It's amazing how the media will push the narrative that Obama is the "elites" choice. This decidedly unelite magic user supports him, as do many other folks I know.
This puff piece in Salon, which used to be the source, just underscores this by reminding us that Obama's education, coupled with a rather specious claim about his beer of choice in Pennsylvania, that Barack is just too cool for regular folks, thus, setting up Hillary as the "Okie from Muskogee" candidate.
This is very convenient, except that she went to Yale, an even more elitist school than Harvard, for a start.
That's why I laugh everytime she complains about her treatment. She's gotten off easy.
Yet, I stop laughing, because of Ohio, and I wonder "Do people really buy this bullshit?".
Update: Case in Point.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Dr. Puma from the Front Lines of the Texas Caucus
"I'm sitting here with my precinct (60)(state senate district 13) at the county level caucus. We are 21 Obama delegates and 14 Hillary in my precinct and will be electing 2 delegates to go to Austin. Probably we will split. However, if all their delegates don't show, our alternates can take their seats- I think. It isn't exactly clear and could become a bloodbath. Of course, we would have to have alternates to spare and I think we are just at 21. Its tough to get people out on Saturday morning, even for the promise of standing history on its head.
Puma"
Update: 3:01pm
"Awesome. Hillary supporters on the rules committee are trying to pull some shit. they are trying to unseat Obama delegates so we are going to vote on the challenges precinct by precinct--about 180 precincts. OMG!!!"
Puma"
Update: 3:01pm
"Awesome. Hillary supporters on the rules committee are trying to pull some shit. they are trying to unseat Obama delegates so we are going to vote on the challenges precinct by precinct--about 180 precincts. OMG!!!"
Friday, March 28, 2008
Greg Fischer
Mitch McConnell, one of Kentucky's two BushCo's sycophants, has been virtually unopposed since he barely beat Harvey Sloane, the former mayor of Louisville, in 1990.
Since then, there hasn't been one time he hasn't voted for the monied few, and, like Steve Chabot, always roots for his team, voting, according to the Washington Post, 92.5% percent of the time.
However, via Mike, MyDD likes Greg Fischer, the beverage tycoon, and a quick look at his positions reveals why.
I mean, wouldn't you like put McConnell out on his ass? Unfortunately, we are stuck with Bunning until 2010
Since then, there hasn't been one time he hasn't voted for the monied few, and, like Steve Chabot, always roots for his team, voting, according to the Washington Post, 92.5% percent of the time.
However, via Mike, MyDD likes Greg Fischer, the beverage tycoon, and a quick look at his positions reveals why.
I mean, wouldn't you like put McConnell out on his ass? Unfortunately, we are stuck with Bunning until 2010
Casey Endorses Obama
What effect will this have in Pennsylvania? I don't know, really? Will it be a repeat of Kerry and Kennedy's endorsement?
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Judas Priest!: Hillary Clinton and the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy
An exclamation that my girlfriend's mother uses in exasperation, to which I usually make the devil horns underneath whatever table we are sitting at. It's reflexive.
Unfortunately, we are not talking about those Manchester Titans of Metals, but something that master triangulator and right wing boy toy James Carville uttered upon hearing that Richardson had-gasp-given it some thought, and saw the future in Barack Obama.
So, gentle and ungentle reader, this is where we are at: Staring down a sense of entitlement that is so massive, so sure of its historical significance, so monumentally megalomaniacal and egoistic, even for a politician, that, by extension, Hillary Clinton is Jesus Christ.
Presumably, in another popular epithet, the "H" in "Jesus H. Christ" is for "Hillary".
I ask you: What the fuck is wrong with these people? If this is a comparison they are willing to make, or rather, should have been extrapolated, does the Clinton campaign not know what happens to public figures who make such comparison. There were Beatle bonfires when John Lennon said that the Fabs were more popular than the Son of God, yet nobody is making much of this extrapolation.
It's a shame, really, because, unlike Hillary Clinton, John Lennon, for the most part, walked it like he talked it-but we'll get back to that.
Nobody is making much of this extrapolation because the whole of the Clinton campaign is insinuation and innuendo, for the maximum deniability. See, Carville is not "officially" with the campaign-just like Mark Penn. Maximum deniability.
It is through this that the various e mail whisper campaigns, Hillary's refusal to say that Obama was a Christian, the various race baiting tactics of the now sorely diminished Bill Clinton, and her ostensible buddy buddy act with the increasingly confused John McCain, who is having "senior moments" at a shocking clip, are all in the service of insinuation and innuendo.
It's the ultimate manifestation of Carville's Triangulation Doctrine, and for the most mercenary of reasons: Playing nice with the Republican Nominee, creating a binary of Patriotic Americans vs. "Liberal" "Leftist" "Progressive" Flag Burners.
It would seem that she is exactly three mentions of "authentic" Americans and two helpings of "Heartland", and she's switching parties-or rather, switching back-she was a Young Republican at Wellesley, after all...
I've said that it is rather shocking how much her campaign, at this point, apes Bush's campaign: The racial dirty tricks, the whisper campaigns, the thumbing the scales, and surrogates as attack dogs are all in the Karl Rove play book, now the James Carville, no wait, the Mark Penn-okay, who the hell is running things over there? Ah…there's that deniability thing again.
