Change We Can Believe In

Whatever happens this fall, Barack Obama has already made history by being the first black person to become a candidate for the presidential election in the United States of America.

It is a milestone for a society that abolished slavery only 143 years ago. Moreover, he has been able to inspire millions of new voters, most of them young, thanks to a message of hope and change. It was a long time since a politician was able to draw thousands of people to his rallies all over the country.

Below is an approximate transcript of Barack Obama’s speech on the main slogan of his presidential campaign: “Change We Can Believe In”, certain content of which (as highlighted) is felt to be universally applicable to all countries of this world including our own Malaysia. It serves to inspire the spirit of hope and change for all people of the world who really yearn for their respective governments of the people, by the people and for the people!

Thank you [place name]! Tonight, the hard-working, long-suffering people of [place name] have sent a message that echoes out across this great land of ours. From the forested coast of [some other place name] to the fertile fields of [third place name], the call for change has been heard in the factories and the farms and the foyers.

From the coal mines of [some place with coal] to the vineyards of [some place with grapes], and from the strip malls of liberal suburban areas to the student unions of overpriced universities, the people have told the powers that be in Washington and in the corporate boardrooms that they have had enough of the failed policies of the past. They’ve had enough of government by the few for the fewer. They’ve had enough of tax breaks given to the rich for no other reason than that they are the ones actually paying taxes. And most of all, they’ve had enough of despair, and other things people generally don’t want, such as hopelessness and cynicism.

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And because of you, hope has a new dawn, in a future that doesn’t belong to the past, but that is being made here in the present, by a people who have learned from history, even as they look forward and not behind. And of course we should look both ways before we cross the street, like the chicken that crossed the road to get to the hope on the other side.

Together, we the people of the street corners and front porches, of main street not Wall Street, of the Waffle House and not the White House have set a new course in the grand old ship of state of which I, of course, will need to be the captain as we head to the rosy horizon where the sun will come out tomorrow. Tomorrow! Tomorrow! I love ya’ tomorrow. You’re always a day away!

In an America no longer divided by race, I call upon people, by specific color, to join this raceless crusade (a crusade without crosses, even though it raises money in churches and yet condemns the use of religion by conservatives). I call upon white people and black people, and brown people. Si se puede! I call on the yellow people and the red man. I call upon those of indeterminate or piebald pigmentation, and even those who, through no fault of their own, suffer from diseases of the skin that may rob them completely of their pigmentation – but not their hope!

These people may be a glaring, shiny white on the outside, but inside they know who they are. They are victims! Victims too long facing Big Oil and Big Drug companies without health insurance or hybrid crossover vehicles here in this, the greatest country on earth, which robs its people of hope.

People like Larry Madeup, who fought for his country in an unjust war but had his home foreclosed upon by a subprime lender who thought he could put a variable rate on hope. And people like Mabel Oldervoter, who needs a dream transplant just to be able to stand the pain of having her future sold to the highest bidder behind the closed doors of a failed foreign policy that has isolated uninsured Americans both at home and abroad --while shipping their jobs overseas, where everybody wants to come to America, the land of opportunity, which has been too long under the thumb of special interests, as recession looms.

So tonight we join in something greater than ourselves: a confused mixed metaphor of imagery and hyperbole, symbolism and simile. And with this clichéd rhetorical schizoid montage of optimism and fear, which always looks forward, unless looking back, we proudly march into the tomorrow of the future, proud of the past that has victimized us all so diversely.

So thank you [place name]! Thank you, America! And now we will carry the message of [place name] on to [yet another place name] and, yes, finally on to Washington, which we will change in unspecified ways. Change you can believe in -- details to follow!

Footnote: The general election in March 8, 2008 saw Malaysia for the first time in 50 years since independence moving a step closer to true parliamentary democracy when the ruling coalition (Barisan Nasional) lost its 2/3 majority in the parliament and the state governments of 5 out of 13 states fell into the hands of the opposition coalition (Pakatan Rakyat). Let's hope for a true 2-coalition system of democracy come the next general election in 2013 or before when we Malaysians can proudly announce to the world that we finally practise true parliamentary democracy. Yes, change we can believe in! Let’s us work towards that day of hope and change!!