This is a letter that my budding "ata wewe" political activist of a brother wrote to Barack Obama. A saucy if not interesting read. I have often told him to forward his thoughts to me as I think they were worthy of publishing. Let's discuss.
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My Problem with Barack
By Timi Odulate
I was born in Washington DC to Nigerian parents. I am a Philadelphia, PA resident, and I graduated from Temple University with a double in Computer Science & Political Science with a minor in French. I drove 2 and a half hours from Washington to Philadelphia to vote for Barack in the PA primary due to the fact that I’m still a Pennsylvania resident, after telling my boss that I was taking part of my day off to assert my constitutional right to vote.
I also braved the commute because it was one of the most motivated periods of my life. I was intrigued, zealously so, by somebody who had adopted the right views and positions about the path that this country was long overdue for, despite the paradoxically suicidal path elected officials had assumed, and their willingness to continue bleeding the country until it was dead. I was captivated by someone who wasn’t afraid to change the fate of this country. The citizenry, prior to Barack’s emergence on the national scene, were comparable to a dying person refusing a blood transfusion. How else could you explain the re-election of our current president and the world’s subsequent declaration that Americans were stupid, embodied in a UK paper’s headlines on Thursday November 4, 2004, The Daily Mirror, “How can 59,054,087 people be so Dumb?” Americans made this decision with the knowledge that the basis for war, weapons of mass destruction (now affectionately known as WMDs) was manufactured and thus non-existent.
It was frustrating that what was common sense to the rest of the other 50 million or so voting electorate was apparently rocket science to the remainder of that said electorate. The Republican Party, and George Bush, until recently, were immensely averse at using issues to polarize the electorate and using dirty tricks to smother their opponent. An excursion into the annals of political science will reveal that that concept has been historically utilized for a considerable amount of time, and it tends to benefit Republicans more than Democrats because Democrats will usually respond negatively to dirty tricks by their candidate as opposed to the same by a Republican candidate and his supporters. Gay marriage, weakness on our national defense, and a charge that the Democratic candidate was wayward, shamelessly convinced the rest of the nation into voting for a weaker candidate thus plunging the country into deeper economic mediocrity whilst lowering our moral standing with the international community.
I never understood why such a number of people allowed themselves to be confused or polarized by the aforementioned tricks. I supported Barack because he spoke the truth from the beginning. I firmly believe his stark increase in popularity was due to the fact that the truth never goes away and can only be discovered. He spoke against the war. He said we didn’t properly assess the consequences and that was true. He said we rushed into it and that was also true. We were told by Republicans, including McCain that the oil would pay for the war. Huh? The long-held Democratic view that Bush’s tax cuts were only benefitting the wealthy and were ruining the economy and middle class is being proven more and more every day. The weakening of the US dollar against all other major currencies and its contributing effect on oil prices has put the majority of the country in an immensely compromising situation. Did anybody notice that America is being bought up by the world? All part and parcel of the status quo. I just can’t remember when it’s been this bad. When the first Bush was in power, we had a bad economy but our standing in the world was above par, and the economy wasn’t as bad as it is today. When are we going to fully realize the extent to which this country has been mismanaged? When gas is $6 a gallon next summer?
What’s hurtful about Obama is my belief that his incredible success has gone to his head, of late, and is clouding his judgment. There’s no doubt about it. Do all politicians, including McCain, do it, and as a matter of fact, do it more? Yes. But Barack is supposed to be different. On issues such as FISA and whether or not the telecommunications companies should receive immunity for unlawfully aiding the government in eavesdropping, his position clearly shifted. He categorically labeled it as illegal and unjust. His position now, indicating that he’s for that immunity, is clearly different from the one he adopted before. Who’s he trying to fool? Barack also previously stated that he would fully utilize diplomacy and talk to states America considers hostile. Not only is that a great position that had been adopted by respected former presidents such as Kennedy and Roosevelt, it is also common sense. It saves lives, resources- both military and monetary- and aggravation. Anybody can be talked to, and wars aren’t as great as they’re built up to be. His position on that obviously changed to a more confrontational one, especially on the Iranian front. He’s shifted his position on guns when he didn’t have to. Bill Clinton was anti-gun throughout his eight years in office. Lastly, but certainly not least, not by any means, was his statement regarding Iraq stating he would be opening to refining his position. Sometimes I wonder who’s being paid to sanction these statements and positions in light of the fact that they’re silly and just don’t add up. He beat Hillary on Iraq. Why would he even try to appear to be open to modifying his position on Iraq, for political purposes?
