Why I Support Barack Obama

I grew up in rural Kansas, with the kind of Norman Rockwell childhood you hear a lot about these days: our two-room school's baseball diamond was carved from a cornfield. My dad, who held Army medals for marksmanship, owned two rifles. I never killed a polar bear, or shot at wolves from a helicopter, but I took care of my share of rats at the garbage dump where we took our trash in those pre-green days. It's been a while since I held a rifle, but I used to be able to clean and fire a .25 pretty well.

Our family was typically American in other ways: we were a Heinz 57 mix of religions and ethnicities. One of my great-grandfathers was a Hasid, an ultra-orthodox Jew in eastern Poland; another studied for the Catholic priesthood before realizing that life wasn't meant for him. Other great-great grandfathers were part of the generation of Puritan preachers who settled New England in the seventeenth century.

In my family, as in so many blended American families, our central holiday was the Fourth of July. On that day, it didn't matter if you spoke to the Divine Presence in Hebrew or Latin or English; it didn't matter if the Divine spoke back to you through tongues or in Isaiah's still small voice, or didn't speak at all. What mattered was that we all came together to celebrate this sweet land of liberty.

On the Fourth of July, my father taught us the history of the country. My mother had my brothers and me memorize sections of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitution. We learned:

We the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do establish and ordain this Constitution for the United States of America.

We the People. Not, we the billionaires. Not, we the believers in Creationism. Not, we the oil industry lobbyists. Just, we the people.

This is why I support Barack Obama for President of the United States. He understands this mandate, and he has lived it during fourteen years of public service.

The Founders of this country could not have imagined our health care system when they wrote that they wished to "promote the general welfare." But they surely did not confuse "the general welfare" with the wealth and health of the few. In America today, we taxpayers give the Republican president and his would-be successor free health care of the highest quality in the world. When Mr. Bush returns to Crawford, and Senator McCain to Sedona, we taxpayers will continue to provide them this gold-plated health care. Meanwhile, Mr. Bush and Mr. McCain have told us taxpayers to go to the emergency room when we're sick.

Barack Obama, from the day he entered public life, has understood that we all share the blessings of liberty, and that we all share the costs and the benefits of those blessings. As a state legislator in one of America's largest states--with almost twenty times the population of Alaska--he worked with Republicans and Democrats to create affordable health care for Illinois children, so that when they were sick, or born with disabilities, their mothers didn't have to line up in an emergency room. He worked for the welfare of our oldest citizens, who had given a life of service to this country, and did not need to spend their final years in poverty and indignity. As a United States Senator, Barack Obama has continued that important, bi-partisan work.

When the Founders of our country talked about "establishing justice," they wanted justice for all Americans without fear or favor. We've lived in a poisonous atmosphere for the last eight years, where if you paid lip service to religion, you could buy and sell our natural resources while having cocaine and sex parties. You could fire federal prosecutors for not supporting the president. You could threaten to put librarians in prison for the crime of consulting a lawyer when the Department of Justice came calling at their libraries.

This is also why I support Barack Obama for President of the United States. He believes that justice means observing the law impartially for all, not just for the wealthy, not just for people who pay lip service to religious beliefs.

I have spent the last forty years working for women's rights to be treated as full and equal citizens under the law. And this is the final reason that I support Barack Obama.

I have a fourteen-year-old granddaughter, and like all grandmothers, my beloved granddaughter is dearer to me than anything else on this earth. I want her to grow up in a world where she can make the most important decisions about her life in the privacy of her home or doctor's office: her decisions about whether to become pregnant, whether to be a mother. She doesn't need a government telling her what to do.

Governor Palin has demanded privacy for her teen daughter's pregnancy, and for the Palin family's decisions about sex education and contraception, but the governor, and Senator McCain, both want my granddaughter's decisions to be the government's business.

If Barack Obama is elected president, he will keep the government out of our bedrooms. He will return our nation to the serious work the Republicans have abandoned for far too many years: providing for the common defence, promoting the general welfare, securing the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity.

Sara Paretsky is a writer whose most recent books are the essays Writing in an Age of Silence and the novel, Bleeding Kansas.

Comments

[yatzee11]

Baraq Obama is in the wrong party!!

It was the Democrats who fought to keep blacks in slavery and passed the discriminatory Black Codes and Jim Crow laws.

[KP1]

Excellent statement. Thank you. The founding vision for America is still sound and beautiful: Fairness, respect, honesty and a collective agreement to ensure all Americans equal voice and equal opportunity. That's the legacy we need to leave our children and our grandchildren. This is one of the youngest countries in the world. It was formed in response to tyranny and disrespect. There's still a lot of work to be done to realize that dream. We need to keep fighting to protect and to make it real. The selfishness and cynicism that we're seeing from the Republican leadership threatens to tarnish and erode the core of what makes America truly great. Of the two candidates running, only Obama seems to understand what's at stake.

[GunnyJ]

Excellent article. Obama/Biden '08.....

[chartridge]

http://www.englandforobama.com/help-us-out

"England for Obama" is a new movement and we need your help! Our small team of contributors can"t keep up with the fast paced political landscape as much as they would like. We are currently looking for English Obama supports to contribute to this website!

Duties include writing articles, linking to articles and of course keeping up with any new press related to the race for nomination and reporting on them here.

You would also be responsible for helping to grow the "England for Obama" campaign and hopefully help us to convince our cousins across the pond that their votes should go to Barack Obama!

[RobertHenryEller]

Many thought "WE are the ones WE've been waiting for" was some empty, feel good phrase. Neo-con cheerleaders like the New York Times' David Brooks wondered in print, "What does that mean?"

