Don't get me wrong, I was at the DNC in 2004, I stood on the floor and watched Barack give the keynote speech. I was 14. I said that day "I hope he runs in 2008" knowing that doing so would mean challenging President Kerry, who I thought was sure to win.
Everyone knows how this ends. The Democrats laid down and took it where the sun don't shine and we did what we do, twittering our thumbs until the senate elections. (Not that we sprang into action even after that...)
The past four years have been a lesson in apathy for a kid who was 14 in 2004 and 18 now. Since then, I've been bombarded by the most politically bipolar actions a country can manufacture. I've been doused with terror, threats, war, flailing economic conditions, gas prices, legalization of assualt weapons, and a president who takes pride in his ability to ride a horse. Likewise, I've witnessed utter and complete lack of faith in the executive branch from my party, wimpy and flaccid pokes from "activist groups" whose mission it appears to be to alienate everyone who doesn't agree, and a overwhelmingly large percent of the population who would rather worry about the winner of American Idol.
I was offered the chance to write for OffTheBus and have it appear on The Huffington Post. That's quite an offer for a kid who just voted for the first time this year and still has yet to properly use the parking brake. But the words wouldn't come. What was I going to write about, how Senator Obama was so superior to Hillary Clinton? Look, she got a little nuts towards the end of her campaign, but I mean she was a Democrat and she would have done a lot to make this nation better and it would have been sad to see her win the nomination over Barack, but it wasn't worth ripping the party apart for.
Basically, what we had was shaping up to be another 2000's election. Both of which were action packed and full of inane promises and ended with the Republicans teaching the definition of political domination to the Democrats.
I was ready to call it quits. I was ready to believe the system was broken. A system that has functioned for more than two centuries, and has gone from a series of pathetic colonies demanding equality to the single greatest power ever seen in the entire history of humanity.
I was ready to do that because what had made us great was not our ability to compromise. Not our extreme polarity. Not our intra-national squabbles and political battles, it was the moments in history when we as a nation united and raised our fists and took a stand. When we risked everything we had to further advance the human race. We've done it countless times before, in thousands of different ways.
And as a kid who took the American History advanced placement test and got a pretty stellar grade on it, I felt that that era was over.
I felt that in a decade or two, I would be telling my kids about "the old America", one in which we were great and full of potential, given to us by our fathers, and how we squandered it on gasoline and plastic. I saw a nation dying in slow motion.
Until I saw the front page of the Huffington Post this morning, and saw this.
Those states might be blue, but in truth, they're purple.
They're not Democratic states, they're not Republican states. They're American states. They're dedicated not to the petty politics that have plauged this nation for far too long, they're dedicated to the great American way, and hope, and change.
Sure, they're hypothetical, but the thought is there. In 2004 when Senator Kerry was campaigning, did anyone speak of a fifty state strategy? No. Because he was a Democrat, hell, they barely spoke of a 25 state strategy.
John McCain is weak. He's old and a little senile and completely clueless. He's playing a different game than Barack. He doesn't represent the Republicans, and Barack doesn't represent the Democrats, albeit in different senses. If Mr. Obama represents that shade of purple, a hybrid of the beautiful ideals that make this nation so fantastic, McCain is the pitchest black we've ever seen. He runs a campaign centered on national security, insisting we're hated for our freedom, and that everyone who isn't like us, wishes to kill us.
For the first time in AT LEAST 8 years, we have on our hands an ideological election. (I wasn't really politically conscious before that, so I'm not too sure what went down).
We have an opportunity, as Democrats, to invite the Republicans, politely, to invest in a candidate who may run under a Democratic ticket name, but is, at his core, an American. We have a chance to affect the nation in a truly visceral way. These moments have come before, but never in such a violent storm of apathy.
These contemporary apathetic days combined with a society that can reward men and women with superficial happiness through elaborate toys have mixed to create a nation that isn't in a proper position politically, yet has no desire to revolutionize or even amend it's way of life.
So why 50 states? Because this needs to be an American movement. This needs to shed the layers and layers of political hatred that has been bred by the few to keep us under control. This needs to be about putting aside our differences on issues of abortion and gun control and freedom of speech (while respecting the need to find a fair resolution) and taking a look at the big picture.
We're still stuck in a Cold War mindset for the world, only now, the Communism is Terrorism, and everywhere, especially non-Westernized societies, seems to be a breeding ground for this terror. Well, we think we can fight the terror, declare war on it, and that's ridiculous.
We need to take the helm in world politics again. We need to send people and money to areas where there is nothing. We need to spread happiness. That's the way to fight terror. We're not going to do this with McCain. We're going to continue the same mindset. Barack and his staff have noticed this, and they're ready to show the world what America can really be.
In times of great struggle, we have united as a nation, and really, really, fixed things. We have an opportunity to do it again. My grandparents, and perhaps your parents did it for you, now, here's our chance.
Thank you, Barack, you have my full and complete support.
-Max Rosenbaum, age 18.
