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Psychoblues
10-26-2008, 09:32 PM
A friend of mine wrote this piece and has given permission to me to post it in it's entirety wherever I felt it appropriate. I believe this is such a place that needs to read it and I hope you appreciate and enjoy it. I found it inspiring, moving and even though above the heads of many down to earth and human in the very best sense.

by NanceGreggs

Well, Barack, It's Kinda Like This ...

After the past eight years – and I know I don’t have to go into details, because you know, and I know, and we ALL know what it’s been like – I was really hoping for a Democratic candidate who was smart and savvy, a for-the-People kind of guy who understood what life was like for the vast majority of us; someone who could speak intelligently but still be down-to-earth; someone who could talk TO me and FOR me, without being condescending or over-my-head.

I’d hoped for a guy – you know, just a regular guy – who had something of value to say, and could say it well. A guy who made people actually want to listen; someone who made sense on the most basic level – and if he could convey a bit of vision, be a bit of an unashamed, unabashed dreamer, that would be icing on the cake.

What I got was you – and I don’t know what I ever did to deserve you, but it must have been something spectacular.

I wanted a man who would say that things could and would be better. What I got was a man who reminded me that the best of what we could be as a nation was just around the corner, there for the taking if only we are willing to work together to achieve it.

I wanted a man who would speak wisely. What I got was a man who speaks not only with wisdom, but vision; a man who dares not only to dream, but dares to encourage the dreamer in me, and my fellow citizens.

I wanted a man who was willing to take on the responsibilities of true leadership. What I got was a man who leads not by words, but by example; a man who is humble enough to admit that he is human, but strong enough to demonstrate that it is our humanity that makes us unique, makes us worthwhile, makes us capable of accomplishing more than at times seems possible.

I wanted a man who had that all-elusive common touch. What I got was a man of uncommon ability to raise the bar, to encourage us to set our sights higher, to say without hesitation that WE can do whatever needs to be done to make things right, to reach whatever goals we set no matter how lofty, to BE what we were at our very best moment in history – and surpass it with ease by virtue of our determination to do so.

I wanted a man who couldn’t ignore what we’ve done wrong; who didn’t pretend that a flag-pin in a lapel and a politically-correct bumper-sticker was sufficient cover for deeply flawed policies that have cost us precious lives and the respect of the world. What I got was a man who understands the tragedy not of numbers in the thousands, but of each individual loss; a man who realizes that the shame of wrongdoing can only be erased by having the courage to do what is right.

I wanted a man who wasn’t afraid to speak the truth, and wasn’t cowed by the task of facing that truth head-on – even when it was ugly and almost impossibly hard to look at. What I got was a man who inspires the courage in me – in all of us – to seek out the truth within ourselves and each other; who gives us all hope in a time that seems too overwhelmingly hopeless, who says “you can DO this” when we have been, for far too long, rendered too paralyzed by fear to attempt to do anything worthwhile.

As I have said before, you are not the BEST of us – you are the best OF us. It would be the easy way out to look to you to miraculously and single-handedly change the course of our history, to undo the incredible damage that’s been done, to right every wrong.

But the fact is that you can’t do that alone. You can only do that by reminding ME – reminding ALL OF US – that together, we can do whatever needs doing, and then some.

I wanted a man who could do good things. What I got was a man who invites me, along with my fellow citizens, to do GREAT things.

I wanted a man who wouldn’t let me down. What I got was a man who I don’t want to let down. And I hope I never do – because there’s so much of ME in you, and so much of YOU in me. And that, more than anything, says something important about both of us – about ALL of us, about who we are as a nation, as a people, as a family of world citizens who are about to change the world – together.

I just wanted to thank you for being who you are – the guy who reminds all of us who we will be, if we just allow ourselves to be who we can be. Because who we can be is something incredible.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hope you all will read it, understand it and appreciate it as much as I do.

Yurt
10-26-2008, 09:36 PM
snore

how is that different than mccain?