Except that it all ends up sticking to her, and, what's shocking to me is, that for some people, they don't care. She never argued against NAFTA. Her participation in the Irish Peace Process and the Balkans has been exposed as total frauds. They needed to produce videotape to prove her wrong? Are peoples' memories that bad?
This would appear to be what the Clinton's are banking on. However, the desperation in the Clinton campaign is palpable.
What could possibly explain Clinton's invocation, very solemnly, about Jeremiah Wright, which her own Church disavows this kind of racial politicking. Clinton explains, of course, that "she would have just gotten up" and that "we choose our religion"-to which she is absolutely correct. So I guess we can all ask her about "The Fellowship", a right wing organization that seeks to bring Jesus to D.C.-and to the rest of us:
"The Fellowship isn't out to turn liberals into conservatives; rather, it convinces politicians they can transcend left and right with an ecumenical faith that rises above politics. Only the faith is always evangelical, and the politics always move rightward."
Consorting with a right wing theocratic movement? Hmmm…
Mark Penn=Karl Rove. The cozying up to John McCain. The employment the duplicitous "patriotism" meme for political gain. The "3 a.m" ad/Bush's "Wolves" ad. Support of the war (you know, when she was allegedly "duped" by dumbass George Bush)to the cost of 4000 Americans and countless Iraqis, all for the ever bloating coffers of the no bidders.
When the Clintons spoke of the "vast right wing conspiracy", were they projecting, or were they trying to hide something?
Update: Ah yes...when in doubt, start the threats.
Friday, March 21, 2008
Richardson endorses Obama
This is a little late, but better than never, and certainly welcome:
"You are a once-in-a-lifetime leader," Richardson said. 'Above all, you will be a president who brings this nation together'."
Since Bill and Bill watched the Super Bowl together (wondering if they were up to the same as me), presumably to lock up a Richardson endorsement, I wonder how this went up over:
"Bill Richardson described the conversation he had with Hillary Clinton on his decision to endorse Barack Obama as 'heated' in an exclusive with NBC Nightly News today."
I think "heated" might be an understatement.
"You are a once-in-a-lifetime leader," Richardson said. 'Above all, you will be a president who brings this nation together'."
Since Bill and Bill watched the Super Bowl together (wondering if they were up to the same as me), presumably to lock up a Richardson endorsement, I wonder how this went up over:
"Bill Richardson described the conversation he had with Hillary Clinton on his decision to endorse Barack Obama as 'heated' in an exclusive with NBC Nightly News today."
I think "heated" might be an understatement.
Confessions of An Irish American Camel Smoker
Well, the quarter is over, and the grades are submitted, and...I'm smoking again.
I was a smoker for about fifteen years, and quit last June with the help of Chantix- at 130 bucks a pop, I might add. Christ, either the tobacco companies get your money, or the pharmaceutical companies get your money, but either way, its a cabal I tell you, A CABAL!- and things went really well, really smooth, for until the holidays.
See, the thing about Chantix is that it gives you a fresh start in that it reprograms your brain to before you were a smoker. Why would anybody smoke who isn't already a smoker, you might ask?
Well, here's the thing about cigs: People smoke them, and evidentally, they enjoy them, to, and while it is true that Chantix reprograms your brain to before you were a smoker in that you do not crave them at all, it is not hypnosis or a brainwipe: You still remember the good things (believe it or not) about smoking. Bars. Hanging with your friends. Good Times. Combine that with some beers, or liquor, or wine, and smoking friends...
Anyhoo, around the holidays, while out with friends, I had a cigarette. No big deal. Woke up and didn't want anymore. Went on with my life. In bars, at parties, didn't want one. This went on until around Christmas, and while at a Christmas Party, I had a few cigarettes. What the hell, its the Holidays.
However, a funny thing happened: While I was at the pub, I began to bum them-not many, maybe four a night. it was fun. It made me feel at home.
Then, another funny thing happened: I felt so bad about bumming them, that I would buy a pack of goddamned devil Camel Lights, as to not be a total mooch.
Anybody who has been a smoker, and bought a pack, knows that you have to smoke them before they go stale, usually around a day or so. This wasn't often, maybe once a week or so. I always left the pack at the bar. I had told myself, on sage advice from an ex smoker, that if you do not smoke first thing in the morning, you can quit. There's no evidence, of course, but a certain wisdom I think, certainly, a wisdom I needed to pay heed to.
No big, right? I would wake up with a dry sinus cigarette headache, and not repeat.
When I went out for my birthday at the end of January, I bummed quite a few, and when we got back to my place for the after hours, I really started smoking. Woke up, dry head, feeling tired and shitty, and thought that things were cool.
What followed in February was a swift and steady backslide.
First, the Super Bowl. A day long celebration of everything that is good in the worst possible things you can do to yourself. Copious Beers. Pizza. Beef Jerky. Potato Chips-all covered in a thick layer of processed cheese.
And cigarettes, cuz I ain't no mooch, right?
For some reason, I feel like I need to justify myself: Despite what some might say about me politically, there is something of a consensus that I am not an idiot. I have a B.A. in English Lit and Philosophy, and an M.A. in English. I teach at a large university. My favorite author is Joyce. I read Nietzsche and Derrida for fun. I'm not an idiot!!!
However, I doth protest too much. I smoked almost two pack that Super Bowl Sunday, caught up in the power and glory that is this most American Spectacle.
Now, the bad part: When I woke up, on the Deacon's couch the next day, I looked around and found my pack of Camel Lights-with a few in it-and then proceeded to cross the threshold, and I smoked one.
