" But, like it or not, this is the situation within which Obama's great speech must find a way to last"
This is the major question for all of us ~ the media could play a valuable role if they balance the political implications of the speech with a continuing and meaningful discussion of "where do we go from here ~ how can we, as a society benefit from this message so long awaited.
At the moment the ongoing concentration of the media on the "why didn't he leave" question while replaying the dreadful images of Rev Wright at his worst. Those replays simply keep the fires of hatred burning and prevent the real discussion so needed by this nation.
If Rev Wright's words bring about better understanding and tolerance (CHANGE) in the minds and hearts of this nation, then Obama's candidacy will have not been in vain regardless of the primary outcome.
If we can ALSO get back to discussion of the important issues that face this nation in a meaningful way as Obama suggested, then we will have accomplished significant CHANGE!
Can we as a society think and chew gum at the same time???? We'll see I guess.
Obama, Reverend Wright, The Speech: A Problem and An Unanticipated Upside
It is already clear that Obama's Tuesday speech could not have been better. It is being justly compared, by knowledgeable people, to some of the great political speeches in American history. Whether it will register on the public consciousness in that way is another question.
Because there's this problem: there may not be a place in this culture for a history-making speech anymore -- I mean literally, no room in the flood of imagery and commentary for something of lasting value to sit there and be itself, to sink in and define the moment. Ask yourself: what would FDR's "fear itself" speech or MLK's "I have a dream" speech actually have been, as a cultural phenomenon, in the context of 24/7 news cycles, talk radio, cable, YouTube -- and, yes, blogs like this?
At a minimum, the answer to that question is: diluted. This has to be faced, especially by those of us who support Barack, because our job is to deconstruct and counteract this inevitable effect of postmodern media. One good thing, sometimes, about the old top-down mass media was that everyone paid attention to the same thing at the same time and for a long time and in more or less the same way. Of course, that was also a bad thing. But, like it or not, this is the situation within which Obama's great speech must find a way to last.
There is however an unanticipated upside: as the right wing platforms play and replay the loop of sound bites from Rev. Wright's sermons -- it gets trickier for them to sustain the rumor that he's a Muslim! Ah, the little ironies...
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One of Barack's stories this week has my wondering about his truthfulness, the advice he is receiving and the media's job performance. He mentions a 9 year old named Ashley whose mother got cancer, lost her job, her medical benefits and files for bankruptcy. Ashley knew food costs were a big expense and decided to help out by volunteering to eat muster and relish sandwiches. She convinced her mother that was really what she wanted and did it for a year until her mother got better. I'm unsure why a mother or other family member would allow a child to eat muster and relish sandwiches for a year. It would be irresponsible.
Now she is 23, and she joined Barack's campaign so that she could help the millions of other children who want and need to help their parents (Barack's words). I'm not sure what that really means. She joined Barack's campaign to help children eat muster and relish sandwiches? Why didn't her mother receive SS benefits and food stamps? There seems to be a lot more to story since it seems very hokey and phony. I'm unsure why this story isn't being investigated by the media. Barack then said that Ashley could have blamed her mother's problems on blacks who are on welfare or illegals but she didn't. How could Ashley blame anyone for her mother's medical problems? Barack's story is totally illogical.
Why would Barack think the voters would swallow this story? Why didn't his advisors step in and advise him not to tell the voters this story? The story is full of holes and why did the media give him a free pass on the story? The press and media are to be the fourth branch of government but allow political candidates to tell obvious feel good, phony unchallenged stories to support their campaigns.
Agreed! They should have challenged Clinton on her role in NAFTA, and her support of it. Not only that, but they have failed to challenger her claims about being in on National Security decisions in the White House, even though she never had clearence. Then there is McCain, and his flip-flops and peddling false scenarios about al Qaeda and Iran. You are right the 4th estate is doing a terrible job investigating things. they should compare Wrights sermons with those of the Right Wing and see whose is worse.
You wrote a very clever satire of the news media good job!
As per the thrust of the post. best analysis I have read about the SPEECH to date. Thanks, very thoughtful.
Mainly because when this story was first shared many months ago, it was done so by Ashley herself. But sure, the media hasn't wasted much time on non-issues, non-sequiturs and the like... so let's go tackle this one!
It's a nice story about a little girl that wanted to help her mother. What's your problem? Why so cynical?
