Once I was the most conservative of conservatives, convinced of black and white and good and evil and heaven and hell. The journey out of that was not short nor was it easy, but it was a journey I had to take, even though it meant, in the end, losing even my religion, and I was more religious than you can possibly imagine. I left huge chunks of my personal identity, real parts of who I was, behind me, and it has taken a long time for me to become, if even I have yet, a whole person again.
People come out of religion and conservatism for many reasons. For me it was not about a desire for personal freedom, though I treasure the freedom I now feel. For me, the ideas and ideals and tenets of the identity into which I grew from childhood - an identity that was shaped by a situation and environment that, like all children, I did not choose - were always and increasingly at odds with what I have come to recognize as my own natural, organic idea, ideal and tenet: I believe that people, all of them, are valuable and good.
Though some of you might also believe this, I know that many of you do not. That's okay with me. I think people are allowed to be wrong. It doesn't lessen their value or their goodness, just their quality of life.
From first hearing him speak and reading his words several years ago, I saw in Barack Obama a kindred spirit. I believe he and I share that same faith, a faith in all of you, in all of us. I hope more and more people can come to believe.
He's not perfect in the traditional sense of the word, I've seen this myself. Nevertheless, I love him. And I love that people like us, fools though we may be, can win such victories in this world.
Hello, friends. How are you today? I'm great. I can't stop smiling.
Later. Love.
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