Well, first.  There are so few.

No, seriously –  let me start by saying that the fact that we have a president who talks about race seriously at all is a huge step in the right direction.

That said, I am frequently distressed by what the president actually says when he does speak about race.  Because I think he is (perhaps unintentionally) intellectually dishonest about how race truly operates, what life is actually like as a Black person, and what it will take to really create equality of opportunity and an equitable division of resources (which are two very different things that require two separate, but specific, approaches).

Unlike most people, I thought the Philadelphia speech was terrible, a historical, and dangerous.  I thought in his attempt to appeal to both White and Black, he made a crucial mistake that many people make when discussing race — equating Black and White feelings about, and experiences with, race symmetrically.  Meaning White people’s resentment at Black progress was the same as Black frustration with being oppressed.

Simply – though both are legitimate, they are not equal.

To suggest, as he did, that they are, I think is dangerous.  I think it contributes to a feeling of fatigue in America.  Fatigue with remedies for past wrongs.  Fatigue with talking about Black people when we can talk about White people.  Fatigue fatigue fatigue.

This is perhaps unavoidable.  He is a politician and there are many more White people than there are Black people.  He must say what will allow him to stay in power and do what he wants to do to help everyone.  I get that.

But because race operates the way it does, what any prominent Black person says carries enormous weight.  In this case, what he’s saying is incredibly detrimental to a concerted, real fight to end racism (it’s great, if you’re goal is bettering race relations…but yea, that’s a different goal).

We’ve got to find language that talks honestly, directly, and passionately to the specific and unique experience of being Black in America without it being assumed that, by doing so, we ignore everyone else. 

I think Obama attempts to find this language in his speech before the NAACP last week:

The first thing we need to do is make real the words of your charter and eradicate prejudice, bigotry, and discrimination among citizens of the United States. I understand there may be a temptation among some to think that discrimination is no longer a problem in 2009. And I believe that overall, there’s probably never been less discrimination in America than there is today.

But make no mistake: the pain of discrimination is still felt in America. By African-American women paid less for doing the same work as colleagues of a different color and gender. By Latinos made to feel unwelcome in their own country. By Muslim Americans viewed with suspicion for simply kneeling down to pray. By our gay brothers and sisters, still taunted, still attacked, still denied their rights.

On the 45th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act, discrimination must not stand. Not on account of color or gender; how you worship or who you love. Prejudice has no place in the United States of America.

But we also know that prejudice and discrimination are not even the steepest barriers to opportunity today. The most difficult barriers include structural inequalities that our nation’s legacy of discrimination has left behind; inequalities still plaguing too many communities and too often the object of national neglect.

Lovely language, but later in the speech he says something he’s never really said before:

We need a new mindset, a new set of attitudes – because one of the most durable and destructive legacies of discrimination is the way that we have internalized a sense of limitation; how so many in our community have come to expect so little of ourselves. (emphasis mine)

This is the part of the speech that has been missing from all his other speeches regarding race.  And boy – it’s beautiful to see.  Even more beautiful to listen to.

See, the problem I’ve always had with Black conservatism, particularly as embodied in Obama, is the silly belief that Black self-reliance is so Herculean that it can fix all problems that Black folks face.    Black conservatives didn’t always pay the proper attention to just how damaged Black folks really are.

Here though, Obama nods at something that few public Black figures speak enough on – the psychic dimension of racism.  He acknowledges that so much of what being Black is is about wrestling with a legacy of racism that manifests in subtle, specific ways all damn day long.  That takes its toll on a person.

The problem then, in this speech, is that he doesn’t expound on this idea more.  He doesn’t talk about the daily bombardment with anti-black images and ideas that black folks have to deal with.  He doesn’t talk about the fact that Black boys do well until about 4th grade and that it could have something to do with the fact that a racist White America is still largely in charge of his education.

But he does immediately follow it up with the usual, “get off your ass and change,” undercutting the weight and importance of his statement about the psychic damage of racism.  So much so, that no one has mentioned it.

Shame.

Were it that easy for us to collectively pick ourselves up, dust off the racism and keep it moving, we’d have done it long ago.

The sad truth is that even if you work really hard and play by the rules all the time, as a Black person, you are still more likely to “fail.”  Even if you “succeed,” you have to be like Obama and pretend that you aren’t the exception that proves the rule that you are.

Either road isn’t good for Black psyches.  Either road perpetuates the dominant narrative that if there is a problem in Black communities, it’s Black folks’ fault.  Either road doesn’t eradicate racism.

Continuing to deny that Black people are profoundly damaged, that life is hard for us no matter how “well” we do, that the end of Jim Crow, slavery and lynching isn’t the same as the end of racism, that the burden for ending racism has as much to do with White folks as Black folks will doom us to repeat the past.

