“Out of this political darkness I see a great political awakening”, said former president Barack Obama in his speech at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign on Friday, September 7, 2018. It is for the first
Since the day America elected president Trump, Barack Obama restrained himself from political comments in a public arena. He was watching from the sidelines, with his mouth shut, out of courtesy or calculation, one could argue both ways. Many were irate with Obama for not stepping up to publicly criticize the current president following a long-established American tradition of former presidents “riding off into the sunset”.
Obama’s speech at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign on Friday, September 7, 2017, has a healing power to social and political wounds president Trump and those who support him have created in America. America needs a common ground and a power of few to make a change, insists Obama. It’s about going back to the fundamentals of what makes America great and not losing sight of right and wrong. “How hard can that be? Saying that Nazis are bad,” asks Obama.
Mike Pence expressed his disappointment about Obama’s political comments in an interview with “Fox News Sunday,” telling host Chris Wallace “It was very disappointing to see President Obama break with the tradition of former presidents, and become so political, and roll out the same tired arguments that he and liberals have made over the last eight years.” Pence based his criticism on an idea that American people have rejected eight years of Obama’s policy. “
This may, or may not be true. But what American people did not reject are the universal values of freedom, the ones president Trump infringed on, the moment he decided to attack journalists, immigrants, and LGBT communities. What Trump does not understand is that while policies may not be all perfect, the values that they are rooted in must be innately American. That’s why Obama needs to speak up. So are you. Democracy counts on a power of a few. What is it that you stand for?