Banks got a break, can blogs get one too? The culture of reneging.

Note the date.

No, specifically note the YEAR.  Yes, this blog post comes after two full years of silence.

At the end of the last decade, I sought out to deconstruct it (or its symbols rather) through this blog.  I proposed my plan of attack, my goals and began on my quest.  And, although the first several posts were engaging, I failed.

If I was Wells Fargo or Bank of America, I would really get my PR people on this situation.  It might go something like this:

Dear Valued Blog-Reader:

The recent climate of the blogging industry has put us all on edge and we realize the struggles that we are facing together affect you as much as us.  With the rising number of blogs, we know you have a choice of which blogs to read and which blogs to follow, and we heartily thank you for placing your blog trust in us at Deconstructing the Decade.

Our recent failure to post in some time has no doubtfully caused you, our valued reader, concern.  While the nature of this format is always in danger of certain kinds of silence, and internal circumstances helped to stoke that fire, we recognize how these errors have affected you.  We want to take this opportunity to address this concern head on and ease any fears as deal with this difficult time in blogging history together.

We stand by our pledge to you to continue to give you thought provoking blog posts, as well as the opportunity to for you to post your own thoughts and rhetorical commentary.

Again, we apologize for any inconvenience we have personally caused you.

With highest regards and thanks,

Deconstructing the Decade


Alas, I don't have a PR firm--or a readership to warrant one--but I do want to own up to the fact that I haven't addressed this blog the way I had hoped and to re-pledge my intent to do so.  Since this blog posting is the "re-birth" of this project, I thought an apropos symbol would be the famed bank bailout during the 2008 recession.

With that, I'll open it up to commentary and thoughts on this:

How did the 2008 recession, specifically the "bank bailout," affect the symbolic American Dream that generations have been working towards since the 1950s?
   

Cliched Block: Reposting the Reviewing of the Rough Draft

This red text has two purposes, both of which, are symbolic: 1.  The color of writer's error or revision & 2. The color of S.O.S., or rescue...which is preciely where I am at and what I need.

In between the variety of the spices in my life, I have continued to pursue this first "piece" to reconnect me back to the academic world.  It still hasn't become what I know it could become...so I'm essentially stuck.

This "And" vs. "But" notion is extremely interesting to me, but the more identify the differences, the more I also uncover some similarties, and thus, the thesis gets murky.  What do you think?  Look at Bush in 2001 and compare in 2009--does anything jump our you?  (Forget the ands and buts.)

I think I've looked at the language too much and now forget the range of feelings or thoughts I had about our President during that time...so, I'm using my first SOS.  Please help.

Off the top of your head, did you notice a shift in the Bush administration from the early to the late years?  

Deconstructing a dream...

Today, on Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday, these mild January East Coast winds remind me of much harsher, colder January winds a year ago. My wife and I made the trip to our nation’s plaza, outside the Capitol Building to witness the swearing in and Presidential Inauguration of our 44th President of the Unites States, Barack Obama.

I will never forget the numbness in my toes, the shallow chill-like-ice breath in such stark contrast to the immeasurable human warmth that radiated from every person on the National Mall. I remember standing next to an African-American gentleman, who stood there—pressed against me, holding an American flag with his daughter on his shoulders—anxiously awaiting the ceremony to begin. That moment is frozen in my memory: the pure joy, excitement from this man, from hundreds—thousands just like him. In spite of bone-chilling weather, masses upon masses of people; everyone was so happy, so honored to be a part of this historic moment.


“America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.”


-the final words of the new President’s inauguration speech.


With a lump in my throat, I glanced over at that man with his little girl on his shoulders. He was crying. Not sobbing, but that proud kind of crying you experience, where your face is almost stone cold, your nostrils might flare a bit, and you have a steady, strong, stream of tears down the sides of your face. I looked over in the other direction and this African-American woman (she must have been 65 at least) was bundled up and sobbing. There I stood right next to her, I was a total [white] stranger and she reached over to my hand and grabbed it with both of hers, hard. She didn’t even have gloves on. She looked at me and cried, “We did it, I never, never thought I would see anything like this. I’m so happy.”

Words seem flat when trying to describe that moment, but one thing that I couldn’t shake was this moment’s echo of Dr. King’s famous march on Washington in 1963. President Obama’s words and energy seemed to answer the famous “I Have a Dream” speech:


We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.


We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.
We cannot turn back.


There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."


I think in our world of political pundits, billions of blogs, media celebrity, and the like, it may be harder and rarer for the average individual to experience a living, breathing, inspirational American symbol or image. I’ve seen the American flag hundreds of times and have always been proud of my country. Yet after seeing thousands upon thousands of the most diverse people waving flags on January 20, 2009…I will never view that flag in the same way ever again.


No matter what our 44th President is able to achieve or fails to achieve while in office; our country is all the better for his election.