Is This The Night "They Drove Old Dixie Down?"
To give birth to a new one, for all its people.
We will know once Virginia comes in and Obama actually carries he capital of the confederacy.
I only wish Dr. King and LBJ were here to see what is happening. And Malcolm who, at the end of his life, came to the understanding that America could be capable of even of this.
To paraphrase a great truth. If this happens, I am proud of my country for the first time since 1965, when Lyndon Johnson told a shocked Congress "We Shall Overcome" and demanded that African-Americans receive the right to vote.
On August 6, Johnson went up to Capitol Hill to sign the Voting Rights bill. It was an unusual venue. Presidents rarely sign bills there. He asked his teenage daughter to come up to the Hill with him. She recalled asking him why he was signing the bill in the Congress, not at the White House or at some other venue.
"Luci Baines," Johnson said, "We are going to Capitol Hill because as a result of the courageous votes of this Congress, Congress will never look the same. There are some men and women who will not be returning just because of their vote for this bill, and there are many more who will be coming here who otherwise would not have served because of the color of their skins. It is only right that their president come to Congress to thank them for their service to their country."
President-Elect Onama was four but he had just been given the possibility of becoming President by a Texan. I hope heaven, or wherever Johnson is, has cable.
As a child of the COnfederacy (born and raised in VIRGINIA) - I am SO HAPPY to see what is happening (and going to happen) tonight!!!!!!
November 4, 2008 8:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Or "Bye Bye Miss American Pie".
November 4, 2008 8:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Looks like McCain is winning Virginia, Big Time. ((8:40pm EST)
WTF?
November 4, 2008 8:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
No way. Obama should win when all the African-American areas come in (Richomd, etc) plus liberal Northern Virginia.
November 4, 2008 8:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
TPM and Raw Story were reporting many problems in Virginia. CNN said nothing all day.
November 4, 2008 9:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
TPM and Raw Story were reporting many problems in Virginia. CNN said nothing all day.
November 4, 2008 9:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
VA is turning as the votes come in from the 'Fake VA" and the big cities.
November 4, 2008 9:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
May the South never rise again.
November 4, 2008 10:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've heard Johnson's legacy is civil rights, and I will grant it to him from all I understand. I know people have mixed feelings about LBJ. George W. Bush gave us nothing of the sort.
November 4, 2008 11:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
We did it!!!
The networks have announced that Barack Hussein Obama will be the next President of our country! Oh, what a wonderful day - I too am so proud!
There are so many people who played a part in getting us to this and we should honor all of them. It's just an incredible historic moment. I want to thank you, too, MJ, and all the folks at TPM for everything you've done and written.
I'm all emotional so I'll shut up now...
November 4, 2008 11:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm all choked up too. What a day.
November 5, 2008 12:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't know if you'll see this, MJ, since threads go by so quickly, but here's something you might remember and enjoy: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=17267529
I think you and I are about the same age, so you'll probably remember it. Obama echoed the song in his speech last night. It was a long time coming, but a change really has come at last.
November 5, 2008 1:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've heard Johnson's legacy is civil rights, and I will grant it to him from all I understand. I know people have mixed feelings about LBJ. George W. Bush gave us nothing of the sort.
November 5, 2008 12:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
Wow. Nothing this country has done since 1965 has made you proud?
You weren't proud when an American walked on the moon?
Oh, maybe you only care about racial accomplishments.
How about when Clarence Thomas became a Supreme Court justice? (Oh, he is not liberal so he must not count.) Or when Colin Powell became Secretary of State? (Oh, same problem as above.)
What a strange comment to make.
November 5, 2008 1:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
The trolls don't have anything to say on "their" blogs so they show up here...
I realize feeding trolls is generally not a good idea -- but for what it's worth, I've been a Democrat since age 18, (28 years), and I would have been proud if Colin Powell had run for and been elected as President. I gather he did not run because he was a friend of the Bush family, although I'm not well read on that -- just shooting from the hip. He would have been a much better President than Dubya, and tonight's election probably would have been closer if it were for Powell being President as well.
November 5, 2008 1:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Umm .. Reconstruction was supposed to make all of that happen in 1870.
Not 2008.
P.S. Where was the Black Supreme Court Justice in Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson?
You have no response to that.
Bye.
November 5, 2008 4:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
Umm .. Reconstruction was supposed to make all of that happen in 1870.
Not 2008.
P.S. Where was the Black Supreme Court Justice in Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson?
You have no response to that.
Bye.
November 5, 2008 4:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah. That'll help. Let's spend the rest of our lives stewing with intent about centuries past. Got any points a tad more... current?
C'mon. Angry And Sullen is so five minutes ago...
November 5, 2008 10:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
What I kept saying to everyone on the street in Chicago last night:
The Civil War is finally over.
November 5, 2008 10:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
This absolutely spine tingling part of Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech is like listening to him listing the state's that pushed Obama over the edge...and then there's hope for those last three.
And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that:
Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:
Free at last! Free at last!
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!
Martin Luther King
Aug. 28, 1963
November 5, 2008 7:02 PM | Reply | Permalink