As evidenced by Pat Buchanan’s unrepentant racism, the tea parties, caricatures of the First Family, racism is alive and well.  Resurging, even.

Now might be a good time to start talking about it for real.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2009/02/attorney-genera.html

“This guy is from Kenya. Have you ever run a race with a Kenyan and won??”

)

Barack Obama, a legend fabricated to create a legend.

A small part from his Race Speech:

“There is one story in particularly that I’d like to leave you with today – a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King’s birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.

There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.

And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that’s when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.

She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.

She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.

Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother’s problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn’t. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.

Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they’re supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who’s been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he’s there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, “I am here because of Ashley.”

“I’m here because of Ashley.” By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.

But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.”

Colin Powell endorsing Barack Obama - Meet the Press

He closes his speech with the following:

“He’s a transformational figure, a new generation coming into the world stage.”

Ok, sure he is a obviously a transformational figure for America & the world.  He’s extremely open to establishing a Big Nanny State (without the money and institutions needed to do so) and will completely lead the United States into social collapse.  I accept he’s not going to start this, other presidents before him begun this paranoiac cycle.

However, there’s no need to have a “transformational figure” in order to fix the problems at home.  It seems they haven’t learned the lesson that those “new solutions” have already proved to be wrong.  There’s no need to bring new figures with old ideas; but only those people who have the strength to fix the problems or die in the process.  McCain therefore seems not to be the solution either.

The only solution to America’s problems is to go back to what Classical Liberal Ideas of government can do to solve these problems.  There’s no need of new recipes, just of old ones that have never been completely used.  Americans are complaining of what they misunderstood as “capitalism” when it was in fact a mixed economy with a huge government subsidizing it.

What America really needs is a turn back to laissez-faire capitalism and a programmed reduction of Nanny State intervention in the economy.

Americans don’t need either Obama or McCain.  I say, go and vote BLANK.

Sen. Barack Obama’s rally at Philadelphia’s Independence Mall April 18 was yet another confusing moment for me, capping off a long period of ambivalence toward his quest for the Democratic nomination.

Without a doubt the event was impressive, attracting the largest audience of any campaign event held by any candidate this year. The excitement and civic engagement Obama has generated in the last year are refreshing – the 35,000 attendees buzzed with anticipation as though we were at a huge rock concert. This motivated me to make a series of unfunny cracks about Obama stage-diving and the crowd rushing the stage. I couldn’t muster the same enthusiasm as most the other rally-goers, so I felt the need to distance myself from them. This isn’t a legitimate movement, I thought, it’s just a bunch of kids having fun on a Friday night. Don’t expect too much from it.

Long practice has made post-modernist detachment easy for me.

Sens. John McCain and Hillary Clinton are the sort of candidates I expect in national politics. Both have spent long years in Washington and are intimately connected to the last two presidential administrations, which have overseen the development of the problems which are now electoral issues. I’m not claiming that the Bush and Clinton administrations have been indistinct from each other, but I am saying that they have shared one major flaw that is undeniably pertinent to the 2008 election: They have served America’s corporate and financial elite at the expense of the middle and working classes. Neither senator has any credibility in claiming responsible stewardship of the middle class.

Obama, by contrast, has at least a chance to prove he is different from his two competitors. His historic speech on race briefly won me over into his camp. The courage and candor he showed March 18 were unexpected. Don’t believe what they tell you about Social Security: race relations are the third rail of American politics. Obama even spoke about the need for Americans of all races to work together for their common interest against the economic elite.

There is much that I could appeal to if I felt inclined to defend Obama’s candidacy. It has all the trappings of a genuine populist movement; he clearly understands the plight of the middle and working class Americans and has convinced many disillusioned Americans that he is going to do something about it.

Bear with me while I digress on the controversial comments Obama made about Pennsylvania voters being bitter. As the son of a working class family from central Pennsylvania, I can tell you that we are bitter. My father, who recently learned that his job is being outsourced to China, is an avid hunter who has been disgusted with politics for his entire adult life. The only thing unfair about Obama’s comment was the verb “cling” that was an unflattering characterization of a phenomenon which he otherwise described accurately. Rural Pennsylvanians cherish their Christian faith and tradition of outdoorsmanship. They have remained constant while Washington has proven unreliable. Obama has proven that he is more closely in touch with voters than those who have attacked the comments.

Even with that understanding in mind, I remain at best a reluctant supporter of Obama. His broad fundraising base of small donors does not preclude the support of Wall Street, which has donated to him nearly as heavily as it has to Clinton. Obviously the moguls behind America’s financial system don’t believe his populist rhetoric. The same could be said for the “Powers That Be” in Washington. Obama didn’t just wake up one day last year, buy a campaign bus and start driving around delivering inspirational speeches. He was elected to the Senate, which is easily a contender for the most exclusive club in the world. It would be much harder to be skeptical of Obama if he was leaning on the populist aspects of his campaign, using only money from small donors and eschewing support by the establishment in his party. The viability of such a strategy is questionable, but its integrity would not be.

Thus I arrive at my present conundrum: How close can Obama come to traditional politics before he undermines his own message? How far can he stray from them before he becomes a hopeless fringe candidate? I will continue to watch his efforts in confusion.

—Joe Gauger

Last time I was insulted just for saying that Obama was half white and black (Link to post: Where is Democracy going in the US?).

First of all, I wasn’t being racist.  I was just commenting on why he shouldn’t have used that “race” speech in his campaign (and as usual, I was being sarcastic about American “Democracy”).  We already knew he is black (we are not blind).  And as “unastronaut” comments:

“He’s just a person running for President. That’s how we should address and see him. He’s not his skin (…)”

Now, it seems Americans are going way to far since Obama’s last comments about Midwesterns (here’s one of many articles that are talking about the issue).  He never “suggested” anything offensive about they being attached to “religion & guns” because of their financial “trauma”.

Sorry guys, he just made a comment that was disrupted by those political correct parasites.  It is true, he is a black guy running for president and yes, he was born in a wealthy family.  So, just because of that he can’t speak about poor people? and religion? and Midwesterns?

If so, then Hillary shouldn’t say anything about poor black people, Hispanics, Asians, males, etc.  And McCain should speak about anyone else but wealthy Christian Conservatives.

As Stoessel says, “give me a break!”

I really wanted to know what had people swooning over this man. What I’ve come to discover makes me wonder even more. How are people falling for this? I can see why Black People would, but Whites? This is racist speech if I’ve ever heard it. Let’s go through this speech given at the Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

“We the people, in order to form a more perfect union.”

Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America’s improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.

The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation’s original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.

Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution – a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.

Yup, and we’ve taken care of that just as we have the fact that women didn’t used to be able to vote and were more property of their husbands than people. I didn’t hear that being mentioned. But hey, this is about race right? One needs a poor pity me card in order to get the people’s attention.

And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part – through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk – to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.

Again, while I sympathize with Obama for the slavery card, women were next to slaves for a long time too being unable to vote, own property, even have a say in what happened to their children if their husbands died. So what’s your point?

This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign – to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together – unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction – towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.

This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.

I really thought America was past all that. Am I out of touch with reality? I’ve always looked favorably on black men myself. So does my roommate for that matter. But then we are just two women out of the whole country.

I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton’s Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I’ve gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world’s poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.

It’s a story that hasn’t made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts – that out of many, we are truly one.

Yes, your history is very controversial. Born Hawaii, attended both a Muslim school and Catholic school and went to Harvard. Father was Muslim, step father Radical Muslim. Obama is Christian Separatist Church for only African Americans. We won’t even get into his Reverend here who for 20 years spoke out vehemently against white Americans and America in general AND who took his children to this church.

Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.

I think that is really wonderful. And I’m sorry that any of this had to go to the racial issue. But it wasn’t my Reverend that spoke the way yours did. Controversy was bound to happen with someone like that.  Were you counting on it?

This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either “too black” or “not black enough.” We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.

And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.

On one end of the spectrum, we’ve heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it’s based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we’ve heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.

In your Reverend’s own words I might add just in case you were wanting to pass that off as some kind of mistake. And if the truth be told this whole campaign has gone on way too long for my liking. Can we pass a law that says we aren’t subjected to this for more than 6 months? Please?

I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely – just as I’m sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.

And I can point out times when you denied these very things too! I have also NOT heard you denounce Reverend White, only say that he is your friend and mentor and that you stand by him. It is also my belief that he, the Reverend White, only retired so that you, Obama, could save face. For example: Obama expert Andy Martin: “…Obama’s claim that he has been a part of an institution for over twenty years, and yet had no awareness of the controversial claims being preached from the pulpit, is completely unbelievable, mendacious and probably a bald-faced lie. And this man wants to be president? He’s running on judgment, intelligence and bringing us together?”

Obama wrote that he has looked to Wright for spiritual advice, not political guidance, and he’s been pained and angered to learn of some of his pastor’s comments for which he had not been present. Obama told MSNBC that Wright had stepped down from his campaign’s African American Religious Leadership Committee.

In the Trib’s article on Obama’s speech in Philadelphia, Obama was quoted as saying, “Did I ever hear him (the Rev. Wright) make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church?”

Obama’s answer was yes.

Strange as it may seem, he also said in an interview with Fox News correspondent Major Garrett last week that he never heard controversial or un-American remarks by the Rev. Wright.

There are more, but I think you get the point here.

But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren’t simply controversial. They weren’t simply a religious leader’s effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country – a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.

But you sat there for 20 years listening to that. How can you say these views didn’t affect you? How can you say NOW that they are profoundly distorted if you sat there for 20 years listening to them?

As such, Reverend Wright’s comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems – two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.

So what are your solutions? You keep saying this but offering nothing at all in the way of a solution. I can say a lot of things, go off on tangents of my own, but without concrete plans they do no-one any good. What are your solutions?

Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way

But the truth is, that isn’t all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God’s work here on Earth – by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.

Yup, I’m getting a real sense of love from Reverend White every minute. And other black people I’ve heard from say the same thing, he is NOT typical of black America. And most Ministers, Reverends or Pastors do this type of work and they also TEACH their doctrine on the side. Call me born, but it wasn’t yesterday! Can you tell me why there is no mention of this important man in your life in Wikipedia?

In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:

“People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend’s voice up into the rafters….And in that single note – hope! – I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion’s den, Ezekiel’s field of dry bones. Those stories – of survival, and freedom, and hope – became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn’t need to feel shame about…memories that all people might study and cherish – and with which we could start to rebuild.”

I’m sure we women felt that way the day we finally got to own our own land, our children, be able to vote, etc. black people aren’t all that different. Women’s blood spilled in childbirth and then wasted in war. A mother’s pain is universal too.

That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety – the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity’s services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.

Not according to the black News casters I’m hearing from on Lou Dobbs and other shows. They are denouncing what has happened in your Trinity Church as an abberation. And I’m not talking about the jumping, clapping, shouting, screaming, etc. I’m talking about Reverend White.

DOBBS: I want to ask you, also, before I go to the next question, and that is Jeremiah Wright and his — the bile that he was spewing, whatever the reason, whatever the context, whatever else he did say, whatever else his words, that kind of language, a number of people on this broadcast, in fact, have said that some of his comments, some of the more hateful comments, in fact, are typical of the traditional black church in this country.

And I’ve got black friends who are saying that is absolutely untrue. There’s a contest over that. What role does a black church play in both resolving and perpetuating racial tension in this society of ours?

STEELE: Well, the black church has always been an extremely important institution in black America. Certainly, the civil rights movement evolved out of the black church. But that’s a long way from Reverend Wright who it seems to me is rather demagogic and actually preaches hate almost as a kind of consolation for his flock. And that is not normal in a black American church today. That’s not the norm.

And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions – the good and the bad – of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.

Nope, it doesn’t but I think it helps you JUSTIFY your association with him. And as long as people don’t think about what you say, everything will be fine. But I’m not one of those people. I do examine what you say and how you say it.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

Please, give me a break here. You can pick your friends and your Reverend but you are stuck with your relatives. That’s a fact.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.

Geraldine Ferraro withdrew from Hillary’s Campaign and apologized to boot. I haven’t heard a word of apology from Reverend White concerning his comments about white Americans or America. I will assume he meant every word.

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America – to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we’ve never really worked through – a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.

You find it odd that we would be absolutely SHOCKED at his outburst? I find your attitude odd, you are the candidate running for PRESIDENT after all. You are to represent ALL AMERICANS, yet you persist in defending this racists honor? Please, give me a break here, the only one keeping racism alive is black Reverend White.

Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, “The past isn’t dead and buried. In fact, it isn’t even past.” We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.

Again you bring up someone who was heavily influenced by race in his day. While that doesn’t discount who and what he was, it also doesn’t solve the problem. How about you look to S.B.Fuller? Now there was a black Man who knew how to make things happen!

Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven’t fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today’s black and white students.

Statistics have proven that Blacks do no better in desegregated schools than in segregated ones. This is a myth that everyone loves to harp on.

Black Students’ Occupational Expectaltions
A National Study of the Impact of School Desegregation
Marvin P Dawkins

University of Wisconsin-Parkside

Attending desegrated schools does not change blacks’ occupational expectations uniformly and substantially.

You are using myth and hype here to make a point that doesn’t exist.

Legalized discrimination – where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments – meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today’s urban and rural communities.

Show me hard facts or is this more like the bush administration WMD? The terrorists are out to get me! While I can imagine SOME may have met with resistance back in the day, this is not so today. Now if you had mentioned Katrina I would believe you. But you didn’t mention that, you left this wide open like it is a dirty secret no-one talks about and is still going on today and it isn’t. Not with the average citizen.

