Reactions to the Obama victory from the blogosphere

Wow, I got a lot of hits on that last post, which got me to wondering what others have been saying in the last 48 hours or so. So here’s a semi-random sample of some of the Linux/free software/free culture bloggers that I read and enjoy, and their reactions to the Obama victory.

Penguin Pete – I Have Never Been This Shocked

My concession is that I have been too cynical before. I had given up on my country. I had seen too many former friends in the past eight years turn to enemies because they suddenly came out Red (as in Red State) and I would not be a party to their terror-mongering. I had seen too much civilization rot back to savagery. I had seen too much racism. I had seen too much enlightenment torn down by too much ignorance.

Roy Schestowitz – Change, Hopefully?

There will be a new guy and a new political party in the House. My personal feeling, however, is that the United States administration has done nothing to rid itself of corruption, despite the depression that seems to be coming as a result of deregulation. This means that those running the country will continue to be mega-corporations which fund and contribute to decision-making figures like Obama.

Aaron Seigo – Overcoming Cynicism

Can we overcome our cynicism and believe? .. and not in a God we can not see or in people we build up to heights they can never live up to .. but in each other as we are right now, tonight?

Works With U – Now The Real Work Begins

We’ve done a lot of things right — and a lot of things wrong — as a nation. Regardless of whom you supported in the US Presidential Election, it’s time for us to capture the energy we’re witnessing this evening and move forward. We’ve all got a lot of work to do.

Lawrence Lessig – Words Would Not Do

Words fail me.

Hi there. You know me, I’m Pete Daniels. The guy who wrote this. Today I’m going to write something a little different.

Last night I (of all people) was in downtown St. Paul, at the Minnesota DFL election day party. Now one thing you have to understand here is that the last time I was in downtown St. Paul I was assaulted and gassed and brutalized by the police state at the Republican National Convention. That was only two months ago, and my feelings about it are still fairly raw. Going back to St. Paul was slightly weird for me.

After Obama’s victory speech last night a few of us who were there went down to the place we were attacked on Labor Day. It was… an emotional experience for me, one that I’m not even going to try to convey here. No offense, but you just wouldn’t get it.

The whole night was incredible, and needless to say it was a hell of a party. I firmly expected a Democratic victory and I didn’t think it would be close, but holy shit. As Nancy Pelosi said in her press conference early in the evening, it would be “a wave upon a wave.” Fifteen seats in the House, four or five in the Senate. The rejection of the South Dakota abortion bill. And state after state, a wave upon a wave for Barack Obama. As we were getting ready to leave for the party last night ABC called Pennsylvania for Obama, and I looked to the person I was with and said “It’s over. This is what you’re going to see for the rest of the night.” And damned if it wasn’t.

Last night in St. Paul grown men wept and people danced on Kellougg Boulevard. Strangers embraced, children stared, and everyone got totally hammered. A few blocks away, two Americans (who by the way, love each other very much) stood on a street corner and watched the lights reflecting off the river and listened to history happening above us, and in a small way took back the spirit of our city from a great darkness.

Do I sound like I drank the Kool Aid? I did not. I’ve never made any bones about the fact that I wouldn’t vote for Obama, and I did not. I said in the post I linked to above that Barack Obama was “not the change we need,” and I stand by that. We’re in deep shit. America’s on the ropes and the world’s on the brink. We have serious problems and we need serious solutions, and no one man is going to magically fix things, and to project that sort of expectation on anyone instead of taking responsibility for our own lives and our kids’ futures is childish. Grow up. No one man can be “the change we need.”

We are the change we need. We have to be, or we’re finished. But even if Barack Obama getting elected President isn’t the change we need, it may very well be the chance we get.

Let none of that diminish the fact that we saw history last night. In twenty years, you’ll remember where you were.

-p.

For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime — two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century.

Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us. There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after the children fall asleep and wonder how they’ll make the mortgage or pay their doctors’ bills or save enough for their child’s college education. There’s new energy to harness, new jobs to be created, new schools to build, and threats to meet, alliances to repair.

The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even in one term. But, America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you, we as a people will get there.

There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as president. And we know the government can’t solve every problem.

But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And, above all, I will ask you to join in the work of remaking this nation, the only way it’s been done in America for 221 years – block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand…

This victory alone is not the change we seek. It is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were.

It can’t happen without you, without a new spirit of service, a new spirit of sacrifice. So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of responsibility, where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves but each other…

In this country, we rise or fall as one nation, as one people.

…Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Let’s talk, America.

Good afternoon, friends. Let’s have a talk. It’s about Barack Obama. I’m concerned about you, America. It seems like you keep falling for the same tired shit over and over, and I’m concerned you’re getting played again. Now, I know you’re all “hope-y” and excited and everything, but please, folks. Let’s be rational about this. Let’s all take off those silly-ass rose colored Hope Glasses ™, and assess the situation like adults.

Let’s start abroad.

• Would Barack Obama get us out of Iraq? No.
• Would Barack Obama get us out of Afghanistan? No, quite the contrary, he wants more troops there.
• Would Barack Obama get us out of the World Trade Organization? No.
• Would Barack Obama pull the plug on our unceasing (and grossly expensive) support for the terrorist regime of Israel? No.

Okay, foreign policy thus covered, let’s move on to the home front.

• Would Barack Obama repeal the Patriot Act and roll back the police state that we live in? No.
• Would Barack Obama take action (be that in the form of impeachment or my preference, actual federal charges) against the Cheney-Bush Junta? No.
• Would Barack Obama fight for separation of church and state? No, he wants to expand federal funding for “faith based programs” (puke).
• Would Barack Obama stop this idiotic, agri-business funded push for ethanol, which is an expensive, inefficient fuel whose manufacture ruins our soil and destroys the economic stability of what’s left of our farm economy, and actually push for real renewable energy instead of this band-aid approach? No.

So where does that really leave us, America? What does that leave us with, other than the same tired platitudes about Hope and Change that the Democrats try to feed us every four years? What exactly are we talking about changing here, Barack?

Don’t mistake me here. Barack Obama in the White House would be a “change,” and even, compared to the terrorist junta that currently occupies said space, a “positive change.” But when you cut all the bullshit out, here’s the bottom line. Barack Obama’s change means “a change in the way the empire is run.”

And deep down, America, you know that’s not the change we need.

-p.

A brief letter to America regarding Barack Obama’s pastor

Dear America,

Have you all forgotten that our current sitting president thinks God told him to fucking invade Iraq?! And now you all decide to get worried about people’s religions? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!

Your pal,
Pete

Lessig on whether Hillary can win (and whether she should)

Yes, it’s another drive-by link post. Anyone who knows me knows how I feel about this election. If there’s not a masked man with a molotov running, I’m not interested, because that’s what I feel this country really needs. But Lawrence Lessig posted a very interesting 10-minute clip addressing what he feels (and I agree) is the myth that Hillary Clinton is the “electable” Democratic candidate, and why Barack Obama is better for the Democrats, and better for the country.

It certainly doesn’t change my mind fundamentally on whether the American political system is worthwhile, but it does shed a little light on what I think is the Democratic party’s key weakness this year (and every year for the last decade or so): not knowing when they’ve won. If any election in the history of presidential elections shouldn’t be about “electability,” it’s this one. All the Democrats have to do is point at the other podium and say “They fucked it all up!” How in god’s name can we not beat these crooked sleazebags? So why not vote your conscience?

In my view, going with Clinton merely repeats the mistake the Democrats made in ‘04 with John Kerry. Howard Dean would have won. You know it and I know it. It’s not time for centrism, electability, or bipartisan compromise. It’s time to shoot these lame ducks out of the fucking sky so we can get on with the serious business of fixing this country.

-pd-