Kathianne
10-26-2008, 09:42 PM
and if one thinks McCain sucks, but Obama is not only not spectacular, but downright dangerous? No choice or applicability of such a spectacular post. :laugh2:

stephanie
10-26-2008, 09:45 PM
I've seen the name of this writer somewhere before..

I believe it's at the DuUnderground..

good grief, I wonder if they had an orgasm while they writing this...yuk

Psychoblues
10-26-2008, 09:49 PM
I've posted several things written by NanceGreggs in these forums, stevie, and all with permission.


I've seen the name of this writer somewhere before..

I believe it's at the DuUnderground..

I think you are probably correct about seeing her name in DemocraticUnderground. WTF was an idiot like you doing over there?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

:salute::cheers2::clap::laugh2::cheers2::salute:

theHawk
10-26-2008, 09:52 PM
Whoever wrote that sounds like a queer in love with Barack.

No1tovote4
10-26-2008, 09:54 PM
Just another one willing to drink the bathwater...

stephanie
10-26-2008, 09:55 PM
I knew I'd seen that name..and let me tell you, she is a doozy..I'll just leave it at that..:uhoh:

Sitarro
10-26-2008, 10:05 PM
All I really needed to see was the silly way she decided to spell Nancy....... what a rube. Could I get her address, I have a rotted out, pile of shit car with a new paint job I could sell her as new.:laugh2::laugh2::laugh2:

retiredman
10-26-2008, 10:17 PM
great piece...and the foilks here will be absolutely devastated when it comes true next Tuesday. We could even get our 60 senators by then as well and then.... adios Bushonomics. Adios Reagan/Gingrich conservative revolution.
:dance:

stephanie
10-26-2008, 10:19 PM
you and the Nance would make a great couple..

two people who live in la la land

retiredman
10-26-2008, 10:23 PM
you and the Nance would make a great couple..

two people who live in la la land

and we'll both be dancing next tuesday night....

and you'll sit on the sidelines and watch your conservative revolution swirl down the drain.

gosh...that's too bad.

Sitarro
10-26-2008, 10:27 PM
and we'll both be dancing next tuesday night....

and you'll sit on the sidelines and watch your conservative revolution swirl down the drain.

gosh...that's too bad.

I'm curious cookie, when Barry loses are you going to join the one black guy in Maine and riot?

Psychoblues
10-26-2008, 10:29 PM
Here is another piece that I have permission to post in it's entirety. The piece by Nance was the inspiration for the completion and the sharing of it with us. This one was written 40 years ago and just recently finished and named. It is a wonderful example of how far our dear country has not come in only 2 generations.

by nolabear

Forty Years On

It was April; azaleas hung like
promises of resurrection, delicate
in the Southern breeze.
I was thirteen, babysitting age,
trying to keep the neighbor’s kids
from killing one another over supper,
popping my fingers to WTIX out of New Orleans,
learning to do the Tighten Up, to Archie Bell and the Drells,
movin’ and groovin’. Then the music stopped:
“We interrupt this program—.”
My heart jumped up in my chest like a captive bird.
And before I even heard the words complete I heard
the tombstone in the voice on the radio.
Phrases dissolved to little snatches—
lone assassin,
shot dead—balcony—Memphis,
riots in the streets,
a familiar incantation:

“Requiem. Requiem.”

All night long they played that speech
that sounded like a sermon;
the dream and all God’s children.
The terrible things that people have done.
The terrible things that people will do.
They played “We Shall Overcome,”
on my very own radio, on WTIX out of New Orleans.

When they said that people danced in the streets,
they meant my people.
Good People.
My streets.
The faded “Coloreds Only” sign still hung,
not on some crumbled antebellum plantation
half a world away,
but on the stair up to the balcony
at the Ritz Theater,
not half a mile away.
And even if that law about that balcony wasn’t law any more,
fear still hung in that flower filled spring air
like nooses in the trees,
a portend of the strange fruit yet to be borne.
And I didn’t know if it was all right to cry,
because I was tainted, too,
pinned beneath the RESERVED signs
on the tables in my grandparents’ café,
where the cigarette ad on the door said
“C’mon in, it’s KOOL inside,”
and everybody knew who could come on in,
and who could not.

