Hey, righties, give Obama a chance

When George W. Bush was selected president (elected if you’re a conservative or a Republican), I was displeased, to say the least. Even so, I resisted immediately criticizing him. I figured he deserved at least a year’s time in office to get his bearings and feet wet.

After almost nine months in office on Sept. 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden and al Qaida decided America needed a wake-up call and changed the world as we knew it.

What little criticism Bush had received, all but vanished. Old arguments between blacks and whites, Democrats and Republicans and liberals and conservatives ceased. For about two months following 9/11, Americans were just that: Americans.

Nine years later, following the historic election of President Barack Obama, criticism of him began immediately. Led by Republican presidential wannabe Newt Gingrich and ultraconservative talking head Rush Limbaugh, the right smashed the customary 100-day presidential honeymoon.

Right before his election, the bottom fell out of America’s economy. The U.S. economic struggle was mirrored by most of the other world’s leading economic countries, too. Even so, Obama’s counsel was sought by Americans and citizens of the world before he was inaugurated and officially assumed office.

Obama literally hit the ground running, not only because the U.S. economy was on the verge of financial collapse but because the country was fighting two wars and had lost respect all over the globe.

Sticking to his campaign promises to bring change to Washington, Obama made tough choices with his cabinet nominations. And he made appointments in a bipartisan way. He selected people he felt could best help America recover economically.

However, Obama’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court to replace retiring Justice David Souter has provided Newt and Rush new opportunities to go after the president.

Sotomayor in a 2001 speech said, “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”

For that statement, Newt called Sotomayor a racist. So far, and to the credit of the senators who will eventually vote to confirm or reject her nomination, none has agreed with Newt.

Having been called a racist myself for stating what some people didn’t want to hear, I can agree with Sotomayor. Does Newt want us to believe that, had blacks or women been on the Supreme Court a century-and-a-half ago, slavery would have lasted as long as it did or that women (and blacks) would have been denied the right to vote?

Newt and Rush aren’t alone in their displeasure with Obama.

Many people in the Shenandoah Valley, John McCain voters, also refuse to give Obama a break.

Some local vehicles already have anti-Obama stickers on them. One read, “Don’t blame me – I voted for McCain.” Another reads, “OBAMA – One Bad Ass Mistake, America.”

Obama haters would prefer four more years of bad Bush economic and foreign policies, trampling of civil liberties and the torture of “enemy combatants.”

Nelson Graves, of Augusta County, is a columnist for The News Virginian. E-mail him at .