Well, Super-Amazing-Fantastic-Tsunami-Fat-Duper-Tuesday is finally here. It’s such a weird feeling to know that at the end of the day, the race for party nominations will be a lot closer to a final decision. I don’t think it’s hard to guess which candidate earned my vote this morning. Much to my surprise, my polling location was a half of a block away and had no lines this morning as I was given a marker, a long sheet of paper, and instructions to basically play a matching game. I am officially a Chicago voter.

A cold and knee-deep snow gave me a reason to work from home on Friday and Monday, allowing me to take in all of the beauty that is the 24-hour news cycle. For the most part, I was treated to a loop of sound bites and in-depth analysis of what each candidate had for breakfast that morning. I’ve heard that the primary and general presidential election have become nothing more than a beauty or popularity contest, and if you pay attention to what these pundits have to say, you’re probably right. There’s no coverage of their actual positions or proposals, but instead we get to hear crap that doesn’t matter but somehow has been classified as news.

Somewhere in the garbage that’s fed to us, someone can actually dig a little and find real news and important coverage of the ideas and strategies that each candidate is talking about. The thing is, I am still waiting for a Hillary Clinton supporter to show any sign of understanding what her proposals are. I’m just left dumbfounded. I hear a lot of criticism thrown at Obama about how great his speeches are, but how little substance there is in the form of actual policy and proposals. Maybe it’s because I’ve been reading his books and campaign literature and listening to his speeches for the past year, but I just don’t see how anyone that has invested time into researching the candidates could say that.

But maybe that’s the problem.

I have a lot of hope for today’s results. Across the country, my age demographic is finally starting to pay attention and follow through by heading to the polls. There is a deep desire to have a president that inspires and leads in a positive way for the greater good, not a shill of war-mongering corporations.

I feel like there’s something better that we should be striving for, and to me, there’s only one candidate that can lead us in that direction.

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If you’ve received, forwarded, talked about, heard about, posted about, or had any other interaction with the crap-filled lies spread about presidential candidate Barack Obama, please read this.

If you have something… oh, I don’t know… researched and intelligent to say about Obama, I’d love to hear it.  Otherwise, move your mouse away from the forward button and read on.

Barack was born in Hawaii on August 4th, 1961. His father, Barack Obama Sr., was born and raised in a small village in Kenya. His mother, Ann Dunham, grew up in small-town Kansas. Her father worked on oilrigs during the Depression, and then signed up for World War II after Pearl Harbor, where he marched across Europe in Patton’s army.

Barack Obama grew up in Hawaii with his mother and his grandparents, and he lived in Indonesia with his mother and step-father for four years when he was in elementary school.

After graduating from Columbia University in New York, he became a community organizer working with churches on the South Side of Chicago. He then attended Harvard Law School, where he was the first African American president of the Harvard Law Review.

After studying at Trinity United Church of Christ, he was baptized and remains a committed and active Christian. He continues to attend regular services with his family at Trinity United Church of Christ.

Barack has never been a Muslim or practiced any other faith besides Christianity, and in January 2005 he was sworn into the U.S. Senate on his family Bible.

Barack’s patriotism and profound belief in the underlying principles of this country led him to teach Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago. He also worked as a Civil Rights attorney in Chicago, protecting the voting rights of minority communities. Eventually, his commitment to the people in his community led him to run for office as an Illinois State Senator where he served for 8 years representing the 13th district.

In the U.S. Senate, as a member of the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, Senator Obama has fought to help Illinois veterans get the disability pay they were promised, while working to prepare the VA for the return of the thousands of veterans who will need care after Iraq and Afghanistan.

Barack believes that you show your patriotism by how you treat your fellow Americans and veterans.

In November of 2007, General Tony McPeak, Major General J. Scott Gration, and Secretary of the Navy Richard Danzig wrote an open letter praising Barack’s commitment to our troops and to US veterans. Here’s an excerpt:

“We also admire his strong support for our troops and veterans. As a member of the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, he has fought to improve care for wounded troops, slash red tape, and reform the disability review process. He also passed legislation to combat homelessness among veterans. As President, he will expand housing vouchers, and launch a new supportive services housing program for at-risk veterans and their families. In addition, he will improve mental health screening and treatment at all levels: from enlistment, to deployment, to reentry into civilian life.”

It’s about this time every year that I get full use of the ability to roll my eyes that I perfected between the ages of 13 and yesterday. Much to the delight of my mom, no scenario was immune to the eye-rolling… birthday morning wake up calls, church gossip conversations at family events, conversations about the lack of girlfriend in my life… Needless to say, there were/are many opportunities to practice the perfect sarcastic non-verbal response championed by teenagers everywhere, and the next month just happens to be the height of eye roll opportunities.

Usually about a week or two after major retailers begin displaying their pumpkins and ghoulish costumes for the Halloween holiday, a sinister mid-level corporate manager sends memos written in puppy blood on tusks of endangered elephants and walruses to store managers throughout the country to begin slowly clearing an entire aisle in the back of the store in anticipation of a shipment that will be arriving in a week. That shipment? A harmless set of towels emblazoned with a smiling snowman and a few boxes of clear decoration lights.

Then comes day two… a box full of snow globes depicting harmless “winter scenes” and whimsical children against a backdrop of the city skyline. A few older church-lady-esque shoppers are seen visibly shaking their heads as they walk by the mostly empty aisle with distinct shades of red and green backing the empty shelves.

It’s day three that really sets the world into a tizzy, though. Day three is when the heavens open up and reindeer, Santa, penguins, and all the Christmas schwag that had been collecting dust in warehouses for the past four months descends upon local Targets, Walgreens, WalMarts, Menards, Bass Pro Shops, PetSmarts, and Victoria’s Secrets. Someone hastily e-mails Bill O’Reilly to let him know of this calculating and sinister plot that has been unveiled in the middle of their trip to find a five gallon drum of mayonnaise and a pair of super-husky pants for their six year old at their local WalMart, and soon the media machine that is Fox News declares the war on Christmas has entered a new year and that God is angry.

It’s a liberal plot to roll Christmas and Thanksgiving into one big holiday with none of the religious thought! It’s the next step in destroying all Christian holiday observances! This is opening the US to a Hitler/Stalin/insert horrible dictator here!

Really, Bill? If big box retailers are creating such an atrocity by allowing customers to purchase Christmas decorations and Christmas-themed candy before Thanksgiving, why not pull your book from their shelves, cutting off their ability to make a profit on your words of wisdom and insight?

And Bill, if you thought about Christmas as much as a big box retail chain, perhaps it is your heart that would grow and your faith that would find new depth.

But it’s more than just Bill… it’s every day normal Christians that buy into just enough of the corporate Christmas, but become disgusted when others buy into it just a little bit more. They write letters to the editor of local newspapers decrying the row of plastic evergreens that are now available at your local Home Depot, never mentioning the fact that they bought their husband’s Christmas present in May when they found it on sale.

It’s a good thing there’s nothing else in the news to report and that the biggest and most important talking point is the evil, watered-down, crafted by Satan himself message of “Happy Holidays.”

Meanwhile, the message of Christmas… the hope and joy and redemption found in a Savior… is lost amongst petty squabbling by “christians” more worried by the way the city square depicts a menorah next to the manger than their own belief and observance of the day itself.

When you allow others (read: big box retailers looking for the highest profit possible and public officials putting together holiday displays to make everyone feel welcome) to shape your belief in and observance of Christmas, you have much larger issues than the jack-o-lantern/turkey/snowman display at your local Target.

Besides, if this means we get to enjoy Great Lakes Winter Ale a little earlier, is there really any harm?

Want to know a quick way to tick me off?  Wait until I buy some pumpkin bread or a pumpkin muffin.  If that sucker has a raisin in it, I may flip out.  Snap.  Go ballistic.  Turn into Joe Paterno when I’m cut off by a car full of hippies who run stop signs.

Don’t get me wrong.  I love raisins.  Those wrinkly, chewy little nuggets of dried fruit gold are a great addition to many things.  GORP, for instance… or “ants on a log” with celery and peanut butter.  However, raisins most certainly do not belong in anything pumpkin.  It is an abomination created by Sauron himself in the fiery pits of Mount Doom.  Old people and coffee shop owners of the world have been cast under Sauron’s spell and I will champion the cause of all who strive to fight the good fight.

This is, in effect, another fight against “The Man.”

So, how do we fight this villainy, this perversion of baked goods?  We bake, my friends.  We bake with pumpkin… and with chocolate.  Taking the earthly, ripe taste of the seasonal pumpkin and combining it with the year-round, always appreciated chocolate just makes sense.