God, this is all getting so depressing. I barely want to read the blogs anymore. The fact that everyone is making such a big deal out of Rev. Wright's statements, and the fact that it appears to actually be hurting Obama's campaign, is just surreal to me.
It's funny. This primary campaign is starting to make me feel like I did in 2004. I feel like an absolute stranger in my own country. I just can't relate to all of these people who are so offended by a few comments like these. George W. Bush offends me. Hillary Clinton even offends me. Rev. Wright? I could really care less. At least he's honest. That's more than you can say for most of the people leading our country.
But still, Obama marches on. The speech was flat out brilliant, as expected. The guy is just awesome. Whatever is in front of him, he just deals with it in the same straightforward, common-sense way. Unflappable. He is still winning, but something is different. The wind seems to be out of the sails.
Obama reminds me of all my favorite rock bands. Plenty of critical acclaim, but somehow not palatable enough for mass consumption.
The media is just such a sickening, festering shitswamp. All they know how to talk about is petty crap. They drag us all down. It's getting to be too much to take.
Hang in there, it's well worth it. We will survive this, the truth will set us free. This offensive Fox and other media snippets on Rev. Wright will bring people to his side, for it's the truth that counts. They now will start to seek out the real message that Wright was giving, and see how the MSM is trying to manipulate people into believing that Obama isn't capable of being President of the USA. It will happen very soon and Obama will be that much stronger for it.
Obama/ Richardson 08
as a white america male i finally found an excuse not to vote for obama. i knew if i waited long enough i could find one.
white america is not about to put a black man in the white house. will look for any excuse to find a way not to vote for this guy.
and who is leading in penn state and won ohio. and how many white males votes did he get in mississippi?
we are a racist war mongering country. capitalism has turned us into that. best kept secret in american politics.
watch hillary steal this one in sept and the convention. then lose to mc war. she has more negatives in america then hitler with the white males.
Maybe a better way to respond to all this hatred and slimy politics is to vote for Obama if you believe he is the one you've been waiting for.
He most certainly won't win if everyone we allow ourselves to be manipulated by the media and the angry, fearful, hateful people who want to retain their hold on power and superiority.
If nothing else, my vote for Obama will be a reflection of my desire to stay in the arena for as long as it takes to get us back to the important work of fixing the problems that will be our society's undoing if neglected ~ they are the problems Obama has been talking about and in fact listed at the end of his speech this week.
If only for our grandchildren's sake, we must not surrender to politics as usual!
Certainly his Tuesday speech wasn't perfect - Obama himself said so in the context of his campaign.
Whether or not it turns into a political homerun for the Senator, I think it was historical, especially at this time. The art of speechwriting and speech-giving has not been lost, although we probably haven't seen one this good since the late 60s.
It actually reminded me of some of the content in the Lincoln-Douglas debates that you have to study in school, where that 'other' Illinois congressman we know about continued to respectfully receive Douglas' attacks, even acknowledge and understand them, then point out where they missed the mark or misled the voters, in his opinion, while fervently appealling to to a larger discussion, the saving of the union as envisioned by the country's founders.
Obama's approach to all the attacks and invective coming his way is strikingly similar, while Lincoln's historic theme of saving the union I find stongly echoed in Obama's call for building bridges to heal and unify the country at a critically divisive time.
(although who today would be Douglas to Obama's Lincoln? hmmm....)
Also, like that other guy from Illinois, with Obama there was no disrespect for anyone, not his former pastor, not his opponents or enemies even. It reminded me that and the ability to inspire and persuade can be used to open the hearts and minds of others, instead of stratifying and closing them off. A much-needed antidote for the cynicism that we've all got in droves these days.
Oh, I can think of so many ways his speech could have been better.
Frankly, I fault his speech-writer.
Former presidential candidate Governor Richardson (former Secretary of Energy and Ambassador to the UN under President Clinton) will be endorsing Senator Obama Friday night in Portland, OR!
As everyone who has been reading most of the Clinton-Obama related blogs on HuffPo knows, Obama wrote this speech himself until 2AM in the morning, and many of his advisors were against giving a "race speech".
For a 24/7 long-time commenter like AnninCA, I'm impressed that she, a staunch Clinton supporter, displays such unrelenting dedication to the propagation of lies and insinuations. She must have a great conscience, and individuals who are fortunate to have met her in real life must feel truly blessed. God bless AnninCA, for lies from Clinton supporters are what America truly needs right now to save itself from the lies of a Bush presidency.