Then I smoked another one. I got in my car, and on that drive home, I smoke another one, wondering what I had done to myself, swearing that this would be the only time I did this, yadda yadda yadda.
When I got home, I took that last cigarette, and threw it in the toilet. Flush. "I won't do that again.”
But I did. I would go out, hang with friends and colleagues, buy a pack at the bar, return home with them, smoke until bed, and throw them in the toilet. Flush.I probably did that with around a carton of cigarettes in February.
Soon, I was looking for reasons to go out to the pub, and buy cigarettes. Hell, some nights, I was sitting there, alone, sipping my beer, and smoking, all the while justifying it as "good times". My weeks without were now only days.
It was a day or so after such a night, while out with friends, on the Friday before the Snow storm, that I awoke, made coffee, and sat down to grade, knowing it was going to be a long weekend, and I should be productive.
Except that I couldn't. I couldn't concentrate. A gnawing sensation in my guts. Fidgeting. Christ, I was fiendin.
And you know what I did. I went out in the storm, walked four blocks, and bought Camel Lights. It was only then that I could grade, concentrate, not kill myself from cabin fever. I did the same the next day. I had gotten re-addicted.
I have been smoking, almost at full habit, for about a week or so now. No illusions about "social" smoking. No bullshit about only smoking while I'm out at the pub. Nope. I wake up, smoke, smoke throughout the day, and stub that last fucking butt, joylessly, out right before bed.
Goddamn. How did it happen?
I'm not sure about a moral here, because I try not to moralize about vices. It's a tough world out there, and you have to try to find peace however you can. But, as I drag on this Camel that I use to both mark and hasten the clock to my demise, I could tell you not to start, but if you've never smoked seriously before, then you are probably thinking "What an asshole".
You'd be right. There's no happiness, no pleasure. Joyless time marking to death. I am managing stress. No. The main stress right now is cigarette centered. Let me reiterate, in case I'm unclear:
This. Fucking. Sucks.
Oh yes, the moral: I'm not, nor was I, an ex smoker who expects the world to stop for them. I don't even think that smoking need be banned in bars and pubs. I don't moralize about vices.
However, it's clear to me that it's one thing to be tolerant, and its another to participate.
I cannot be a "social" smoker. That time came and went at the end of my senior year of High School, when I first picked up the habit, and while I associate so many amazing things that I have seen or done with cigarettes-being cool in all black with my equally being cool then girlfriend, my first serious one, talking about Buddhism and pretending that we were like Sartre and De Beauvoir, all drama and cafe living; drinking excessively and trying to find love (sex) when her and I were, in fact, all drama; standing around in my motorcycle jacket with pillar box red hair and white Dr. Martens on Short Vine, feeling cynical, drunk, wanting Fugazi to set the world right, etc. etc. etc.
I never imagined in those halcyon days that it would go on like this. Yet, here I am, several brands later, in my mid Thirties, sucking these Camels like the antidote was in it.
At one time, it was. Now, it's just something I'm doing, again, marking time.
Anyway, as I sit here, my apartment smells like a VFW, and I am looking, right next to my laptop, at an ashtray, half full of the butts of a pack that I bought five hours ago, having just divested myself (or Capital One) of the 135 dollars American for new prescription of Chantix, knowing I have just days left of cigarettes, wondering if I am finally shaking the ghost of associations that were pleasure.
I know where and how it all went wrong: I gave myself permission, thinking I had it right this time, that I wouldn't pick up the habit again. I made exceptions when none should be made; "This will be the only time", yada yada yada.
Tomorrow, I'll take that first Chantix, and start again.
I think its my nature, and I'll have to find something else to compliment my life of the mind, something else to be compulsive about.
Hell,I might even exercise.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
And the name of our new troll is...
Cincy Capell! :
"HEY WIZARD OF COVINGTON-WHY DON'T YOU TAKE A FEW OF THOSE HARD EARNED CENTS THAT YOU EARN AS AN UNDEREMPLOYED INSTRUCTOR AND BUY A RAZOR AND SOME SHAVING CREAM, AND THEN TAKE A SHAVE?THE 60'S ARE OVER. YOU WEREN'T EVEN BORN DURING THAT DECADE. SO DROP THE DIRTY FUCKING HIPPY ACT ALREADY. LOSER."
So nice, he used it twice...
Making friends where ever I go.
"HEY WIZARD OF COVINGTON-WHY DON'T YOU TAKE A FEW OF THOSE HARD EARNED CENTS THAT YOU EARN AS AN UNDEREMPLOYED INSTRUCTOR AND BUY A RAZOR AND SOME SHAVING CREAM, AND THEN TAKE A SHAVE?THE 60'S ARE OVER. YOU WEREN'T EVEN BORN DURING THAT DECADE. SO DROP THE DIRTY FUCKING HIPPY ACT ALREADY. LOSER."
So nice, he used it twice...
Making friends where ever I go.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
The Truth
Barack Obama, in answering his detractors on Rev. Wright, hits it out of the park.
You wanna know what Barack Obama is really all about? Read on:
"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.
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.
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 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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."
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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."
You wanna know what Barack Obama is really all about? Read on:
"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.
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.
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 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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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."
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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."
Monday, March 17, 2008
St. Patrick's Day
(Translated, this reads as follows:)
St Patrick's Day today and, as usual, nothing noticeable. I was at Mass, my hair cut shorter and much better also. I didn't know the priest who said Mass.
