The Race and Gender to the White House

I am currently reading through Speeches That Changed the World (compiled by Simon Sebag Montefiore). This morning I read speeches from four and five decades ago by Dr Martin Luther, President J F Kennedy, and Shirley Chisholm (all Americans from ages past). And I am thinking today America is at yet another crossroad.

As we watch the drama unfold in the primaries and the race to the White House, I realize that much of what these two men and this woman stood for in the 1960's are still being tested in today’s America and I wonder how America will decide.

Many have predicted that the Democratic Party has planned to lose this year’s Presidential elections because they are principally fielding a white woman and a black man. Their prediction is based on the premise that traditional America is not ready for a female President and neither is she ready for a black President. We live to learn.

Starting with Shirley Chisholm
In an address to the House of Representatives in May 1969, Shirley Chisholm, the first black Congress woman, highlighted and spoke impassionedly on the necessity of improving the lot of the socially disadvantaged, including women. “It is obvious that discrimination exists,’’ she said. “Women do not have the opportunities that men do. And women that do not conform to the system, who try to break with the accepted patterns, are stigmatized as ‘odd’ and ‘unfeminine’. The fact is that a woman who aspires to be chairman of the board, or a Member of the House, does so for exactly the same reason as any man. Basically, these are that she thinks she can do the job and she wants to try.”

Shirley Chisholm sponsored the Equal Rights Amendment, which would guarantee equal rights for all regardless of colour or gender, through Congress. She also competed for the nomination as the Democratic Presidential candidate in 1972. She was unsuccessful. Her race and her gender no doubt played a role.

Ironically Mrs Clinton’s bid to the White House perhaps is enabled by the Equal Rights Amendment. Who knows if the prejudices of the human mind and mindset, which any statute cannot conquer, will stop her from reaching the White House – simply because of her gender.

I have a dream
And then I read that most famous speech. That great and mighty civil rights crusader, Dr Martin Luther King, said in August 1963, “ I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal”.

Dr King went on in the same speech: “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today…..this is our hope”

This could yet be America’s greatest test. Barack Obama’s finest hour - buttressing his audacity of hope.

A new generation of Americans
At his inaugural address in 1961, JFK said: “Let word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans – born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage – and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.”

He closed his inaugural speech with these words:

“Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world, ask of us here the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God’s work must truly be our own.”

History the final judge of our deeds.
JFK led America on the ticket of hope and change. Both Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton ride on the winds that cry out for change.

America is indeed at a crossroads. And the legacy, the ideals and the struggles of JFK, Shirley Chisholm and Dr Martin Luther King stand yet still to be tested.

And yet all men are created equal.

The Whole Nine Yards

I’ve been teasing a friend of mine of late. Charming individual that he is, I’ve told him several times that were he still single, I’d literally order my younger sister to pack up and relocate here in Ghana. We had recently caught up quite by chance after some five years of absence. So thrilled have I been about his level of insight, joie de vivre, ambition and level of spirituality, that I even telephoned my younger sister in London to tell her about him.

We had a conversation of late that really got me reflecting on the G-factor (that is, the God factor) in each of our every day lives.

A number of exciting, lucrative business and career opportunities are on his plate, and, the great thing about them is, they have literally come to his plate effortlessly. And the key word there is effortlessly.

We discussed the greatness of the absolute mercy of God, and how when He decides it’s your turn for a blessing, well, it your turn o, as we say here in Ghana.

Suddenly you make contact with people who you know you were just fated to meet; you have a business meeting with a financier which leaves you with goose pimples, you are awarded a significant contract which you know you did not give your utmost attention to... the list goes on.

I had one such similar experience late last year. Like joke, like joke (I’m going local today with all my west African clichés...) I thought to make a particular investment and, like joke like joke all things worked out seamlessly, effortlessly and all so very easily. Note - I had been seeking to make the same investment for the past three years and on each and every occasion, it fell through, and I lost a whole lot of cash.

As I talked to my friend, the word from Jeremiah 17 verse 7 kept ringing in my head: blessed is the man who trusts in The Lord, whose hope The Lord is.

We settled on the merits of staying with Him now and forever more, for He is the whole nine yards.

All Things Bright and Beautiful

Starting Over
2008 arrived with a bang for Miss TheArtofLiving. At half past midnight on 31 December she was out of church and straight into that party that I wrote about a few weeks back. And what a party it was. After all the praying and praising, it was time to shake everything my mother (actually The Lord) gave me and celebrate the entrance of a new year and new, better, beginnings.

The past three weeks have been enormously fun and love-filled. Plenty of resting, socialising, partying and some 'me time'. It’s funny how, in every day living, we don’t realise how much we omit to give of ourselves to ourselves. Life had been filled with so much doing, doing, and yet more doing. I learnt to relax again, learnt to unwind again, and I even discovered the joy of early morning running in the mountains.

So Miss TheArtofLiving starts 2008 thanking God for Him, and celebrating all things bright and beautiful – family, friends, and the gift of life. She also enters into 2008 exuberantly expectant for fresh, happy, brighter beginnings for 2008.