Obama four more years

With the dust settling on this historic victory for Barak Obama the biggest single takeout lesson for me is that you can't buy an election and that even with the huge funds available to Romney and the right wing ideologues of the Republican party the American people were just not up for being bought.

This is not to say that a lot of people didn't work very hard to deliver this result for America but that they were not driven by the desire to make their 1% richer  and more powerful than they already are and at the expense of the rest.

We have globally seen the diminution of the idea that government can do something good - be by the people and for the people.  Civil society works on the basis of shared rights and responsibilities.  We agree that everybody drives on the same side of the road and according to rules that allow for traffic that is predictable and safe. We also agree with the power of the state to regulate thi activity and apprehend those who don't stick to the rules.

Governments that stay out of defence, security, education and public infrastructure are not being governmental.  Yes we need checks and balances to make sure we don't live in a state where land rezoning comes with a brown paper bag of cash handed over to a gatekeeper secretly in return for a favour at law but in a transparent, open fair system these transgressions can be sorted out.  The drive to get government out of civil life is a contradiction in terms and should be tackled head on.  

If there is too much red tape in a particular area of activity lets look at the whole process and decide.
There was a time when conservative was a label for a party or person who didn't believe in rapid change where things were working ok but gradual evolutionary change that wouldn't cause a great deal of disruption to society. That agenda was hijacked a long time ago, or not so long in our lifetime terms, to mean radical, root and branch turning everything upside down that could be equated with the status quo and that did not benefit the robber barons and the wannabees.

It is enough.  The people of the US have spoken.  Health care is good for everyone and the idea that a family can be bankrupted for the need to pay for one of them to have the health care and procedures we all expect and get in the rest of the world is frankly shocking..
You've come a long, long way America and please keep going.
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Over in Australia as I have gone about my daily tasks the most unlikely range of people grin and talk about how happy they are that Obama is President and Romnesia is ....what?