed. I still feel that there is a need for specialized mental health care facilities that can help and support those who are mentally challenged and those who don't seem to be able to be able to cope in 'Our Real World'. I have no answers but I don't think President Reagan's answer to mental health in this country was an avenue with long lasting results and benefits.
My time at the State Hospital was difficult in knowing how to deal with the needs of individual residents and provide appropriate treatment though I was one having a hands on relationship with residents while taking direction from a staff that was aloof at the best of times. For right or wrong our government decided to close such institutions and there were those who could thrive in a healthier more unstructured environment than what had existed. I still feel that there is a need for specialized mental health care facilities that can help and support those who are mentally challenged and those who don't seem to be able to be able to cope in 'Our Real World'. I have no answers but I don't think President Reagan's answer to mental health in this country was an avenue with long lasting results and benefits.
Friday, April 19, 2013
Why We Drive:
If anyone notices this, I admit to a long absence. I have been spending a lot of time on FB which isn't always conducive to expressing one's feelings.
I know that
I can be strong willed and even vehement at times, but emotions dwell deeply
within me and are ever felt. The reality
of living with MS (Multiple Sclerosis) becomes more present some days than I
really wish to recognize and give credence to a disease that I really want to
ignore. Why do I want to ignore it? The answer is simple because it absorbs my
life and controls too much what I am able to enjoy and perceive as the
blessings of life. Yet, I went to a
wedding of a dear friend as well as a former student a few years ago and I
found myself involved in a conversation with a common friend. He challenged me in a way that any person who
suffers from a chronic incurable disease should be challenged. He said, "Mr. J, you gripe and complain
too much". He works for the State
Department and at that time had recently been in Haiti after their devastating
earthquake. I thought to myself that
even with my own personal agenda that I must sound awfully petty in a world
suffering from such turmoil and international indifference.
I spend too much time thinking at times and contemplating how this disease that consumes and seems to direct my life has isolated me and engendered a feeling of anger. Yet, who is that anger directed toward or why should I even feel this way toward anyone or even myself. I have found that as often as Multiple Sclerosis is talked about in the public media how little most of us know about it. I don't want this to be a scientific discussion of the nature of the disease other than it is an auto-immune disease of the Central Nervous System. That can lead into a discussion of import but I want to spend a moment, I hope, on the emotional impact on such a disease and the general indifference to the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) signed into law by George Herbert Walker Bush.
I live on
the East Coast in Northern Virginia and most of my family live in Indiana or
west of the Mississippi and it is usually easier to drive than use any other
means of transportation. It is not a
mystery why because there are so many things I need such as a wheelchair, a
scooter, a shower chair and the list could go on and on. The problem with traveling is that you will
eventually need a restroom and for most people with a disability like mine it
also means you will probably require assistance. I need such assistance which means my wife so
we have discovered Walmart normally has a family assistive restrooms and
truck-stops with showers for drivers provide assisted care for the disable as
well. It is still not easy but it is by
far much better than flying when every walking aid is taken from you and is
gate checked. You need either a very
short flight or a very large bladder and we know how conducive an aircraft
restroom is to allow the assistance of two people in such a small space that
you are provided in a modern commercial aircraft.
When I have had to fly on an emergency basis, I was fortunate enough to take a Southwest flight where there wasn't an assigned seat. In that situation I could be the first person on the flight and the last person off. Even with Southwest there are no provisions or procedures in place to enable the disabled passenger to have the same experience and protection of a stress free trip without the convenience of restroom providing privacy and room for the assistance I require. However, this an industry wide problem and not limited to Southwest. Yet, I wonder, at least to myself what am I do when it seems like my neighbor or fellow citizen doesn't care about a law like the ADA. If we believe in Locke's and Jefferson's 'Social Contract', we can not deny the role of government in our lives. That role can be positive or negative depending on your point of view, but it is an undeniable role that isn't going to disappear anytime soon. Yet, it will hopefully encourage political discourse without which the safety and security of all of our citizens could be endangered.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Veterans for Obama
New Hampshire Veterans
Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans for Obama
VA Veterans
Dissent is the highest form of PATRIOTISM. ~ Thomas Jefferson
Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans for Obama
VA Veterans
Dissent is the highest form of PATRIOTISM. ~ Thomas Jefferson
Monday, June 9, 2008
Retrospective of 1968
Meet The Press on this extremely warm Sunday morning did a retrospective on Bobby Kennedy and June of 1968. He was challenging an incumbent President because of his failed war policy in South East Asia. That president would eventually announce that “He would not seek nor would he accept the nomination of his party for the Presidency of the United States”. This led to a contested primary season within the Democratic Party with the Vietnam War being the central focus of that contest. It was also in the Spring and then in the early Summer of 1968 that showed the underlying violence that had become the plague of ‘public discourse’ in that decade of shame. Martin Luther King, Junior was murdered in Memphis during April of that year followed by Sirhan Sirhan’s murder of Robert Kennedy in June following his victory in the California Primary.
