theDesMoinesPerspective

It is my hope that Barack Obama is elected to the office of President of the United States. It appears at this time to be the likely result. As the next President, Obama will inherit a stinking putrid mess:

• Our military is stretched to the breaking point prosecuting two wars without definable "win" goals.
• Years of deregulation have created a financial system best described as a foggy swamp. Nobody knows which direction the exit is located.
• Millions of Americans are without health insurance, many of them children. Those that have health insurance see their premiums rise by double-digits every year.
• Many of our cities struggle to provide basic services, education, police, and fire protection to increasingly poor populations.
• Increasing economic and cultural segregation have lead to a polarized country, half "other" and the other half consumed by fear of "other" - terrorists, Muslims, Black people, Mexicans, welfare cheats, poor people, anti-Semites, socialists, Marxists, Arabs, Indians, community organizers...

Unfortunately, in his desire to win, John McCain is drawing on a politics of division to make his case. He has passed the point of "Country First" and proceed on to a new strategy of "Win at All Costs".

I stay on top of a lot of progressive architecture blogs. For my money (time), Progressive Reactionary is one of the best. The most recent blog post over there says in much better words than I could why Barack Obama is the right option for people who are interested in urbanism and urban revitalization.

A key quote:

The Des Moines Register has endorsed Barack Obama for President of the United States. No doubt, those predisposed to believing that the media are uniformly "librul", will play down the steady drip-drip of high profile endorsements falling to Obama.

Republican Polk County Supervisor Bob Brownell is building a significant online presence including:

• A blog
• Facebook
• A YouTube channel
• And of course the obligatory campaign website

According to his Linked-In page, Brownell's interests are: homelessness, affordable housing, economic development, lead paint poisoning and bureaucracies. As a Supervisor, and as a Board Member of Neighborhood Finance Corporation, he has demonstrated his understanding that a strong urban core is critical to a healthy region.

Schools rank right up at the top of any respectable list of urban "issues".

When children, morals, and big money are thrown together in the political blender, the mixture is likely to explode every so often. It looks like this September 9th, there will be an explosion of sorts in Des Moines.