The orderlies were giving out food to all who were returning from Mass. They tried to give me a plate of food. It was put in front of my face but I continued on my way as though nobody was there.
I got a couple of papers today, and as a kind of change the Irish News was there. I'm getting any news from the boys anyway.
I saw one of the doctors this morning, an ill-mannered sort. It tries me. My weight was 57.70 kgs. I had no complaints.
An official was in with me and gave me some lip. He said, 'I see you're reading a short book. It's a good thing it isn't a long one for you won't finish it.'
That's the sort of people they are. Curse them! I don't care. It's been a long day.
I was thinking today about the hunger-strike. People say a lot about the body, but don't trust it. I consider that there is a kind of fight indeed. Firstly the body doesn't accept the lack of food, and it suffers from the temptation of food, and from other aspects which gnaw at it perpetually.
The body fights back sure enough, but at the end of the day everything returns to the primary consideration, that is, the mind. The mind is the most important.
But then where does this proper mentality stem from? Perhaps from one's desire for freedom. It isn't certain that that's where it comes from.
If they aren't able to destroy the desire for freedom, they won't break you. They won't break me because the desire for freedom, and the freedom of the Irish people, is in my heart. The day will dawn when all the people of Ireland will have the desire for freedom to show.
It is then we'll see the rising of the moon."
From the Diary of Bobby Sands.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Theology
Wes speaks Truth to Power concerning Obama's Church, and comes away shuddering at the hypocrisy.
While its no secret that clergy of all types often say hateful, ridiculous shit on the pulpit, the fact of the matter is when said preacher is a black man speaking to a black point of view, informed by the experience of the black community in this country, and weave all of this into a theology, the establishment freaks out.
To me, this isn't really all that different than Liberation Theology championed by Romero, and that ultimately...uh, yeah.
It certainly is in the best interest of mainstream Christianity to attack this, because, like Barack Obama's message of change, it represents a repudiation of the theology of the status quo, the theology that allowed Dr. King to be beaten, Jim Crowism, Vietnam and Iraq to continue unabated. "Mainstream" Christianity is antithetical to the teachings of Christ, because it does not actively engage Power to alleviate the suffering of the world, and, instead, tells people to wait on death their reward. In effect, the word of Christ gets reduced to "Shut up, know your place, and sit at the back of the bus".
That's not the book I read.
While its no secret that clergy of all types often say hateful, ridiculous shit on the pulpit, the fact of the matter is when said preacher is a black man speaking to a black point of view, informed by the experience of the black community in this country, and weave all of this into a theology, the establishment freaks out.
To me, this isn't really all that different than Liberation Theology championed by Romero, and that ultimately...uh, yeah.
It certainly is in the best interest of mainstream Christianity to attack this, because, like Barack Obama's message of change, it represents a repudiation of the theology of the status quo, the theology that allowed Dr. King to be beaten, Jim Crowism, Vietnam and Iraq to continue unabated. "Mainstream" Christianity is antithetical to the teachings of Christ, because it does not actively engage Power to alleviate the suffering of the world, and, instead, tells people to wait on death their reward. In effect, the word of Christ gets reduced to "Shut up, know your place, and sit at the back of the bus".
That's not the book I read.
Saturday, March 15, 2008
From the People Who Brought You Tiannenman Square and the continued asskicking of Tibet
Are now citing BushCo's torture policy as justification:
"Chinese spokesman Qin Gang has accused the United States of 'exercising double standards on human rights issues' in its condemnation of his country. There is little question that we are applying a double standard when both the President and Congress has struggled to preserve a well-defined form of torture. This hypocrisy will become more acute when our soldiers are waterboarded by other countries who will quote the President and various members of Congress in saying that it is perfectly appropriate."
As cruel and unhinged as he was, I'm not sure this is result Nixon had in mind when he went to China.
Nevertheless, they are one up on us: They don't need no stinking FISA courts in China. The telecoms have full immunity there.
"Chinese spokesman Qin Gang has accused the United States of 'exercising double standards on human rights issues' in its condemnation of his country. There is little question that we are applying a double standard when both the President and Congress has struggled to preserve a well-defined form of torture. This hypocrisy will become more acute when our soldiers are waterboarded by other countries who will quote the President and various members of Congress in saying that it is perfectly appropriate."
As cruel and unhinged as he was, I'm not sure this is result Nixon had in mind when he went to China.
Nevertheless, they are one up on us: They don't need no stinking FISA courts in China. The telecoms have full immunity there.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Hillary...everywhere you don't want her.
This is interesting:
"I voluntarily left the Hillary Finance Committee after I discovered more than $3,000 in unauthorized charges from HRC campaign on my own VISA card! And that set off a wave of overdrafts and $400 in bank charges that I was stuck with. And the compliance officer Allison Wright at Hillary VA headquarters refused to reimburse me for the charges. And the senior finance reps who I notified about more than $3,000 in unauthorized Visa Charges never once aplogized or empathized with my plight, much less sent me a "sorry for all the trouble" note and a check! "
"I voluntarily left the Hillary Finance Committee after I discovered more than $3,000 in unauthorized charges from HRC campaign on my own VISA card! And that set off a wave of overdrafts and $400 in bank charges that I was stuck with. And the compliance officer Allison Wright at Hillary VA headquarters refused to reimburse me for the charges. And the senior finance reps who I notified about more than $3,000 in unauthorized Visa Charges never once aplogized or empathized with my plight, much less sent me a "sorry for all the trouble" note and a check! "
The Strange Prisoner
Because it is at the end of quarter (which typically, would be really over by now-graded, submitted,and in the bag) and finals next week, I am headed down into Plato's Cave for the long derangement of the senses know as portfolio grading.