Meet the Press Remembers RFK
1968 was a significant year in my life as well. I graduated from high School in Fort Wayne, Indiana and then the following Fall I would head off for my freshman year in college. I want to go back to April of that year before I graduated from high school. We had lived in Fort Wayne since January of 1961, but Dallas had been our home since 1954. Spring Break of 1968 was going to be very special for myself and my younger siblings because my mother took us to Dallas for that week. The trip to Dallas though long, remembering the Inter-State System was far from completed, was fun but you often had to travel through metropolitan areas instead of being able to bypass them as you can today.
My mother decided we should go home through Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and finally back into Indiana. It was late in the day when we left Dallas, but we made it to Texarkana that first evening. While we had dinner at a restaurant near our motel, other patrons came in with the news that Martin Luther King, Jr. had been assassinated in Memphis. Reactions and remarks varied but you have to remember where we were and when it was. She didn’t say much but it was quite evident that my mother was much more concerned than she wanted us to realize. I think she was more concerned to not alarm the rest of us and keep us from knowing how worried she was. That turned out to be the best night of the trip home. We were on the road first thing in the morning since Mom knew we had at least two days before we could expect to be home. I was eighteen ready to graduate from high school and thought I was so grown up, but that day opened my eyes to issues and attitudes that began to make me wonder about the promise of America.
What I remember most about that day was one military convoy after another coming south. Encountering military convoys back then wasn’t a strange occurrence, but what confused me was that there were so many of them. I guess we don’t think about it today because they are all in Iraq. The drive to Memphis wasn’t bad but once we were there we had no choice but to drive through the city. What did we encounter and what did we see? Well, it was something I never expected to see in the United States or it was my own naiveté. We drove up a rise in what was then the downtown business district of the city, and you wouldn’t believe what I saw or you shouldn’t be. I saw American troops walking down ‘Main Street, USA’ carrying automatic weapons in the midst of armored vehicles and tanks tearing up streets for which someone just got the City Council to approve improvements. We finally got out of Memphis driving northward seeing more convoys traveling south as we went north and I looked at Mother and asked her ‘WHY’ but she had no answer that made sense.
Then I noticed the increase flow of traffic as we travelled north. It wasn’t just holiday traffic returning home, but the kind of traffic that impedes its flow and speed because of the congestion on the highway. Those of us who grew up during the 1960’s remember well the stark reality of the riots in Watts and Detroit as well as far too many other American cities. Hindsight is a wonderful gift and one not so wonderful at times because it can enlighten us to what was more difficult to perceive at the moment. What I do remember was one gasoline station after another saying no gas, and motels and hotels with flashing signs saying ‘NO VACANCIES’. We had no alternative but to keep driving further and further north eventually finding ourselves in Northern Kentucky with our gas gauge getting closer and closer to empty. My mother had four children with her ranging in age from eighteen to ten, and she knew that a decision had to be made. What she didn’t know was whether it was the wisest or safest one under very strained circumstances.
She took the next exit knowing that we were nowhere close to a large city in search of gas and a motel. I was becoming more frightened with each mile we drove, but finally and well past midnight and probably having driven an additional seventy miles since we had taken that exit we found a motel. It was not the ‘Ritz’ but it was a roof over our heads and as cramped as it was we all had an opportunity for much needed rest especially my mother. The next morning we were able to find gas and made our way back to the highway that would take us to Fort Wayne. Such fear and prejudice still permeated American society in 1968 that many both in and out of government were afraid that a ‘Race War’ or some major expression of violence would follow Martin Luther King, Junior’s death. That did not happen because most supporters of King believed in his Dream and one that was nonviolent.
In 1968 when Hoosiers found themselves at the center of a dynamic struggle over a Presidential nomination and the future direction of our nation gave insight into the tensions, tragedy and emotions of a singular moment—Senator Robert Kennedy's remarks in Indianapolis just hours after Dr. Martin Luther King had been shot—and provides a deeper understanding of one of the more significant events in our nation's long, contentious civil rights journey." —U.S. Senator Evan Bayh
The following is a report of how Robert Kennedy received the news of Martin Luther King, Junior’s Assassination while making a campaign a campaign stop in Indianapolis, IN April 4, 1968.
It was supposed to be a routine campaign stop. In a poor section of Indianapolis, 40 years ago, a largely black crowd had waited an hour to hear the presidential candidate speak. The candidate, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, had been warned not to go by the city's police chief.
As his car entered the neighborhood, his police escort left him. Once there, he stood in the back of a flatbed truck. He turned to an aide and asked, "Do they know about Martin Luther King?"
They didn't, and it was left to Kennedy to tell them that King had been shot and killed that night in Memphis, Tenn. The crowd gasped in horror.
Kennedy spoke of King's dedication to "love and to justice between fellow human beings," adding that "he died in the cause of that effort."
And Kennedy sought to heal the racial wounds that were certain to follow by referring to the death of his own brother, President John F. Kennedy.
"For those of you who are black and are tempted to ... be filled with hatred and mistrust of the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I would only say that I can also feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling," he said. "I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man."
Many other American cities burned after King was killed. But there was no fire in Indianapolis, which heard the words of Robert Kennedy.