If you hate the combination of pumpkin and chocolate, then the terrorists have already won.  Go hide in your duct tape and plastic covered windows and enjoy living out the rest of your days like a hermit eating nothing but the castaway rancid raisin-filled concoctions that pollute our bake sales and church potlucks.

That’s right heretic, bake sale organizers hate your kind.  You show up with the type of treats that get put at the back of the dessert table on Thanksgiving, thinking that somehow your raisin-filled tripe will sound appealing this year.  You yourself passed it up to enjoy a nice piece of someone else’s pumpkin pie!  How do you look at yourself in the mirror the day after Thanksgiving?  Is that why you soaked your raisins in rum?  You think a slight rum-raisin-induced buzz will save you from shame and ridicule?  You think that raisin-filled pumpkin bread is going to help the scouts pay for their canoe trip, or the soften the blow on the marching band uniform budget?  I’ll give you $5 to leave that waste at home where your children will beg you to throw it out and your dog will hate your existence for even thinking about putting that thing in the oven.

And you, coffee shop owner and operator… you should know better.  Your mother made this?  I think it’s time your mother was moved into a home and forced to play scrabble all day while watching re-runs of Matlock.  No… that sounds more like a reward than a punishment.  Change scrabble to Russian Roulette and change Matlock to any of the MTV shows that feature 17 year olds who drive BMWs and live on the ocean and complain about the drama of only getting a $20,000 dress for prom.  Your mom will waste away as we enjoy raisin-free delights with our grande non-fat sugar-laced heroi… coffee.

Me?  I’m going to enjoy the last few lingering bites of pumpkin and chocolate chip muffin I have in front of me while I listen to the new Radiohead album.

We’ve won this battle, my friends, but the war against raisin-filled baked goods has only begun.

Three years ago, I watched in awe as the Junior Senator from Illinois delivered a speech at the Democratic National Convention that connected with me unlike any politician or national leader has ever done before. I remember flipping channels and catching C-SPAN’s coverage of the convention, most likely during a commercial break for something much more entertaining. I had heard the name Barack Obama, but I was living in camp-world with Minnesota on the brain – not Illinois.

I remember being challenged to have hope – the audacity to believe that we should be optimistic and that we should take on overbearing issues like unemployment, health care, education, and every other pressing issue that had been ignored for far too long. Watching Obama speak, I felt like I was watching John or Robert Kennedy and became a little jealous of my grandparents. It must be at that point in the cycle when an entire generation needs a leader that can inspire hope, and I remember thinking that Obama may be the man to do it.

I became a Barack Obama fanboy.

Now, as I read through his recent speech at a Ministers’ Conference, I feel more than ever that this is the time for a leader like Barack – someone who can inspire an entire generation and lead our nation into a progressive future.

Here is the speech he recently gave – give it a read when you get a chance. If it brings you into the Obama fanboy fold, let me know.

Also – do your part. Get involved. Make sure you are registered to vote now so when the primaries roll around, you can decide who your party puts on the ticket!

A few excerpts that gave me goosebumps…

If we have more black men in prison than are in our colleges and universities, then it’s time to take the bullet out. If we have millions of people going to the emergency room for treatable illnesses like asthma; it’s time to take the bullet out. If too many of our kids don’t have health insurance; it’s time to take the bullet out. If we keep sending our kids to dilapidated school buildings, if we keep fighting this war in Iraq, a war that never should have been authorized and waged, a war that’s costing us $275 million dollars a day and a war that is taking too many innocent lives — if we have all these challenges and nothing’s changing, then every minister in America needs to come together — form our own surgery teams — and take the bullets out.

—————-

We have been told that our mounting debts don’t matter, that the economy is doing great, and that people’s anxieties about rising health care costs and disappearing pensions aren’t a big deal. We’ve been told that climate change is a hoax, that our broken schools cannot be fixed, and that we are destined to send millions of dollars a day to Mideast dictators for their oil.

And when it comes to faith, we’ve been told that all that matters is what divides us – Evangelicals from Mainline Protestants, the Black church from the White church, Catholics from Protestants from Muslims from Jews.

And when we try to have an honest debate about the crises we face, whether it’s from the pulpit or the campaign trail, the pundits don’t want us to find common ground, they want us to find someone to blame. They want to divide us into Red States and Blue States, and tell us to always point the finger at somebody else – the other party, or gay people, or people of faith, or immigrants.