A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one’s family, contributed to the erosion of black families – a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods – parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement – all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.

See, I don’t believe this. If you can make it, so can they. No one tried to keep you down and you lived part of your life out of country. So, PLEASE tell me something I can believe. And they sat in the same public school classroom that I did. I’m not on welfare, my poor education hasn’t contributed to any sense of frustration. I don’t blame the rich people for my only making enough money to support myself, in fact I CAN and DO support myself, so I ask “why can’t they”? We have the same background came from the same neighborhood…..yet they are somehow deprived and “held back”? So if so many white people from poor neighborhoods and poor public schools manage to live, no matter how tightly, why can’t, or won’t, they? Today, the only ones holding them back are themselves.

This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What’s remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.

Are you saying “Oh poor pity me I’m black and I’ll never amount to anything so why should I even try?” That is pig’s swallow. This country allows for each and every person who WANTS to, to become what they desire. If black males decide to become criminals because the money is easy, who is to say that wasn’t their choice? And if they bowed to peer pressure, who is to say that still wasn’t their choice? We do have a choice in who our friends are. If this is true, explain to me people like Oprah, or Morgan Freeman, Cuba Gooding Jr., Halle Barry, Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes, not to mention all the singers and comedians. Are you going to tell me those are token black People? These people had a PLAN and followed it. They weren’t flukes. Anyone can follow a plan if they want to.

But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn’t make it – those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations – those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician’s own failings.

Well that goes without saying for white folks too. And make no mistake, white people DON’T blame black people for what happens to them. So how come it is ok for black people to do that???

And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright’s sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

It seems to me this is one of the things that IS wrong with America. That is WHY there was a separation of Church and STATE, so that things like this DIDN’T happen. Hate breeds hate, no matter where you find it. I’m sorry for the Reverend White, but he wasn’t in the generation that was a slave. He can’t claim he was. So what is his problem? If you have to continue to justify something, you already know you are wrong!

In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don’t feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience – as far as they’re concerned, no one’s handed them anything, they’ve built it from scratch. They’ve worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they’re told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.

OK, I partially agree with you. I hate justifications of any kind. It isn’t right. It perpetuates the white/black problems and doesn’t solve anything. Let’s not go there. Let’s find solutions, not more problems.

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren’t always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.

And if you were paying attention to the VOTER you would know that we are against where the government is headed! We aren’t WITH the Reagan Coalition or some such! Geese! Where did you get this stuff?

Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze – a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns – this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.

I totally agree with this paragraph. The first one out of all those I’ve read so far!

This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.

I have always had Black lovers and friends, they were not those I looked down on, but those I looked to. We shared opinions, cried and laughed together, had fun together. There was nothing racial to our relationships. And it is people relating together that are going to express themselves. We didn’t have wounds between us to heal. We had love and friendship. I fail to see where the racial wounds are unless they be perpetuated by others in other places and not the norm.

For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances – for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs – to the larger aspirations of all Americans — the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives – by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.

So if binding our grievances equate to better health care, better schools, and better jobs, doesn’t that already relate to ALL Americans? I’m all for it. But I want to hear the PLAN. I want concrete stuff that I can point to and hold you to.

Ironically, this quintessentially American – and yes, conservative – notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright’s sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.

The profound mistake of Reverend Wright’s sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It’s that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country – a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old — is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know — what we have seen – is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope – the audacity to hope – for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

No society is EVER static, not unless that society is dying and I certainly hope ours isn’t. Not knowing the Reverend White I cannot say what his thoughts were, but from what I’ve seen, it seems simple and straight forward. And America has been changing since her conception. What bothers me is that Reverend White couldn’t see this. How could he NOT see this?

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination – and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past – are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds – by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

OK, and by the same token what of the discrimination against the whites by preferential treatment of blacks or Asians or Hispanics for that matter? And again I will point to studies done that say ALL schools need investing in and that this No Child Left Behind shit is the Problem, not the solution. The No Child Left Behind program was the worst thing ever done to our children. Truthfully this is sounding an awful lot like let’s give the black American hand-outs. I’m not sure I agree with that at all. The rest of us are just as pressed right now. Affirmative Action has been in place for decades, and I don’t believe it is needed any more. Affirmative Action has caused a backlash of reverse discrimination. We need to STOP focusing on color and ethnicity and focus on PEOPLE only. ALL People have the same chances and opportunities IF they choose to take them. You can lead a horse to water but you cannot force it to drink.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

NO! This should NOT be about religion, or God, or the Golden rule! This should be about a Government that is For the People, By the People! On a personal level YES, but NOT on a Government Level. You cannot do that!!!! Our Constitution strictly forbids it.