A historian says a well-organized black community kept its calm. It's hard to overlook the image of one single man, standing on a flatbed truck, who never looked down at the paper in his hand — only at the faces in the crowd.
"My favorite poem, my — my favorite poet was Aeschylus," Robert Kennedy said, "and he once wrote:
Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget
falls drop by drop upon the heart,
until, in our own despair,
against our will,
comes wisdom
through the awful grace of God.
"What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love, and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black."
RFK Announces the Death of MLK
Two months later, Robert Kennedy himself was felled by an assassin's bullet.
Assassination of RFK
Total Popular Vote in the Democratic Primaries of 1968:
Eugene McCarthy: 2,914,933 (38.73 per cent)
Robert F. Kennedy: 2,305,148 (30.63 per cent)
Stephen M. Young: 549,140 (7.30 per cent)
Lyndon B. Johnson: 383,590 (5.10 per cent)
Thomas C. Lynch: 380,286 (5.05 per cent)
Roger D. Branigin: 238,700 (3.17 per cent)
George Smathers: 236,242 (3.14 per cent)
Hubert Humphrey: 166,463 (2.21 per cent)
Unpledged: 161,143 (2.14 per cent)
Scott Kelly: 128,899 (1.71 per cent)
George Wallace: 34,489 (0.46 per cent)
Richard Nixon (write-in): 13,610 (0.18 per cent)
Ronald Reagan (write-in): 5,309 (0.07 per cent)
Ted Kennedy: 4,052 (0.05 per cent)
Paul C. Fisher: 506 (0.01 per cent)
John G. Crommelin: 186 (0.00 per cent)
The two leading candidates in 1968 were Eugene McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy who both advocated Peace and an end to the Vietnam War. The nomination should have gone to Eugene McCarthy, but as a result the influence of President Lyndon Johnson and the DNC Hubert Humphrey who had received just over 2 per cent of the popular vote won the nomination. Hubert Humphrey would go on to lose the general election to Richard Nixon in a close election.
Richard Nixon: 31,783,783
Hubert Humphrey: 31,271,839
There are political analysts who have maintained for many years that Humphrey’s failure to disassociate himself from the policies of Lyndon Johnson was the single greatest factor in his loss. Would a Robert Kennedy candidacy in the 1968 Presidential election have made a difference? I think so but it is something we will never know because it did not happen. There was part of Tim Russert’s retrospective that I found interesting especially in the context our election in November. He pointed out in a Speech that Robert Kennedy had given as Attorney General his belief that in forty years a Negro could be elected president and hold the same office as his brother. If someone would have suggested this same possibility in 1968, he or she would probably be given the mantel of ‘Fool’ for such naiveté. Yet, it is 2008 and we find ourselves in historic times. Yes, we have an African American as a candidate of a major political party for the Presidency of the United States but we also have the opportunity of redefining ourselves and how we expect government to operate. Do we want a government that puts the needs/desires of Corporate America over the Human needs of its citizens? Do we want a government that allows speculation on commodities that drive fuel and food prices higher and higher? Do you want a government that separates families from one another because they can no longer afford the gasoline to visit them? The social divide that Katrina showed so clearly to the nation and the world, now Wall Street is showing almost daily how deep that chasm is in the United States of America.
Meet the Press Remembers RFK
1968 was a significant year in my life as well. I graduated from high School in Fort Wayne, Indiana and then the following Fall I would head off for my freshman year in college. I want to go back to April of that year before I graduated from high school. We had lived in Fort Wayne since January of 1961, but Dallas had been our home since 1954. Spring Break of 1968 was going to be very special for myself and my younger siblings because my mother took us to Dallas for that week. The trip to Dallas though long, remembering the Inter-State System was far from completed, was fun but you often had to travel through metropolitan areas instead of being able to bypass them as you can today.
My mother decided we should go home through Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky and finally back into Indiana. It was late in the day when we left Dallas, but we made it to Texarkana that first evening. While we had dinner at a restaurant near our motel, other patrons came in with the news that Martin Luther King, Jr. had been assassinated in Memphis. Reactions and remarks varied but you have to remember where we were and when it was. She didn’t say much but it was quite evident that my mother was much more concerned than she wanted us to realize. I think she was more concerned to not alarm the rest of us and keep us from knowing how worried she was. That turned out to be the best night of the trip home. We were on the road first thing in the morning since Mom knew we had at least two days before we could expect to be home. I was eighteen ready to graduate from high school and thought I was so grown up, but that day opened my eyes to issues and attitudes that began to make me wonder about the promise of America.
What I remember most about that day was one military convoy after another coming south. Encountering military convoys back then wasn’t a strange occurrence, but what confused me was that there were so many of them. I guess we don’t think about it today because they are all in Iraq. The drive to Memphis wasn’t bad but once we were there we had no choice but to drive through the city. What did we encounter and what did we see? Well, it was something I never expected to see in the United States or it was my own naiveté. We drove up a rise in what was then the downtown business district of the city, and you wouldn’t believe what I saw or you shouldn’t be. I saw American troops walking down ‘Main Street, USA’ carrying automatic weapons in the midst of armored vehicles and tanks tearing up streets for which someone just got the City Council to approve improvements. We finally got out of Memphis driving northward seeing more convoys traveling south as we went north and I looked at Mother and asked her ‘WHY’ but she had no answer that made sense.