To my neighborhood, I’m officially a gentrifier. Less than 4 days after I moved in, a note addressed to me let it be known that I had been labeled and judged because of the color of my skin. The catalyst of the letter was a parking ticket, but what flowed from the author’s pen over two handwritten pages carried a generation of hurt and pain from a broken world and an unjust society. Growing up in 99% white Appalachian Ohio, I will never completely understand the displacement and race-fueled politics that have shaped the lives of my black and Latino neighbors, but I do believe that God has brought me to this place. Regardless of my naivety, and with God’s grace, I can contribute to the efforts of community development and racial reconciliation around me.

There’s something about this mixture of experiences and education that have been intertwined to prepare me for this particular point in life. Working with my boys at camp, spending a year in community centers in Erie, and somehow stumbling across The Sanctuary while in the Twin Cities – there’s a reason these seemingly separate experiences have fallen into place. There’s a reason that statistics that once could be shrugged off now stick in my gut and weigh on my heart and mind, and why losing an entire generation of black boys presents a call to action, rather than a momentary grief period.

But I’m not here to save the world. It is so easy to take a paternalistic savior approach to service in a community that has been hurt for generations… to believe that I have all the answers and can change the world if people would simply listen and do what I say. There’s a power that comes with that approach that is oh so tempting, but must be prayerfully avoided. The wisdom of the community far outweighs any books or seminars, and a genuine approach of a united community must be taken, rather than the first instinct of trying to be a hero.

Oscar Romero is often attributed with a quote that was actually taken from a homily written by Fr. Ken Untener that challenged the paternalistic overtones that come with serving the poor and oppressed which basically says liberation will only come in realizing that we can’t do everything, even if it means I get to struggle with a feeling of incompleteness.

Great. I love that feeling of incompleteness.

-

“Creating the Church of Tomorrow” by Fr. Ken Untener

It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.

The Kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,

it is even beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the

magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.

Nothing we do is complete,

which is another way of saying that the Kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.

No prayer fully expresses our faith.

No confession brings perfection, no pastoral visit brings wholeness.

No program accomplishes the Church’s mission.

No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about.

We plant the seeds that one day will grow.

We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.

We lay foundations that will need further development.

We provide yeast that produces effects far beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything,

and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.

This enables us to do something,

and to do it very well.

It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning,

a step along the way,

an opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results, but that is the difference

between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders,

ministers, not messiahs.

We are prophets of a future not our own.

Written by Fr. Ken Untener (later Bishop Untener, bishop of Saginaw) for John Cardinal Dearden; given by John Cardinal Dearden as a homily at Blessed Sacrament Cathedral, Detroit, October 25, 1979.

The Delocator!

That’s right, friends!  You can take your anti-corporate consumer spending to a whole new level of efficiency.  No more asking awkward teenagers behind the counter getting paid minimum wage about the independent nature of their establishment only to get a blank stare.  You can find independent coffee shops, book stores, and movie theaters all by entering your zip code.  In a flash, you will be instantly transported to a world of true community-friendly entertainment hubs and java huts, allowing you to cast your consumeristic votes at a locally owned and operated establishments in an effort to bring down The Man.

(It’s OK to sacrifice corporate uniformity and allow a little adventure into your life, I promise.)

A quick list of ways I’m fighting “The Man”:

1) Today, I am wearing gray slacks with black socks. I know conventional fashion wisdom says that socks should match the color of the pants, but this morning I realized that I had ne’er a pair of clean gray socks. Being forced to choose between dirty gray socks, clean black socks, or calling in sick to avoid any awkward encounters, I bucked the system and am now enjoying the coziness of fashion freedom. Alexis made a huge scene at Potbelly’s when she noticed my secret, somehow creating a sound similar to that of a record player’s needle scratching to a halt, followed by a large woman fainting. I pressed on, defiant and famished, and enjoyed my Wreck on (fake) wheat with brown mustard, oblivious to the slack-jawed onlookers gazing at my casual irreverence.

2) For the past 3 business days, I have refused to read the last page of the RedEye and the typical celebrity gossip contained therein. I realize that I am considerably out of the loop as to the marital status of several celebrities, but somehow I’ve managed to get by. I also have, as a matter of principle, refused to read Liz Crokin’s weekly segment, “Eye Contact,” for the past year and a half, instead skipping straight to the Chicago news to find out how many people were shot in my neighborhood over the weekend. I also find time to kick the Sudoku puzzle’s ass… unless it is a 4 or 5 star. I struggle with anything past 3 stars.

