By Lydia Fiser
By Jessica Newman
Sherwin Henry represents District 1 as a city commissioner in Gainesville, and he decided to support President Obama leading up to the 2008 election after comparing him with the other candidates.
“First of all, from the previous administration, I felt that the needs and wants of the people were of a less priority,” he said. “It seemed as though we had moved more so in the direction of protectionism stemming from the fear of terrorist attacks.”
Henry felt Obama was the best person to right this national wrong because “he understood that the people were suffering.”
After a year, there are some disappointments from the Obama administration, but many of those stem from problems that existed before he took office, like unemployment and involvement in foreign wars, Henry said.
“But just in my little domain of being an elected official, there are expectations that you have as you enter into office,” he said. “But a lot of times the expectations are quite different from the reality.”
There are also limitations, like Congress or the power of party politics, to what Obama can get accomplished.
As a black American, Henry saw America’s first election of a man of color as “surreal.”
“I’m 57, and 20 years ago I didn’t really think that I would see the actual day that America would be open enough to elect a president of color. I believe that truly, for at least that moment, America became a place for all people to really feel a part,” he said. “That might have lasted for a day or a week or a month. But at least on that night, all the ideals of what America stood for came together in that one person.”
Sherwin said the old institutionalized racism is still in place, but at least for that one moment, America was able to move beyond it.
