On his 47th birthday yesterday, Barack Obama gave his most important, pivotal speech ever.
More so than his lauded 2004 Democratic convention speech, more so than his Iowa monologue on the third day of January this year, more so than his speech on race relations during the Rev. Wright controversy, more so than him accepting his party’s nomination in the incipient stages of June, and more so than his speech two weeks ago in Berlin.
Lansing, Michigan, the hone of Michigan State University, was the site of the Illinois Senator greatest conversation to an audience in attendance.
From the outside perspective, and from the narrative delivered by the traditional media outlets in the country (looking more for the excoriating soundbite on John McCain to paint Obama’s as practicing negative policies as the one who spews “hilarious” ads in unfunny times ), this speech was about his full energy policy for this country. But from a deeper conspicuous stand point, his comments in the capital of the Keystone state were ones directed fully to an entire nation extremely vulnerable to the difficulties and challenges this county is currently facing, and may continue to face. Especially this poignant one:
“For the sake of our security, our economy, our jobs and our planet, the age of oil must end in our time.”
It is a request, and a plea, for those from the 48 state mainland, in Hawaii and especially in the near arctic shores of Juneau. A plea where you don’t need to understand even the slightest bit of economics to know how serious the statement was from the presumptive nominee of a party, looking to push energy conservation that differs from the constant rhetoric of offshore drilling.
A stringent viewpoint that needed to even be slightly made flexible by Obama, who sees people are hurting at the pump just like he sees people hurting with their houses being taken way, their jobs being lost, and their belief in the American Dream severely tested. He is cognizant of the fact that he had to show something for those who still don’t understand that (or don’t want to understand) McCain, George Bush, and the House Republicans’ theatrical performances for drilling on the nation’s shores won’t alleviate the price at the pump in the slightest bit.
With that showing of concern to even put himself through the incongruous and idiotic label of him “changing or altering his views” or “flip-flopping” (a word the media loves to use quicker than they ever do to admit a mistake) on this, Obama however asked deep questions on his 47th birthday to us; to make the choice that could changed this country’s future forever. And for the better.
“Will we be the generation that leaves our children a planet in decline, or a world that is clean, and safe, and thriving? Will we allow ourselves to be held hostage to the whims of tyrants and dictators who control the world’s oil wells?”
“Or will we control our own energy and our own destiny?”
It is a message that won’t struggle to resonate if people understand fully how high the stakes are. If they get through the heavy hits of truth Obama delivered to the petroleum conglomerates and labeled McCain as an oil craven just like Bush, they’ll see the even bigger picture. And frankly, if you look right at the campaign team and staff of the so called “Maverick”, he surly isn’t a maverick when it comes to the 29 oil lobbyists part of his squad, isn’t he? If they get though the “analysis” of the speech from some network pundits who repeat each others talking points like they are PR people one after another, highlighting just his differences with McCain then doing their jobs and seeing who’s telling the truth and whose being “a politician.”
If they get though those things and a few more, they will clearly see and remember the sense of urgency not only Obama showed on the day where his 48th year on Earth started, but also in the current times upon us. If the former Harvard Law Review president had to convince you that “This is why this election is the most important of your lives,” then please, convince yourself now to do so. And if there is anyone that you know that hasn’t been swayed in the least bit, try your best to sway them.
Obama yesterday featured a tone that amalgamated optimistic realness with a sense of deep desire for those to wake up and see how critical it is to make the right choice now. He told us that the road was not going to be easy if he was elected president, at all. He told us that things aren’t peachy and creamy, and that when he is president, the road is going to still be a bumpy ride. In short, he gave you the “straight talk” that the Straight Talk Express can’t give you.
But he was the total obverse of pessimism at the same time, putting his trust in the nation and believing that the turn around back to economic prominence can happen if people are willing to join along in the sacrifice for our country’s amelioration. And oh, being knowledgeable and informed citizens, something we have lacked in this country for a countless number of years.
If it takes you until November 4th to choose who is your choice to lead us from the disasters of this administration, then so be it. But by then, the reasons for the right choice should be so exponential that you wouldn’t be able to raise it to another power (and that will certainly hold strong for those who liked or hated algebra).
And one of them definitely should be a real, true, and pre-energy policy, even if you aren’t well versed in that discussion as in other areas.
“When it comes to our economy, our security, and the very future of our planet, the choices we make in November and over the next few years will shape the next decade, if not the century. And central to all of these major challenges is the question of what we will do about our addiction to foreign oil.”
It is a topic worth full supplication to not only the oil companies’ practices, but also to yourself. This isn’t a request of you dumping the car you have now and be mandated to get an electrical powered car or to ride a bicycle more (because I certainly can’t ride a bike myself anymore), or you becoming fully an environmentally first individual. Senator Obama didn’t say that, and neither do I. It is a request though to acknowledge and realize what is real and what is true, that this country is painfully addicted to “Texas tea” (fitting that is where our current president is from), and its addiction can be more pestilent to us than ever before if we don’t control it.
We will wage unjust wars for it like we are doing now. We will let speculators overseas play us as greedy fools by telling us what price is best for their barrels of fuel, like these barrels are the soccer players priced at ridiculously high levels of currency and soled for those same figures. Or that those barrels are valued as high as Angelina Jolie’s and Brad Pitt’s asking price for the pictures of their two kids. We will let gas prices go up even more and prevent most families from even thinking about trips (because we are already at the stage where some can’t go them). Or have Greyhound raise the price of bus tickets by five to 10% to trips slated for New York City, or Boston, or Washington D.C., or wherever your heart yearns for. It may alarmingly get to a point where oil becomes more valuable to us than food.
Scary and crazy as the last sentence is, with the way things are going at the moment, only the imaginatively challenged will take any scenario off the table. But the New York Times best seller doesn’t see it the upcoming years that way, thankfully.
“Well that’s not the future I see for America. I will not pretend the goals I laid out today aren’t ambitious. They are. I will not pretend we can achieve them without cost, or without sacrifice, or without the contribution of almost every American citizen. But I will say that these goals are possible.”
Those goals, an increase in renewable energy and not giving sweat heart deals to the ExxonMobil’s of the world, are what was technically requested. But on his 47th birthday, Barack Obama wished for something more than those two valuable things. He requested that we, if we haven’t already, understand that our future is in own hands. And that we must make the choice, and care deeply about the consequences of that choice.
Take pride in that choice, because you never know if you’re going to have that choice again.
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