I knew there would be loud talk.
I knew there would be hot anger.
I knew there might be bright blood.
But I didn’t know if I ought to be afraid,
and I didn’t know who to be afraid of,
because what needed to be overcome was me.

And the black preachers and the white preachers
preached their sermons come that Sunday,
and the black choirs and the white choirs
sang their hymns about the Blood of the Lamb,

and the interviewers interviewed the candidates on TV,
who said that they would help us,
but they didn’t know how to help us.

And we thought we might not survive, but we did,
or most of us did, though forty years on
it’s all so much the same.
We’re still tired and confused,
and our children still hear
tombstones in the voices on the radio.
And the preachers still preach, and the choirs still sing
and the candidates still say they know the way.
But there are nooses in the trees,
Good People,
there are nooses in the trees.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I find it enormously helpful in my political deliberations within myself as I contemplate this election cycle and especially after having been so exposed to exactly what is being said right here on the DP Message Board.

retiredman
10-26-2008, 10:30 PM
I'm curious cookie, when Barry loses are you going to join the one black guy in Maine and riot?

he's not gonna lose.

wanna put your money where your mouth is?

I'll bet you $100 that Obama wins next Tuesday.

Mr. P
10-26-2008, 10:37 PM
great piece...and the foilks here will be absolutely devastated when it comes true next Tuesday. We could even get our 60 senators by then as well and then.... adios Bushonomics. Adios Reagan/Gingrich conservative revolution.
:dance:

She may be, but intellectually she's brain dead. I know ya like yer women like that...seems psycho does too.

Sitarro
10-26-2008, 10:42 PM
he's not gonna lose.

wanna put your money where your mouth is?

I'll bet you $100 that Obama wins next Tuesday.

You didn't answer my question. I never bet with dishonest people, what would be the point, liars never pay their bills and a lying Democrat tries to get some one else to pay theirs. Keep your money, you'll need it.

retiredman
10-26-2008, 10:47 PM
You didn't answer my question. I never bet with dishonest people, what would be the point, liars never pay their bills and a lying Democrat tries to get some one else to pay theirs. Keep your money, you'll need it.

there are a lot more that one black person in Maine. I would never riot over an election.

so...you admit that you're all hat and no cattle? Why am I not surprised?

Yurt
10-26-2008, 11:35 PM
there are a lot more that one black person in Maine. I would never riot over an election.

so...you admit that you're all hat and no cattle? Why am I not surprised?

:lol:

you have the nerve to go around the board and spell/grammar check others.....

Psychoblues
10-27-2008, 01:34 AM
Share with us a bit of your intellect, p.


She may be, but intellectually she's brain dead. I know ya like yer women like that...seems psycho does too.

Perhaps a stanza or so about the ol' man and his trophy veep candidate?!?!?!?!?!??! Just an idea to get you started!!!!!!!!!!!!:laugh2:

:salute::cheers2::clap::laugh2::cheers2::salute:

Psychoblues
10-27-2008, 01:59 PM
No shit?!?????????!??!!?!??!:laugh2:


and if one thinks McCain sucks, but Obama is not only not spectacular, but downright dangerous? No choice or applicability of such a spectacular post. :laugh2:

:salute::cheers2::clap::laugh2::cheers2::salute:

Binky
10-27-2008, 02:03 PM
Just another one willing to drink the bathwater...


Yuk! That's an appetizing thought!

Psychoblues
10-27-2008, 09:00 PM
Disgusting, isn't it, binky?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?



Yuk! That's an appetizing thought!

:salute::cheers2::clap::laugh2::cheers2::salute: