When discussing issues the media usually refer to the more popular ones—the meat, as they say. And sure, I get why everyone’s always talking about the economy. Things are still rough out there. I was one of the new numbers on the recently released unemployment figures. Then there’s Iraq, and National Security which, of course, is very important—something We can get back to when our Boys (& Girls!) come back from Iraq. However, you shouldn’t forget that even seemingly smaller issues can mean a lot to many of us.
Take Our drug policy. I know, we don’t really have much of one. The number of impoverished crackheads and heroin addicts I see everyday on my way through Lexington Market in the heart of Baltimore hasn’t dwindled much since the beginning of The War on Drugs. (Funny how throwing the word war around has become the standard way to show Us how to solve Our problems.) But Our government has been fighting the same War for a generation now, and other than making a few small dents in the supply and warehousing a lot of people in jails that continue to overcrowd, not much has changed—at least not on the federal level.
At this point I should make it clear why this issue means so much to me—other than the fact that I live three blocks away from Lexington Market. Those of you who might have read My Letter to the Superdelegates, which I wrote when it looked as if things might come down to them, or my flash fiction Bus Stop, or many of the other things I’ve blogged already know that my family has been ravaged by drug addiction. For those of you who don’t know, I lost my mother to AIDS in 1991. Although a loving and courageous woman, a woman who helped new arrivals from Puerto Rico and other Latin American areas settle and adjust to life in Baltimore, she battled with heroin addiction most of her life.
A few years later, I lost my uncle. He was a character, in and out of jail for a lot of his life, hustling when he was out. But sometimes he was the closest thing I had around to a father. He was usually very good to me. Like my mother, he was a heroin addict and ultimately succumbed to AIDS.
My baby brother was barely 17 when my mother died. Although he became a hard worker and a loving father, he suffered greatly after the death of our mother. He also turned to drugs—crack and heroin. On the day after Christmas, 2006, Joe became the latest in my family succumb to AIDS.
The rest of my family has been more fortunate, but I see the ghosts of what my family has been through every day I step out for lunch. And it’s not just the poor. I’ve been privy to the same sad excesses within Our wealthiest families; and other than more and better recovery facilities and less law enforcement scrutiny, their stories are no less tragic than mine.
So when it comes to drug policy, perhaps it’s not as much of a priority as National Security, but certainly should be close behind when you stop to consider how drug abuse continues to destroy Our lives, Our families, Our children, Our schools and Our neighborhoods. What else has to be destroyed before drugs do become a matter of National Security? Bottom line: one of the myriad of reasons I will NEVER vote for them is because that would mean my lunch breaks will never change. The faces will, but the same problems will still haunt me, along with the memories of everything drug addiction has taken away from me.
Maybe a President Obama will not be able to fulfill my dream of a nation where addicts are getting whatever treatment they need, and where we initiate programs to eliminate illegal drug trafficking intelligently instead of with the brute force that has been so ineffective for so long. There’s a lot of work to do and to undo to get there. However, he is the only hope I see of getting Us on that path.
Seven score and eight years ago another seemingly inexperienced politician from Illinois was chosen to represent his party as a catalyst for change. He too had risen through the ranks of the Illinois State legislature, followed by a brief stint in Congress. He too recognized the need to change the way politics operated in Washington. He too was nominated by his party on the basis of his grand oratory and the hope he offered of uniting the nation. Of course, most of you recognize this inexperienced yet eloquent politician as one of our greatest American Presidents, Abraham Lincoln.
Perhaps it is too soon to draw comparisons between Obama and Lincoln. After all, as of this writing, while it is a given that Barack Obama will capture the Democratic nomination, he is not assured the Presidency. However, the connections between the two are unmistakable, and if Obama does indeed win election to the highest office in the land, I believe it will be the ultimate fulfillment of everything Lincoln fought for.
Before I get pounced on by the history buffs, I do understand that Lincoln did not, at first, set out with the purpose of freeing slaves. If anything, his campaign was a rejection of the status quo—continual compromises with slave owners that threatened to eventually expand slavery nationally—as not just ineffective, but dangerous.
It was the general feeling in the South that every state should be able to choose whether or not to allow slavery, and their hope was that they could expand slavery into territories extending all the way to the Pacific. Meanwhile, pro-slavery forces flooded not-quite-a-state-yet Kansas with slaveholder settlements from the slave state of Missouri and elsewhere.
When the time came to create a constitution, a requirement prior to statehood, slavery proponents imported thugs from outside of Kansas to stuff ballot boxes to assure that Kansas would in fact be admitted as a slave state. The delicate balance between North & South was in jeopardy. Lincoln simply wanted to maintain that balance and hold the Union together.
Of course, things worked out a bit differently than expected. Southern states began seceding almost as soon as election results were announced, and soon after his inauguration, Lincoln and the country were thrust into a war no one really wanted. It was during the Civil War that Lincoln's beliefs evolved. On September 22, 1862, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. While not abolishing slavery outright, it did lay the groundwork for what would ultimately become the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution. Not bad for someone whose political experience amounted to eight years in the Illinois State Legislature followed by two in Congress.
By this point, I'm sure you can see where I'm going. As a matter of fact, some might dismiss this essay as just another in a line of those I've written to support my candidate. This line of thinking is not entirely off base. However, regardless of whom you support, you can't deny that the parallels between Lincoln and Obama are fascinating. This is not to say that I believe we are a nation on the brink of internal war. Nor am I guaranteeing that Obama, should he ultimately be elected, will be as great a president as Lincoln. I do however believe in Destiny.
It feels a bit like Destiny when the first African American to have a viable shot at the Presidency can virtually tie up his nomination on the anniversary of Lincoln's Inauguration (March 4, 1861 & 1865). It also feels like destiny that 148 years later, another presumably inexperienced, yet eloquent politician rising to prominence after a tenure in the Illinois State Legislature, followed by a short stint in Congress may soon be the one who will finally fulfill Lincoln's Legacy.
