From Kenya

Submitted by James Protzman on Sat, 12/01/2007 - 9:08pm

Ten years ago my family and I had the privilege of touring Kenya with a guide named Alex, who was a most knowledgeable birder and all around wonderful man. After we left the country, I kept in touch with Alex and his daughter, Lucky. The tourism business in Kenya is a roller-coaster, and they depend on us for help in tough times.

I communicate with Alex by email regularly, and I am always curious about politics on the ground there. It's hard to get a good picture of things from reading Kenyan news online. In response to my recent questions, Alex had this to say:

Thanks once again, we appreciate your assistance, all of us in the family. Our election comes after every five years for President and other members of parliament, expectations are always high as people yearn for change, many of us expected to see the changes after the last 2002 but many were dissatisfied as the trend was the same since independence back in 1960.

Tribal politics plays major as the distribution of recourses leaves many not fully happy as mostly the bigger portion goes to the incumbent's choice, but probably as time goes we will have some leader with all the people and country at heart.

We have EU observers to be sure it is a free and fair process, they have no powers but to observe.

Probably I have a different thought but we still need leaders who are bound by the people not the opposite, that is why my prayers are for a free and fair election.

We still need leaders who are bound by the people, not the opposite. Amen.

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Beautiful.

Submitted by Leslie H on Sun, 12/02/2007 - 9:27am.

That line ...

We still need leaders who are bound by the people, not the opposite.

Prayers for the people of Kenya. And prayers for our own elections, that we elect leaders who are bound by the people.

This article in todays NY Times talks about the fury of activity on k-street and corporate lobbying associations as they anticipate a Democratic presidency. They're after all sorts of things ... coal companies want to dump waste into valleys and streams with impunity and be allowed to emit more crap into our air, the manufacturing assoc. wants to water down the family leave act and many other groups want concessions on laws and regulations that are in place to help and defend regular people like you and me. I suspect Brad Miller's efforts to help families facing foreclosure to keep their homes is something they'd like to water down or kill, too.