We stand today on the brink of a long awaited and sorely needed new dawn for America. It's difficult to be cynical on such a day; it's difficult even to revel in the schadenfreude of an outgoing presidency and a newly-irrelevant political party. On a day like today, the scales fall from the eyes of even one as jaded as myself, and for a brief moment, the raw possibility of the moment is electric. Never have we, as a nation, needed such a moment so badly. Never have we been so fallen, and not since the Civil War have we been so divided, one from another. Today sees us pulled up from the nadir of our course as a people, and to pass the word 'hope' about is neither hyperbole nor triteness. Hope is a palpable thing today. Hope for an end to our foreign wars. Hope for the end of torture. Hope for health care for every citizen. Hope for a new era of equality. Hope for a green future. Hope for a change in trajectory and an escape from the last eight years, years of ignorance, fear, and the gradual slide towards tyranny. Today, then, is a very important, a very hopeful, day indeed.
For the last few months, I've been less concerned with the inaugeration of Barack Obama than with the departure of G. W. Bush. The man, and by extension his administration, has represented everything wrong with modern America: the willful ignorance, the arrogance, the divisiveness, the sheer, unfathomable greed. Bush has been a specter and a bogeyman for anyone who cherishes the environment, personal freedoms, open discourse. I hate him of course; truthfully I hate what he has meant for this country, and what his continued political survival has meant about this country. Despite what Bush may think, history will in no way look favorably upon his terms, and I firmly believe that as the full scope of his actions are with time revealed, he will be recognized for the stain he truly is.
It's a sign of the the moment then, that as I sit watching the inauguration, Bush is now so far from my thoughts. It takes a remarkable magnitude of good will to overcome the bitterness in my heart, yet here I am. I, like so many people the world over, am dazzled. I am won over. I am drifting on the current of hope which has sprung forth after so long being stifled. The happiness, the very sense of well-being engendered by this moment is somewhat inebriating. Even Rick Warren, a blight on an otherwise pristine ceremony, is hardly dimming the gleam. This is the very thing we need to speed the forgetting, to speed the healing. What but this moment could eclipse the mistakes of our recent past?
I don't look to Obama as a messianic figure, and I don't step into this new era with my defenses lowered. I firmly believe in the corrupting influence of politics, and I ardently believe that sacrifices are made in the name of the greater good; Washington grinds down square-pegs into round ones, inexorably. Yet how can one not give themselves up to the gestalt spirit? How can one not abandon, even momentarily, their skepticism, in the face of such overwhelming joy? Today, we usher in a new President, but more than that, we usher in a new age for America. It's a time when hope can flourish, when the better angels of man's character are not detriments, but strengths. It's a time when the sins of the past are washed clean in the rising tide. We wade today in that tide, in the waters of hope. And for once, we wade together.
No comments:
Post a Comment