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle – as we did in the OJ trial – or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina – or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright’s sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she’s playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that

And your solutions are???? Again I’m asking for something concrete here. I have yet to hear 1 solution. You are killing us with words here.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.” This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can’t learn; that those kids who don’t look like us are somebody else’s problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.

No one has EVER said kids can’t learn. Whoever told you that must have been stoned because it certainly wasn’t in MY vocabulary!!! This is nothing but rhetoric and platitudes and you people are sucking it up like Mana!

This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don’t have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.

This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn’t look like you might take your job; it’s that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.

This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should’ve been authorized and never should’ve been waged, and we want to talk about how we’ll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.

This I will agree with.

I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation – the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.

Like the ones you were starting to raise in Reverend White’s Church? Makes me feel real confident in you I can assure you. Not! May I remind you that ALL Americans are open to change? It is Politicians who refuse!

There is one story in particularly that I’d like to leave you with today – a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King’s birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.

There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.

And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that’s when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.

She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.

She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.

Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother’s problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn’t. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.

Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they’re supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who’s been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he’s there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, “I am here because of Ashley.”

“I’m here because of Ashley.” By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.

But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.

Nice story. Way to go Ashley. But tell me why you said that Ashley’s story might have gone a different way and then made all those suppositions? Those didn’t make any sense to me. We all make choices every day. I think it would have been nicer to leave her story just as it really was. But that is just MY opinion. I realize it has nothing to do with anything.

Within the past few days, a few polls have been released for Pennsylvania, and things look promising for Barack Obama. The week prior, the polls had Hillary Clinton at a 15% lead, and bigger depending on the poll you were readings, and all things looked like it would stay there. That was the really bad week for press for Obama, with the Reverend Wright incident and a few more niggling news cycles that did him no good. However, once he made the now famous ‘More Perfect Union’ speech, and then it was exposed that Clinton has been lying about her trip to Bosnia (she has been claiming that her foreign policy credentials are better than Obama’s, and one example was when she landed among a hail of sniper fire, and they ran with their heads down to safety. This was a lie – there was a reception for her and she met a kid and heard her read a poem. There is video and photos of this encounter), Obama managed to pick up in the polls.

The latest figures show that none of the bad press for Obama over the Wright incident stuck – that his own speech and Clinton’s lies have managed to boost him up in the most recent polls. The latest Rasmussen poll had Clinton up, but not by her required margin. 49% to 39% – Obama only trailing by 10% with a 12% undecided. During the previous week, Clinton led in a 51% to 38% poll, and the week before 52% to 37%.

That change, in Rasmussen’s polling, comes off the back off purely the race speech of Obama’s and Clinton’s Bosnian bungle. Also something to note: Clinton has been campaigning hard in Pennsylvania, Obama has hardly stepped foot in the state. He’s been on holidays in the Virgin Islands for the past few days, and his bus tour, his first campaigning since, begins on Friday.

The changes are important for a second reason. The campaign narrative floated by the Obama campaign, that Clinton needs to win Pennsylvania by 15-20% at least, has been taken up by the media. The news outlets are saying the same things. Obama’s campaign has repeatedly said that if Obama loses by a single-digit number, even 9%, then he sees that as a victory. The media has begun to say the same thing – that Clinton needs a massive win to stay in the race.

The second part of the narrative, that Obama will win North Carolina, has also been taken up. The latest polls there indicate a big Obama win – bigger than Clinton’s in Pennsylvania. PPP has a 55% to 34% leaning to Obama – a huge 21% lead. The data for this was gathered around the time of the race speech, so while some might say it’s inflate because of that, I’d say that the speech didn’t have time to ’settle in’ among the voters. If Obama wins North Carolina by this much, and manages to get a single-figure loss in Pennsylvania, then the media will turn on Clinton in a heartbeat. If she can’t stay competitive in North Carolina, where she has to, and can’t push Obama out of a state that she should be winning big in, then she’s going to be called into question.

Now that the basic narrative has been taken up by the media, watch for them to start talking about margins of victory. Like I have been here, I expect that news people to start saying: “If Clinton loses Pennsylvania by anything less than X, and Obama wins North Carolina by Y, Clinton has lost the two states, and Obama has made more gains on the pledged delegate count.” That will then turn into questioning whether one should get the nomination based on pledged delegates, and if that is the topic of the news, Obama has the much better footing.

