Today marks the Ceremonial beginning of President Obama’s
second term as the U.S. President. It also commemorates the life of civil
rights leader The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I find it incredibly
fitting that the U.S. ’s
first African American President is ceremonially sworn into a second term on
such a day. It makes me feel proud that we’ve come so far as a nation.
There’s still an immense amount of work that will need to be
done, there will always be work for a nation so diverse and independently
driven as The United States. The work that needs to be done will take a little
belt tightening from everyone, but we’re American’s and can do anything we put
our collective minds to. The price of our freedom is vigilance and sometimes a
little sacrifice and as always, a lot of hard work.
It isn’t easy being a nation of immigrants and individuals
with such wide and varied backgrounds. It takes a lot of hard work to remember
that you can’t please all of the people all of the time, but you can always try
and do what is right for the people. Right is doing those things that common
sense dictates will be the most helpful to these varied citizens and immigrants
without infringing on all our basic rights as constructed by the framers of our
liberties.
It is a testimony to our national thoughtfulness and ever
evolving society that an African American man can be re-elected to a second
term as the most powerful man in the world. It shows that as Americans, we can
do something that is hard, but do it for the right reasons.
Dr. King had a dream just as all Americans have a dream.
There was a time in this country where those two dreams seemed as far apart as
the Earth and the Sun but through time and a desire to strengthen the fabric of
our nation we worked at making those two dreams a collective dream, the fully
realized American Dream. Our nation, while wounded with war abroad, violence at
home and economic troubles, still dreams the same.
I still believe in that American Dream. I believe in it
because we have a Martin Luther King Jr. Day and we have an African American
President. I know that American’s can sometimes seem cemented with piety and
Victorian sensibilities, we can seem arrogant and stubborn, but we are always
looking forward. We all want the same dream and I know we are all capable of
achieving it because of what we have done so far.
I have faith in the people, I have faith that with some
perseverance and fortitude American’s will come out on top and be the shining
beacon of liberty, justice and the symbol of hope we know it can be. We must do
the hard work; the hard work that Dr. King did to bring the plight of the
African American people to the forefront of our consciousness. The hard work
that will go into the gun control issue, same sex marriage, affordable
education for all Americans, affordable healthcare and equal justice for all.
There is work that must be done. No one ever said, “You’re
an American now, so take it easy. You don’t have to continue to be the best you
can be”. Some people may have thought it, but it just isn’t true. It takes a
strong will, a sympathetic heart, an educated mind and the willingness to do
what is hard. It’s what made America
the powerhouse it is. It’s what put men on the moon, it’s what opened the West
to settlement; it’s what created the technologies the rest of the world now
uses. It was our dogged determination that made us what we are today and what
will propel us into the future.
In honor of that Dream, that spirit American’s carry and
want to carry always in their hearts I must let someone far wiser and far
greater than me wrap this patriotic piece up.
“The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy
present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the
occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew”. - Abraham
Lincoln
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