The Obama Victory

I'm down at the Blind Beggar where, amongst a great many other things, I blog political news for their groundbreaking and wildly successful newsletter; "Beggar Blast". It's a Sunday, there's a band named "Double Ds and the B.J." up on stage and I'm drinking a coffee absolutely drenched in at least three types of booze. And trying to get my head around it all. The Obama victory. "Why not write it up for our groundbreaking and wildly successful newsletter," Pat advises me, after I yammered about it to him non-stop over a very decent soup. Like I have a choice to write about the thing but Pat is good about giving me a deadline to utterly bust and drag around with me. A topic this time as well, though I’d already assigned it to myself, had been writing about it for a few years now.

Getting drunk. With fun new friends that can possibly teach me guitar. Being served big frothy beers by some very unique and sexy girls. Gained a scribe along the way, which is invaluable to a blogger on the run who’s usually ripped when his best work gurgles up from the primordial ooze. But only when the background music ain’t loud and my scribe can actually hear me, which is seldom in this joint, which means you gotta grab a piece of ‘puter whenever you can and fire out what blasts there be. Because the moment has to be encapsulated. And this is not just a moment. It’s a Moment. Know what I’m saying? I’m betting you do.

What does the Obama victory mean? To me? The culmination of years of writing vicious and cynical diatribes against a land of fools ruled by monsters, an American dream turned to nightmare, a world powerless but to sit back and watch a once noble country eat itself alive. Suffice it to say, it got ugly for a while there. Real ugly. So ugly the temptation is to pull it all out and explore it once more, call out those evil jackdogs and pirates just one more time because it’s what you’re used to, man! It’s what you feel strangely comfortable doing. And why not?

Lemme get it out of my system: George ‘Dubya’ Bush is actually a moron. A swaggering, snickering, half-retarded hick that broke almost anything worth breaking and within reach. And lied obvious lies about it. And didn’t really give a shit about it. And probably never will. That even red-meat Republicans seem ready to embrace this otherwise universally accepted truth is all the evidence you’ll ever need. George Dubya Bush is less like a presidential figure and more like a character in a sitcom. Like an evil Balki Bartacamus. He is a buffoon and often seems more interested in talking about what he’s had to eat that day then pressing matters of global concern. I could go on. Forever.

Point is, how can you talk about the Obama victory without talkin’ bout Bush? The Bush presidency was the end of the old ways. It brought every corrupt and filthy detail of how business goes down in the Halls of High Power to the forefront where even the American Idol crowd ever so slowly realized something was rotten in the land of the Free and Brave: criminals were at large and in charge. And it was funny at first, until countries got invaded, levvies started breaking, people started dying and global economies started crashing.

What can I say? From thence came Obama. Yeah. Guy talking straight about the whole thing. Saw him first at the Democratic National Convention in 2004, the brightest light of a party about to lose what should have been a no-brainer of an election. That’s what you get for nominating a largish chunk of wood for your presidential nominee. I won’t go into it. This is about ‘Bama, who was basically a total unknown in ’04 that went out there and laid down the thunder on that crowd and said it like it was and blew the socks off of anybody that heard him, including this lil’ blogger from Up North. Made me turn down the cynicism for a while and just listen. Which doesn’t happen a whole lot to us hardened, political blogger types. Almost never.

Second time I saw him was maybe six months later when he was being interviewed by Charlie Rose and I sat and listened to the 30 minute interview. Thinking oh man, if only you could get elected. Jesus H. Christ, just imagine it. Guy knows exactly what’s going on out there and has vision and may even be one those ‘Great Men’ that America produces now and again. And right then and right there I felt he had a shot at it. What he was saying struck a chord and I felt that a fella slingin’ truths in this time of very obvious and almost universal deception could maybe do quite well for himself. Especially as the obviousness just keeps getting obviouser. "Never happen," I said aloud to a messy kitchen, "they’d kill him if he ever got serious. Too bad." And went about my day. Even then just a little bit hopeful at what I’d seen.

Reflecting on the moment, I make a shooter of tonic and beef from my sandwich (that I’m told I swore at, which is weird) and have it sent to Pat. I’ve done this only twice before. We haven’t spoken about it since and may never. My scribe returns with his comely lady-friend and described to me a transcendental moment of mercy surrounding a sluggish fly and his sneaker whilst taking a dump and the whole time I’m trying to figure out what to do with my truck. I’m s’posed to stay at the bartender’s place tonight but can’t because my brother’s nailing her and I’m certain the sheets are glazed. I’d rather sleep on the floor, which, I’m told, is probably no better. Hey, am I gonna get in trouble for this stuff? What are the rules here? And where was I? Shit.

In late March of ’07, long before he’d announced his candidacy I had the following to say about America’s next president:

"the question in my mind is not whether he is the best candidate for ’08 but rather if America deserves him. And if they can elect him without killing him."

A very ugly caveat now echoed by almost anyone I talk to: "If they don’t kill him," they say. And people have a point. Abe Lincoln took a double-tap to the back of the head in a theatre. JFK was slain in the back of a convertible on a sunny day by more than one gun. Martin Luther King was killed outside his hotel room and he knew it was coming and had already accepted it. What I’m saying is America kills its great men. Which means George Bush’ll probably live forever. But Bama?

This is where I’m powerless but to delve into that strange realm that I find myself returning to now and again in my own personal odyssey, a realm where all my Science and my Logic and my Reason flies the coop because for a few seconds at least there’s something more powerful driving the whole show. It’s something that says relax, Sense. It’s not supposed to be like that. You haven’t gone through all that, caught a glimpse of the Sublime and the Greatness only to see a Great man’s head explode in a crimson mist, a return to crime, deceit and universal ugliness. As awful as we can be, we can be also great. Both sides of the binary exist within each of us and therefore collectively. Maybe I’m nuts. Certainly I’m nuts but hey, prove me wrong. You can’t. You can only prove me right.

Maybe sounds weird coming from a dude like me but that realm is a Faith in something much larger and greater than we can ever possibly fully understand. And you can call it Jesus or Allah or the Great Gazoo, I guess, so long as I can call it the Universe and we can all just agree to disagree and be done with it. But the point of the Faith angle is that sometimes you just have to believe. And I believe it’s time for greatness again. From even us Canadians. But that’s a whole other blog.

A ‘Bama victory is the triumph of Reason. Over Fear and Idiocy. Over mindless patriotic chestbeating and cheerleading and the denial of simple Truths. It’s an about-face, as in the whole ship turns around and goes back in the exact opposite direction, away from the Abyss and just in the nick of goddamned time. That’s what Obama stands for, that’s what the American people chose and the whole thing leaves me in a kind of pleasant shock. And there’s this Hope thing. You feel it too? I think maybe you do.

Anywho, they chose and they chose wisely. An Obama victory. That’s the first snippet of what it means to me. How far can it go? Maybe that’s a whole other blog. But a few years ago I started writing something that I’ve never stopped writing and the raw thrust of it is that I felt the whole world was on the cusp of massive impending change, one way or the other. It’s a Transcend or End kind of trip and nothing that’s happened since has proved me wrong. A vote for Obama was a vote to rise above the sludge and the crap and hatred and the fear and to think about what we can actually do with all our technology and smarts and internets and whatnot. The polar opposite of an Apocalypse has in the past been referred to as a Renaissance, which it may well be, if this cat’s the real deal and I’m certain he is. All of which is also a whole other blog. At the very least.

Peace, friends. And tip your waitresses.