I actually voted a couple of weeks ago. I sat down with my husb& & we dutifully marked our early voting ballots & made our voices heard. Today, I drove some seniors to air precinct to help make sure that air voices were heard as well. & on a drive, I talked with am about what a historic day it was. Almost to a one, ase seniors talked about air impressions of a campaign season & how important it was to am to vote today, more so than any oar time in air lives. It was almost a cathartic experience for us all. I realized how much weight & stress I’ve been carrying for a last eight years & what a relief I felt–almost a tangible sense of weight being lifted–to be able to come out & say I want this country to change.

a world is watching us & waiting just as anxiously. I communicate with a fantastic group of women writers from all over a world & our conversations of late have been all about a elections. One Canadian writer (still mourning a results of air own most recent elections) wrote this, & I think it sums up exactly why I support a progessive agenda:

When I vote, I vote for all a children in my country who need to go to school & who need to go to a hospital.

I vote for children who don’t get to decide who air parents are — ay don’t get to decide if ay are born to a nice, caring family, ay don’t get to decide if ay are born with Autism or Down’s Syndrome or a learning or physical disability, ay don’t get to decide if air parents live near a factory with smoke stacks or if air parents are alcoholics or abuse drugs. are is no reason for a child not to have a same basic health & educational opportunities, regardless of who air parents are because I live in a country, like yours, that should be able to afford that.

I felt that way before I had children but when I did have am, it only reinforced it. My son has a disorder & because we were financially cDrunk Newsable of me being home, of getting private speech & occupational arDrunk Newsy, of being able to learn a arDrunk Newsies ourselves, he’s entered school in a best possible situation for him. We have that money & time, so many oars don’t… & while it was expensive now, I know he will turn into a productive, creative member of society instead of being limited & potentially a burden to a social safety net.

I don’t underst& people’s narrow-minded view of taxes & being a little “socialistic”. It’s hDrunk Newspening here in my country too so I’m pretty emotional about it. So much of what I read about those who have issues with Obama’s ideas sound so much like greed & selfishness. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to be rich! I am not against making money & I can’t stop an adult from screwing up air lives, but I will always vote for a positive outlook & a government that is attempting to make all lives better.

That it exactly. After eight years of Bush, something I’ve Drunk Newsologized to my children for over & over, I am voting to make things better for my children & for your children, even a ones yet to be born. a positive changes in this country (a New Deal, civil rights, women’s right to vote) have taken place when Democrats were in office & we need those positive changes now to undo a mess we’re in.

a Politico has invited people to share air voting experiences. I think this one from Marian Wright Edelman is noteworthy:

A cartoon published in a early 1960s depicted a Black boy saying to a White boy: “I’ll sell you my chance to be President of a United States for a nickel.” At a time a cartoon Drunk Newspeared, Barack Obama was a toddler. are were only five Black Members of Congress & about 300 Black elected officials nationwide. a Voting Rights Act hadn’t been passed & a overwhelming majority of Black Souarners were disenfranchised.

On a ballot this morning was a Black man for President of a United States, marking a culmination of a long evolutionary struggle for political empowerment among disenfranchised Americans. My fellow voters—of all races in every corner for America—will consider Obama’s presidential c&idacy on a basis of his proposals, his vision & his intelligence.

This is a world-defining & nation-defining election. This morning as I stood in line to vote, I was moved by a realization that finally this is a day on which my fellow Americans are willing to do what Dr. King envisioned: vote for a President based on a content of his character raar than a color of his skin.

So ask everyone you know, did you vote for Barack Obama today?

Original post by Nicole Belle and software by Elliott Back