In 3 and a half hours from now, the United States of America will welcome its 44th President.\u00c2\u00a0 President Barack Obama.\u00c2\u00a0 And a new era will begin, hopefully.<\/p>\n
No, I’m not talking about some touchy-feely, bleeding-heart-liberal, MLKjr, kinda era.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m talking about a new era for us in the peanut gallery.\u00c2\u00a0 That is, the era of paying attention.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
George W. Bush had something going for him his last term.\u00c2\u00a0 Those who hated him had written him off.\u00c2\u00a0 There was no need to pay attention to what he was doing because everything he was going to do was going to be steeped in failure.\u00c2\u00a0 By the time this recent Presidential Election got started, he only had the hearts and minds of 1\/5th of the country.\u00c2\u00a0 And one has to assume that many of those are probably party loyalists who feel it is their sworn duty to support ANY Republican President.\u00c2\u00a0 It seemed like somewhere along the way, a majority of Americans, though they loathed W’s performance as a President, decided, “Meh, we’ll just wait him out”, and then tuned out in favor of Dancing with the Stars.<\/em><\/p>\n So now we have this new guy coming in.\u00c2\u00a0 And in some sense, he still is a relative unknown, when you compare him to the typical life-span in DC politics.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s clear that there are many who desperately want him to succeed.\u00c2\u00a0 I suspect even some of the fifth who still like W, would love to see Obama succeed, thought they’d be loathe to admit it in public.\u00c2\u00a0 There is a collective weight on our shoulders in the form of this failing economy.\u00c2\u00a0 We desperately want someone to come along and lift it.\u00c2\u00a0 We want someont to come along and succeed<\/em> in lifting it.<\/p>\n But the key will be remembering that this is our burden to share with him.\u00c2\u00a0 The biggest role we have is to support his efforts.\u00c2\u00a0 That is, to support them by paying attention.\u00c2\u00a0 We cannot allow this “Hope for Change” to become insulation.\u00c2\u00a0 We cannot put so much trust in Obama that we stop paying attention.\u00c2\u00a0 Holding his feet to the fire when he walks astray will be our best contribution.\u00c2\u00a0 And we know the fifth will do that anyway.\u00c2\u00a0 The rest of us need to represent the rational and reasoned response.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n At least, that’s how I see it.\u00c2\u00a0 – Reverend What’s-His-Name?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In 3 and a half hours from now, the United States of America will welcome its 44th President.\u00c2\u00a0 President Barack Obama.\u00c2\u00a0 And a new era will begin, hopefully. No, I’m not talking about some touchy-feely, bleeding-heart-liberal, MLKjr, kinda era.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m talking about a new era for us in the peanut gallery.\u00c2\u00a0 That is, the era … Continue reading Attention Must Be Paid<\/span>