Urban Thought Collective

I’m happy to be alive and well at this moment in history. To see a black man stand before millions and profess that despite all the swift boating attempts, losing a few key primaries, and being forced “off message” for the past few months, he was the presumptive presidential nominee for the Democratic Party. Chills. Sadly for America and the world at large, the thought of a black person reaching this level was so far fetched and seemingly unattainable, people are still reeling. Still waiting for the other shoe to drop. Let’s just pinch ourselves right now and get it over with, ‘cause it’s real ya’ll.

But, just being the first black presidential candidate is not enough.

All of this fanfare and joy is nothing if we don’t seize this moment to turn the tide in a tangible way. If Obama makes it to the White House, let it not be a presidency of simple symbolism. Let it be bold and painful and hard as nails every day. Let it be about truth telling, policy changing and righting a ship that has gone more off course than the Titanic. I love the campaign slogan, “Change we can believe in.” I want to believe it. I want to believe that he can hold on to that message and make it real for all of us.

But it will hurt. He can’t just be another guy telling these crowds in these cities what they want to hear. You tell Iowa farmers you won’t touch their corn subsidies and workers in Pennsylvania that you won’t take their coal jobs away. You tell Detroit you’ll bring back the auto industry. You tell all the forgotten towns on every stop that you speak to their issues and their fears and their hopes. It isn’t always possible.

As my favorite (and deeply missed) television series “The West Wing” had one of the characters opine, “You campaign in poetry and govern in prose.” So, you make promises that you may never be able to deliver on. But the charge to keep is that no matter what, there will be no cowering or fear of retribution when you make the hard, cold decisions that are for our own good. You can’t stall the process just because some folks don’t like it, rail against it, defile you for it. Didn’t your folks always tell you that sometimes you have to do something you don’t want to do for the overall good? It may make you momentarily unpopular, but who cares? Its gut check time.

Obama left his church because of the Reverend Wright controversy, which was just one in what will be a long line of compromises. White people (and black folks too) will make accusations that he could spend his whole presidency fighting. There has to be a strong, unwavering, tunnel vision focus on what has to be done.

He must be willing to face a level of scrutiny that none of us has ever seen. This will trump the domestic terrorism of the early part of this century. This will trump the death threats and the racist fear mongering that America has perfected. The Klan’s most heinous acts ain’t nothing compared to what we are about to see. In our own ways, let’s help him brace for it. Because just getting this far isn’t enough.

See, White America is stuck on a skewed image of what this country is. They have conveniently forgotten this is a country of immigrants. They have forgotten their ancestors came here from all over the world. Now, somehow white is right and all other spectrums are just part of the melting pot. I don’t want to melt. I want you to see my color. I want you to see my history and know it and respect it. I’ll do the same for yours.

But there is a lot to do, and if Obama gets bogged down in defending his pastor, defending his wife, defending his heritage and so on, he’s not doing the work of getting crack out of the streets and kids in school and men to be dads and economics to make some kind of sense again.

Every major “change” in history is preceded by a movement of people that are ready to move forward. A people that are tired, hungry, and fed up with corrupt political systems, disenfranchisement and always being on the fringes of equality and progress. After these eight long years of dictatorship, “we the people” actually does mean all of us. We are all less safe, prosperous and stable because of this regime. Everyone is losing homes and jobs. We all have to make deep sacrifices. Change isn’t easy. But, Obama will have to tell us unequivocally what is real, what will make things better. He will have to be more than a leader.

I know. He is just a man. How can we expect him to be our messiah? We have to, because just getting there is not enough.

Ellene Miles has worked as an entertainment publicist for more than 6 years. Her collections of rants are featured exclusively on UTC for the good of the people.