A New President - Praise to the Gods

It has been with muted anticipation that I look forward to tomorrow. I am SO excited about Barack Obama as our new president, but I do need to try to contain myself. I know there are others, especially up here in Essex County, New York, who don't feel the same way. I am so relieved to be rid of "The Decider", who decided badly for all of his eight years as president. He was far more of a Divider than any kind of a decent Decider.

I believe with every ounce of my being that Barack Obama will right the near sinking ship that he has been left by George Bush. And I believe this because he has made it clear that he wants to listen to all sides, to understand the other side and see where there might be common ground. There is nothing wrong in this type of thinking, no matter what the ultra left progressives say. I prefer someone who wants to understand other viewpoints to someone who thought he knew it all, a man who made "unilateral" the very dirty word that it really is in today's world.

I read this article today: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/19/us/politics/19mccain.html?scp=4&sq=&st=nyt about how Obama has been seeking John McCain's counsel these last weeks. Frankly, I still have a bitter taste remaining from the campaign about how he ran for president and the miserable and low tactics he used to try to attain the highest office in the land. In spite of how I still have lingering doubts about the man, this article makes it clear that good things are likely not that far away. Bush and a Democratic Congress were bound to be at loggerheads; Bush didn't engender trust or confidence for most of his presidency, and certainly not in the last two years. Nobody's had much trust in him in a long time, all polling will tell you that. But couldn't a Republican president have made some progress with a Democratic Congress? All it takes really is a little consideration. Bush rarely offered it, and he certainly never earned it back.

Yes, I am psyched about tomorrow. And I am ready for a party!

PS - Essex County, New York is generally a Republican stronghold, but this year, it went for the Democrats, pretty overwhelmingly. I like to think that Dana and Darryl and I had a fair hand in that shift!