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My grandmother was a very strong Irish Catholic Democrat. Her family had emigrated here only a generation before and quickly became political here in Utah. My grandma also lived during the Great Depression and she was never afraid to talk about the trying times America faced in that era.
One quote, however, has stuck with me for a very long time. I remember asking her, shortly after I started my American History class in high school, why she and her family supported FDR. She had told me that the family was so poor that her mother's sister sold her house and moved in with the family to help make ends meet. My great grandfather ran a drug store on the western side of Salt Lake City, back then heavily influenced by the Greeks and Italians. The family, like much of Utah, took a big hit and were thirsting for hope. My grandma still recalls Hoover promising a chicken in every pot. Except there was no chicken in the final year of Hoover's administration, in fact, the family had little food and even less money. Then Roosevelt came and offered hope. He talked a big talk and my family devoured every bit of that hope.
It was that hope, my grandma said, that helped the family through the worst of worst. They didn't know if Roosevelt would live up to his own words, but at that time they didn't care. See, the nation just wanted something to hope for again and that's what Roosevelt was selling. In the 1932 election, 52% of Utah voted for Roosevelt and he was swept into office in what would be one of the biggest electoral landslides in election history. My great grandparents proudly voted for him and I again asked my grandma why they had chosen that vote. She looked at me and said that her entire family saw something historical emerging on the political horizon and they weren't about to be a roadblock to history. They didn't want to look back 20 or 30 years and regret that they weren't apart of history. That their historical vote went for the other guy. It's funny, because she said that when JFK ran, he offered the same hope and optimism as Roosevelt. When my grandmother pulled the lever for Kennedy in 1960, she imagined that her certainty for a prosperous future was the same as her own mother's when she voted for Roosevelt nearly 30 years prior.
What we are seeing today is history. We can send a message to the entire country that hope and optimism will once again ring out through this great land. I'm not asking you to support Obama in the primaries, but when the general election is here, ask yourself, are you going to be a roadblock to history? To those who are unyielding in their utter contempt for Obama, do you want to tell future generations that you had a chance to make history, but you opted for the other guy instead? My grandmother took great pride in her vote for Kennedy, because it was so historic. Her mother, too, took great pride in her vote for Roosevelt. If Obama is lucky enough to win the Democratic Primary, I will enter that voting booth on November 4th knowing that my vote will go toward history. And I hope that 40 years from today, I will be discussing the importance of this election with my grandkids, just like my grandmother discussed the 1932 and 1960 elections with me.
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