It has been a bittersweet year for the Conejo Valley. We’ve seen the worst—a crippling downturn in the housing market, a rash of store closings, a sharp increase in unemployment, the reelection of Elton Gallegly and Audra Strickland, the election of Tony Strickland, the passage of antigay legislation—and we’ve seen the best—the election to the presidency of Barack Obama.
Only one mark in our favor seems trifling, pitiful, laughable. But it is not. The nation can always and forever be proud to have elected an African American to the highest office in the land. The Democratic party can always be proud that it was the first party to successfully run an African American candidate. But most of all, the American people can never cease to be proud of what it has accomplished by the election of this man to the White House.
We have rejected eight years of regressive policies, economic mismanagement, willful ignorance, and petulant statesmanship. We have accepted in its place a new openness. We have confirmed America’s place at the standard bearer of liberty, as a place where the Constitution, not a muddled theocratic conception of the world, is the highest source of law. We have reclaimed our rightful place among the community of nations.
Barack Obama, there is a lot on your shoulders, but we believe in you. Do not ever be discouraged. There is a nation depending on you.
There was a telling few seconds of video on the NBC Nightly News the other night. The story dealt with California’s fiscal crisis and Republican obstructionism. A brief snippet of video showed Tony Strickland in the Senate chamber lethargically poking away at a Blackberry while the important business of the state passed him by. His answer to the budget crisis was a simple “no.” No is not a responsible answer. No simply abdicates responsibility to someone else. No is not leadership.
It would be easy at this point to bemoan the loss of Hannah-Beth Jackson to Strickland in the narrowly contested Senate race. But what matters is where we go from here. We have a budget; there is still much work to be done. So Democrats lick the wounds they’ve suffered from during the last year, but can be confident in the knowledge that they have won the fight—and that their good work will continue to invigorate our nation.