I am the Strangest Prisoner because, while my students struggle with their written voices, I am with them, and though I ascertain forms, it is arguable that I ascertain the sign any better than them. In my line of work, we trade mostly in signifiers, after all.
As my students struggle with language, so I struggle with them, toward the liberation that can only come through language. That struggle, after all, is what allows the truly revolutionary to occur-personally, socially and politically.
I am the Strange Prisoner because I am evaluating the panoply of experience, yet I only feel the heat of the fire. And what's between? Life, perhaps...
Anyway, posting may be light, at least from this end. I doubt I'll see daylight until St. Patrick's Day, and then I hope to see a mess of stout and water of life.
Anyway, check out this great track... Lou Reed and Elvis Costello. It's a personal favorite of mine, "Set The Twilight Reeling".
I am the Strangest Prisoner because, while my students struggle with their written voices, I am with them, and though I ascertain forms, it is arguable that I ascertain the sign any better than them. In my line of work, we trade mostly in signifiers, after all.
As my students struggle with language, so I struggle with them, toward the liberation that can only come through language. That struggle, after all, is what allows the truly revolutionary to occur-personally, socially and politically.
I am the Strange Prisoner because I am evaluating the panoply of experience, yet I only feel the heat of the fire. And what's between? Life, perhaps...
Anyway, posting may be light, at least from this end. I doubt I'll see daylight until St. Patrick's Day, and then I hope to see a mess of stout and water of life.
Anyway, check out this great track... Lou Reed and Elvis Costello. It's a personal favorite of mine, "Set The Twilight Reeling".
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Write Your Congressman...
seems pointless when you have a total shill like Jim Bunning. I wrote to him months ago, telling him to let the Protect America Act expire on the grounds that it was unconstitutional. You can see how much he really cares about his constituents-he insults the House (which did the right thing) and, by proxy, me. I can't wait to get this bastard out of office. He's our Boehner, except even stupider, if that's possible.
On the other hand, at least I have his warmest personal regards.
God...I need a scanner...
On the other hand, at least I have his warmest personal regards.
God...I need a scanner...
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
A Republican Strategy
I've been thinking for awhile, and have written as much, the Clinton's are willing to do anything, including burn down the Democratic Party, to get elected-including, as we've seen since South Carolina, adopt shockingly GOP-esque tactics. The Geraldine Ferraro thing is just the apotheosis of trend.
I would ask Hillary Clinton supporters if these are the values they hold? Are they the values of Democrats? Are they the values this country is founded on? If you can look the other way on this shit, then...Jesus...
I had a longer post planned, but Olbermann, once again, tells it true:
Out of curiosity, I had to go over to the 'net's number one hater site, who, as you might or might not know, I had a little beef with a while back. The heads must be exploding.
Update:
Things are hottin up over at C&L as Hillary faithful try to defend the indefensivible, and Kos piles on.
Here’s a little song for everybody out there…
George's song is the ballad of misdemeanors, cynicism, and megalomania, but unlike the ballad's of the outlaws of old, there is, apparently, no hope of his getting brought to justice.
I wonder, at this late date, whether those "stalwarts" who have still Bush/Cheney stickers, realize he's telling them to fuck off as well, those who are worse off than four years ago (at least) economically, and much worse off than we were during Watergate (at least).
For the victims of Katrina, the grieving friends and families of Iraq, here and there, for the good people who have been thrown under the bus, for our Constitution, for our way of life, for all of us who actually have to live in the aftermath of this guy…
Actually, it is that in your face. It is that naked, that insolent, and the closest we'll ever get to a confession from the son of a bitch.
Saturday, March 8, 2008
Obama Wins Wyoming
It's funny how the media works. Despite Obama winning 59-40, you get a doozy like this:
"...but that in this nail-biter [my bold]of a race saw heavy campaigning by both Obama and Hillary Clinton."
Wasn't Hillary's victory in Ohio, by a considerably smaller margin, considered decisive?
Well, something's up. Obama's candidate for Hastert's seat won.
"...but that in this nail-biter [my bold]of a race saw heavy campaigning by both Obama and Hillary Clinton."
Wasn't Hillary's victory in Ohio, by a considerably smaller margin, considered decisive?
Well, something's up. Obama's candidate for Hastert's seat won.
Friday, March 7, 2008
November Spawns a Monster
Well.
In terms bad P.R., I wish this hadn't come out, even if its true:
"'In Ohio, they are obsessed and Hillary is going to town on it, because she knows Ohio's the only place they can win', Power is quoted as saying. 'She is a monster, too — that is off the record — she is stooping to anything'."
South Carolina, any one? Attempting to thumb the scales, anyone? Oh, and this:
"Brodie told reporters that the Clinton campaign had called the Canadian embassy in Washington to tell officials to take her anti-NAFTA rhetoric 'with a grain of salt', said local media."
In terms bad P.R., I wish this hadn't come out, even if its true:
"'In Ohio, they are obsessed and Hillary is going to town on it, because she knows Ohio's the only place they can win', Power is quoted as saying. 'She is a monster, too — that is off the record — she is stooping to anything'."
