A benefit to the Obama victory I hadn’t considered

If you’re familiar with the history of Hawaii, I’d think you’d likely agree that the annexation of the islands wasn’t exactly America’s finest hour. On a rational level, one could debate whether Hawaiians are better off as a part of the USA than they would be as an independent nation, but national pride and the sense of national identity doesn’t operate on a rational level, or at least not only so; there’s still a lot of resentment among many Hawaiians that the US didn’t play fair back in the 1890s, and many who would rather have had their independence back in 1959 than statehood. Of course, tourism is a major part of the Hawaiian economy, and tourist economies tend to generate a lot of resentment of the tourists anyway, and those two things no doubt work to reinforce each other.

Apparently, though, that’s being mitigated somewhat by Barack Obama’s ascension to the presidency, as having a Hawaiian in the White House—even if he hasn’t lived there full-time in many years—has created a lot of pride. My in-laws just returned from a trip, and one of the points that really struck them was how every place President Obama lived, went to school, etc. was pointed out to them; from the comments people made, it sounds like his election has given many in his home state a new sense of ownership in America, a new sense of being Americans as well as Hawaiians. That can only be a good thing. I tend to think the US government ought to offer Hawaii the chance to regain its independence if the Hawaiian people want it—no doubt the feds would insist on retaining military installations, but one imagines a deal could be worked out, if a constitutional means for such a plebiscite could be found—but given the unlikelihood of such an act, it is well that Hawaiians at least have more reason to feel like they belong to the country of which they are legally a part.