How Strange the Change

Obama or McCain. Black or white? Young or old? A wave of change or more of the same – only, just possibly, incredible to think, just possibly worse?

History is in the making. Not the kind of history in which the economic fundamentals are changed, but history nonetheless, of one stripe or another. The question, as the final countdown to polling day begins, is what stripe?
The dead hand of the fundamentalist neo-con Republican right has dragged us all down, over the past eight years. It has dragged us down and then further down again, until it seems like the whole world is on its knees. And then it has dragged us further and more and deeper down, right down, into the mire until it seems like we are all up to our necks in it.
Under George Bush almost everything that could have been mishandled was. It was an era during which hope took a back seat. Compassion too. Driven mad by power, fuelled by greed, and high on the assumption of their own invincibility Bush and his crazed mob of imperialist blood suckers brazenly fucked the underprivileged at home and indulged in wanton rampages abroad.
And other leaders of the so called free world played along. He was poison in the bloodstream. They proved themselves to be little better. This is the Bush legacy: a world where the best lack all conviction and the worst are full of passionate insanity.
The Bush legacy is a divided society. The Bush legacy is a fractious world. The Bush legacy is an appalling war-toll of hundreds of thousands dead in Afghanistan and Iraq – and no end to the fighting in sight. The Bush legacy is billions upon billions of dollars wasted fighting the wrong war for the wrong reasons at the wrong time in the wrong way. The Bush legacy is torture in Guantanamo Bay. The Bush legacy is the American army in disgrace. The Bush legacy is dead Palestinians. The Bush legacy is New Orleans in ruins. The Bush legacy is the erosion of human rights by stealth. The Bush legacy is the suborning of the media. The Bush legacy is the sabotage of free speech. The Bush legacy is the rigging of elections. The Bush legacy is the freedom of those in power to abuse. The Bush legacy is the future of planet earth under threat.
The Bush legacy is the triumph of stupidity. The Bush legacy is dumb talk and bad jokes. The Bush legacy is dodgy deals. The Bush legacy is the ascendancy of self-interest. The Bush legacy is the systematic theft by the rich from the poor. The Bush legacy is werewolves on Wall Street. The Bush legacy is pyramid schemes and three card trick merchants. The Bush legacy is the house of cards falling down. The Bush legacy is corporate arrogance, fecklessness and irresponsibility. The Bush legacy is banks gambling with money that isn’t theirs. The Bush legacy is spiritual bankruptcy. The Bush legacy is negative emotional equity. The Bush legacy is the keys being handed back. The Bush legacy is lies in the public domain and hypocrisy in the private. The Bush legacy is hypocrisy in the public domain and lies in the private. The Bush legacy is wilful ignorance. The Bush legacy is religious fundamentalism. The Bush legacy is flat earth thinking. The Bush legacy is sick motherfuckers in charge. The Bush legacy is oppressing the already oppressed. The Bush legacy is corrupt to its very core.
And John McCain and Sarah Palin could be worse.
On the other hand, Barack Obama represents the possibility of a new deal. The possibility of renewal. The possibility of withdrawal. The possibility of détente. The possibility of investment in health and welfare. The possibility of a wind of change blowing through the festering corridors of power. The possibility of being able to breathe again without the fear of asphyxiating on the stench of institutional cynicism and bullying.
The possibility of a different way. The possibility of a reversal of the momentum towards an increasingly intolerant and authoritarian world. The possibility of compassion re-entering not just the vocabulary but more importantly the policies and actions of politicians and political leaders.
Of course it could all go horribly wrong, with Barack Obama in power. He could yet prove to be a man of straw. In the end he will be judged in the only currency that makes any sense, on his actions. But the sense of possibility is enough at least to brighten the morning of the election and to give us hope that we may be, right here, right now, at the very start of something good.
You know the answer. Sing if you feel it in your bones: how strange the change from minor to major...