South Carolina, any one? Attempting to thumb the scales, anyone? Oh, and this:
"Brodie told reporters that the Clinton campaign had called the Canadian embassy in Washington to tell officials to take her anti-NAFTA rhetoric 'with a grain of salt', said local media."
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Hypocrites
I thought you were smart
But man, you've got a wicked, wicked heart
And, oh, you're just being used
When they're through, you will be refused
(The Heptones "Hypocrite" ).
Well.
Obama trounced Clinton in Vermont, she trounced him in Rhode Island. She won Texas in a close one, and Ohio?
Well, she won handily in Ohio. What happened?
Was it the fearmongering Clinton Wolf Ad. Was Obama's counter ad too subtle? Ohio is not good for subtly. Maybe he should have ran with this one.
Maybe it was the NAFTA thing. That doesn't make any sense, though. Ohio probably voted Republican because of NAFTA. Why would the name associated with that have any leverage among the working class?
The 800 pound gorilla in the room here may be Steve Croft's piece. Is it possible that, even Democrats, the ostensible good guys, are susceptible to racist smears and the whisper email campaign about Obama being a Muslim, not saying the pledge, etc.
It's possible, because its incredibly pervasive. I've gotten them. You've probably gotten them. I've had these forwarded from life long Democrats, with subject headers like Fwd: Fw: Who is Barack Obama?
The Clintons haven't exactly disavowed this sort of thing. In fact, they were only to happy to engage in some old fashioned race baiting in South Carolina if they thought it would help.
Or thumbing the scales; What the hell was with Hillary declaring, in her list of states won, Florida and Michigan?
Every scurrilous attack by the Clintons, every underhanded tactic, has only proved Obama's thesis about the politics of the future, and puts, in greater relief, his position as its avatar, and her, as the dangerous, counterproductive past.
Yet, the future and the past are inextricable linguistically, phenomenologically, epistemologically, ontologically, and, evidentally, politically, because, what is emerging after last night constitutes a kind of nightmare yin yang scenario:
We are looking at the Democratic ticket, in one combination or another. Certainly, I would have my preference on who's on the title card, and who's on the undercard, but quixotically, I been hoping for a complete break, politically, from the New Left (aka, The Boomer Left) who's rhetoric and ideological battles we've been fighting for forty fucking years. It would seem, barring a miracle, that possibility may be sliding away.
I guess, in Ohio and Texas, people like the 90's.
Hold your nose, take your steaming bite of the philly style shit sandwhich.
Tastes like the status quo, doesn't it?
Integrity
"Anonymous opponents used "push polling" to suggest that McCain's Bangladeshi born daughter was his own, illegitimate black child. In push polling, a voter gets a call, ostensibly from a polling company, asking which candidate the voter supports. In this case, if the "pollster" determined that the person was a McCain supporter, he made statements designed to create doubt about the senator..."
For a guy who is all about honor and integrity, you'd think he'd wanna punch the guy responsible? He is-or was, after all, Mr. Straight Talk, right...
The 2000 John McCain would win this year. The whore that he's has become, pandering to the reactionary fundementalists, and ignoring his good sense in order to suck up to the far right wing of the Republican Party...so much for integrity.
You hitched to the wrong wagon, buddy.
For a guy who is all about honor and integrity, you'd think he'd wanna punch the guy responsible? He is-or was, after all, Mr. Straight Talk, right...
The 2000 John McCain would win this year. The whore that he's has become, pandering to the reactionary fundementalists, and ignoring his good sense in order to suck up to the far right wing of the Republican Party...so much for integrity.
You hitched to the wrong wagon, buddy.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Pathetic
Who do you think the establishment candidate is?
Oh Jack: You fucking sucked it big time in The Departed.
Update: Just a friendly reminder that this isn't about star power, its about people power.
Oh Jack: You fucking sucked it big time in The Departed.
Update: Just a friendly reminder that this isn't about star power, its about people power.
Saturday, March 1, 2008
Freezing For The Future: My Day with Ray/ Vote OBAMA!
I cannot take credit for this video; I do not have the capture ability. Contrary to the meme, my phone is only an LG VX8300, and, while handy for bar snaps, not good to capture the hugeness of this thing except in a rather revealing abstraction- a slightly deconstructed spirit photograph, if you’ll excuse the semiotic back flip.
However: The Kid, The Veteran, Professor, Accountant, ROTC, Joe Public and otherwise passionately exhausted citizens of these United States, getting reminded how much these used to be our United States and not just their United States, the States of Fear, the States where the most virulent people waving the flag were most antithetical to the words behind it, and thus, odious to it, and could be again, who’s technology was better than mine, should be thanked for this video, and for two reasons;
1. It’s earnest Cinema Verite, for, after standing on the glacier outside in 5/3 for two hours, people went bananas while inside, and this shows Obama’s entrance.
2. The above person was in my section, hell, somewhere in my row it seems, and thus, he is kind of acting as a Wizard by Proxy.
This time last week, I was in my office, watching the slow trickle of southern Ohio make its way to the venue formerly known as the Shoemaker Center, but now named after a bank. Something’s never change, even on university campuses, and vanity naming rights of various buildings to the highest fat cat contributor is a constant, even if they are responsible for turning loose CIA backed rightwing death squads in Central America…ah, the humanities.
