Obama’s Impact: A Post-Inauguration Dialogue
The scene takes place at noon in a random cafe. We follow the dialogue of Anum Kebab RODRIGUEZ, who called John Freedom SMITH some days after Obama’s inaugural address.
(Sound of Skype)
John: Hello? Anum, what do you want? Why are you calling me at this time of day?
Anum: Hello John, I was just sitting in a cafe and I thought that maybe you would like to talk about Obama, because you really like him.
John: Indeed, I think Obama is a good president, a really big step forward from Nixon and others. Obama being the first black president really had me worried to start, but I think he has proved to be worthy of being called the President of the United States of America.
Anum: Just to be clear, this place has really weak Wi-Fi so we might have some problems.
John: Man, things have really started to change thanks to this new president. I believe we are going to see a brighter future from now on.
Anum: You’re talking nonsense, nothing has changed. It’s just like always, politicians are a bunch of liars anyway.
John: Are you serious? Obama has been doing a really good job. Just look at Health Care Obama, or Obamacare for short. Earlier this year I had some problems with my lungs, but thanks to this law I was able to obtain not one lung, but two of them.
Anum: What! That’s impossible! NO WAY!
John: Aha!
Anum: I mean, that’s really good for you, but what about something that I still have to go through: Discrimination. In America, 80% of the stops made were of blacks and Latinos compared to a mere 8% of white people stopped. Each day we receive tons of bad looks and even we get called racial slurs. Just yesterday I was getting my keys to open the door to my house, and I already had four cops on my back telling me to stop trying to steal this house because they had already seen me. I mean, come on! It was my house. Just because I’m black doesn’t mean that I steal everything on sight.
John: That could have been a misunderstanding, maybe you looked suspicious.
Anum: Nah man, because one day I was seeing a real-life robbery.
John: What about it?
Anum: I saw how a black dude was being robbed by some white guy when I decided to call the police. Luckily they came real fast, but without asking any questions they just attacked the black guy and helped the white guy to “escape” this danger. I mean, if that ain’t racist I don’t know what is racist.
John: That maybe was racist, but there will always be racist people in the world, but at least Obama cares about their lives. I can prove it with his withdrawal of the US army from Iraq. Obama’s a cool guy, he just wants peace, but he actually does something, not like the other politicians.
Anum: Maybe he did that, but that’s in another country. Here in America there’s still countless murders against blacks and Latinos by white people. It’s almost normal because when it happens nobody bats an eye.
John: But he still fixed some of the problems with education in the USA. I mean, we now have a much better education.
Anum: That would be great… if it was true. We, Latinos, blacks and/or Arabs have a tough time getting quality education because we aren’t allowed in some schools. The headmaster fears us because of what we might be able to do, they think we might rob someone, blackmail someone, or even perform a school shooting.
John: I didn’t know that. Man, you guys have it rough.
Anum: You know what, because of the poor education that I got I don’t even know how to end this call! (laugh track)