Democratic Convention Mini-Posts: Day Four

This election cycle, the Democratic Party's National Convention aligns with the beginning of my semester. While I wish I could write more extensive pieces, I suspect I will have to limit myself to shorter reactions and impressions of what I see and hear.

It has been said that actions speak louder than words. It is difficult to imagine a more powerful statement than holding an acceptance speech before not a crowded convention center but a full stadium.

It says more about Obama, who wants to involve as many people as possible, and the people, who are hungry for change, than I can.

Enjoy Stevie Wonder and the speech.

Democratic Convention Mini-Posts: Day Three

This election cycle, the Democratic Party's National Convention aligns with the beginning of my semester. While I wish I could write more extensive pieces, I suspect I will have to limit myself to shorter reactions and impressions of what I see and hear.

Last night, I was impressed by Senator Clinton's speech -- more than impressed. I won't claim I wasn't worried part way through. After all, it began to appear that she was beginning to give her usual campaign speech. Indeed, she did -- with one exception. She reminded us of why she ran. Then, she reminded her followers that the reason for any campaign is not (and must not) be about the candidate as a person. It must be about the vision that the candidate espouses.

This afternoon, she landed her second hit by moving that Obama be nominated by acclimation. There were only brief flickers when the political mask cracked and it was possible to see how much it cost her to make that movement towards unity.

It was, nevertheless, a historic moment. We now have the first serious African American candidate being pushed over the top by the first serious woman candidate.

Now, we will see if the next big one-two punch lands. Tonight, Senator Biden and President Clinton speak -- two men known for speaking their minds and being able to reach their audiences. In addition to the future of the race for the presidency, the present and future legacies of these men are on the line.

While Biden's speech, given that he is the man who will soon be one heartbeat away from the presidency, may be the more important of the two, President Clinton's speech may be more significant.

There are few men who are more capable than President Clinton of rising to such an occasion. I'm sure if you are reading this, you are going to watch (or have already watched) his speech and are looking forward to seeing it as much as I am.

Democratic Convention Mini-Posts: Day Two

This election cycle, the Democratic Party's National Convention aligns with the beginning of my semester. While I wish I could write more extensive pieces, I suspect I will have to limit myseff to shorter reactions and impressions of what I see and hear.

Today is an important anniversary. It is Women's Equality Day. Today, we honor and celebrate women finally winning the right to vote in national elections in 1920. The winning of that right, too long withheld, was no small achievement. It was done in the face of stiff opposition by those who believed that women were physically and mentally beneath men. Women were considered children.

Tonight, we will see one of two things: With the exception of Nancy Pelosi, the most important woman in the Democratic Party is giving the big speech at the Democratic National Convention. She will either inspire our party or wound our party. 

The challenge before her is, like that of the women who won the right to vote, is to show that she is not a child and that she can accept her defeat with the dignity and and poise that she has shown time and again in the past.

This will be no small achievement. Like her, I have lost elections and had to stand in public and be mature in front of the press when part of me wanted to hide or lash out. When I had to face that challenge, it was only in front of a local audience. People in Monroe, Union County, and throughout the greater Charlotte area watched my name flash up on their televisions -- in last place. Nevertheless, they universally said how proud they were and how much in awe they were that I got out there and ran.

Now she will have to do the same thing with the world watching.

Please don't misunderstand me. I am, like those people who spoke to me, in awe of what Senator Clinton did in her campaign. I watched her, clearly tired, keep moving and reaching out to those who were considering voting for her. I watched her make her pitch that she was the best candidate for the job. I am sure, in her heart of hearts, she still believes that.

If she wishes to remain merely a politician, she can damn Obama with faint praise or praise him well but drag her feet once the campaign leaves Denver. If she wishes to become the exemplar of something new on the American political scene -- the stateswoman -- is the real question tonight.

I have no doubt that she can do it. I desperately hope she will do it.

I must admit to a certain bias in this hope. It is not because of my preference for Obama. I believe she would be a fine president and, if she won, would have been proud to cast my vote for her.

The reason I want her to prove herself a stateswoman is because there is a good chance that my one year old daughter will be in the room when she speaks -- much like I was when the Apollo astronauts landed on the moon. I desperately want to be able to tell her that she was there and watching when Clinton gave the speech that inspired a new generation of women -- her generation of women -- to reach higher than they ever have before and believe that there is no job, no office, and no dream to great for them.

Senator Hillary Clinton has the opportunity tonight to prove that the American Dream is equally accessible to both halves of the country. I am looking forward to watching her do it.

Democratic Convention Mini-Posts: Day One

This election cycle, the Democratic Party's National Convention perfectly aligns with the beginning of my semester. While I wish I could write more extensive pieces, I suspect I will have to limit myself to shorter reactions and impressions of what I see and hear.

One of the themes of the Obama campaign has been hope. I suspect the only word you are more likely to hear or see at one of his rallies, meetings, and appearances is change. Listening to tonight's presentations, I think I learned something important about hope. Hope is not an unachievable dream or delusion based on denial. Hope requires and acceptance of the reality of the situation without being so dominated by that situation that you cannot imagine it changing for the better. That acceptance of a reality that can be changed echoed through all of the speeches. 

You could hear it in Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr.'s references to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech. Dr. King knew he might have to pay with his life to help bring about a better future for his children and his friends' children. I am sure he would have been more than proud to see his friend's son serve his country in the House of Representatives and continue that legacy of hope when he spoke at the convention of the party that forced through the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960s.

You could hear it in President Carter's video presentation as he discussed the failures of our government in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. Yet based on his work with Habitat for Humanity and in working with people around the world, he could still believe that it was possible for those failures to be overcome.