It didn’t seem like very much, but I had some odds and ends to tie up for Tuesday-a slide show for the Guidance Counselors coming the following day, showing all the wonderful things we do at the Center For Access and Transition. It will also likely be one of many media epitaphs of this brilliant if misunderstood simple proposition: The University serving the people of the city, all the people. Imagine! Oh well, it was fun…
(We bring you back to you preordained Ivory Tower, already [and always] in progress.)
It was hard to concentrate, though; Since the ill starred run of John Kerry, a less than stellar candidate who should have (and by some accounts, did) beat Bush, I’ve been paying attention to Barack Obama. Certainly, his star turn at the Convention (the only real bright spot in an otherwise horrible year of hoping against hope) made everybody take notice of the Junior Senator, though, his relative inexperience seemed to be a problem for the foreseeable future. The foreseeable future, however, had a visibility of about eighteen months.
You know the rest; Kerry gets beat, and we have another four years of Emperor Dumbass and his cronies, and, as a result, they proceed to run the country further into the ground-further, I think, than anyone could have imagined. I mean, c’mon-running for the President of the United States in 2008, and you have to state explicitly that you would restore habeas corpus? This is what we’ve come to.
Early on in this thing, I was delighted to have John Edwards back, though I admired Barack Obama a great deal, I wasn’t so sure yet. What a quandary to have. The field was well qualified, and, with the exception of Hillary Clinton, who’s demons haunt us, and the spectre of a Co-Presidency with Bill
Incidentally, for those of you who may have rose tinted the nineties, it was all Doc Martens, floppy hippy hats and Pearl Jam, you know. However, given the last eight years, the tendency to treat it like a fucking GOLDEN AGE is understandable. Hell, I’ve get nostalgic whenever I hear “Hunger Strike”, but c’mon, I like Little Richard, too, but I don’t want to revisit the fifties…
It’s instructive, though, perform this little exercise in nostalgia-go ahead, love the 90’s, only in so far as it is necessary to perform an exorcism of that time as well, because, while in the perverse simulacra that has been the United States for about a decade, it would seem that returning to the 90’
s-something that the Clintons are trying to sell us on, makes sense, since we now back in the Eighties. Bush made an Eighties that Reagan’s darker visions could not fathom: Perpetual War. Corporate Hegemony. Jesus Freaks, out in the street-running for fucking Congress. Ah yes…The New World Order-except that Reagan, the old bastard, was an incredible politician, and surrounded himself with intelligent misguided people in the context of the Cold War. Bush surrounded himself with second and third tier Cold Warriors with no Soviet Union who had been milking no bids for whatever Very Large Corporation (VLC) they had been shilling for since the Bush 41 spectacularly crashed and burned in the early 90’s. Thus, the Very Large Cluster Fuck we find ourselves in now (VLC[F]).
While freezing the magical gonads off in much more frigid weather than the Doppler had called for-much more, like ten or more degrees, watching people queue up by the dozens since my 11 am arrival time. By One, the line went from the front of 5/3rd Arena, around the back, up behind the baseball field, around the front of Edwards, and out to Vine St. En mass, people came out, skipped class, cancelled class, skipped work, and stood out in the elements, waiting to see this guy who keeps going on about change. It was amazing to see people from all corners of the American tapestry here to hear, “just words”. The Korean and Vietnam War vets, the retire teachers, the preachers, the students, the Grad student who had voted for Bush, all out in the elements.
And Ray. Ray got in line right behind me, and, just like people caught in uncomfortable climatic conditions, we began to joke about the weather, about freezing, and about the fact that neither Ray nor myself were wearing the proper socks for standing for a long time on the icy snowpack that was the plaza level of the arena.
Ray introduced himself, and explained that his wife, who worked at a local hospital, was unable to attend, and that he had an extra “Ticket for Change”, which he had procured at the HQ downtown, and he wondered whether I wanted it; “We get to sit in a special section”. Sweet.
It was just around Two when the line started moving, and people began filing into the arena. As the flow of the line led to the side of the Arena, I watched Michael Eric Dyson go into a side entrance. One of my heroes! This was better than the rumor (which I could not visually verify) that George Clooney was in the house. Yeah, whatever.
Ray and I continued chatting. He works at a local corporation (uhhh mmmm),is a big Springsteen fan and came to “be convinced” that Obama was the real deal. I explained that I had made a decision in December that, despite having started as an Edwards supporter, Obama seemed like he might actually have a chance to fulfill his promise. The possibility that he might do just that, and more, fulfill our promise was tempting.
However, I reject the idea of a “historic candidate” in favor of this “historic moment”; who can begin to undo the disaster of Emperor Bush? Who can we trust to turn back to the Constitution, and not be tempted to take the expanded executive power and use it for “good”. There are no good uses for this power-it can only end in tyranny. Who had the judgment to see the Iraqi clusterfuck on the horizon. I’m no national security expert, but I read the papers, and I knew that BushCo’s claims were hincty at best, and criminal at worst. In this case, at least Edwards apologized. But not Hillary. How is this possible?
Since South Carolina, it’s been a foul affair, with the Clintons, proving Obama’s thesis about the “politics of the future” with every shitty insinuation, every whisper campaign, and some actually strange bizarre behavior involving a playground challenge for Cleveland. It seems that the Clinton’s are desperate, and willing to do anything.
