Accents
A dream fulfilled
Take this as a droplet in the torrential downpour of news, comments and the like on Obama then, now, and in-the-making. Multimedia inundate with Obamamania—from Larry King's Best of Obama, film clips of his interviews with the President-elect and of Michelle, the better-half. Not Live as King's program professes but recordings of his live interviews, oh, well. The rest of the networks vied for a slice of the audience with the spins of their commentators, night of Election Day, Nov. 4, 2008, and the immediate hours thereafter. In the domestic front, family members tussled for the remote. Let Survivor wait; better still, record it for future viewing. Obama was the concern of the moment. All sit-coms to the back seat.
The Pinoy newspapers flooding California are not to be outdone in publicizing the highlights and minutiae of Obama victory. One paper we picked up in Sacramento had a cover spread headlined OBAMAmania! a-blare with the most eye-catching, smilingest Obama photo. When the celebratory mood will wane, we can't tell.
The preponderance of good news becomes eventually no news. A whiff of bad news certainly makes interesting copy. Thus, the headline of the Record Searchlight, Nov. 10, 2008 (in Redding, California where the hubby and I are presently staying) was very arresting: Obama may face early terror attack. To quote: "Terror greeted the past two presidents early in their terms. Clinton faced the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993 and Bush, the world-changing attacks of Sept. 11, 2001." I can only say most ardently and prayerfully, Heaven forbid! Please, not another serving of "JFK," Oliver Stone's movie prowess and crazy conspiracy theories, notwithstanding. You must agree, though, that JFK sounds better than BO.
Night of Nov. 4, BO victory was announced! It earned a jump of joy from my daughter Raileen, a practicing physician here in Redding. We got exultant calls from our two daughters, one in Oakland, the other in South Carolina. Peaceniks all, anti-war, and anti-racist. Chips from the old block, I must say. Gush, and was I misty-eyed, seeing a sea of white and black hands mingled in jubilation, the TV spotlighting different parts of the US and focusing several times on two renown African-Americans, Rev. Jesse Jackson and Oprah Winfrey, in tears. (Jackson was a Democrat presidential candidate during the ‘60s who lost in the primary. Oprah is the TV personality of world-fame.) In the popular count, Obama's 7-million-vote margin of victory over Republican John McCain was a clear mandate from the people. "Hello, Garci" was non-existent here.
A TV anchor said the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr. was finally fulfilled. Hence, the title of this column. His remark sent me to my personal archives of choice quotations: "I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up, live out the true meaning of its creed." That was Martin Luther King, Jr., a human rights activist and dreamer for his people, speaking in 1963 to an international assembly said to be more than 200,000 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. Decades later, President-elect Barack Obama was to fulfill that dream.
In 1968, gunned down at 39 by a racist's bullet, Martin Luther King's last address was prophetic of his martyrdom: "Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its fate but I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will and if it allowed me to go up the mountain and I took over and I'd seen the promised land, I cannot go there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get the promise." Indeed, prophetic that an African-American would turn that promise to reality in Election 2008.
(E-mail: lagoc@hargray.com)