Part 1: Deep-Red Region Has Obama Blues

Here is a link to a photo essay in The Wall Street Journal about a town in Texas getting used to the new President-elect: Deep-Red Region Has Obama Blues

I guess every story has its flip-side, and this is the one of the Obama victory: the 48% of the country who did not vote for him is now quite anxious. It's strange for me, since basically every politician I've ever supported in my adult life has lost their elections (Gore and Kerry, to name a few, not to mention my U.S. and California representatives). I was just used to Republicans being unbeatable. I remember how let down I was back in 2004 when John Kerry narrowly lost the election to President Bush. It was so close, and yet the Bush team had squeezed out another victory.

This time around, it was such an incredible high to see the person I voted for back in January win the presidency. I almost didn't believe it was true, but once I realized that he'd really won it felt great. I imagine the people who didn't vote for him are getting their first taste of defeat in a while, of course mixed with a huge amount of economy anxiety. I hope that they will give Obama a chance to prove himself and try to tackle the country's problems.

I was thinking that, in some senses, it's a little unfair of Democrats like me to expect the losing Republicans to support the new president, given that we have cried bloody murder at George Bush for much of the last decade. However, the way many people view Bush now is not the same as it was right after he won the election.

Back in 2000, my first reaction at learning the truth about Bush's victory was utter anger that the election had been illegitimate and tampered with in Florida. To this day I am still furious about that, and quite frankly, I can't believe the controversy went away so quickly. There is nothing that will change the fact that Republicans and members of the establishment in the state of Florida deliberately manipulated the electoral system in their favor, placing antiquated and faulty voting machines in counties with large non-white populations, excluding thousands of people from voting at all due to deeply flawed felon lists, failing to count ballots that had been marked improperly but could still be understood, and allowing military absentee ballots with no postmarks and signatures to be counted. In short, it felt like theft, and was. Those of us who did not support Bush were deeply disappointed and perhaps a bit worried, too. We all thought he was a total idiot. That said, once he actually took office and the country got back to business, I gave him a bit of support. I certainly wasn't hoping for him to fail. And I think when September 11th happened, a lot of us were comforted by his leadership.

But the years since then have been difficult, and I have very mixed feelings about his leadership. Though, I wonder sometimes how much influence a president really has. How can we pin all of our woes or triumphs on him when he is only the top of the huge pyramid of businesses, money, politicians, bureaucracy, governments, states, and local communities that make up America? I mean, there are 300 million of us. The president is our most visible leader, of course, but clearly much of our national business is going to proceed in its own way no matter who is in charge. Power and leadership are diffused in our federal republic. That said, a president is enormously influential and his administration's policies have real impact. I think these are more obviously felt when they are negative, but they are there just the same. Just as a plumber's work is never noticed unless it is faulty, a president's policies are not really noticed in detail unless they produce bad results, such as President Bush's have.

This president, though I do not think he is the evil, unfeeling monster he's made out to be at times, has filled his administration with people who have made bad choices. The people he has chosen to run our government have run it into the ground and, what's more, wreaked constitutional and human rights violations on us and citizens from abroad that will not easily be undone. Republicans worry about government intrusion now that Obama has been elected, but people, look at what your own choice has done! President Bush's terrible administration, coupled with his seemingly reckless leadership style are what have made him a bad president. The rest of us, and the rest of the federal government are not off the hook for everything, especially IRAQ, but he has been a bad president nonetheless.

The reason Bush is so deeply unpopular nowadays is that he, simply put, has been a bad chief executive and has not looked after the country well, though I'm sure he meant to. We are tired of him. It makes me deeply sad to see the relationship between the country and the president deteriorate to this level, though. Make no mistake: I wish he had done better. I really do. And, I recognize that he has been faced with a lot of difficult choices and has done things in the name of protecting the country. I take absolutely zero joy in making fun of him. It's just not funny anymore. It always makes me sad to see countries faced with leaders they hate, because it usually means that things aren't going well there. It's a sad thing. I am tired of so deeply disliking my own president, and that is a big part of the reason why the moment that I found out that Barack Obama had won the presidency was so deeply cathartic. It was as if a weight had lifted off my shoulders: I no longer hated the president! It was such a novel, so totally unexperienced feeling that it took hours for me to recognize it and I drove home from volunteering at the polls almost giddy with joy.

Obama's no idiot and I have hopes that he'll try his hardest and will make good decisions. To those who didn't vote for him, I say it's your right to be anxious and disappointed, but give him a chance, as I gave President Bush a chance. Obama won a clean election with a lot of support and it's in all of our best interests to be cooperative and peaceful in this time of national crisis. Surely there are massive disagreements about the best actions to take, but he has won the election and has the prerogative to do his job as he best sees fit within the limits of the law.

Let's give him a chance. It's time to get back to business.