Ray, and our new frozen friends, echoed these sentiments, bewildered as to why the Clintons, who most of us had supported at one time or another, would be so willing to blacken the eye of the Party because of some sense of entitlement. The people are shouting loud, in the ballot box, and in the glacier that was Cincinnati last Monday.
Finally, we shuffled inside, and the closest visual analogue I can think of is the excitement of your first Rock N Roll show, when you know you are about to see something amazing. But for all the trappings of Rock N Roll visually, it felt more like a Revival. Stomping. Clapping. Shouting. Call and Response. And the church organ, courtesy of the Stevie Wonder blaring out of the arena’s public address system
Ray and I, stopped by the men’s room for some last minute business, and found our way around to the “preferred viewing” section, and took a place among the others, waiting for change, the cross section of America.
Outside of this brother and sisterhood, downtown, the ugly truth of America, the ugly right wing Cincinnati were whooping it up, enjoying the “jokes” of local embarrassment Bill Cunningham as he insinuated that Obama was a terrorist, to the execrating throngs of a paranoid local Country Club set. It was only later that this would slightly embitter this day with its reminder of the work that lies before us. In fact, as I type this sentence, this remains very true, with Hillary Clinton weaseling out of refuting the rumor that Obama is a Muslim. Nice…
One has to wonder whose side she’s on, and the answer is clear as I sat with this cross section of the country, this American Panoply; She’s on her own side, which why we are assembled here. She isn’t on our side.
Ray and I set about inadequately trying to capture the images of this event with our limited technology while Mallory announced his support. This was met with rapturous applause, but I had the sense it was a bit like, to paraphrase the movie “like having your band open for Nirvana”. Thankfully, somebody captured this lightning.
Ray and I talked a bit, mostly about Tom Waits’s latest CD and his show in Louisville last year. Naturally, I told Ray that it was awesome, religious even, because it was. Not unlike this moment.
Then Obama came out, and the place went absolutely bananas. Bedlam. People freaked.
What followed was an hour the, like the best music, built to a crescendo, and it seemed as though each thought, each sentence he threw out there, snowballed in its conviction, its moral authority, and crackled with electricity. The people here wanted to hear that the American Dream has been slipping away, because it has. The people wanted to hear that the war is wrong, because it is. The people wanted to hear that teachers should not be teaching to a test, because it is a disaster, and, in what may be the most optimistic, heartening moment I have ever experienced as an American, that we have work to do, and we must think beyond our own selfish interest, and think about what’s good for the country. Yes I can. Yes I can. YES I CAN.
Readers of this little blog will know that I am as cynical as they come. People who know me know that Jesuit Skepticism, if not its theology, is burned into my critical brain. I clapped until my recently thawed hands ached. I stomped until my nuts hurt. I screamed myself hoarse. He called for the future, and I responded. Yes I can.
Ray and I, and everybody, just looked at each other, gobsmacked, bowled over, ready to take it on NOW. This revival was the revival of our country. This, simply, was one of the most amazing things I have seen in my life. If this was his standard stump speech, it must be like watching Judas Priest crank out “Livin’ After Midnight” twenty six years after they wrote it, with the conviction and thermonuclear energy of the righteous: Hell YES!
As I finished this reflection, this reportage, I am sorry that I must wait until May to help this light burn brightest as our next President of the United States, who can, should and will inspire us toward the actualization of our Creed, toward a new era of justice worldwide by insuring it at home.
I’m thinking of my new friend Ray, who had parked all the way down Straight St. I was parked at a meter on Jefferson, and we walked, making some small talk, to my car, so I could give him a lift to his car. We talked about had happened, and we really couldn’t articulate it. We nodded, and pondered. I dropped him off at his car, and bid him a good evening, thanking him for the ticket. He smiled, nodded, and went off into the winter afternoon.
Tomorrow, Ohio, Texas, Rhode Island and Vermont will help decide this future, perhaps once and for all. I understand, full well, the implications here, and I only hope, with baited breath, that Ohio, the state of my birth, will reach for future. I know Ray will.
JK Rowling vs Potter Fans
I've seen this story before, so don't let the Feb 29 date fool you into thinking it is fresh. However, this IS the first time I've seen it in any popular press arena. And, while there are pros and cons, fors and againsts, let me just say one thing that should put this all into perspective:
SHE SHOULD BE GRATEFUL SHE HAS THIS PROBLEM!
Much like no-name bands under no-name labels wish their music had the notoriety to be passed around in the underground MP3 community, normal authors would KILL to have books written about their books.
You know what that means? That means you are in the spotlight. You win. Take a bow, and buy a boat.
And, seeing as though JK is the first MF to become a billionaire because of her writing, I think she must have just lost sight of where she is, how far she's come, and what elite company she shares history with.
Please, Ms. Rowling, just accept it. You are rich and famous. Your books have inspired millions of people. And, you won't get ALL the money from it, like so many in history.
SHE SHOULD BE GRATEFUL SHE HAS THIS PROBLEM!
Much like no-name bands under no-name labels wish their music had the notoriety to be passed around in the underground MP3 community, normal authors would KILL to have books written about their books.
You know what that means? That means you are in the spotlight. You win. Take a bow, and buy a boat.
And, seeing as though JK is the first MF to become a billionaire because of her writing, I think she must have just lost sight of where she is, how far she's come, and what elite company she shares history with.
Please, Ms. Rowling, just accept it. You are rich and famous. Your books have inspired millions of people. And, you won't get ALL the money from it, like so many in history.
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