We need to use the broad-reaching power of online media to make sure that Fox doesn't get away with their smear job. The "chickens coming home to roost" comment was a quote of a white ambassador who was on Fox News - the Reverend says so. The actual sermon is a damning and brilliant commentary on the nature of revenge.
Watch this in its entirety and share it. What Fox is doing is criminal.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOdlnzkeoyQ
Oh and who said "God D*** America" and the Aids one oh.. oh .. and the Hillary one. If it was just that one comment I would give it to you but all of these come on.
Did you that the whole Reverend Jermiah Wright contreversy was actually a farce. GUESS WHAT!!! The clips being portrayed all over FOX news and MSM was actually Revrend Wright quoting direcdtly a U.S. Ambassador. Here is the link to the full video. AGAIN THE WORDS ON THE CLIPS ARE DIRECT QUOTES FROM A U.S. AMBASSADOR WHO HAPPENS TO BE WHITE. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOdlnzkeoyQ
Who is asking for it to be given? All anyone wants is for the truth to be spoken and that we acknowledge that we are all imperfect beings and we can either be here for each other, or not. Your choice.
And, for goodness sake, can we not agree here that context is everything? Anyone's statements taken out of context and reduced to a 30 sec looped clip of the most outrageous things said in a 30 year span on the pulpit produced, no less, by that arbiter of truth, Fox News, might not be the wisest means by which to choose our next President of the United States? Just sayin'.
Ok please put Hillary Clinton has never been called a N**** in context, cant think of the others and dont want to watch them again. Well we also live by the best example. Would you reward your son or daughter if you found out they were beating up the kid next door?? would you just ignore it , sure some parents do but I wouldn't . I think you need to lead by example and Obama has donr nothing that I would do. I think he is a Sneak and a Liar.
Lol!
You know, it a post-modern society where every disjointed bit has meaning only as it relates to ME, there is something comforting in the presence of a person like Barack Obama who has the ability not only to see and understand the pieces, but to relate them as an intricate, but patterned whole. We may need Obama's vision for more reasons than we can yet fathom. History marches on.
I am so thankful that Greg Mitchell has written this blog - even if I do agree that it is very late from the Post. And I'll tell you exactly why. Weeks ago, right before the Ohio and Texas primaries, the first Hagee story broke. I found it interesting and began to do some research on the man. At any rate, the story broke on Wednesday and McCain chose to take the weekend off in Arizona (or go into hiding as I like to think of it) and the press completely dropped the story. Since then, I have sent comments to any blog which was appropriate, written to papers, CNN, etc.
Nothing more. You needn't be reminded that there was another Republican candidate at the time. Now while I was not a Huckabee supporter, he deserved to have this story run. The American people deserved to have this story run then. It has been extremely frustrating to me - especially during the past 1 1/2 weeks of seeing Obama "vetted" and not seeing this story take on steam. Hagee is a frightening man. What little the press did say lead us to believe that he is simply anti-Catholic. He is so much more than that. He is a man whose endorsement McCain is "proud to accept" - stood on the stage with him - will receive large amounts of money from him. But he's anti-Catholic, ultimately anti-Jew (although he manipulates those to think he supports Israel for only the right reasons). The link to a documentary is below. It is not a nasty clip - rather an informative one. We all deserve to learn about this man and about Preacher Parsley as well who has also endorsed McCain. Reverand Wright's comments were deplorable, shameful and they have been painful to watch over and over. Senator McCain, during the past week or so, has taken the high road and has defended Obama when others wanted to tear him apart. And while I certainly appreciate that - and I try not to be a skeptic - I have to believe that he did so - not quite out of the goodness of his heart - but rather gearing up for what he will now have to face. But he's also not here in America now is he? There should be total transparency for all three candidates. Hillary needs to come forth with her taxes, contributors & talk about the fact that she and Bill are facing a 17 million dollar law suit - accused of campaign fraud. How she manages to always make sure her stories are under the radar is nothing less than shameful. But for now, the link to Hagee's Motivation is below. You decide if you agree with me that he's not supporting Israel for the right reasons. Rather, because that is where Jesus will come home in the end times and he will save all of us. ALL? Well, maybe not the Catholics and Maybe not the Jews and Maybe not main-stream Christians and certainly not homosexuals. However - when we all CHOOSE to be born again - then we will all ascend into Heaven. The rest of us??? We burn in hell! What a charming Preacher Man who endorses John McCain.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/max-blumenthal/rapture-ready-the-unauth_b_57826.html
For those of you who would like to have a real understanding of who Rev. Wright really is and what a typical sermon at Trinity United sounds like, versus the inflammatory clips that Fox News shows, I invite you to check out these links for the full Christmas 2007 sermon. ¨¨
Xmas 2007, Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdfbWSJINhg¨
Xmas 2007, Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVeK0JDPm8Y¨
Xmas 2007, Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1o36KBeDXJ8¨
Xmas 2007, Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFQAQVcn89A
¨¨
What I saw is a very wise, joyful and intelligent man who loves Jesus and knows how to share that love with his congregation. Gave me a whole different context on IMs too!