Similarly, the old question of building momentum going into the final races will come up. A single-digit loss for Obama will create more momentum for him than it will for Clinton. And then going into North Carolina, and getting a 20% win this late in the race, and only a week after his ‘loss’ in Pennsylvania, it will give him a big push in the eyes of the media, and this will translate into momentum among the voters. If Obama could get out a win in Indiana as well (which has no polling, and is the enigma of the last races), combined with the win in North Carolina and the ‘win’ in Pennsylvania, then I believe it will put the final nail in the coffin for the media. The rest of the states have already been decided, except Indiana. Some outlets are saying that Clinton needs to win Pennsylvania, Indiana and North Carolina to be a viable candidate. Without North Carolina, she still needs Indiana. Because we know she won’t win North Carolina.

Thomas.

If you have not heard or read Barack Obama’s much-discussed “race speech” from a few weeks ago, I urge you to do so. You can read the transcript here (warning: it’s lengthy).

Now I am far from an apologist for Barack Obama. I have many reservations about him, as I do for the other candidates vying for the presidency. But one area in which I think Obama does exceed Hillary Clinton and John McCain is in rhetorical capability—the command of the spoken, well-articulated word.

Quite simply, Obama’s speeches blow the doors off of any of Clinton’s or McCain’s. Case in point: the “race speech.” Ostensibly delivered as a damage-control oration (to tranquilize the understandably damaging Rev. Wright controversy), the speech turned out to be one of the most complex, nuanced, unexpectedly brilliant bits of prose uttered by an American politician in the last two decades.

The speech was so striking because it did not sound political; it sounded intellectual. It did not pander to the lowest common denominator, but instead demanded a high level of cerebral engagement on the part of the audience. This is all very shocking and uncharacteristic of politics in the 21st century.

Even conservative intellectuals have noted the uncommon intelligence of Obama’s speech. Here’s an excerpt from a Wall Street Journal editorial by former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan:

“The speech assumed the audience was intelligent. This was a compliment, and I suspect was received as a gift. It also assumed many in the audience were educated. I was grateful for this, as the educated are not much addressed in American politics.

Here I point out an aspect of the speech that may have a beneficial impact on current rhetoric. It is assumed now that a candidate must say a silly, boring line—”And families in Michigan matter!” or “What I stand for is affordable quality health care!”—and the audience will clap. The line and the applause make, together, the eight-second soundbite that will be used tonight on the news, and seen by the people. This has been standard politico-journalistic procedure for 20 years.

Mr. Obama subverted this in his speech. He didn’t have applause lines. He didn’t give you eight seconds of a line followed by clapping. He spoke in full and longish paragraphs that didn’t summon applause. This left TV producers having to use longer-than-usual soundbites in order to capture his meaning. And so the cuts of the speech you heard on the news were more substantial and interesting than usual, which made the coverage of the speech better. People who didn’t hear it but only saw parts on the news got a real sense of what he’d said.

If Hillary or John McCain said something interesting, they’d get more than an eight-second cut too. But it works only if you don’t write an applause-line speech. It works only if you write a thinking speech.

They should try it.”

Indeed, I think the reason Obama is so appealing to many of my generation is because he is so very counter to the cable news soundbite/infotainment zeitgeist. He is smart, serious, and eschews political stupidity. After eight years of an “I feel your pain” amoral politico and then eight more years of an anti-intellectual cowboy in the oval office, Americans are aching for something new—something as far from the “establishment” as possible. We don’t want a trigger-happy maverick in the White House; we want an educated visionary. We don’t want a politician in control of the free world; we want a professor.

Obama’s speech was more akin to a lecture by a college professor than it was a policy speech by a politician. It requires more than a thirty second Fox News soundbite to process and inspires us to rediscover the art of thinking through the issues. It recognizes that complicated problems can’t be solved in campaign speeches—but campaign speeches can at least get us thinking productively and critically about what and why these problems are.

In what might be the greatest speech on race relations in America since Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke “I have a dream”, presidential hopeful Barack Obama boldly and honestly and openly addresses the controversies of pastor Rev. Wright, Geraldine Ferraro, segregated Sunday worship, and race relations in the USA. History was made today.

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I totally agree with Reason’s Jesse Walker. This is the core element of the speech.

 From the link:

This morning Obama delivered a speech on the subject. It goes on endlessly, as his speeches often do, but it makes the essential, obvious point:

As imperfect as he may be, [Wright] has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions — the good and the bad — of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother — a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

I guess you either understand this instinctively or you don’t. And then, of course, there are the people who understand it but will continue to pretend they don’t, the better to smear Obama as a secret jihadist, Weatherman, or Farrakhanite.

Parts one here and two here.

There’s not a whole lot I could say about a speech made by Barack Obama today. It’s not something that can be cut into sound-bites, or sections copied. But it is something that everyone should listen to. Here’s the link. It’s long, but it is worth every second.

