What Obama's Election Really Means To Some People

The right is often trying to ridicule Obama by calling him names like The One or the Messiah. Even Elliot Stearns is fed up with what he feels is deification of Obama.

What Elliot or the baser bloggers on the right or even I can't fully comprehend is what it means to some people.

Maybe this, from Renee Crawford, will help:

My husband and I watched the 10:00pm pronouncement of our new president alone in our bedroom. We just sat there silent, he grabbed my hand as the tears started to run down my face and we let it sink in. After about 15 seconds though, I heard my father scream and we met on the stairs with him shouting and cheering and then, he grabbed me and broke down into tears. Watching my 77 year old father fall into sobbing tears when Barack Obama was elected president by the people of this nation was an overwhelmingly emotional thing for me personally.

My father actually started crying that morning. When I came down the morning of November 4, 2008, my father was watching the television with tears in his eyes. I plan to write an entire blog on my parents at some point (although this really should be a novel), but suffice to say that a 77 year old African American man who served his country as a hero in the Korean War only to come home to the severe racism of the late 1950's in America, who 10 years later married a white woman from Neenah, WI when that was illegal in 38 states, who raised 4 successful biracial children in a time when the national was in unbelieveable turmoil, who has been personally discriminated against more times than any human being should ever have to endure, and through all of it, became a leader in his community, fought on the front lines of the civil rights movement with his children at his side, a man admired and respected by all who know him, a suburban soccer dad, a grandpa extraordinaire, a father to all he knows, a husband of 42 years to my lovely and strong and beautiful mother, always keeping his sense of humor, his love for all of humanity and his love for living, to see a man I've only seen cry a few times in my 41 years and only at the loss of his closest and most adored relatives. To see my father openly sob as he said, "I never thought I could live long enough to see this." All those years of disappointment that he held to himself just poured out of those tears.

The tears were not entirely sad, they were full of joy, love for our country, patriotism beyond patriotism and love for all Americans. They were tears that all those who came before, those my father knew and worked with to make this country look beyond skin color, that their work was not in vain. They did something then so profound that the fruits of their sacrifices had taken longer than they hoped and shorter than they imagined. The tears were full of hope and optimism and dreams and they were followed by dancing, cheering, setting off fireworks, and we laughed and listened to our neighbors, friends, the students on UWM's campus as they did the same.

Do read the whole thing, then take some time to reflect on it. Then gripe if you want, but it will only make you look jealous and petty.