Dear Mr. President,
After the first presidential debate, many pundits began discussing if you were too nice, too passive, not aggressive enough to "go for the jugular of your opponent, Mitt Romney. There were commentators who were upset...heck, they were fighting mad. I taped that debate but was at a birthday celebration when it aired live. Listening to the post analysis, I couldn't watch it when I returned home. Nor could I watch the politicos for the next couple of days.
Then I remembered, the Democratic National Convention where First Lady Michelle Obama spoke endearingly about how you sit up nights reading letters from people all across the country. They write about the trials and tribulations that they have gone through. They write looking for hope, they write to give hope.
So tonight, I write one of those letters. Tonight, I am writing to make a request. During these final weeks of the election season, before your final two debates, I am asking you to fight -- fight for me and for people like me.
In 2009, I was laid off from a municipal government job. I had been there four and a half years and survived the first round of layoffs. I was told, I would be transferred to a new department, to create a new division and that I was to move officially on a Friday. I was laid off on Wednesday.
I spent six months on unemployment. The organization had provided additional "assistance" by providing me with a head hunter to provide job search counseling. Turns out that I had more information about what I needed to find employment in my field than they did and I left many of the meetings with the hunter learning more than I had. During that time I was depressed. I felt that I had let my husband (another public servant) down. I even cashed in some of my retirement to help out. I cried often.
I tried to start my own business, but those "connections" that I had volunteered with so readily while I was employed, wanted me to do public relations work for them, pro bono. They would ask for a formal proposal, but then would ask for me to help them out this time and maybe an agreement could be reached in the future. In March 2010, I landed a position with another municipality and have been there ever since.
When I hear the question, "are you better off now than where you were four years ago?" I'm not better off than I was in 2008, but I am much better off than I was in 2009 and I would like to think that it was your clear mind and steady hand that helped to make it so.
When I think about what a Republican presidency would mean to the country right now, I am nervous. Heck I'm afraid! I am an African-American woman, in her early 40s, with a middle-class income. NOTHING in that says Republic support. I listen to the speeches and they don't speak to me. Their programs are created for me. I make too little for them to care about me and too much for them to feel sorry about me.
I.AM.INVISIBLE.
I met you when, as a Senator, you visited Phoenix on a book tour. When it was finally my turn, I introduced myself as such...
"Hello Senator Obama. My name is LaTricia Woods. I am a lefty, like you. I am from Kansas, like your mother and when you become President, I will be your press secretary." You laughed with that famous smile. That was before you announced your intentions to run and now look where you are.
So when you prepare for your next debate, when you need that small burst of energy to continue to propel forward, when you watch the umpteenth commercial funded by secretive PACs to promote more untruths...please remember this letter. Please fight for me. Please fight for us. Please fight for America.
Please make me VISIBLE.
Thank you,
LaTricia Woods
Voter, Supporter, Believer