If anyone has ever wondered what the ‘change’ is that Obama talks about, it’s in that speech. If anyone has ever wanted to see a politician grapple the most toughest of issues that float around U.S. politics, it’s in that speech. If you ever wanted to see something inspiring, honest, true, challenging, and thoughtful, it’s in that speech. It verges on perfection.

I listened to it, and as an Australian listening to a U.S. politics speech, it shouldn’t have spoken to me as much as it did. It shouldn’t have found a place in my mind. A mere speech in a primary race which has little bearing on me. But it was incredible. It was something you listen to and it sends tingles up your back.

There were no placards, no ‘Obama’ signs, no banners. There were American flags behind him as he spoke. Because he was speaking about an American issue, speaking to all Americans, appealing to the minds and hearts of American citizens. That speech was presidential. It was beyond anything we’ve heard this race, and probably we will never hear anything like it in a primary election again.

Just watch that speech and think how far America can soar under the presidency of Barack Obama. Just think of where the country has gone in the past 7 years, and then imagine where the U.S. could end up with Barack Obama as president. What he said in that speech proves that he is more qualified than Hillary Clinton or John McCain to be president. The job isn’t about military service, or years in office, of legislation moved, or playing the political game – it’s about looking at things and not settling for change. Not being content with what you have. It’s about looking ahead, inspiring people, making the better change, and serving for the people that need it.

You can bet that Hillary Clinton and John McCain watched this speech. And you can bet that both campaigns are in panic mode. Obama is a renowned orator, and everyone knew it. And he had made some impressive speeches to date – but nothing this big. And nothing this good. This was his big gun. This was a speech that, even if he were to lose the primary race, or the general election, will put him into history books. This speech has cemented his place in U.S. politics and in their society’s mind.

I really do recommend watching that speech.

Thomas.

Like most Americans, I reported to work this morning and knew I wouldn’t be able to see Barack Obama deliver a much hyped speech. Let me re-phrase that…like most Americans I reported to work this morning. It’s unlikely most Americans knew there was a much trumpeted moment coming in the morning’s news cycle.

There were no inhibitions as the campaign and commentators referred to it as the most important in his campaign and a history making moment. I was first able to get the transcript….

THE TRANSCRIPT…appeared long and read something like a professor’s lecture notes. I love this guy but wondered if it was necessary to read the whole thing. I hoped his delivery would make the difference. Then I found an mp3…

THE MP3…revealed some passionate moments but there was no single moment when the speech took off. It sounded like Obama’s feet were squarely planted on the ground. Distracted by a co-worker, I decided to simply let it go. I couldn’t remember his remarks well enough to rewind to the place where I was interrupted. Nothing really left a mark. This evening I was able to watch the video…

THE VIDEO…I’m still certain that this is affecting most as much as your average college lecture. You can’t possibly hang onto every word and it’s anyone’s guess what will stick. Will everyone be talking about mustard and relish sandwiches tomorrow? I can’t help but wonder how this is being received outside of Obama’s circle…

THE NIGHTLY NEWS...The local news gives a nod to the fact the primary campaign continues. Clinton gave a speech on Iraq today and Obama gave a speech on race. That’s it. With Brian Williams on NBC, the report starts with the fact that Rev. Wright played a central role in Obama’s faith, married the Obamas, and baptized the Senator’s two daughters. Important details but much more focused on the question of Rev. Wright rather than any greater message about race.

AT THE END OF THE NIGHT…There are essential themes to Senator Obama’s remarks that we shouldn’t overlook. There’s the promise of redemption and forgiveness for our own imperfect selves. There’s a complex picture of what it means to be an American of any color. The line that resonated most for me spoke about the anger inherent in any discussion of race….

But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

Too often we look away too quickly. It’s the real anger that makes discussing race as a spectacle (O.J) or as a tragedy (Hurricane Katrina) more destructive than we dare admit. We’d like to think we’re boldly talking about race. The problem is that we’re talking about but we’re not saying anything about us, what these events say about who we are and the people we want to be. Today, Obama laid out an alternative.

I found one post-speech analysis that gives credit to the greatest contribution Obama provided today….

For the bravest thing Obama did in his historic speech at the Constitution Center in Philadelphia was to ring the bell louder. He chose to focus on an uncomfortable topic that most Americans would rather leave unspoken. He offered an honest and gutsy tour of the complexities of our wounded national psyche, even explaining that his own beloved white grandmother engaged in racial stereotypes. And he articulated a big part of what his supporters liked about him in the first place: the chance to take us into a better racial future.

The question continues to be how many Americans are prepared to follow his lead.