Victory...for the most part

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

After 143 years, a person of color will finally have the privilege of exercising his 14th amendment privilege to hold the highest office in the land. Enough articles have been written by more eloquent journalists than myself about the significance of this election; I think the Onion describes it best in its article, "Nation Finally Shitty Enough To Make Social Progress":

"The election of our first African-American president truly shows how far we've come as a nation," said NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams. "Just eight years ago, this moment would have been unthinkable. But finally we, as a country, have joined together, realized we've reached rock bottom, and for the first time voted for a candidate based on his policies rather than the color of his skin."

This is a huge step forward in electoral politics, that people are able to see the promise in a candidate beyond the color of his (or her) skin. It was also really fun celebrating with an estimated 4,000 of my closest friends in the streets of Seattle.

What this election has also made clear is that while a majority of our country is able to see beyond the color of an individual's skin, progress is still needed when it comes to groups of people. On the same day as Obama's election, a number of discriminatory referenda were passed around the country. We've all heard about the varying degrees of anti-gay legislation that passed, but you might not have heard that Floridian's manage to screw up in a big way, as usual. I don't mean to discriminate against Floridians, but it would be really nice if they could make it through a single election cycle without totally screwing up.

The New York Times, at the very bottom of their article on gay marriage, tells us of a fairly disturbing part of the Florida constitution that voters narrowly voted to uphold:

Among the more unusual measures on this year’s ballots was one in Florida that would repeal an old clause in the state constitution that allows legislators to bar Asian immigrants from owning land. The repeal would be symbolic, as equal protection laws would prevent lawmakers from applying the ban. With 78 percent of precincts reporting just before 11 p.m. Tuesday, the vote was close, with 52 percent voting to preserve the clause.

WTF??? 52 percent of Floridians think Asian immigrants shouldn't be allowed to own land? Turns out, on further investigation, Florida was probably just too stupid to understand what this clause meant; because it calls Asian immigrants "aliens ineligible for citizenship," (AP) most voters probably thought they were discriminating against illegal immigrants, who we all love to hate. This comes full circle to my original point in "Who's afraid of direct democracy"; voters are too stupid to make decisions on their own and should let the stupid and corrupt politicians they elected do their jobs. Representative democracy was specifically designed by our founding fathers to prevent an angry, bigoted majority from repressing the rights of minorities.

It's easy to discriminate against a faceless minority. It's harder to discriminate against a man that we've all gotten to know and scrutinize over a long two year campaign. I'm sure if Floridians were asked to vote to ban their Asian American friend specifically from owning land, they'd make the right choice. And if the decision was up to a legislature, which unlike an electorate is accountable to public scrutiny, the ballot measure would have passed unanimously. I'd like to think that no modern politician could survive voting against allowing Asian immigrants to own land.

Fortunately, I live in the most hippy liberal progressive state west of Vermont, so I'm pretty happy with the results of our moronic voter initiative process. Seattle/Washington voters affirmed every last spending initiative except for (thank God) I-985. We voted most overwhelmingly in favor of spending upwards of $5 million a year to increase the number of hours of training required for "the people who wipe old people's butts" (The Stranger). The stupidity of this is offset by the fact that we voted to officially make Seattle a real city some day by building light rail and keeping Pike Place Market from caving in.

In other less political news, it has finally started raining all the time. Not quite as bad as Hanoi though, so I can't complain. Can't wait until ski season...