To remain strong, we must unite

Fresh from a week's vacation to visit my mother in Spokane, Wash., which was digging itself out from under 59.3 inches of accumulated snowfall in December, I arrived back in spring-like Southern Shasta County to a flurry of news events, not the least of which is this nation's inauguration ceremony on Tuesday, Jan. 20, of Barack Obama as our 44th President.

Watch for first-hand, eye-witness accounts and photographs from Susanne Lewis, the City of Anderson's Grants & Redevelopment Manager since October 2007.

So sure was she that her favored candidate would win the national election, Lewis booked flight and a week's worth of hotel reservations for herself, husband Jon, and her two teen-age children in June, well before the primaries had even concluded and the party conventions held.

It is rare and wonderful when we, sitting here at home in the comfort of our own recliners, can vicariously witness such historic events in such a personal manner.

Check our Web site regularly for Susanne's sporadic submittals of photographs and stories at www.andersonvalleypost.com.

Most likely, her submissions will be personal accounts that give a slice-of-life view into the emotions and excitement that you or I would also feel if caught up in the whirlwind of activities scheduled for Inauguration Week in the nation's capital city.

Inauguration Day itself never fails to amaze me as to how peacefully we pass the reins of power in what most would describe as the world's mightiest nation in terms of both influence and economic wealth from one political faction to the other, especially if we remember the rancor and rhetoric of the most recently concluded election process.

Nowhere else in the world is this done in such a dignified yet completely peaceful manner.

I, like most of you, will be watching carefully during the next 100 days to see whether our newly-elected Commander in Chief measures up to the many weighty challenges at hand, both domestically and abroad.

I, like some of you, will also be holding my breath and hoping that no harm comes to any of our men and women in uniform, our elected officials or our millions of innocent citizens here at home by any group intent on upsetting the apple cart for whatever reason they might concoct or imagine.

Over the years, my mind's eye has too often been filled by the Armageddonesque scenes of Hollywood blockbusters and B-movie reels, Tom Clancy adventure novels and comic book super villains intent on destroying everything that Americans hold near and dear to their hearts. Woe to us if any of these imagined horrors take on even the faintest whiff of reality.

Now is the time for unity of purpose and resolve. Now is the time to stand behind our elected leaders, whomever they may be, as we enter together into these uncharted waters. Now is the time to absolve our differences of opinion and stand united as Americans. Now is the time to be proud of our common heritage and sense of purpose, aware of our weaknesses and shortcomings, yet determined to set things right. We must do so not only here at home, but anywhere that despots, anarchists, genocidal maniacs and oppressive regimes trample on the rights and freedoms of common men, women and children. We must stand up for all people whose only fault is that they are too sick, too weak, too poor, too uneducated, too alienated, too isolated, too downtrodden to be able to fight for themselves.

If we can do this, we can once again rightfully claim the title, "American, Land of the Free and Home of the Brave."