Then I noticed the increase flow of traffic as we travelled north. It wasn’t just holiday traffic returning home, but the kind of traffic that impedes its flow and speed because of the congestion on the highway. Those of us who grew up during the 1960’s remember well the stark reality of the riots in Watts and Detroit as well as far too many other American cities. Hindsight is a wonderful gift and one not so wonderful at times because it can enlighten us to what was more difficult to perceive at the moment. What I do remember was one gasoline station after another saying no gas, and motels and hotels with flashing signs saying ‘NO VACANCIES’. We had no alternative but to keep driving further and further north eventually finding ourselves in Northern Kentucky with our gas gauge getting closer and closer to empty. My mother had four children with her ranging in age from eighteen to ten, and she knew that a decision had to be made. What she didn’t know was whether it was the wisest or safest one under very strained circumstances.
She took the next exit knowing that we were nowhere close to a large city in search of gas and a motel. I was becoming more frightened with each mile we drove, but finally and well past midnight and probably having driven an additional seventy miles since we had taken that exit we found a motel. It was not the ‘Ritz’ but it was a roof over our heads and as cramped as it was we all had an opportunity for much needed rest especially my mother. The next morning we were able to find gas and made our way back to the highway that would take us to Fort Wayne. Such fear and prejudice still permeated American society in 1968 that many both in and out of government were afraid that a ‘Race War’ or some major expression of violence would follow Martin Luther King, Junior’s death. That did not happen because most supporters of King believed in his Dream and one that was nonviolent.
In 1968 when Hoosiers found themselves at the center of a dynamic struggle over a Presidential nomination and the future direction of our nation gave insight into the tensions, tragedy and emotions of a singular moment—Senator Robert Kennedy's remarks in Indianapolis just hours after Dr. Martin Luther King had been shot—and provides a deeper understanding of one of the more significant events in our nation's long, contentious civil rights journey." —U.S. Senator Evan Bayh
The following is a report of how Robert Kennedy received the news of Martin Luther King, Junior’s Assassination while making a campaign a campaign stop in Indianapolis, IN April 4, 1968.
It was supposed to be a routine campaign stop. In a poor section of Indianapolis, 40 years ago, a largely black crowd had waited an hour to hear the presidential candidate speak. The candidate, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, had been warned not to go by the city's police chief.
As his car entered the neighborhood, his police escort left him. Once there, he stood in the back of a flatbed truck. He turned to an aide and asked, "Do they know about Martin Luther King?"
They didn't, and it was left to Kennedy to tell them that King had been shot and killed that night in Memphis, Tenn. The crowd gasped in horror.
Kennedy spoke of King's dedication to "love and to justice between fellow human beings," adding that "he died in the cause of that effort."
And Kennedy sought to heal the racial wounds that were certain to follow by referring to the death of his own brother, President John F. Kennedy.
"For those of you who are black and are tempted to ... be filled with hatred and mistrust of the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I would only say that I can also feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling," he said. "I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man."
Many other American cities burned after King was killed. But there was no fire in Indianapolis, which heard the words of Robert Kennedy.
A historian says a well-organized black community kept its calm. It's hard to overlook the image of one single man, standing on a flatbed truck, who never looked down at the paper in his hand — only at the faces in the crowd.
"My favorite poem, my — my favorite poet was Aeschylus," Robert Kennedy said, "and he once wrote:
Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget
falls drop by drop upon the heart,
until, in our own despair,
against our will,
comes wisdom
through the awful grace of God.
"What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love, and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black."
RFK Announces the Death of MLK
Two months later, Robert Kennedy himself was felled by an assassin's bullet.
Assassination of RFK
Total Popular Vote in the Democratic Primaries of 1968:
Eugene McCarthy: 2,914,933 (38.73 per cent)
Robert F. Kennedy: 2,305,148 (30.63 per cent)
Stephen M. Young: 549,140 (7.30 per cent)
Lyndon B. Johnson: 383,590 (5.10 per cent)
Thomas C. Lynch: 380,286 (5.05 per cent)
Roger D. Branigin: 238,700 (3.17 per cent)
George Smathers: 236,242 (3.14 per cent)
Hubert Humphrey: 166,463 (2.21 per cent)
Unpledged: 161,143 (2.14 per cent)
Scott Kelly: 128,899 (1.71 per cent)
George Wallace: 34,489 (0.46 per cent)
Richard Nixon (write-in): 13,610 (0.18 per cent)
Ronald Reagan (write-in): 5,309 (0.07 per cent)
Ted Kennedy: 4,052 (0.05 per cent)
Paul C. Fisher: 506 (0.01 per cent)
John G. Crommelin: 186 (0.00 per cent)
The two leading candidates in 1968 were Eugene McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy who both advocated Peace and an end to the Vietnam War. The nomination should have gone to Eugene McCarthy, but as a result the influence of President Lyndon Johnson and the DNC Hubert Humphrey who had received just over 2 per cent of the popular vote won the nomination. Hubert Humphrey would go on to lose the general election to Richard Nixon in a close election.
