Hope, Disappointment, Despair, Outrage, and back to Hope

Admittedly, I voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primary, and I mostly voted against McCain in the general election, but a part of me longed for the hope and change that Barack Obama promised.  I had a young child, how could I not want things to be better for him than the way things were looking?  But it soon became apparent, and increasingly so, that change was not coming and hope might be futile as well.  Eighteen-plus months into his presidency and Guantanamo is still open, we're still in Iraq and Afghanistan, wireless wiretapping has been expanded, torture methods are still on the books, DOMA stands solid, the wealth gap is increasing, average folk are hurting financially and unemployment is high.  We did get health care reform, but the health care reform we got still leaves lots of room for inflated costs, high insurance company profit margins, and exorbitant executive benefits packages.  Similarly with college loan reform and financial oversight and consumer protections.  It's been too little, too late and poorly executed.

I realize that Obama is not alone in the blame, our Congress has also done their part.  One party is obstructionist, and the other ineffectual.  Hell, I haven't even been horribly thrilled with the judiciary lately, except for in the case of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.  On that issue, the presiding judge took the correct stance and even made sure her ruling had teeth.  DADT was declared unconstitutional and an injunction was declared, having the net effect of killing DADT, something that Obama has said he wants done.  Simple, right?  The judge took the decision out of the hands of the legislature and still got what Obama wanted.  Yeah!!! 

So why's the Department of Justice asking for a stay and considering an appeal of the judges decision?!  They claim they have to uphold the law, but DADT is already only sporadically enforced.  The judge's decision does leave the law on the books, but as an unconstitutional law, which would not be able to be enforced at all.  I'm not sure that there's a functional difference there?

All of this is to say that I'm really pissed off and fed up with the lies out of this administration.  Today I hit a brick wall.  I couldn't help but have a good long cry.  And then I hit the heavy bag for a while.  I hugged my baby little boy (he's five in just a couple of months!?) close and promised he'd have a better life if it took every once of fight I had in me until my last dying breath.  Now I'm sitting and watching Amandla while I write this, and I can't help but be inspired.  Individuals can make a difference.  We can change things for the better.  We can start a revolution.  We can love one another.  We can leave our corner of the world a little better than we found it.  That is all we can do, and it is all that we must do.  Let it begin with me. 

Now to complete my circuit back to some semblance of hopefulness, I'm going to have some spreadable chocolate.  It may or may not be spread on anything.