3) I was the deciding vote holding out on the confirmation of John Bolton as US ambassador to the UN. I just didn’t like the guy’s shifty mustache. He looked like a creepy uncle, and while that does somewhat reflect the current US role in international policy, the vibe was just too much.

4) I now watch almost every television show I’m interested in via DVR, allowing me to skip commercials at will. I still stop for the Sonic commercials because Nate knows one of the guys. I also really like limeades. So take that, corporate America! Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you are slipping your wares into sitcoms since your 60-second commercials are now reduced to 10 seconds of squiggly lines! Dwight just “happened” to use a Staples brand shredder a couple of episodes ago on The Office, right? Come to think of it, that shredder was pretty cool. Can it really shred a CD? Wow.

5) I rigged the BCS polling machines. Surprisingly, the 7-3 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute was slated to face off in the big game against Ohio State before I changed the weighting to favor Florida.

6) I use my staff ID to get a student discount at movie theaters. Right in the gut, huh Hollywood? Soon, I may even pay for a $5 Movie Club ticket, then sneak into a full price show! Feeling the pinch, movie industry? I mean, come on, $11 for a movie ticket? How about I just watch it on YouTube or pay $10 for the bootleg on the subway?

Most likely, you are trying to find ways to incorporate my examples into your own life right now. Please, feel free to share.

One of my favorite new road trip activities is to tune into local talk radio stations as I drive through different areas of the country. With the recruitment season taking me to Cincinnati again this year, I knew I was going to have the opportunity to pass through rural Indiana and Ohio, which always leads to great talk radio. Freaky, scary, bigoted talk radio, but still entertaining in a weird kind of way. Luckily there’s a Cincy-area station that carries Air America, or I would have been forced to ride in complete silence.

Of course, the most popular conversation on both conservative and liberal stations has been President Clinton’s interview with Fox News that apparently showed the world how rage-filled the 42nd POTUS really is. Personally, I thought it was awesome. I know Bill threatened the very core of our country by having sexual relations 8 years ago with a woman not named Hillary, but his ability to actually stand up for himself in the face of the Fascist News Channel was nothing short of inspiring. Sure, he poked a cowardly, wannabe reporter in the knee. I saw that and I thought to myself, “wow, if I’m getting out-smarted and out-witted on my turf, the last thing I want is for the guy to step it up and poke me.” I hate when a person rubs in their higher ground by doing something like that. But that Wallace… he just chilled out and let the President continue with his venting. He’s a trooper.

Of course, we probably should be paying attention to the anger a former President showed on a cable news interview where he was asked questions purposefully meant to agitate him instead of the fact that a report was put together in April by our intelligence agencies that clearly points out that the invasion of Iraq has made the United States less safe than before the war. A report that was “leaked” by someone in the current President’s own freaking administration. All while enemy combatants are stripped of their rights as Prisoners of War in weak-kneed political bullying labeled as compromise so congressmen and women can go on break with a clear conscious and a happy electorate.

Instead, let’s talk about how angry Bill Clinton is and how he didn’t do enough to prevent 9/11. That’s productive.

See the Clinton interview for yourself:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3 (not as exciting)
 Keith Olbermann says it all.

I’ve been struggling with something to write concerning world affairs and the significance of Monday and everything that has happened in the last 5 years, but putting together an honest reflection has been somewhat challenging.  So, instead of putting together something of my own, I point you to the slacktivist… a somewhat liberal, Christian blog I read.

The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were intended to kill a lot of innocent people, and they did, but all that hideous death was meant to serve a larger intention — “to influence an audience.” Specifically, they were meant to scare us and to keep us scared.

This was a gamble on al-Qaida’s part. They were gambling that the America of the early 21st century, George W. Bush’s America, was populated by a much weaker breed than was the America of the 20th century, FDR’s America. Bin Laden surely remembered that Imperial Japan had tried this same gambit — the devastating sneak attack meant to demoralize — back in 1941, and that it hadn’t worked out very well. But he was gambling that Americans nowadays were made of flimsier stuff.

And for the past five years, our so-called leaders have been tripping over themselves to prove bin Laden was right. From color-coded “terror alerts,” to duct-tape panics, to the fetishizing of “security,” to the idea that the Constitution, due process, legal warrants and the Geneva Conventions are “quaint” relics unsuited to these insecure times, our leaders have been working hand in hand with al-Qaida to make us scared and keep us scared.

(Get the full post here)

It’s an honest read and one that I completely agree with.