Richard Nixon: 31,783,783
Hubert Humphrey: 31,271,839
There are political analysts who have maintained for many years that Humphrey’s failure to disassociate himself from the policies of Lyndon Johnson was the single greatest factor in his loss. Would a Robert Kennedy candidacy in the 1968 Presidential election have made a difference? I think so but it is something we will never know because it did not happen. There was part of Tim Russert’s retrospective that I found interesting especially in the context our election in November. He pointed out in a Speech that Robert Kennedy had given as Attorney General his belief that in forty years a Negro could be elected president and hold the same office as his brother. If someone would have suggested this same possibility in 1968, he or she would probably be given the mantel of ‘Fool’ for such naiveté. Yet, it is 2008 and we find ourselves in historic times. Yes, we have an African American as a candidate of a major political party for the Presidency of the United States but we also have the opportunity of redefining ourselves and how we expect government to operate. Do we want a government that puts the needs/desires of Corporate America over the Human needs of its citizens? Do we want a government that allows speculation on commodities that drive fuel and food prices higher and higher? Do you want a government that separates families from one another because they can no longer afford the gasoline to visit them? The social divide that Katrina showed so clearly to the nation and the world, now Wall Street is showing almost daily how deep that chasm is in the United States of America.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
This I Our Time
Remarks of Senator Barack Obama
Final Primary Night
Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008
St. Paul, Minnesota
As Prepared for Delivery
Tonight, after fifty-four hard-fought contests, our primary season has finally come to an end.
Sixteen months have passed since we first stood together on the steps of the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois. Thousands of miles have been traveled. Millions of voices have been heard. And because of what you said - because you decided that change must come to Washington; because you believed that this year must be different than all the rest; because you chose to listen not to your doubts or your fears but to your greatest hopes and highest aspirations, tonight we mark the end of one historic journey with the beginning of another - a journey that will bring a new and better day to America. Tonight, I can stand before you and say that I will be the Democratic nominee for President of the United States.
I want to thank every American who stood with us over the course of this campaign - through the good days and the bad; from the snows of Cedar Rapids to the sunshine of Sioux Falls. And tonight I also want to thank the men and woman who took this journey with me as fellow candidates for President.
At this defining moment for our nation, we should be proud that our party put forth one of the most talented, qualified field of individuals ever to run for this office. I have not just competed with them as rivals, I have learned from them as friends, as public servants, and as patriots who love America and are willing to work tirelessly to make this country better. They are leaders of this party, and leaders that America will turn to for years to come.
That is particularly true for the candidate who has traveled further on this journey than anyone else. Senator Hillary Clinton has made history in this campaign not just because she's a woman who has done what no woman has done before, but because she's a leader who inspires millions of Americans with her strength, her courage, and her commitment to the causes that brought us here tonight.
We've certainly had our differences over the last sixteen months. But as someone who's shared a stage with her many times, I can tell you that what gets Hillary Clinton up in the morning - even in the face of tough odds - is exactly what sent her and Bill Clinton to sign up for their first campaign in Texas all those years ago; what sent her to work at the Children's Defense Fund and made her fight for health care as First Lady; what led her to the United States Senate and fueled her barrier-breaking campaign for the presidency - an unyielding desire to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, no matter how difficult the fight may be. And you can rest assured that when we finally win the battle for universal health care in this country, she will be central to that victory. When we transform our energy policy and lift our children out of poverty, it will be because she worked to help make it happen. Our party and our country are better off because of her, and I am a better candidate for having had the honor to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton.
There are those who say that this primary has somehow left us weaker and more divided. Well I say that because of this primary, there are millions of Americans who have cast their ballot for the very first time. There are Independents and Republicans who understand that this election isn't just about the party in charge of Washington, it's about the need to change Washington. There are young people, and African-Americans, and Latinos, and women of all ages who have voted in numbers that have broken records and inspired a nation.
All of you chose to support a candidate you believe in deeply. But at the end of the day, we aren't the reason you came out and waited in lines that stretched block after block to make your voice heard. You didn't do that because of me or Senator Clinton or anyone else. You did it because you know in your hearts that at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - we cannot afford to keep doing what we've been doing. We owe our children a better future. We owe our country a better future. And for all those who dream of that future tonight, I say - let us begin the work together. Let us unite in common effort to chart a new course for America.
In just a few short months, the Republican Party will arrive in St. Paul with a very different agenda. They will come here to nominate John McCain, a man who has served this country heroically. I honor that service, and I respect his many accomplishments, even if he chooses to deny mine. My differences with him are not personal; they are with the policies he has proposed in this campaign.
Because while John McCain can legitimately tout moments of independence from his party in the past, such independence has not been the hallmark of his presidential campaign.
It's not change when John McCain decided to stand with George Bush ninety-five percent of the time, as he did in the Senate last year.
