Let's Organize Our Global Community

Both Rudy Giuliani and Sarah Palin have mocked Barack Obama's experience as a community organizer. Obama was 24 years old and a recent college graduate when he decided to take that $12k a year job on the south side of Chicago instead of grabbing for a 7-figure salary on Wall Street which he could have easily pocketed.

I would think Dems and R's would agree that Barack's $12k move was an admirable career choice and not one to be mocked. And the R's seem to forget that Obama went on to become a constitutional and civil rights law professor at the University of Chicago, worked in the Illinois State Legislature, and worked in the U.S. Senate where he co-authored an impressive amount of bi-partisan legislation in a comparatively short amount of time. He was elected to the US Senate in Nov. of 2004. I don't think there's anything funny about that experience and track record. But as the "Hockey Mom" Sarah Palin mocked Obama, she said that she had "actual responsibilities" in her job as Mayor ... of a town the size of Emmaus. Tee Hee. And she can also see Russia (and President Putin's plane flying over her Alaskan airspace), so hey, case closed on her foreign affairs expertise. Obama serves on the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, as well as the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. The R's downplay Obama's legislation. Here's some of it:

Coburn-Obama Tranparency Act- legislation to stop abuse of no-bid contracts in aftermath of disaster, included in the final Dept. of Homeland Security funding Bill.

Lugar-Obama Non Proliferation Act- a comprehensive nuclear threat reduction plan

Veterans Affairs Committee Bill- Obama wrote legislation to improve veteran's healthcare.

STEP UP- summer learning plan for disadvantaged youth (please see my prior posts about Obama's education plans)

Stop Fraud Act-protects low income home buyers

See here for more About Barack Obama (scroll down to ACTIONS) and here for more The New York Times > U.S. > Image > Obama’s Record in the Illinois Senate

When Obama was a young man working with poor people who had lost their jobs, he was responsible for organizing after school programs for at risk youth, job training programs, removing harmful asbestos from a housing project, and early education programs, just to name a few. He helped ordinary hardworking people organize for CHANGE as a response to the failed policies of out of touch politicians. He says that this work "taught me a lot about listening to people as opposed to coming in with a pre-determined agenda." McCain, on the other hand, has continuously voted against minimum wage increases, SCHIP, and funding for Head Start. And Palin's positions are identical to Bush and Cheney. Very scary looking, even with lipstick. She also believes that women should not have the right to choose to give birth, or not, in cases of rape and incest.

In these chaotic and troubling times, we can't think of a better quality for our next President to have than the demonstrable and documented quality Barack Obama has to reach across the aisle and bring disparate and opposing factions to common ground. Let's give Barack Obama a mandate to organize our national community and our global community.

Mr. Dottie/Bill Villa contributed to this post.