Why I Voted For Barack Obama

As anyone who knows me or reads this blog knows I have lived, worked and traveled internationally most of my life.

On March 19, 2003, one hour before the bombing of Baghdad started, I arrived home from a trip to China and India.

At the time I was living in a beautiful, serene place right along the Hudson River about half way between New York City (I watched the Twin Towers collapse through my binoculars) and Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant.

About one month before I had been a part of a huge anti-war demonstration that included at least 250,000 to 300,000 people in New York City (we could not find reference to this massive demonstration in the New York Times the next day-a subject for another posting).

During the week of "shock and awe" I was asked by friends if I wasn't afraid to be on a trip outside the U.S. during a time of such unrest. My cheeky response was that I lived half-way between New York City and the Indian Point nuclear power plant and that I actually felt safer in China and India!

To the point: during the last months we have opened our home to volunteers working, canvassing and knocking on doors for Barack Obama.

We have just had the honor to host two really fine young men who traveled from Australia to work for Barack.

At a time when our image abroad is the worst it has been in decades, few Americans, I fear, understand how important the choice of the American president is to the rest of the world.

How many Americans know who the president of Australia is? How many Americans know that Australia doesn't have a President-that they have a Prime Minister? How many Americans know anything about Australian politics at all? Or the political and economic imperatives of most of the other nations of the world?

The point of all of this is that when I walked through the door on March 19, 2003 I told my partner that I felt like the people of the world gave the American PEOPLE (not George Bush or the American government), a pass. They were not blaming us as a people because for the most part they thought that the election of 2003 was an anomaly, and that if George Bush was reelected in 2004 that we, as a people, were on our own.

The people of the world know and care about who leads the world...and the leader of America is stil the most important and powerful leader in the world. What happens here, what we do and how we do it, affects the entire planet.

Once again today the U.S. dollar is still the reserve currency of the world. We are still, despite our failings, the most powerful nation earth, looked to for leadership by the people of the planet.

The most important thing that the American people can do to renew the world's faith in us as a people and America as the good, decent, peace loving nation that we are is to show the face of Barack Obama, the next President of The United States, on election night to the people of the world; a face of decency, intelligence and wisdom-one that is respected and admired. That is what we must do. Nothing is more important to the future of this great nation and the world.