Agreeing with Obama

(from a speech by Barack Obama, a U.S. senator from Illinois, at the Take Back America conference on June 14, 2006...)

i've heard very few major political figures of any stripe have the courage to call the bushco strategy for what it is - social darwinism...

The problem is not that the philosophy of this administration is not working the way it's supposed to work; the problem is that it is working the way it's supposed to work. They don't believe -- they don't believe that government has a role in solving national problems because they think government is the problem. They think that we're better off if we just dismantle government; if, in the form of tax breaks, we make sure that everybody's responsible for buying your own health care and your own retirement security and your own child care and your own schools, your own private security forces, your own roads, your own levees.

It is called the "ownership society" in Washington. But, you know, historically there has been another term for it; it's called "social Darwinism"...

and, so, as progressives and liberals, what is it that we want in its place...? corny as it may sound, it's really nothing more or less than the golden rule...

[Americans] know the government can't solve all their problems, but they expect the government can help because they know it's an expression of what they're learning in Sunday school. What they learn in their church, in their synagogue, in their mosque - a basic moral precept that says that I have to look out for you and I have responsibility for you and you have responsibility for me, that I am your keeper and you are mine. That's what America is.

and he echoes a very deep passion of mine - the need for leadership...

We're tired of being divided. We are tired of running into ideological walls and partisan roadblocks. We're tired of appeals to our worst instincts and our greatest fears. So I say this to you guys, that America is desperate for leadership. I absolutely feel it everywhere I go. They are longing for direction and they want to believe again.

i have a thing about leadership, primarily because i see so very damn little of it in today's world... and, i believe it is not only americans who are crying out for authentic leadership, i believe the WORLD is crying out for it...

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