Dear Mr. President: Day 365.
Dear Mr. President,
A year has passed since that bitterly cold January day you made history.
And after flipping through the twelve tumultuous calendar pages which we’ve now discarded, we still want to believe you’re the right guy at this time in history to lead us from the dark shadows of 2008 and 2009 and into the hope filled future which your election promised.
But man, we gotta say, right now… it’s tough to believe the next three years will be any better than the last two. Frankly…we feel like we’ve been assaulted and battered. We busted our asses for your candidacy during the election cycle…hoping that you would end the cycle of cynicism and mistrust we have for our politics and for our government.
Instead, Mr. President…we are sorry to say…many of your actions have created more of the same-old, same-old within us.
Because you have allowed Wall Street power interests to continue business as usual. In fact, you placed many of the Street’s scheming thieves in your very own administration. As a result your declaration to the banking industry that “we want our money back”…rings as a token pronouncement for the benefit of those who might not have been paying attention.
You have fallen victim to the Pentagon generals and corporate lobbyists who have promised you victory in God forsaken territories; succumbed to private contractors and the 21st century military industrial complex…those eager to sell you new war toys at the expense of brave lives and national treasure.
And you allowed the very divisiveness you have so passionately argued against to destroy the dream of true national health care reform.
A year later we feel so immature for believing that you could…would…make a difference in our lives…and in our nation.
Perhaps, given time…the next three years…you will have a positive impact.
In your Chicago acceptance speech 15 month ago, you said “There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as president.”
We accept that, Mr. President.
But at least, Mr. President…make the kind of effort you so eloquently promised you would, to create the kind of change which would set a new path for our nation’s future, unlike the worn paths so many presidents and Washington bureaucrats have led us down before.
Because, we won’t get fooled again.