"WE" are the "WE" of "WE the People." That's what it means, Mr. Brooks. And it is not just words, Mr. Brooks. It is the most profound preamble in the history of government, and the absolute source of our Nation.

And if we've been waiting for ourselves, then it means that those who claim to govern us has not been serving us, and representing us as they should, under our laws.

It means that we've been letting those who claim to govern us get away with this.

It means that we must take our government back. Now. We have two strikes against us: 2000, and 2004. Look around you. Do you want to bet that you'll get another chance at bat after 2008?

WE ARE the ones we've been waiting for. What are YOU waiting for?

[imagram3785]

Thank you Sara. Thank you for supporting Barack Obama and for this terrific article. I agree with everything you said, but you expressed it much much better than I could have done. I wish that the Obama campaign leaders could get your article sent to all voters, including those voters who have yet to commit. I hope that more undecided people will "wake up", for if they don't, it won't be the roses we'll be smelling.
Loved your books too.

[jhNY]

The Constitution is no longer operative. We're all in the insurance business now, slaving away in accounts payable. Payable by us. Please lay off the ironic comparisons, as they are merely cruel given our great loss. The Constitution is just a piece of paper under glass downtown in DC, and almost nowhere on its pages does it mean what you think means. Ask a lawyer. He can explain it you.

[eka15]

You could not be more wrong. The Constitution is a living document that determines the entire structure of government around you, protects your civil liberties and establishes the common American spirit. Just because it was not written yesterday does mean it is not extremely relevant to the world today. It was relevant when it was created, seventy years later during the Civil War, one hundred and thirty years later during the women's suffrage movement, 170 years later during the civil rights era, a few years ago when the heinous Patriot Act was passed and in every court case in American history. What stopping it from being relevant today, roughly 220 years later. America would be nothing without the Constitution. Maybe you need to keep you mouth shut and go back to school.

[CalDoug]

Great post. It occurred to me recently that there is a fundamental difference in the parties' different emphases on the individual's obligation to society: essentially the difference between affirmative and negative obligations.
With Democrats, there is a recognition that, as you describe here, individuals should work together to benefit the nation, not just themselves (yes, a community organizer can be a good thing). With the Republicans, or at least the right wing, the focus seems to be that the nation is stronger when the individual refrains from anything the nation (at least as they view it) might find offensive (gay marriage, flag burning, criticizing the war, take your pick). I don't claim that this always accurately describes either party, but I think it does describe the overall tone.

Also, although not an original comment, I can't pass up the opportunity to tell Ms. Paretsky how much I enjoy the VI Warshawski novels.

[paulita]

It is good for some one to point out the actual hypocrisy of the Republican position. That´s what I can´t understand is how they can keep putting forth hypocritical views and some people don´t notice? For instance:

1. We are for the Founding Fathers and what they stand for and it should all be interpreted literally but--We only represent one segment of society, and the smallest segment at that--the rich

2. We want the government out of our lives but-- we decide whether you should have a baby, whom you should marry, when you should die, and every personal aspect f your life

3. We are pro-life but-- it´s our right to carry guns that no other purpose than killing people, i.e. AK 47´s.. and it´s good to shoot animals from helicopters

4. We are moralist--but we could care less about the environment as long as it interferes with our profits. Nor do we mind slaughtering innocent people in other countries or torturing others

5. We take the Bible literally- but we ignore all the parts about peace, humanity, and justice and only read the parts that justify our wars and bigotry

6. We are laissez-fare- but we vote against all bills that would help the average person achieve and grow .

and really the list could go on and on. I think we voters must think about whose really going to look out for the interest of We the People.

WAKE UP AMERICA!

[rwe]

And Sarah , Look at Chicago, Cook County, Illinois... In his years as community organizer, state Sen , Us Senator ,,, what has Barack done for We the people? John Mccain has a record ofr we the people

[Danigirl65]

If John McCain is so "we the people" why did he vote with Bush over 90% of the time?? Why has he flip-flopped to become the Republican's puppet if he is so "we the people?" John McCain is so hungry for the Presidency, he will say, and do, almost anything to get John Q. Public to vote for him. This man used to be a Maverick; the Maverick died with his presidential campaign in 2000. God Rest the REAL John McCain in peace.

[Gidster]

In Chicago He worked as a community organizer for three years from June 1985 to May 1988 as director of the Developing Communities Project, a church-based community wide organization in Greater Roseland, helping set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens. Communities that had over 200,000 residents!
That's all.
As a State Senator he was chairman of the Illinois Senate's Health and Human Services Committee and and led unanimous, bipartisan passage of legislation to monitor racial profiling.
As a US Senator:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bills_sponsored_by_Barack_Obama_in_the_United_States_Senate

[Burp]

Thank you for your honesty with this one. I respect Mr. Obama for his work in Chicago because I am a Chicagoan who has been there, seen it, lived and exsisted in the poverty that hits neighborhood such on the Southside.

Anybody who could step outside of neighborhood politicians to get things done in the capacity that he did it in.... should have been president years ago.

It has always been We the People with Barrack O.

Thank you again Sara Paretski

[greentipcove]

Sara...

I loved your article....great read...

[jtshp]

"We the People. Not, we the billionaires. Not, we the believers in Creationism. Not, we the oil industry lobbyists. Just, we the people."

Great line!

Thanks Sara.... Truly a fine article.

[dagnew]

Wonderful piece.

[naschkatze]

I love your books, but more importantly I love the way you have stood up for the Constitution in the wasteland years of the Bush Administration. We will win.