It's not change when he offers four more years of Bush economic policies that have failed to create well-paying jobs, or insure our workers, or help Americans afford the skyrocketing cost of college - policies that have lowered the real incomes of the average American family, widened the gap between Wall Street and Main Street, and left our children with a mountain of debt.
And it's not change when he promises to continue a policy in Iraq that asks everything of our brave men and women in uniform and nothing of Iraqi politicians - a policy where all we look for are reasons to stay in Iraq, while we spend billions of dollars a month on a war that isn't making the American people any safer.
So I'll say this - there are many words to describe John McCain's attempt to pass off his embrace of George Bush's policies as bipartisan and new. But change is not one of them.
Change is a foreign policy that doesn't begin and end with a war that should've never been authorized and never been waged. I won't stand here and pretend that there are many good options left in Iraq, but what's not an option is leaving our troops in that country for the next hundred years - especially at a time when our military is overstretched, our nation is isolated, and nearly every other threat to America is being ignored.
We must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in - but start leaving we must. It's time for Iraqis to take responsibility for their future. It's time to rebuild our military and give our veterans the care they need and the benefits they deserve when they come home. It's time to refocus our efforts on al Qaeda's leadership and Afghanistan, and rally the world against the common threats of the 21st century - terrorism and nuclear weapons; climate change and poverty; genocide and disease. That's what change is.
Change is realizing that meeting today's threats requires not just our firepower, but the power of our diplomacy - tough, direct diplomacy where the President of the United States isn't afraid to let any petty dictator know where America stands and what we stand for. We must once again have the courage and conviction to lead the free world. That is the legacy of Roosevelt, and Truman, and Kennedy. That's what the American people want. That's what change is.
Change is building an economy that rewards not just wealth, but the work and workers who created it. It's understanding that the struggles facing working families can't be solved by spending billions of dollars on more tax breaks for big corporations and wealthy CEOs, but by giving a the middle-class a tax break, and investing in our crumbling infrastructure, and transforming how we use energy, and improving our schools, and renewing our commitment to science and innovation. Its understanding that fiscal responsibility and shared prosperity can go hand-in-hand, as they did when Bill Clinton was President.
John McCain has spent a lot of time talking about trips to Iraq in the last few weeks, but maybe if he spent some time taking trips to the cities and towns that have been hardest hit by this economy - cities in Michigan, and Ohio, and right here in Minnesota - he'd understand the kind of change that people are looking for.
Maybe if he went to Iowa and met the student who works the night shift after a full day of class and still can't pay the medical bills for a sister who's ill, he'd understand that she can't afford four more years of a health care plan that only takes care of the healthy and wealthy. She needs us to pass health care plan that guarantees insurance to every American who wants it and brings down premiums for every family who needs it. That's the change we need.
Maybe if he went to Pennsylvania and met the man who lost his job but can't even afford the gas to drive around and look for a new one, he'd understand that we can't afford four more years of our addiction to oil from dictators. That man needs us to pass an energy policy that works with automakers to raise fuel standards, and makes corporations pay for their pollution, and oil companies invest their record profits in a clean energy future - an energy policy that will create millions of new jobs that pay well and can't be outsourced. That's the change we need.
And maybe if he spent some time in the schools of South Carolina or St. Paul or where he spoke tonight in New Orleans, he'd understand that we can't afford to leave the money behind for No Child Left Behind; that we owe it to our children to invest in early childhood education; to recruit an army of new teachers and give them better pay and more support; to finally decide that in this global economy, the chance to get a college education should not be a privilege for the wealthy few, but the birthright of every American. That's the change we need in America. That's why I'm running for President.
The other side will come here in September and offer a very different set of policies and positions, and that is a debate I look forward to. It is a debate the American people deserve. But what you don't deserve is another election that's governed by fear, and innuendo, and division. What you won't hear from this campaign or this party is the kind of politics that uses religion as a wedge, and patriotism as a bludgeon - that sees our opponents not as competitors to challenge, but enemies to demonize. Because we may call ourselves Democrats and Republicans, but we are Americans first. We are always Americans first.
Despite what the good Senator from Arizona said tonight, I have seen people of differing views and opinions find common cause many times during my two decades in public life, and I have brought many together myself. I've walked arm-in-arm with community leaders on the South Side of Chicago and watched tensions fade as black, white, and Latino fought together for good jobs and good schools. I've sat across the table from law enforcement and civil rights advocates to reform a criminal justice system that sent thirteen innocent people to death row. And I've worked with friends in the other party to provide more children with health insurance and more working families with a tax break; to curb the spread of nuclear weapons and ensure that the American people know where their tax dollars are being spent; and to reduce the influence of lobbyists who have all too often set the agenda in Washington.
In our country, I have found that this cooperation happens not because we agree on everything, but because behind all the labels and false divisions and categories that define us; beyond all the petty bickering and point-scoring in Washington, Americans are a decent, generous, compassionate people, united by common challenges and common hopes. And every so often, there are moments which call on that fundamental goodness to make this country great again.