Last night I laid awake unable to fall asleep. In my mind I kept going over the question, "Am I being fair in my judgment of Senator Obama? He hasn"t really done anything wrong." All the time convincing myself that his belonging to the Trinity United Church of Christ was O.K. Suddenly I felt like a hypocrite. I went to the churches web site and copied its statement of faith down and replaced the word Black for White and Africa for Germany "The Motherland". (I use Germany because of the History of White Supremacy in America)
"We are a congregation which is Unashamedly White and Unapologetically Christian... Our roots in the White experience and tradition are deep, lasting and permanent. We are a Germanic people, and remain "true to the motherland." We constantly affirm our trust in God through cultural expression of a White worship service and ministries which address the White Community.
A congregation with a non-negotiable COMMITMENT TO GERMANY."
It suddenly took on a different light. As a progressive for almost 30 years I felt ashamed. Are we willing to overlook this obvious departure from our core beliefs? If this was a church that a republican candidate belonged to for 19 years what would we (progressives) be saying? If the republican candidate last night said "Typical Black People", what would Al Sharpton"s response be? I am a progressive because I believe that all people should be treated equally, with respect and dignity. I believe that we cannot tolerate exclusionism in America. We as progressives must stand firm in the fight against Hate Speech. How far do we bend our beliefs before they break? If America is truly going to come together as one, we need to be true in our resolve and hold ourselves to a higher standard.
Thank you,
Robert Sorce
(I apologize in advance if this posts twice - my posts easily get lost in cyberspace)
Rob,
I applaud your commitment to really consider this issue, and I appreciate the trouble and concern that you're devoting to it.
What I would like to contribute to your thoughts is my view of the difficulty of your strategy for rethinking this racial issue.
It has been the tactic of Bill O'Reilly to say, much like you have done, "substitute 'white' for 'black' in what Wright has said..." If we simply go along with this line of thinking, I believe we do ourselves a disservice. It overlooks the complexity of the racial issue, and particularly the history of race in this country.
The black self-identity is one that has been historically imposed upon African Americans; they have been defined not by themselves, but by colonialist European powers (primarily the Dutch, Belgian, Spanish, etc.) as 'others' - and thus, this term 'black' and the cultural baggage that goes with it, is not the same kind of self-identification that whites have traditionally used. I believe that we should be troubled by any church that would espouse 'white' principles, because of the notion of superiority attached to 'whiteness' historically. Whenever 'whites' have come together as such in a self-consciously racial way, it has most often been for the sake of dominating other racial groups.
On the other hand, the identity of 'blackness' has been a result not of active aggression on the part of African Americans, but rather of a long history of being aggressed against, primarily by whites. 'Black' has often carried with it the sense of a common struggle of people whose rights had been denied for centuries, and whose status in this country, despite the advances in the civil rights movements over the past 50 years, continues to lag far behind what we consider to be just.
Traditionally in this country, the discourse of race has had this unevenness built into it. I do not wish to attempt to recount the complicated history of racial identity formation in this country, but I do believe that it is worthwhile to look into this history when you are considering, for example, the Trinity church, the Reverend Wright, Obama's comment about his grandmother, and the various movements of the civil rights in general.
That said, I hope you can see how it might be problematic to simply switch terms in order to level an unbiased judgment on this issue, or to consider the cased closed on this basis. As Obama implied in his speech on Tuesday, this conversation about the complexities of race in this country is really just beginning.
Rob,
I applaud your commitment to really consider this issue, and I appreciate the trouble and concern that you're devoting to it.
