I've been trying to figure out how to say this without sounding like it's just another post complaining about my mom. I feel like it's something that needs to be said, and, unfortunately, she is being made into an example. Well, that's her problem. Here goes:
Last night as I watched the numbers rise, as the networks, one by one, announced the winner, I had one thought repeating in my head:
"It's over."
Not just the election (though I'm glad to be rid of that as well) but the eight long years of the ignorance and arrogance of the Bush regime. The dark times were over. It's over.
I watched McCain's concession speech with my jaw agape and tears in my eyes. My mom, a staunch Republican, stood in the kitchen, eating her dinner. Of all the places in the kitchen where she could have stood, she made sure to stand where I could see her. Her back was to me. After McCain's speech I was walking through the kitchen, and she moved as I moved - she made sure her back stayed toward me.
When Obama told his daughters that they had earned a puppy, she scoffed, "Oh, geez." All night long she was making sarcastic comments, following each one with, "Oh, I didn't mean that. I'm just in mourning."
Look, this has to stop. Republicans, don't turn your back on this country. Don't turn your back on this president. Don't wallow in your party's loss when you can be celebrating your country's future. I know you don't see it. You see every bad quality, every evil - real or imagined - all packed into one skinny black senator from Hyde Park. You see in him likely what the rest of us saw in McCain. But look beyond that. We need you.
Democrats have a majority in the Senate, in the House, in the voting booths. But we need you, now more than ever, to make sure that another voice is heard. We need to know that when we are out there making a change, you are out there changing with us. Not because we want you to give up your life's philosophies and turn blue, but because we are all Americans and we are all depending on each other to get this country through these tough times.
Don't turn your back on us, Republicans. We are still one nation, we still share one hope. We still have a common dream of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The nation can't heal and won't thrive without you. It won't get done on any one party's terms, and it won't get done if we can't work together and face the problems of this nation as a nation united against ignorance and hate.
Don't give America the cold shoulder. It's your America, too. Help us make it something to be proud of again.
And to all of you who went out yesterday and make history in the voting booths, you aren't done. You and I everyone else all have a lot of work to do. Your commitment to this country cannot end after the acceptance speech. Get out. Make a better life for us. Democracy is not a spectator sport. It's time to get in the game.