So it was for that band of patriots who declared in a Philadelphia hall the formation of a more perfect union; and for all those who gave on the fields of Gettysburg and Antietam their last full measure of devotion to save that same union.
So it was for the Greatest Generation that conquered fear itself, and liberated a continent from tyranny, and made this country home to untold opportunity and prosperity.
So it was for the workers who stood out on the picket lines; the women who shattered glass ceilings; the children who braved a Selma bridge for freedom's cause.
So it has been for every generation that faced down the greatest challenges and the most improbable odds to leave their children a world that's better, and kinder, and more just. And so it must be for us.
America, this is our moment. This is our time. It is our time to turn the page on the policies of the past. Our time to bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face. Our time to offer a new direction for the country we love.
The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people. Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth. This was the moment - this was the time - when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves, and our highest ideals.
Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
Final Primary Night
Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008
St. Paul, Minnesota
As Prepared for Delivery
Tonight, after fifty-four hard-fought contests, our primary season has finally come to an end.
Sixteen months have passed since we first stood together on the steps of the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois. Thousands of miles have been traveled. Millions of voices have been heard. And because of what you said - because you decided that change must come to Washington; because you believed that this year must be different than all the rest; because you chose to listen not to your doubts or your fears but to your greatest hopes and highest aspirations, tonight we mark the end of one historic journey with the beginning of another - a journey that will bring a new and better day to America. Tonight, I can stand before you and say that I will be the Democratic nominee for President of the United States.
I want to thank every American who stood with us over the course of this campaign - through the good days and the bad; from the snows of Cedar Rapids to the sunshine of Sioux Falls. And tonight I also want to thank the men and woman who took this journey with me as fellow candidates for President.
At this defining moment for our nation, we should be proud that our party put forth one of the most talented, qualified field of individuals ever to run for this office. I have not just competed with them as rivals, I have learned from them as friends, as public servants, and as patriots who love America and are willing to work tirelessly to make this country better. They are leaders of this party, and leaders that America will turn to for years to come.
That is particularly true for the candidate who has traveled further on this journey than anyone else. Senator Hillary Clinton has made history in this campaign not just because she's a woman who has done what no woman has done before, but because she's a leader who inspires millions of Americans with her strength, her courage, and her commitment to the causes that brought us here tonight.
We've certainly had our differences over the last sixteen months. But as someone who's shared a stage with her many times, I can tell you that what gets Hillary Clinton up in the morning - even in the face of tough odds - is exactly what sent her and Bill Clinton to sign up for their first campaign in Texas all those years ago; what sent her to work at the Children's Defense Fund and made her fight for health care as First Lady; what led her to the United States Senate and fueled her barrier-breaking campaign for the presidency - an unyielding desire to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, no matter how difficult the fight may be. And you can rest assured that when we finally win the battle for universal health care in this country, she will be central to that victory. When we transform our energy policy and lift our children out of poverty, it will be because she worked to help make it happen. Our party and our country are better off because of her, and I am a better candidate for having had the honor to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton.
There are those who say that this primary has somehow left us weaker and more divided. Well I say that because of this primary, there are millions of Americans who have cast their ballot for the very first time. There are Independents and Republicans who understand that this election isn't just about the party in charge of Washington, it's about the need to change Washington. There are young people, and African-Americans, and Latinos, and women of all ages who have voted in numbers that have broken records and inspired a nation.
All of you chose to support a candidate you believe in deeply. But at the end of the day, we aren't the reason you came out and waited in lines that stretched block after block to make your voice heard. You didn't do that because of me or Senator Clinton or anyone else. You did it because you know in your hearts that at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - we cannot afford to keep doing what we've been doing. We owe our children a better future. We owe our country a better future. And for all those who dream of that future tonight, I say - let us begin the work together. Let us unite in common effort to chart a new course for America.
In just a few short months, the Republican Party will arrive in St. Paul with a very different agenda. They will come here to nominate John McCain, a man who has served this country heroically. I honor that service, and I respect his many accomplishments, even if he chooses to deny mine. My differences with him are not personal; they are with the policies he has proposed in this campaign.
Because while John McCain can legitimately tout moments of independence from his party in the past, such independence has not been the hallmark of his presidential campaign.
It's not change when John McCain decided to stand with George Bush ninety-five percent of the time, as he did in the Senate last year.
It's not change when he offers four more years of Bush economic policies that have failed to create well-paying jobs, or insure our workers, or help Americans afford the skyrocketing cost of college - policies that have lowered the real incomes of the average American family, widened the gap between Wall Street and Main Street, and left our children with a mountain of debt.
And it's not change when he promises to continue a policy in Iraq that asks everything of our brave men and women in uniform and nothing of Iraqi politicians - a policy where all we look for are reasons to stay in Iraq, while we spend billions of dollars a month on a war that isn't making the American people any safer.
So I'll say this - there are many words to describe John McCain's attempt to pass off his embrace of George Bush's policies as bipartisan and new. But change is not one of them.
