Sorry For Getting Political…

…but this is one of the best speeches I've ever heard. Obama's speech on racial issues in America was simply amazing, and I'd highly recommend reading it and/or watching it if you have the time. I implore you to do so…this speech deserves so much more than the soundbites you're going to get on the news tonight.

With full text speech located at: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/3/18/105356/186/915/479103

My take: Obama is the one of the first political leaders I've heard that actually gets it. Gets that it should be a struggle framed as white vs black or vs Mexicans or Asians, etc. He frames the issue with concerns from all parties involved, such as the black feeling of lack of opportunity or the white resentment at being denied consideration for a job or school placement by way of afirmative action, atoning for acts which they had nothing to do with.

But most importantly, he gets that the only way we're going to be able to get around these issues is by realizing that the problems in our country today are not simply just "white problems" or "black problems" but that they're everybodys problems. And that all of the division along racial lines distracts us from solving the true problems in America. When everyone is stronger,  the country as a whole is stronger. I'm excerpting a section of the speech below.
 

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.

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.  

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.

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