Sack up, San Francisco.

(photo by JJ San)

The other day I was thinking about how epic the energy was in the Mission when McCain conceded the presidential election.  Hundreds of people rushed Valencia and occupied the 19th street intersection with music, dance, and drinks.  American flags were flying without a trace of irony.  People scaled lightposts to wave Obama signs and capture the moment.  Cops stood idly by with smiles on their faces.  Bartenders at Doc’s Clock jumped on the counter and started pouring liquor in everyone’s mouths.  Horns were blaring for most of the night.  To date, it remains one of my favorite nights in San Francisco.

Months later, Obama was sworn in and those 8 years were over.  Yeah, Aretha wore that crazy hat, but Obama hit the ground running by ordering Gitmo to close and made in-roads with the Arab world.  These were the good old days when we judged a president by their First Hundred Days.

But now it has we’re an entire year into the Obama presidency and I struggle to think of anything significant he has done.  We’re still in two wars, Gitmo is still open for business, he threw the gay community under the bus, he failed at doing anything meaningful with health care, our immigration policies are still fucked, he continues to hold prisoners indefinitely without trial, the banks still skull-fuck Americans on a daily basis, and he reauthorized the Patriot Act.  Sure, he is not as bad as Bush, he appointed Sotomayor, and planted a garden in the backyard, but I wouldn’t argue either of those moves really spent any political capital.  Obama had a filibuster-proof majority and completely squandered it.  Now some sleazebag that whores out his own daughters is the savior of America.

At least we still have 11/4/08.