Change is a foreign policy that doesn't begin and end with a war that should've never been authorized and never been waged. I won't stand here and pretend that there are many good options left in Iraq, but what's not an option is leaving our troops in that country for the next hundred years - especially at a time when our military is overstretched, our nation is isolated, and nearly every other threat to America is being ignored.
We must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in - but start leaving we must. It's time for Iraqis to take responsibility for their future. It's time to rebuild our military and give our veterans the care they need and the benefits they deserve when they come home. It's time to refocus our efforts on al Qaeda's leadership and Afghanistan, and rally the world against the common threats of the 21st century - terrorism and nuclear weapons; climate change and poverty; genocide and disease. That's what change is.
Change is realizing that meeting today's threats requires not just our firepower, but the power of our diplomacy - tough, direct diplomacy where the President of the United States isn't afraid to let any petty dictator know where America stands and what we stand for. We must once again have the courage and conviction to lead the free world. That is the legacy of Roosevelt, and Truman, and Kennedy. That's what the American people want. That's what change is.
Change is building an economy that rewards not just wealth, but the work and workers who created it. It's understanding that the struggles facing working families can't be solved by spending billions of dollars on more tax breaks for big corporations and wealthy CEOs, but by giving a the middle-class a tax break, and investing in our crumbling infrastructure, and transforming how we use energy, and improving our schools, and renewing our commitment to science and innovation. Its understanding that fiscal responsibility and shared prosperity can go hand-in-hand, as they did when Bill Clinton was President.
John McCain has spent a lot of time talking about trips to Iraq in the last few weeks, but maybe if he spent some time taking trips to the cities and towns that have been hardest hit by this economy - cities in Michigan, and Ohio, and right here in Minnesota - he'd understand the kind of change that people are looking for.
Maybe if he went to Iowa and met the student who works the night shift after a full day of class and still can't pay the medical bills for a sister who's ill, he'd understand that she can't afford four more years of a health care plan that only takes care of the healthy and wealthy. She needs us to pass health care plan that guarantees insurance to every American who wants it and brings down premiums for every family who needs it. That's the change we need.
Maybe if he went to Pennsylvania and met the man who lost his job but can't even afford the gas to drive around and look for a new one, he'd understand that we can't afford four more years of our addiction to oil from dictators. That man needs us to pass an energy policy that works with automakers to raise fuel standards, and makes corporations pay for their pollution, and oil companies invest their record profits in a clean energy future - an energy policy that will create millions of new jobs that pay well and can't be outsourced. That's the change we need.
And maybe if he spent some time in the schools of South Carolina or St. Paul or where he spoke tonight in New Orleans, he'd understand that we can't afford to leave the money behind for No Child Left Behind; that we owe it to our children to invest in early childhood education; to recruit an army of new teachers and give them better pay and more support; to finally decide that in this global economy, the chance to get a college education should not be a privilege for the wealthy few, but the birthright of every American. That's the change we need in America. That's why I'm running for President.
The other side will come here in September and offer a very different set of policies and positions, and that is a debate I look forward to. It is a debate the American people deserve. But what you don't deserve is another election that's governed by fear, and innuendo, and division. What you won't hear from this campaign or this party is the kind of politics that uses religion as a wedge, and patriotism as a bludgeon - that sees our opponents not as competitors to challenge, but enemies to demonize. Because we may call ourselves Democrats and Republicans, but we are Americans first. We are always Americans first.
Despite what the good Senator from Arizona said tonight, I have seen people of differing views and opinions find common cause many times during my two decades in public life, and I have brought many together myself. I've walked arm-in-arm with community leaders on the South Side of Chicago and watched tensions fade as black, white, and Latino fought together for good jobs and good schools. I've sat across the table from law enforcement and civil rights advocates to reform a criminal justice system that sent thirteen innocent people to death row. And I've worked with friends in the other party to provide more children with health insurance and more working families with a tax break; to curb the spread of nuclear weapons and ensure that the American people know where their tax dollars are being spent; and to reduce the influence of lobbyists who have all too often set the agenda in Washington.
In our country, I have found that this cooperation happens not because we agree on everything, but because behind all the labels and false divisions and categories that define us; beyond all the petty bickering and point-scoring in Washington, Americans are a decent, generous, compassionate people, united by common challenges and common hopes. And every so often, there are moments which call on that fundamental goodness to make this country great again.
So it was for that band of patriots who declared in a Philadelphia hall the formation of a more perfect union; and for all those who gave on the fields of Gettysburg and Antietam their last full measure of devotion to save that same union.
So it was for the Greatest Generation that conquered fear itself, and liberated a continent from tyranny, and made this country home to untold opportunity and prosperity.
So it was for the workers who stood out on the picket lines; the women who shattered glass ceilings; the children who braved a Selma bridge for freedom's cause.
So it has been for every generation that faced down the greatest challenges and the most improbable odds to leave their children a world that's better, and kinder, and more just. And so it must be for us.
America, this is our moment. This is our time. It is our time to turn the page on the policies of the past. Our time to bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face. Our time to offer a new direction for the country we love.
The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people. Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth. This was the moment - this was the time - when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves, and our highest ideals.
Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
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