"Les chiens aboient, la caravane passe!" so goes a French saying. ("The dogs bark, but the caravan goes by").
Barack Obama's election in 2008 was enthusiastically historic in more ways than one for a great number of American citizens. In fact, each of the voting citizens of America had his or her own reasons for electing the first-ever African-American president of these great United States of America. I was part of that once-in-a-lifetime campaign and, after volunteering for the "Yes We Can" movement starting in 2007 all the way to the election night of 2008, and after casting my vote for both the movement and for Barack Obama, I fortuitously gave my reasons to MSNBC in Harlem on that unforgettable election-winning night.
But a minority, albeit an incredibly loud populace and its leaders in Congress, would not accept in their hearts the Obama win or acknowledge the historical precedence that states that once the elections are over, the elected president becomes the president of all Americans and that Congress then puts the election behind and work together with the president for the betterment of our country and of all its people.
From the get-go, Republicans vowed to not only make Obama a one-term president, but make him fail as president. This isn't the place to debate their deeply held and hidden motivating reasons (the color of Obama's skin? The smart and great speaker that he is? His defense of women and children? Et patati, et patata... ).
President Obama, indeed, tried and even did bend over backward to please Republicans so that they could join him in working together for the good of America, to no avail.
Essentially, from 2008, the president and the Democrats have governed and driven the American "caravan" alone with the Republicans turning themselves into barking opponents who have hoped that by not being part of the caravan and by incessantly barking "failure!", "repeal!", "failure!", that the U.S. chariot would have fallen into a ravine, or at least into a ditch so that the driver, Obama, would be blamed. Sometimes they have even attacked the front horses in order to stop the caravan in its tract by shutting down the government.
Nonetheless, Obama, the Democrats, and the American people did well in his first term and he has kept the U.S. caravan going well and putting it on a better road to the future, especially with his signature healthcare legislation, the Affordable Care Act.
Fast-forward to the second term of President Obama. What's up with it on both sides of the aisle?
On one side, there are still the Republicans' barks that are getting louder and coming from all over the place: Iran, Syria, IRS, Ukraine, Iraq III, Benghazi, now even the speaker of the House wanting to sue the president of the United States for being the president of the United States. How ridiculous can blind hatred and disrespectful contempt get? Where is respectful media outrage?
This, of course, is part of the Republicans' strategy: to keep barking until November so that the Democrats won't concentrate on a campaign strategy needed for them to get the majority in the House that will allow them to implement the agenda that will move America to a better future.
Therefore the president needs to focus on driving the American caravan and stop paying attention to the distraction that is the Republican daily barks (did you notice we don't hear the one about repealing Obamacare any longer?).
It is time for the president to get on the road in order to speak about and to celebrate with the American people the good and the positive things they have accomplished together.
President Obama needs a "What We've Achieved Together" campaign throughout America -- and make it his last campaign that he will ever run; i.e., tour American learning institutions -- in order to remind Americans how he, and the Democrats, and the American people have, together, and this in spite of the party of "No!", put our country on a better path for a great future. The president needs to stop being so humble (or shy) about what he has achieved and instead boldly -- after all, he's the "decider" -- claim CREDIT for himself, for the Democrats, and for the American people for the achievements which include saving the American economy and creating millions of jobs, for ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for getting Osama bin Laden, for not getting America into unwise and unwinnable foreign wars, for the energy of the future policy, for saving our environment, for giving Americans the road to a healthier and a better health with the Affordable Care Act that, not only saves lives, but also it keeps families from financial bankruptcies and ruin, for equal pay for women, and all his other social accomplishments.
And, in order to lighten up the What We've Achieved Together campaign, the president can mention the many times the Republicans have barked to "repeal" Obamacare, or the new state legislations by Republicans to keep Americans from voting, etc.
This campaign should result in Americans choosing representatives and senators who will work with the president in order to build a greater America.