I would be the first to tell you that I am not a fan of Barack Obama. For me he is too much of a Republican and not enough of a real Democrat. I also didn’t like the way he ran his campaign including the way he treated both Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin. He also basically implied that Bill Clinton is a racist. Race was used throughout his campaign and it made me crazy. No one could say anything against Barack Obama without being called a racist. I felt this was all wrong during the election. I really felt it divided our country instead of uniting it.
Leave it to the Republicans to make me slide to the side of President Obama. Governor McDonnell from the state of Virgina has declared April to be Confederate History month. I thought the Civil War was over and the slaves were set free. Yes, the winners got to write the history book and thus get to celebrate their victory. However, the victory was a victory for our country. I get tired of hearing about the Civil War. Back in the eighties I lived in Oklahoma. Just about every pickup I saw had a Confederate flag hanging in the back window. That flag is a symbol for racism. The fight was about slavery. For a governor in the 21st Century to want to celebrate anything about that war I find it just ridiculous and an amazing step backwards into ignorance. We have a racial and class divide in this country as it is why would any politician want to push those buttons of hate?
Living in Oklahoma was interesting. The people were really nice and friendly but some of them were racist. They loved the University of Oklahoma black football players but they only loved them for winning a game. They certainly wouldn’t want them dating their daughters. I could feel it. They flew their Confederate flags with such pride that I thought the war was still going on. They would reference the war to me solely because I was from the north. I, of course, never even thought about the Civil war. I went to Michigan State University in the seventies. While I grew up in a small town in Michigan where it would be rare to even know a black person, attending the university allowed me to grow as a person and meet many people of color from all over the country and even the world. I always felt like I lived under a bubble at MSU as it was sort of like a utopia in the way we all embraced our differences. I can assure you that many of the people that I met in western Oklahoma thought about the war and when someone from the north was in their midst it was mentioned as though it happened yesterday. Now I know that many of them lost family and friends in the war and maybe there was never a real “healing” for this but to want to celebrate such a tragedy in our history is a mistake. Just when a wound is beginning to heal why should we pick at that scab? I can only believe this is so important this year because Barack Obama dared to become President. Gov. McDonnell mentions next year as being a 150 year celebration but what is there to celebrate? The lives lost by both the north and the south? That scab will never heal unless we all become one as a nation. We shouldn’t celebrate the north and the south. We should celebrate America! If you are so inclined to celebrate April with Confederate History month please hug a racist as they need all the love they can get.
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