My thoughts on President-Elect Barack Obama
Digg This!I am excited about this incoming president. During all my years at Family Planning Health Services (34), I’ve seen how different administrations impact the family planning programming in Wisconsin and around the country. In the years prior to 1980, family planning programs were a given within the field of health care. Our services were recognized as needed and an integral part of providing quality health care. Since family planning providers could offer confidential services and excellent reproductive health education, these programs were seen as essential and highly valuable to the country and the communities they served.
After 1980, it was much more difficult to maintain adequate funding for services and it seemed the value of the programs was questioned. For many years, family planning programs worked hard to survive this kind of climate and to continue to provide excellent services. With the election of Barack Obama and the upcoming inauguration my hopes are high for that to change.
I have very high expectations of this young man. First of all he is young and has energy and enthusiasm. Second, from what I’ve seen this is a man with a great deal of integrity. He has plans to unite this country in a way that hasn’t been done since the days of the Kennedy administration.
We are strongest when we are united. We are a people that care for and about one another. We expect honesty in our elected officials and that’s a normal expectation. I am especially encouraged that President-Elect Obama is utilizing skilled people in his new administration. These are people who have invested their lives in the future of this country and worked to make that future a successful and happy one. We no longer have a robber’s roost in the White House with all the attendant cowboys, outlaws and hoodlums grabbing all they can get while riding rough shod over the people of this nation.
Third, I believe that Barack Obama has high expectations for himself and for everyone who works for him. I think he has high expectations of us – the citizens of this country…young and old alike. We now have an opportunity to rise to the occasion and work with an honest, committed man who is willing to take on a monumental task in the weeks and months ahead. He (and we) have to clean up the mess this country finds itself in – the wars, the financial situation, and the health care mess. I believe he is up to the task. I believe that we are up to the challenge to support this man. We now have the opportunity to help move our country ahead in the weeks, months and years to come to a good place. It seems that when the US is in a good place, many others around the world can find wealth, good health and work for peace as well.
