My thoughts on president-elect Barack Obama

I think it's a great thing for our country to have President Elect Barack Obama. I am very excited about this, for a lot of reasons. 1) He's not George Bush. 2) We finally have a non-white president! and 3) I think he's got some good ideas for our country. I voted for Obama. In fact, I voted a straight Democratic ticket this year. We had a Republican president and two Republican senators from our state. This year, I wanted to give the Democrats a chance to change things up and see what happens.

That said - let me put my political and religious views out there so you know where I'm coming from:

1) I am a liberal Roman Catholic. I am pro-life, but I am also pro-gay-marriage. Otherwise, I believe in what the Roman Catholic church teaches and believes.
2) I am a Democrat. Shock and awe! A Catholic Democrat?? A Catholic SOCIAL WORKER??? How does that all go down? SURPRISE! You don't necessarily have to agree with everyone all the time! Again, I'm pro-life!

Okay, here are my thoughts:

I am adopted, hence why I am pro-life. There was a very good chance I may not of been here today since my birth mother was 16 when I was born. People need to "let not our hearts be troubled." There is nothing more that can be done. You voted. It's kind of like in elementary school when you and your friends voted about what game to play at recess. 7 of them wanted to play tag. Only 3 wanted to play hide and seek. Bummer, but you got over it.

I said I was pro-life, but to me, that's not the only issue. When I work in a homeless shelter and see middle class families losing homes, I have to vote with other parts of my conscious.

We aren't close to being a socialist nation. There is a lot of misunderstandings and fear when people think of it, but it's because of the absolute power the government gets along with it, and people get drunk with the power. Please, please, PLEASE do your homework. Understand what the actual idea of Socialism/Communism is. The problem with peoples fear of it is that we've never seen it actually work. I'm not saying we should even BECOME a Socialist or Communist nation. I'm just saying that people need to understand what they're talking about before they say that Obama is a Socialist and so on.

A lot of people have made the accusation that Obama is a terrorist. For all we know, a lot of people could be terrorists. We need to be careful saying things like that, or we'll end up with McCarthyism all over again, only with terrorism instead of communism.

I'm not trying to change anyone's mind about anything. I just want to make sure everyone knows where I'M coming from, and understand why I think Obama could be a positive change for the country. Before accusing him of anything, we need to at least give him a chance.