Political Rant #1

It's a new year, and with the onset of a new year the political landscape of the country (the United States, my country for the off chance that I get some outside of the US folks here) will be changing for the foreseeable next four years. Actually, the political landscape changed the moment Obama, who will be the Commander in Chief tomorrow, was declared winning of the election that didn’t seem to end and whose platform was based solely on change and the phrase “Yes. We. Can.”
He not only won the electoral vote, but he handily won the popular vote too (54%, with Virginia voting Democrat for the first time in decades while not bothering to count the military absentee ballots from overseas) and became the first president of African descent to become the president of the most powerful and influential country in the history of the world.
While it is a great thing that he got elected I have many reservations about Obama.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not bitter in the least. I’m actually very happy that such a man was finally elected in to the highest office that can be held in our country. I am, however, frustrated with the ‘why’ he was voted in.
You see, people were eager to vote somebody in because he promised ’change’ while his absolute lack of experience when it comes to leading anything. Change and the unthinking hate directed at President Bush who had the unfortunate timing to become president of the US months before the events of Sept 11, 2001; an event that obviously set many more events and decisions in to motion the war that was to come.
I guess the thing the disgusts me the most at this point is the media’s willingness to take sides in politics with 3/4ths of the media fawning over Obama while doing everything they could to smear/bury McCain with so much spin and vitrol that facts weren’t evident till the tail end of the election where by that time it was much too late for the Republican party to repair the damage that had been done.
But what’s done is done, but any faith in the media that I had (with the exception of Fox because they were the only ones I could get both sides of the spectrum on--seriously, I was deployed and watched CNN and FOX shows one after the other) which is a feeling that I think I will carry on in to Obama’s president where I will direct my disdain towards him for the crap that I watched and witness not only on TV but on the web where people no less then worshipped the man and sang praises in his honor.
I mean it’s only fair right? After putting up with 8 years of hear say and vitrol from people who want Bush tried on ‘war crimes’, a lot for deaths of soldiers and civilians in a war zone when the casualties in this war have been the lowest that we’ve ever had in a prolonged conflict since the Revolutionary War.

…but you know what? Tomorrow Obama will be elected, and maybe he’ll bring the change we need. Let’s hope so, because my gut, and experience tells me that this change could hurt us all in the wrong places.

And maybe my confidence in the man will grow