Thank you Anne. Happy Thanksgiving.

Want a healthy cry?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us-TVg40ExM

i said for the past year and a half - "when the Democrats lose again, they will have no one to blame but themselves, because they are idealistic rather than sensible. no WAY this country is ready to elect a black man, or a woman. the repubs could run an ACTUAL chimp this time, and they will still win."

and then....

mccain forgot who he is and then the formidably stupid and inciteful sarah palin came along.

and yes, miracle - america was more advanced than i knew!

what joyous tears were shed.

only, anne, jesus and obama both would want you to let the blame go now, and hold out your hand....

Strange and amazing that we really do have Sarah Palin at least partially to thank for the quenching water that is President-Elect Barack Obama. Who knows how many fencesitters would have fallen over on the McCain side, were it not for the scary-comical prospect of her as vice-president? I can say it, because it's true: The Lord does work in mysterious ways.

Ever since that joyous day I have had one burning question, What does Anne have to say about this? Finding out was worth the wait. Happy Thanksgiving, Anne. And for the first time in eight years, a truly happy Thanksgiving, America. Thanks be to God!

god had nothing to do with it. WE did it. Take credit, thinking humans! We are the best hope. Go Obama.

Dear Anne,

Thank you, thank you for all that you've done--all the words of comfort that you've given us through the years. I was part of your letter writing campaign for Kerry in 2004. That election almost shattered my faith in democracy, but I'm mending very well this November.

Ellen Jackson, author

THE MYSTERIOUS UNIVERSE

I just tried to find Cape Canaveral Anabaptist Church on a map - sounded like just the place to celebrate the revival of possibility of this last year. Then I got the metaphor - thanks for such a grandly punchy way to put it.

I was in New Orleans for the election, and along with cheers in the streets and riverboat hooting, the City itself seemed to exhale, a little, when the long-waited for, absolutely impossible news went over wire and web. Yes it's late, but not out of the question - it seemed to say. I'm so glad to hear that resonate on these pages this thankful eve, of all times.

Much like a prosecutor can get Grand Jury to indict a "Ham Sandwich", you could have convinced the population to elect one this time.

The real "miracle" will be if the group Obama has surrounded himself with end the killing of innocent Afghans, Pakistanis, Palestinians, Iraqis et al and don't find new victims.

I don't mean to be disrespectful, but in reference to that hymn - where does one "meet" God? Even Mother Teresa found God absent.

The election results have kept me smiling and my heart full of joy all this month; even a stock market gone wild cannot quench it. I won't breathe ENTIRELY easily until I see George Bush and even more, Dick Cheney fly away from Washington next January for good. Unlearning Paranoia and despair is surprisingly difficult. I've gotten so in the habit in this past eight years.

But the part of my heart that died of despair in November 2004 only looked dead. It has reawakened with a roar this month. Perhaps all the times I've listened to the final movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony have something to do with this, chorus, kettledrums, brass and strings and all in full volume:

Freude, schoener Goetterfunken Tochter aus Elysium!

After all, I'm a Liberal elitist and just now, proud of it! Why not celebrate like one?

'Cause schadenfreude is bad for you, even worse than refined sugar.

The difference between the fear you felt in 2004 and the fear the Republicans feel in 2008 is this: your fear was justified. Way justified. Bush really was a monster and he really did do his very best to destroy the country. Obama, despite the hysteria from the right, is not a Moslem, not a Zionist, not a socialist. He seems to be a decent man. Already I've found some issues on which he and I disagree, but even in those instances, the words that come out of Obama's mouth differ from the words that came out of Bush's mouth, because Obama's words make SENSE. They are in a recognizable human language and they fit together and there's evidence of a thought process that produced them.

How cool is that?

Imagine the torment that's about to be inflicted on the Republicans: they will endure the horror of watching, helpless, as none of their worst fears come to fruition. Hallelujah!

thanks for sharing.

On Thanksgiving I would normally look forward to sharing the small bird that the poverty level income I have allows me to purchase with my loved ones, grateful that I have that. I don't complain that I don't have more than I do. I worry when my elderly mother gets ill, like she did this past March, and had to go in hospital, and am SO grateful that she's here with me now, and as healthy as a person of her years can be.

I have no other family, they've all passed on, as have most of my friends and lovers, their names memorialized on the AIDS Quilt for posterity. But I'm a survivor, still negative, somehow. I think the number was at one hundred and thirty when I stopped counting. Talk about miracles!

Today in the New York Times there was a piece about a rule change in Medicaid that just left me breathless. It was about making poor people pay more in co-payments and prescriptions, emergency room visits and more. Even people at the lowest levels of the poverty line, not a huge amount, but to US, it is. I'm an epileptic, and take four drugs a day to battle it. At huge cost. I'm on Medicare, but have Medicaid as a backstop. How this will affect me I have no idea, but it scares me. It scares the CRAP out of me. I take care of an elderly woman and her home and estate and I don't know what my future holds with Medicaid.

Happy ThanksGiving George Bush And Fuck You Very Much!!