Congratulations President-elect Barack Obama!

I will say that your candidate in Minnesota, Al Franken, is going to be an important part of a coalition that brings about change. He's really, I think, in this to fight for working families. I'm looking forward to seeing him serve in the Senate. And if people are looking for fundamental change over the next eight years, then I think an Obama-Biden ticket, Al Franken in the Senate, is going to be the best answer for working families all across the state ~ Barack Obama on WCCO's Don Shelby Show (11/3/2008).

The election is over, and despite the Republican's best efforts, they were unable to steal the presidency a 3rd time. Thank goodness! This blog has been dormant for some time, but now I'm back! Well, probably not. The reason I stopped blogging was because my posts failed to generate any discussions, or very many responses at all.

In any case, although my last two posts (now over a year old) were in support of John Edwards, I did, eventually, get onboard with Barack Obama (who will be inaugurated on 1/20/2009 as our nation's 44th president). I have to say that I would have voted for Hillary without any reservations, but I am glad that things worked out the way they did. I think the best contestant won -- that's including all the Democrats, all the Republicans, and all the 3rd party candidates who threw their hat in the ring.

The topic I've chosen to return with concerns Barack Obama's "troubling associations" that were brought up during the campaign by McCain, Palin, and right wing pundits. This choice of topics may confuse my readers (if any) due to the fact that the election is over. What does it matter now? Barack Obama took the high road and steered clear of taking the bait put forth by the radical right. He addressed these "associations" when pressed, calmly explaining them. His strategy of not going negative worked and he won the election. Americans are tired of the politics of divisiveness.

However, while writing that post I realized that first I needed to congratulate President-elect Obama, so the post mentioned above will be my second post. Hopefully the Republicans plan to rebuild goes nowhere, and their party fails to reclaim the White House, or any of the congressional seats they lost, anytime soon. Has America finally realized that conservative economic policies, namely "supply side economics" don't work? I truly wish that were the case.

However, I think most Americans were simply fed-up with the direction the current (and outgoing) administration has taken us. What they fail to realize is that we've been on this road ever since the election of Ronald Reagan -- with a brief respite during the Clinton years - although Clinton drank the kool-aid to a certain extent (with the passage of NAFTA and declaring the "end of welfare as we know it", among other things).

In addition to congratulating Mr. Obama, I'd also like to congratulate Mark Begich, who narrowly defeated his corrupt opponent, convicted felon Ted Stevens. And proffer my well wishes to Al Franken and Jim Martin. If Mr. Franken comes out ahead in the Minnesota recount, and Mr. Martin prevails in the Georgia runoff, the Democrats will have secured a filibuster-proof majority. Then we can get down to work rebuilding our economy without having to fear Republican obstructionism.

Further Reading
1. Minnesotans Find Voting For Al Franken or Norm Coleman Very Difficult by Alex Carnevale, Gawker. 11/22/2008. (Reason to read: Find out who voted for the Lizard People).
2. Franken's Odds of Winning Recount May Be Long - or Short by Nate Silver, FiveThirtyEight. 11/10/2008. (Reason to read: Odds of Franken winning the recount may be very good. Find out why).
3. Progressive Eruptions Posts -- Well Done, Senator Obama! 6/3/2008, Happy Obama Day! 1/19/2009, President Barack H. Obama 1/20/2009.

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