Full text of the speech by Barak Obama, here.
After reading the text of the speech, I’m inspired. This is what I’ve been talking about. Do we have severe social challenges, racism being one of them? You betcha. Is there long standing hurt and distrust stemming from these and other challenges? Absolutely. Is this something we can address and move beyond? A resounding yes.
Obama hit on all of the themes that I have personally held dear for years, though much more eloquently and succinctly. His unique ability to take these challenges head on distinguishes him from those, who through the years have sought to exploit our divisions instead of heal them.
Congratulations Senator Obama. I may not have been a true believer before, but I am now.
Here’s the video:
Great line from the text:
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.
Maybe the Best Line:
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.
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.