You could hear it in Senator Ted Kennedy's speech. He knows he is dying. Nevertheless, he has not given into despair and believes that he may yet live to see his life's goal -- the establishment of health care as a fundamental right rather than a privilege of the elite. With a nod to the premature deaths of his brothers, however, he bravely and selflessly reminded us all that the most powerful hopes and dreams outlive those who hope and dream -- even if they pass before they become reality.

Finally, you could hear it in Michelle Obama's speech as she remembered her husband looking into his rear view mirror at the greatest expression of hope any of us can ever see -- his child -- and committing himself to giving her more than he had.

What you could not hear but could clearly see in the eyes of the delegates was the audacity to hope that their candidate could undo the tragic results of eight years of incompetence and mismanagement and rebuild American prestige and dignity at home and abroad.

For the first time in a long time, they once more can dare to believe in that most resilient of things: the American Dream.

An Appeal for Unity

I wanted to post a brief message this evening, now that the Democratic Primary season has come to a close. All of us can take great pride in the fact that our Party, once again, has made history by breaking a barrier that has, for too long, stood in this nation. Although the nomination will not be official until our Party meets in Denver this August, we have selected the first African-American to be the nominee to be President of the United States.

It is not our first historic nomination. We are the Party who first nominated a Roman Catholic to be our Party’s Nominee (Alfred E. Smith in 1928). Of course, we as a nation more fully committed to the promise of religious tolerance when we elected the first Roman Catholic President, John F. Kennedy, in 1960. We were the first major Party to nominate a woman to be Vice President (Geraldine Ferraro in 1984).

Senator Clinton, although she did not win our Party’s nomination, also has a claim to history. She is not the first woman to have run to become a major party’s nominee. She is, however, the first one to have almost become that nominee. While the results, statewide and nationwide, may not be what she and her supporters worked towards and worked for, everyone who has looked at the actual numbers -- especially here in Union County -- agrees that there is much she and they can be proud of.

When we voted in the North Carolina primary and met in convention in May, we were choosing which way North Carolina would vote in Denver this summer. Our focus on the decision to be made in Denver, however, should not blind us to the fact that Denver is not the end of our race. It is the beginning.

While Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama may have some differences, when compared with the Bush-McCain led vision of the Republican Party, their overarching vision is the same. In order for us to insure this vision, we need all Democrats to come together and work for our party’s success in November. I hope you will remain committed -- no matter whether your personal preference for who will be our standard bearer has been chosen or not.

Some thoughts on District Representation for Union County IV: District Representation is not Gerrymandering.

District Representation is one of the major issues before us in Union County. As we move towards a referendum on this issue, I would like to offer a series of thoughts as to how adopting District Representation will benefit Union County.

Some of the opponents of District Representation have looked at the map of the proposed Union County Commissioner Districts and concluded that what they see is a case of Gerrymandering by the Democratic-dominated State House to increase the power of Union County Democrats at the expense of Union County Republicans.

Such accusations are part and parcel of the political process, so it is unsurprising that they have been made. In this case, however, it is inaccurate. After all, the counterclaim could be made that maintaining the current system of at-large representation for all County Commissioners is nothing more than the equivalent of a Republican gerrymander. By drawing the current districts of the County Commissioners to include all of Union County, we effectively maintain districts that are drawn for the advantage of the Republican Party. Perhaps this is why Commissioner Baucom tried to manipulate House Bill 1226 into preserving the current majority – a move that not even the Commissioners who would have benefited most could stomach.

The ultimate test of gerrymandering goes back to the old Latin phrase Qui Bono (Who profits or benefits)? Under the current gerrymandered system, the Republican benefit. If the Democrats wanted to make a power grab via a gerrymandered system, do you honestly think they would draw a series of lines that would leave them in the minority? Do you think that they would include two open seats that would maintain Republicans who might not be able to win in their districts a chance to keep their place on the County Commission instead of requiring one to be from the purported Republican stronghold of the west and another from the purported Democratic stronghold of the East?

The drive to increase representation of the underrepresented is not gerrymandering. It is an attempt to guarantee the type of representative government envisioned by our Founders.

Some thoughts on District Representation for Union County III: District Representation protects all of the Voices in Union County.

District Representation is one of the major issues before us in Union County. As we move towards a referendum on this issue, I would like to offer a series of thoughts as to how adopting District Representation will benefit Union County.

Much has been made of the way District 1 was drawn in the proposed Union County District map. Some have criticized it as a guaranteed Democratic district – one that would assure that Democrats will always have a seat on the currently all Republican County Commission. These critiques usually come from individuals who believe it is currently impossible for a Democrat to be elected in an at-large vote across all of Union County in a partisan race.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, they say little about the districts that currently lean Republican.

Others have praised the way the district has been drawn because it will ensure that African-Americans will have someone who will represent their particular concerns on the County Commission. Others look at this with some suspicion, arguing that it smacks of racism via tokenism or slows racial integration by reinforcing differences rather than seeking to bring people together.

One of the core values of the United States is that the voice of the minority should be protected from the will of the majority. Our Founders were as concerned with the tyranny of the masses as they were with the tyranny of an autocrat or a group of plutocrats or oligarchs. Like it or not, we currently live under a system in Union County where the voice of the minority is not protected. All such systems, like the enforced one party systems of Fascist Europe and the Communist world, have failed because they became far more about the interests of those in power than the interests of the people whom they claimed to represent. Their halls of government became echo chambers, where a single viewpoint appeared to represent the will of many when, instead, it remained the view of a few magnified by repetition of those who were in power or who wished to be connected to those in power.

By moving to District Representation, we will ensure that not only will all groups have a voice in our local government and all ideas will have an opportunity to be heard. In doing so, the ideas and ideologies of all of the residents of Union County will have a place where they can cross-pollinate and produce better solutions to the problems we face – solutions that will take into account all of the needs of Union County rather than just the desires of one group.