The Republican Party did erroneously label Barack as a leftist. By leftist, what they really meant was that he was on the other side of their positions which all appear to be wrong by the way. Politicians and political pundits alike have blurred the line of left and right. Left and right would normally be associated with mostly conservative and liberal principles that the Republican and Democratic Party have identified themselves with, like abortion, small government versus big government, taxes, social programs, gay rights, and the like. They are now being used, in the context of what’s being discussed today, outside of the core principles. If McCain and the Republicans say drill offshore for oil and the Democrats say don’t drill, that is not a traditionally conservative or liberal position. When McCain said American forces could stay in Iraq a hundred years if needed and the Democrats said hell no, that had nothing to do with conservatism or liberalism. It’s policy, not left or right, nor conservatism or liberalism. And some of it is just common sense. Barack’s Obama sudden, yes conspicuously sudden, adoption of a whole bunch of issues championed by Republicans was stupid. It doesn’t make sense to start abandoning your positions that were slated to usher in change so you can be more appealing to people who either will be open to you or not. Those hard right Republicans who aren’t being affected by the economy aren’t going to vote for him. To give an air of being open to modify his position on Iraq, something that’s been proving him right every day, is as big a blunder as anybody could ever make. Thankfully, it either hasn’t been fully noticed, or the electorate realizes he’s twice as good candidate to deal with what ails America as McCain. In playing sports, I remember being told, and seeing, that you don’t change a strategy if it’s working. If you’re beating a team, you don’t drastically adopt a new tactic. You keep at it. He opened up double-digit leads over McCain in several polls just so he could shoot himself in the foot? Talk about being self-destructive.
Now, I don’t think McCain or Hillary, or anybody would have fared any better. Hillary had her own huge gaffes when she outright lied about sniper fire and called it a misspeak, my favorite word of 2008. McCain’s a huge flip-flopper, if there ever was one. Barack was supposed to be different though and didn’t have any reason to start acting weird.
I still like and support Obama. I know he’ll be a great president. I’m just worried about a few silly things he’s done. I’m not as enthusiastic or as zealous as I once was. I don’t feel the need to massively abandon my job as myself and three hundred fellow employees once did to vote for him. Maybe when Election Day dawns, I’ll further see how enormously flawed McCain is and how he really is an extension of failed policies, and find a way to vote for Obama.
By the way, if Republicans want a small government, why don’t they refrain from running for office? Government would be a lot smaller without them in Congress, the Senate, and most notable the White House.
Koshoni, and we were just talking about what a little bit or semblance of democracy has inspired in everyday young Nigerians finding the courage to nurture their talent and voila (see pictures above). My favorite of the lot was a young designer, still in design school at Nobel Afrique, Chineze Araka, who in my opinion should have won the first prize and not second, showcased some of the most beautiful designs of the evening. I met her after the show, had a quick nice chat, and it was evident to me that she wasn’t fully aware of her capacity and potential to become the next big buzz name in fashion in Nigeria. Hopefully she will and I’ll remind her of this someday down the line. 
Odio Mimonet’s designs, though she was the most seasoned and mature of the lot and been around the longest, were quite new to me. She’s one designer whose style I’ve never really placed, nor patronized, but I knew that she did have her following. Her designs tonight were the most polished , practical and wearable of them all; with a relational theme flowing through her entire showcase. They were beautiful and one could tell that she put a lot of thought into every piece. In a sense, each of her designs could be a wardrobe builder and essential for the same woman. From a play on a professional skirt suit to a dinner dress to a Sunday brunch outfit. Her display was in my opinion, the best. 
Tiffany Amber’s designs tonight were the least original. The showcase overall lacked authenticity and seemed to be suffering a bit of an identity crisis. There was a mix of bling embellishment, a tad of avant garde, though a sliver of the real Tiffany Amber shone through with one of the last pieces which had a mix of lycra with the Ankara..jpg)
Now to the computer itself. I currently use (and am about to dump) a Sony Viao. A pretty computer, but has been a most heart-breaking experience to put it mildly. Within the first 6 months of ownership, it crashed on me twice. I lost all important documents and unfortunately for me I hadn't backed up. Their customer service is awful, I got transfered to India and conversed with a totally clueless and barely intelligible unhelpful rep. Aside from that my Viao overheats because apparently, the Intel processor used for my laptop is of the cheap Chinese kind (Celeron). I've heard that some from this model had been known to catch fire. Go figure. The battery life sucks beyond measure. My Viao (from which I type)'s battery life after less than 2 years old is less than 20 minutes from full life. My friend's Macbook is 'over' 2 years old and the battery life on his still exceeds 3 hours!! Then lets not go into all the virus attacks and issues I have had nearly from day one. And lastly, for this entry, but certainly not the least, it took Sony almost 2 months to get the bloody thing to me from the day I placed my order. Macbooks ship in 24 hours. Of this alone I am ecsatic. I have, my whole computer literate-adult life, shied away from Macs, because I thought they were so cumbersome to use and incompatible with everything. In addition, I didn't like their previous keyboard arrangement and that just turned me off. They've since changed all that and Saymama's loving the prospect of a future of virus-slow processing-overheating-free life. They come in 2 colors: black and white. I'm loving the white. So off I go to the nearest Apple store..through the Atlantic, across the Sahara, over the hills and whatever else it would take to get me there. Steve Jobs, you rock. 
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