Two funerals in a week. Work commitments. Continuing education. Coverage of a junior bridge tournament.
Who has time to blog?
Fortunately, my (younger) friend Shay is like the U.S. Postal Service: come rain or shine, she does it!
Millions of words have been written about Michelle Obama's statement the other day about being "proud". As usual, few summarize and analyse the situation quite as well as Shay.
I can rattle off a bunch of things that, from her adult life, Mrs. Obama can point to with pride. Three words immediately came to my mind upon hearing her comments: Civil Rights Movement. How about a country that has provided many opportunities for her - coupled with her own hard work - to graduate from Princeton University, Harvard Law School, become a lawyer and have a successful career? To create the sort of life that she wants? Not to mention the middle-class upbringing that she had on Chicago's South Side, prior to all of these achievements. Mrs. Obama ain't starved a day in her life. Most of the world would love to be in her shoes! How about a country with the world's lowest black poverty rate? A country that played a role in bringing down communism? Assistance to Africa? How the country came together after 9/11? The donations that were raised by Americans after the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina? Going old school, the abolitionist movement?
With her statement, Mrs. Obama not only did a slap in the face of America's history, but a major slap in the face to the generations of black Americans who paved the way for her to be able to do what she does today. That was a key reason why my 63-year-old uncle was so ticked off at the 44-year-old Mrs. Obama, because my uncle actually lived in Jim Crow Alabama and has seen America's growth and the road that was paved for Mrs. Obama and us. This is a growth that Mrs. Obama, in her implied victimology rhetoric, ignores until it involves her husband. The statement also made me wonder if Mrs. Obama has ever traveled abroad, and thus would be less apt to dismiss what she has here in America.
And when you're done appreciating her efforts - you can see a few shots of part of what has kept me from much blogging: a high school bridge tourney!
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