A Grandmother’s Belief and Hope in Obama

Just wanted to add my two cents to this blog for anyone who is still nervous about this election, who still worry that we will be disappointed once again.

I remember four years ago, working for Kerry, going to Ohio the night before the election to volunteer, and watching the returns election evening, and believing Kerry was winning, and then to have the rug pulled out from under us, which left us with four more years of misery with George W. Bush. My daughter-in-law went with me to Ohio with such great expectations, and then we returned home on the bus in tears … Kerry lost, he lost Ohio, the state we worked so hard in. THAT WILL NOT HAPPEN THIS TIME!

Well, I am here to tell you I’ve felt like most of you, and I’ve been worried, and I’ve been anxious, because this election is the most important election in my lifetime. I remember when John Kennedy ran for president, an
Irish-Catholic running and winning … could never happen. Well, we know how that turned out. It was a tough race, and I remember finally going to bed at two in the morning believing he had lost, and that Nixon would be our next president. Then my dad came in to my room and said “we won, we won!!” I’ll never forget that morning. Kennedy’s chances were so slim, and his win was slim, but he won. Barak Obama is doing so much better and in a better place than Kennedy was all those years ago.

The excitement I saw around Kennedy, I’ve now seen happening with Senator Obama. Only this time, I’m all grown up, and I knew that this time I could do something to help him win, and perhaps to win big.

So, I got off my “you know what” because sitting around worrying was not going to elect Senator Obama to the presidency. I had a purpose. I’m up there in years, I’m not worried about my future, but I am worried about my 6 grandchildren, who I love more than anything in this world, and seeing another Republican become president to potentially make their world and their future questionable, I knew I had to do something. So, I’ve gone to Virginia three weeks in a row and I’ve knocked on doors. I’ve done phone banking as often as possible. Doing these kinds of things is not in my DNA, I don’t like to make blind phone calls, or knocking on stranger’s doors, it’s not easy, especially when a phone is slammed on your ear, or a door is slammed in your face, it can shake your confidence, but that doesn’t matter how I felt, I didn’t do it for me, I did it for my kids and their kids. I worry about what kind of world I will leave behind. This was my way to maybe make a difference. Leaving them a safe and secure world is the most important thing I can do, and I hope and believe that Senator Obama will give our children the world they deserve.

I was phone banking last night, every space that could be used to phone bank was used, and the majority of the folks, and I had some good results with more people saying they will vote for Senator Obama. A not too many saying they will vote for McCain, that made my night.

It is 6:37 p.m. on the eve of the most important election in our lifetime, which means there still is time to volunteer. You can make calls for Obama, you can volunteer to phone bank. You can drive people to the polls who have no way of getting there.

Tomorrow, after I vote, I will go back to the Obama campaign office and start matching people who cannot get to the polls on their own with folks who have volunteered to drive.

If you can’t do some of these things, then drag someone to the polls with you, remind people to get vote, do whatever it takes, and we will have a President Obama on Wednesday morning.

We will not have what happened four years ago happen again. This is the time for Barack Obama, let’s make it happen!

Bailout Update

Apparently, as are much things in life, the initial facts about the ‘new’ bailout package were not nescessarily reported accurately by news outlets.  I was just reading Daily Kos and they are doing an ‘oops’ too.

The bailout package is not the blatant pork barrel package that it sounded like this morning.   What the Senate did was take several issues on the table already: AMT tax, disater relief, energy credits, and a few other items and added it to the package in the hopes of getting those items passed with more votes than typically would have occured (e.g. provide more political coverage).  So, my initial rant on this new package was a little off base – particularly to my accusation against the Republicans.

It’s funny, the Senate is usually more level headed, less partisan, and more conservative (not politically, but acting) then the House. It did seem odd they were adding all these ‘sweenters’ from the get-go without further negotiations with the House.  

Now, I still have a problem with the package – particularly the AMT tax.  I fully agree that the tax does need to be changed as it puts an added burden on many middle class families.  However, my concern is the same as it was this morning and the same the Congress and various Presidential administrations have had for many years – that there is no offset for reducing the AMT.  Tax receipts are being reduced significantly without cuts in spending or tax increases in other places.  Again, I think it is a ‘what the hell’ philosophy – we are in bad debt already, we are making it worse, why not add more too it and do the dirty deed we’ve been avoiding for years.   I don’t think it’s the proper way of addressing the need to change the AMT.

As for the other ‘sweetners’ they do not seem as significant as the the press reported earlier in the day and are not significant drivers in boosting the cost of the bill.  Most of them are can’t lose propositions during Congressional campaigning and eases some of the ire of the voter.  In a lot of ways, it backs many into a corner who won’t vote for the package – what Congressman wants to come out against disater relief tax credits or energy credits?

I am currently watching the Senate vote and the yea’s are very bi-partisan.  It’s interesting, just like in the House, some of those in a dog fight election voted nea (Elizabeth Dole, for example).  It just passed 74-25 with only Kennedy not voting.