Thoughts on the Inauguration
Jan. 20th, 2009 12:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janradderBeing 38, I, like the rest of my generation, am a child of Watergate and what I mean by that, is that I've never known a time when I didn't distrust our presidents or our government. I've heard countless members of my parents' generation talk about how, before Nixon, that wasn't the case. It seems hard to believe.
I can be horribly optimistic at times, but, even in those times, there is still this sneaking cynicism that colors my view of the world. And the changing of presidents does nothing to diminish that. Today is different, though.
I have no idea how Barack Obama will do as our president. I have no idea if he will ever come even close to fulfilling the hopes, dreams and expectations of the people who, like me, voted for him. But all the same, there really is something different about today's inauguration. Watching the people in the audience, listening to the news commentators and seeing the our new president sworn in, there is this overriding feeling of change and hope and optimism that I really can't ever remember seeing before.
Like I said, Barack Obama may never be the president so many of us hope for but I just don't find myself thinking about that right now. It's hard to stay cynical when 147 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, 55 years after Brown v. Board of Education, and 44 years after the Voting Rights Act, you've seen a Black man finally sworn in as President of the United States.
I can be horribly optimistic at times, but, even in those times, there is still this sneaking cynicism that colors my view of the world. And the changing of presidents does nothing to diminish that. Today is different, though.
I have no idea how Barack Obama will do as our president. I have no idea if he will ever come even close to fulfilling the hopes, dreams and expectations of the people who, like me, voted for him. But all the same, there really is something different about today's inauguration. Watching the people in the audience, listening to the news commentators and seeing the our new president sworn in, there is this overriding feeling of change and hope and optimism that I really can't ever remember seeing before.
Like I said, Barack Obama may never be the president so many of us hope for but I just don't find myself thinking about that right now. It's hard to stay cynical when 147 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, 55 years after Brown v. Board of Education, and 44 years after the Voting Rights Act, you've seen a Black man finally sworn in as President of the United States.
