Top 5 Reasons We're Saved

By JOHN SHERIDAN

1. Steps Toward Real Equality

A non-white candidate has been elected president. What some said was impossible turned out to be a lot more than possible. But this is no simple passing matter or something to be shoved in another’s face.

This is something to be revered and reflected upon, and let’s be grateful it happened when our generation was able to participate.

2. Transparency

It feels like the White House doors are finally opening again after some four to six odd years. For many, there’s been a feeling that nobody in there was listening. It’s not simply that the Bush administration had turned a deaf ear to the outcries of a nation—not that it was doing it on purpose, but with a war going on it wasn’t going to listen to everyone.

As public approval fell, the government became further estranged from the people who were getting tired of it.

Now it has been proven that we do matter, those of us who thought nobody was listening, and suddenly the White House seems like a hall of justice instead of Bush’s fortress of solitude.
3. Freedom

Hopefully the new administration will ease off the phone tapping. And the cell phone tracing, and the email scanning and every other method of monitoring the average citizen that our current administration has abused and really gotten off on.

Maybe within a year it will be safe for me to tell my dad that really great Anthrax joke that I’ve been saving over the phone. Maybe I can finally say “Yeah, that new Miley Cyrus shit is the BOMB!” at an airport without getting tackled.

4. International Prestige

America has a new face. A face of hope, leadership, change and a couple other buzzwords. With the proper etiquette and action, America could in a few years break away from the ugly stereotypes that it has been pelted with from the beginning.

They can’t call us a nation ruled by “imperialist money-grubbing old white men” anymore. No, they’ll have to think of something new.

5. Well-Spoken Leadership

We have a president-elect who can speak well. This will become paramount as the initial buzz surrounding the election wears off. Language is the greatest tool of our civilization: it conveys ideas, emotions and imperatives.

It can solve problems and it can start wars. None of us will ever know how many times during the Cold War a flock of geese on the radar almost triggered the Rapture, but it was averted by a little red telephone between a man in Washington and a man in the Kremlin.

And when our president speaks to other countries, he represents us. When we suffer disaster and calamity at home and abroad, we want to hear what our president will say. Like him or not, let’s be thankful this one is a proper rhetorician.