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Obama and Restarting America's Hero's Journey
Obama's charismatic appeal and inspiration to many in the U.S. and the globe makes him the ideal candidate to restart America's Hero's journey on the platform of a commitment to Open Government. That would represent the "Call to Adventure" for a new Hero's journey, as described in my The Hero's Journey in the Second American Century. To do so, Obama needs to demonstrate a clear commitment to end the Bush administration's covert and imperial policies. The diverse interest groups that sanctioned these policies in whole or in part must also be resisted and exposed. This will be the greatest challenge confronting Obama who out of political necessity had to appoint many to powerful political office with ties to major corporations.
Over the course of his upcoming administration, Obama will need to exert a major hands-on role to ensure that his appointees don't simply promote a more publicly palatable set of corporate interests. A commitment to Open Government requires releasing to the public previously classified national security information that will reveal much about the inner working of government. This will make it possible for greater accountability of public officials to be exercised. This will be vitally important in dealing with excesses of the Bush administration, especially when it comes to deficiencies in the 911 Commission Report, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the CIA's complicity in the drug trade.
President-Elect Obama needs to set the U.S. on a new Hero's journey, it's eighth, where the U.S. restores public trust in political institutions that have been maliciously eroded by the Bush administration. Most importantly, the U.S. democratic heritage needs to be restored through a genuine form of democracy wherein there is transparency in key institutions of power, and the rule of law is established to ensure accountability for all office holders. Such accountability can be achieved through the declassification of national security information. This declassification process will allow the truth to emerge about critical issues raised in this paper. Political progressives around the world fervently hope that Obama's election marks the starting point of a new Hero's Journey for the United States of America - a genuine commitment to Open Government would be a worthy response to such hope.
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