By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO — Watching the State of the Union address and the Republican response, perhaps many of us took it for granted that President Barack Obama and Senator Marco Rubio represent the fulfillment of a dream that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King had only 50 years ago that someday people would be judged not by the color of their skins, but by the content of their minds.
Obama, son of a Kenyan father and American mother, and Rubio, son of two immigrants from Cuba, by the shorthand of race classification are respectively a Black and a Latino — members of two groups of people who historically had faced discrimination and marginalization. Nevertheless, these two men beat the odds and ascended to high office.
Obama and Rubio were born to parents who possibly would have considered it the greatest honor of their lives to meet a President of the United States, or for that matter a U.S. Senator. Now, thanks to the fulfilled promise of America, their children, Barack and Marco, actually occupy these high offices.
It seems to me the upward mobility that America offers its citizens is the message that will reverberate throughout the world. No matter if people are born to families with modest incomes, in America, no one is necessarily mired in the under class. Through their hard work and initiative — two qualities that Obama and Rubio share — they can advance to the upper strata of American society. The much-vaunted American Dream really comes true.
Compared to that message, some of the differences between the two men pale almost to the point of irrelevancy. Obama thinks the “wealthiest few” ought to pay their “fair share.” Rubio believes that government doesn’t solve problems, it is the problem.
Yeah fine, so they disagree on which is the best direction our nation should take. Their disagreement doesn’t lessen the miracle of democracy; it helps to demonstrate it.
Both of these fine men –and probably the majority of the people who watched them — must have a feeling of awe when they think about what America represents. In this country, perhaps like nowhere else in the world, ideals can triumph over social station; democracy is more valued than aristocratic privilege, and brotherhood and sisterhood is claiming is leaving racism far behind.
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted at donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com