5/12: Okay, he's "evolved"...but still...

Dear President Obama,

I was most pleased to read that your ideas are “evolving” on the issue of gay marriage. Coincidently, my ideas are evolving as well.

My ideas are evolving with respect to the mentally ill and mentally retarded. Some feel these Americans should not be hidden away and warehoused in huge institutions; an idea I could maybe warm to someday.

My ideas are evolving on the issue of civil rights. Perhaps soon I will agree with those who think that African-Americans should indeed have equal rights with European-Americans.

My ideas are evolving on miscegenation as well (an issue quite pertinent to you, I would imagine). Might I someday embrace the idea that blacks and whites may legally marry each other? It is possible.

My ideas about Americans of Japanese decent are evolving too. Could it be that it was not the right thing to do, placing these Americans in internment camps during World War Two? Perhaps.

My ideas are also evolving with respect to Jewish refugees from Europe. With some imagination, I can perhaps foresee a day when I feel we should have rescued Jews from the Holocaust, instead of keeping them out, thus abetting their gassing and burning.

My ideas are evolving on the issue women’s suffrage. Maybe someday I will think that, after all, women really do deserve the vote.

My ideas are evolving about slavery. It is within the realm of possibility that sometime in the foreseeable future I’ll believe that the African slaves should indeed be free.

Finally, my ideas are evolving on the issue of Native Americans. Somewhere down the line I could imagine entertaining the proposal that it might not have been the right thing to do after all, the Europeans’ seizing their land and destroying their civilizations.

Yes indeed Mr. President, my ideas are evolving. We have so much in common!

Yours,

Daniel Silverman

10 July, 2011