Tonight we stand together on a precipice and we look once more to our leader to make sense of things. President Obama’s farewell address from Chicago will be broadcasting live on CSPAN and other outlets tonight at 9 pm EST.
President Obama Farewell Address President Obama delivers his farewell address in his hometown of Chicago, Illinois. He’s expected to talk about the future of the country and American democracy, the role younger generations can play in the years ahead, and his time in office.
Many of my friends have headed there. He had a great run and now we’re about to see things get horrid again.
Obama’s loyalists spent the day grabbing each other for hugs in the airport, catching up, posing for iPhone photos, laughing sarcastically about how funny it is to run into each other here of all places. They’ve made jokes about writing poetry, venting. They ask what people are going to do next.
“I’m fired up,” one said to another on a plane from Washington Tuesday morning, with a twist on the old Obama line. “I don’t want to go. I’m ready to stay.”
These are weird times at the White House, a mix of senioritis and bitterness and throwing themselves into whatever work is left to take their minds off of what’s coming next, reading the emails that come every day with each new wave of departures and deciding which Gmail addresses and cell phones to copy into their personal phones.
Getting a cup of coffee downstairs at the mess can bring on a wave of emotions. Walking through the halls, each day a little more aware of the countdown, they try not to think much about what’s coming but they can’t stop thinking about what’s coming. The photos blown up and hung in the West Wing that were regularly updated as a running picture diary of recent weeks have now become the greatest hits—a shot of the inauguration, one of the president with microphone in hand and singing along with a band at the White House, done up in a tuxedo and First Lady Michelle Obama in a gown on the way to an event, sitting alone at his desk in the Oval Office marking up a piece of paper. Down in the press area, on the wall that every morning was used to print out front pages from around the country to see what was registering with the news of the day, now are print-outs of the best days of the administration—when Obama announced that Osama bin Laden had been killed, when he signed Obamacare, when the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage.
“People are certainly taking stock of their tenure here, and I know the president is,” Earnest said Monday afternoon, in an interview with MSNBC.
We’ve spent 8 years without a scandal and with a first family that shine like stars. It’s been frustrating on many levels but when the President catches his stride he lands on the right path and he took us in the right direction.
Join us to say good bye to a man with whom we’ve all had a complex and complicated relationship and his always classy and smart First Lady.
Tagged: Final Farewell 2017, President Barrack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama
