Garrison Keillor: Sitting on top of the world

Sitting on top of the world

Garrison Keillor
November 12, 2008

Be happy, dear hearts, and allow yourselves a few more weeks of quiet exultation. It isn't gloating, it's satisfaction at a job well done. He was a superb candidate, serious, professorial but with a flashing grin and a buoyancy that comes from working out in the gym every morning. He spoke in a genuine voice, not senatorial at all. He relished campaigning. He accepted adulation gracefully. He brandished his sword against his opponents without mocking or belittling them. He was elegant, unaffected, utterly American, and now (Wow) suddenly America is cool. Chicago is cool. Chicago!!!

We threw the dice and we won the jackpot and elected a black guy with a Harvard degree, the middle name Hussein and a sense of humor—he said, "I've got relatives who look like Bernie Mac, and I've got relatives who look like Margaret Thatcher." The French junior minister for human rights said, "On this morning, we all want to be American so we can take a bite of this dream unfolding before our eyes." When was the last time you heard someone from France say they wanted to be American and take a bite of something of ours? Ponder that for a moment.

The world expects us to elect pompous yahoos, and instead we have us a 47-year-old prince from the prairie who cheerfully ran the race, and when his opponents threw sand at him, he just smiled back. He'll be the first president in history to look really good making a jump shot. He loves his classy wife and his sweet little daughters. At the same time, he knows pop music, American lit and constitutional law. I just can't imagine anybody cooler.

It feels good to be cool, and all of us can share in that, even sour old right-wingers and embittered blottoheads. Next time you fly to Heathrow and hand your passport to the man with the badge, he's going to see "United States of America" and look up and grin. Even if you worship in the church of Fox, everyone you meet overseas is going to ask you about Obama, and you may as well say you voted for him because, my friends, he is your line of credit over there. No need anymore to try to look Canadian.

More...

:7

nt

He loves the ideal of democracy and is celebrating with the rest of the country and people world-wide. Thanks for posting this, it made my day.

To friends and colleagues who call and email from Europe! Such a relief! I've gone from, I'm sorry, I didn't vote for him... to... Isn't he wonderful? I voted for him!

He hasn't taken office yet, and we have already changed course. This is such a relief.

It's not just some desire to be liked by the rest of the world. We're not insecure. The world likes us more now because Barack Obama is bringing a change of American domestic and foreign policy. We won't act like assholes anymore. We will be humble, but humble because it's the proper way to exercise our power. We are making ourselves more likable and that's why they will like us.

And we're getting the lunatic murderer out of the White House! Can you imagine living in another country and wondering if Bush and his henchmen are going to invade your country too?

We brought anti-Bush buttons to wear hoping it would cut down on dirty looks or outright hostility. I can only imagine how different it would be to go there now. I think the world breathed a sigh of relief on November 4th. :D

I may wear an Obama pin:)

Sarah Palin said she could see Lake Wobegon from her outhouse.

and maybe a double dose of Ketchup!

and went hunting with Dusty and Lefty.

Well Hannity,Limpballs et al. are busy proving Garrison wrong there. They would rather be bitter than share in the cool.

"No need anymore to try to look Canadian."

That one he got right.

It could have gone down the drain if they had been able to steal it again. It was so bad that we saw our lives flash before our eyes preparing for the imminent death of our county. But now that's all behind us. I'm still getting used to the new normal

:toast:

:-)

Better yet, listen to it on CD ... he reads it beautifully (of course) ... it has made me feel so good to be a Democrat during these horrible, horrible, dark days of the Bush Admin.

Thanks for the suggestion. :-)

I've had the CDs for over a year now, and I still listen to them OFTEN while I'm going to sleep. Garrison's soothing voice and encouragement of his fellow Democrats always sends me off to sound, happy sleep.

with just the right proportions of mockery, moral outrage and good ol' fashioned Minnesota common sense.

Michelle Obama and Abby Maddox April 2008

Michelle Obama hugs Abby Maddox, 19, whose husband, a National Guardsman, is deployed in Iraq. The Obamas were visiting Maddox's parents' home in Beech Grove, Ind., in April.

Don't think I ever saw this one. So touching. So great that military families are gonna be one of Michelle's issues as First Lady.

I love the baby pic of Barack you posted below...adorable...:loveya:

on edit - Did you notice the countdown-to-inauguration clock? :thumbsup:

Baby Barack
(Photo courtesy Maya Soetoro-Ng)
Barack Obama was born August 4, 1961. This is an undated photo provided by Barack Obama's half sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng

nt

be from Chicago.

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