Give hope a chance

Hope is not dead yet, but it will be if the November elections go as they are being predicted.

As it stands, it looks as if Republicans will pick up a number of seats in the House and Senate, as well as some gubernatorial ones, minimizing the majority stronghold the Democrats currently possess. Supposing this happens, it will severely damage any progress made to reverse the mess left by the cowboy president W. We will, once again, be a doomed nation.

What Obama brought to the table was the idea that if we worked together as a country, differences aside, we could achieve the unfathomable. His 2008 campaign drove home the message of hope, this notion that there was a light at the end of the tunnel. After two years in the hot seat, many of those who put their faith in the president have begun to lose that faith, their hope is beginning to dissipate, or it already has. But, the question remains, is this loss of faith reasonable? Should the Democrats be blamed? Obama? Or should the blame continue to be put on the party who got us in the mess in the first place?

I don't know, nor do I want to get into the blame game. That gets us nowhere and provides no solutions or results. It's the constant bickering between those with different political ideologies that keep this country from moving forward, the unwillingness to work across the aisle or compromise that prevents progress. But what sets Obama apart from the rest, is that he understands this concept, but continues to be stonewalled by members of both parties depending on what initiative he tries to push forward. If it is a Republican-backed initiative, members of his own party try to shut him down. Same goes for Democrat-backed initiatives — he gets blocked by Republicans.

In fact, Republicans have made it their political prerogative to block anything Democrats attempt to do. Unwilling to put aside petty differences to work with Democrats to make this country better, the Republicans have made it abundantly clear they will do nothing of the sort. If they are granted more power come November these same problems will not only continue to exist, but be exacerbated as well. It's politics at its finest. It's about staying true to the base, not losing votes and regaining control of the country. The country's best interests are of no interest to Republicans, power is all they care about.

But what solutions have they offered? Where is their plan for America? They do not have one. Across the country their campaign strategy has been to attack Democrats for broken promises and not turning the country around fast enough. Are we forgetting it was eight years of Republican rule that got us in this mess? And what solutions are they offering? It seems to me they want to go back to the era of W, and we all know where that will get us ... doomed.

In this country we expect fast results and quick turnarounds, it's how we are programmed. But I think people are forgetting that two years ago Obama drove home another message, which was that change does not happen overnight. Two years is not enough time to turn around the abysmal state this country was in.

Syndicated columnist Tina Dupuy made some valid points in her column a few weeks back, some of which I will share with you here. 

"The fact is: Obama is a good president. He’s a centrist who is somewhere between what mouth-foamers on either extreme say about him. He does listen to all viewpoints, which makes people of some viewpoints – ironically – dislike him. He’s not the villain the insane Right says he is, nor is he the do-nothing turncoat the insane Left says he is.
Pulitzer winning fact-check site PolitiFact.com has diligently kept track of what this president has done and not done. By their count Obama has currently kept 121 promises. He’s compromised on 39 and broken 22. Currently, 81 are stalled, and 240 are in the works. According to their calculations he’s kept way over five times more promises than he’s broken. We aren’t on track to go back to the Moon by 2020, but he did fully fund the Veteran’s Administration as promised. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell wasn’t repealed two years ago, but the deficit is down 8% from last year. There’s still a 9.6% unemployment rate, but the economy is creating (as opposed to losing) private sector jobs."

Let's not forget about the health care legislation he finally pushed through and what he has done for education. Hope is not lost, but giving up on the administration and the Democratic party after two short years may hurt more than it helps. The idea is to move forward, not take steps back. All I am saying, is go to the polls this November and give the president we elected what he needs to come through on the change he promised. To remain despondent will doom us all.

'Illegal' being compared with 'N' word

Apparently on the twitter this morning there was a tweet saying  the term "illegal" was now considered a racist slur comparable to the "N" word. In effect, calling an undocumented person living in the United States an illegal is as bad as calling an African-American the "N" word. Hardly.

The "N" word has a longstanding history of being a derogatory term to describe African-Americans in an unflattering and harmful way. It is not a descriptive term with a factual undertone. Illegal simply describes the status of the individual. They are in this country without a visa, which means they are here illegally. Calling them illegal is simply stating the facts.

Unfortunately, I was not privy to the actual article and heard about this secondhand from my fellow editor Chris, so I may not be fully informed of the context of the article, but nevertheless it's worth discussing. Maybe their argument was to just call them "illegal" as opposed to "illegal immigrant" was derogatory. Even still, illegal is just a shortened version of illegal alien or illegal immigrant. Despite your views on immigration, it is hard to argue with the fact that they are here illegally, therefore making them illegal. It is simply a term that describes status. I find it comparable to calling someone in jail a prisoner or inmate. The "N" word does not describe status. It is a pejorative term, a common ethnic slur.

I understand we are living in an era of political correctness, but sometimes people get carried away. This is a classic example of going too far to be PC. When we start eliminating statements of fact, where does that leave us? My question is, would it be better to refer to undocumented "visitors" as "illegal aliens" or "aliens?" Maybe we should just call them visitors, permanent tourists or undocumented workers/immigrants. Can you imagine calling them the "undocumented ones?"

This is not about immigration, or how it should be handled, it's about how calling illegal immigrants "illegals" is in no way, shape or form anywhere close to using the "N" word. It is a statement of fact, not a racial slur. Just so we are clear.

At least they are not being referred to as "the unwanted." Then, you might have an argument.

The link to the "Drop the 'I' word campaign": http://colorlines.com/droptheiword/