Web Letters: What America Is Palin Talking About?

Thoughts at 3 am on November 5:

I cannot sleep. I have been pacing my apartment, pumping my fist in the air at random intervals, trapped in a state of surreal euphoria. I had forgotten how good it feels to be proud to be an American.

If Barack Obama's time had been 150 years ago, he would have been treated by many as chattel, viewed as subhuman, and denied the most basic rights. If his time had been 100 years ago, he would have faced the terrifying specter of the lynch mob, the gross inequity of Jim Crow laws, and open racism which would have severely limited his aspirations. If his time had been fifty years ago, he would have been forced to the back of the bus, attended a segregated school, drank from a "colored" drinking fountain, and grappled with all the other inherent inequalities of the "separate but equal" doctrine. But those times do not belong to him. Barack Obama's time is now. And now, in this moment, he is the President of the United States.

I am proud of a nation that took this wonderful symbolic step towards healing the deep racial scars which mar our history with such ugliness. I am proud of a nation that stood together and overwhelmingly repudiated the neoconservatism that has wrought so much damage over the last eight years. I am proud of a nation that realized the magnitude and urgency of the issues we face requires a man of extraordinary ability and intellect. I am proud of a nation that recognized at its core that change was not a choice, not a luxury, not an option but an absolute necessity if the idea of the United States was to survive.

Our long national nightmare is over. Dawn has broken in America. But dawn is just the beginning of the day. Electing Obama was the necessary first step. We must not rest. The road to rebuilding America is going to be long and laborious. Obama himself acknowledged this in his victory speech, speaking somberly about the enormity of the work that lies ahead. I believe he is not only ready to do that work, but that he wants to do that work, and will love the work itself. But he cannot do it alone. Even the help of the Democratic governing majority that has emerged will not be enough. In a democracy, the politicians are supposed to work for the citizens. The future requires that we take that role seriously and unceasingly push President Obama and the Democratic Congress where they must go, and hold them accountable when they stray from the path.

We must use this victory as the cornerstone upon which we build a permanent progressive majority. We have lived through eight years of an administration that was openly hostile to democracy, but now we have the opportunity to reassert it. We must restore the strength of traditional unions, find ways to unionize the service sector and organize labor without borders. We must praise diversity, and continue to embrace people of all colors, creeds, and cultures. We must summon iron courage and stand against those who peddle bigotry, hatred and ignorance. We must educate and unite our individual communities on the crucial political issues which affect our lives. We must demand that the United States government no longer considers war a legitimate option for solving conflicts. We must demand universal, single-payer healthcare, not as a privilege but as a human right. We must demand the Congress rips up the Patriot Act and restores our constitutional rights. We must demand transparency in our government, and the end of unchecked executive power. We must demand our privacy, and get the government out of our e-mail, and off our phone calls without a warrant. We must demand the mass construction of solar and wind farms today, and the cessation of coal-burning tomorrow. Above all, we must demand the government invest in the people of the United States.

We have seen big government for years now. Despite the conservative invective against "big government," the federal government ballooned under Reagan and reached unprecedented size under Bush II. This big government has invested trillions in one murderous war after another. It has invested in hundreds of billions of subsidies for the richest corporations in the world. It has built enough nuclear bombs to obliterate all life on earth. It has invested in policies creating the most radical disparity of wealth since the Gilded Age, concentrating the treasure of the nation into very few hands. Meanwhile, real wages, living standards, quality of education and health services have all declined precipitously for the vast majority of Americans. It is time for a new investment strategy. We have seen what big government can do for the upper 1 percent. Now it is time to see what it can do for the rest of us.

So let us take pride in this beautiful moment in history today. And let us commit tomorrow to working alongside President Obama and remaking America into a nation we can be proud of every day.

Kyle Gerkin

Phoenix, AZ