(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
WINTER IN AMERICA AND STILL THERE IS HOPE THAT WE CAN
By: Gwen McKinney
It’s winter in America. The official date is about two weeks away, but I can’t help but reflect on the Gil Scott-Heron tune from the 1970s. Many might be too young to remember Gil and that era. Trust that the Vietnam war, the Black Power Movement, Tricky Dick and the so-called “silent majority” were creating a world filled with turmoil and confusion.
Watch: Gil Scott-Heron | Winter in America - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGlRsjHTkbs
That season of frozen dreams and promise offer parallels to today.
The message of Gil Scott-Heron and the fathers of rap, The Last Poets, struck a resonating and unapologetic chord of militancy and resistance.Watch: The Last Poets - When The Revolution Comes - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8M5W_3T2Ye4
It was an era when people were in the streets making their voices heard. Back then ideals mattered and revolution was not something to be left to George Washington’s army or the Tea Party movement of an earlier century. Revolution was change and hope. Those who dared to believe could.
Once again the forecast is cold and dark, even as we prepare for frosty and bitter days in the depths of winter. Soaring joblessness (in some communities higher than the rates of the Great Depression), families out in the streets homeless, people who dreamed of retiring at 67 still working – if lucky enough to even have a job. And still billionaires get the break.
It’s hard to believe that less than three years ago, we were hopeful. The Obama slogan “Yes We Can” was touching hearts and souls, stoking the imagination we didn’t even know we had. When Will.I.Am talked about what inspired that masterpiece, he confessed that until then, he was not clear or resolved to anything political. Then he heard the words of Barack Obama’s New Hampshire speech, profoundly touching his inner core “like nothing” before.
How could someone with so much magic and audacity leave us at such a grim and lonely place? Caving. Capitulating. Betraying the spirits that he touched as he soared? We soared with him and now feel left hanging and drained of hope. The millions who were mobilized to believe are now in the wilderness. We have collectively lost our way. I can’t imagine why people are not in the streets, chaining themselves to the White House or confronting congress. Shaking up. Breaking up. Turning despair into outrage that can be felt and acted upon. Is it Obama’s fault alone? Are the Dems in power (or losing power) the only group to be blamed or held responsible? What happened? In many ways, all of us are accomplices in these continuing crimes. This untenable circumstance in which our nation is trapped has demobilized action as much as it has torn apart lives. Perhaps, the only path to finding our way is to begin again to believe. To hope. Yes we can.
So here, I leave you – some 21,532,692 hits later, backed by Common, John Legend and the hope of a nation -- with Will. I. Am/Blackeyed Pea’s inspiration.
Watch: Yes We Can - Barack Obama Music Video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjXyqcx-mYY
Excellent post, truly capturing what so many of us (Obama supporters) are feeling. We believed then and want to believe now, but feel almost betrayed.
ReplyDeleteI for one, often reflect on his nomination acceptance speech, seeing Oprah and Jesse Jackson cry, seeing my Mom tear up and glancing in the mirror to see my own tears. They were tears of jubilation and happiness and hope. We put our eggs into Obama's proverbial basket, and right now we're getting scrambled.
I guess I'm looking at Obama's glass as half full instead of half empty. I agree...things look bleek in terms of the country's social economic situation, but I see the ball clearly in Obama's court. Weeks after the mid-term elections Obama is using playa rule #007... "keep your friends close and your enemies closer". The republicans have suddenly gone from pure opposition to dealing with a man a lot of them were calling a commie Muslim alien a month ago.
ReplyDeleteGranted, Federal employees are not to happy about what he did with their pay freeze....but it allowed Obama to extend unemployement benefits. If this continues OBAMA may be sitting pretty when election time comes around and the country's economy is showing improvement.