What I would like to contribute to your thoughts is my view of the difficulty of your strategy for rethinking this racial issue.
It has been the tactic of Bill O'Reilly to say, much like you have done, "substitute 'white' for 'black' in what Wright has said..." If we simply go along with this line of thinking, I believe we do ourselves a disservice. It overlooks the complexity of the racial issue, and particularly the history of race in this country.
The black self-identity is one that has been historically imposed upon African Americans; they have been defined not by themselves, but by colonialist European powers (primarily the Dutch, Belgian, Spanish, etc.) as 'others' - and thus, this term 'black' and the cultural baggage that goes with it, is not the same kind of self-identification that whites have traditionally used. I believe that we should be troubled by any church that would espouse 'white' principles, because of the notion of superiority attached to 'whiteness' historically. Whenever 'whites' have come together as such in a self-consciously racial way, it has most often been for the sake of dominating other racial groups.
On the other hand, the identity of 'blackness' has been a result not of active aggression on the part of African Americans, but rather of a long history of being aggressed against, primarily by whites. 'Black' has often carried with it the sense of a common struggle of people whose rights had been denied for centuries, and whose status in this country, despite the advances in the civil rights movements over the past 50 years, continues to lag far behind what we consider to be just.
Traditionally in this country, the discourse of race has had this unevenness built into it. I do not wish to attempt to recount the complicated history of racial identity formation in this country, but I do believe that it is worthwhile to look into this history when you are considering, for example, the Trinity church, the Reverend Wright, Obama's comment about his grandmother, and the various movements of the civil rights in general.
That said, I hope you can see how it might be problematic to simply switch terms in order to level an unbiased judgment on this issue, or to consider the case closed on this basis. As Obama implied in his speech on Tuesday, this conversation about the complexities of race in this country is really just beginning.
Thanks for the links, bridgeworker. Please repost this comment under the ugliest, most reductive and self-righteous comments of Obama bashers as long as this distraction from the genuine issues continues to blight the web.
I doubt if those who are taking such pleasure in disparaging Reverend Wright will read the links that were so thoughtfully provided. Some people simply enjoy wallowing in their hate and ignorance and resist anything that could possibly enlighten them or help them to merely see things from a different perspective. It's a very sad commentary on the state of our nation, but it's a reality that is revealing itself more and more ... especially on this blogsite.
I appreciate your piece, but coming from HuffPo, it's too little -too late. This site went so overboard with anti-Obama snippets from every rag it could get its hands on -quoting the likes of Bill Krystol and Newsmax instantly and repeatedly?? Without taking down the comments even when they were found to be wrong, prefering instead that they linger to inflame more anti-Obama sentiments.
Like Olbermann said, .."when you have to start using Newmax as a source for content, you're in big trouble".
Well HuffPo -it looks like you're winning. Obama is sinking quickly in the polls, and every hack out there is quoting now , not Newsmax or Fox -but YOU. So in your glee to crown Clinton -the hated, you've likely contributed to the destruction of Obama- the loved.
But look at what you've wrought - the polls show Clinton dropping faster than Obama , the Super D's will never now throw him under HER bus - for fear of the end days of the Democratic party.
And you've lost me. Because I don't play dirty pool -with anyone. I will remove myself from your lists.
This is a 'golden-age' argument, and like most such, it depends on the way that human memory--mercifully, no doubt--tends to exaggerate the good and forget the bad.
Humans being what we are, there is likely just as much space for serious thought and elaborated argument as there ever was in our culture. We now tune in to youtube in stead of Cronkite, and those who have paid attention to Barack Obama's speech no doubt got via a dozen or more vectors--from youtube to email--rather seeing it on the network news and/or reading it in the afternoon newspaper.
in this, McLuhan was wrong: it's the message that mattered, not the media.
There's an added advantage to getting the speech on the internet -- less liklihood that the message would be filtered or diluted by talking heads!
TV sux
As a person who lives by word craft, I worry that you are right, and my worry approaches grief. How sad, that a country with its roots in enlightened, thoughtful discourse is degenerating into a screeching monkey island. Watching the "pundits" (I spit the word) pick through the speech for sound bites and, even better, things to melodramatize and distort to feed the frenzy, I was sick. These are the heirs of Murrow and Leibling, Ernie Pyle and Ambrose Bierce? These self-inflated airheads, mob-loving bullies and kick the victim cowards?
On the other hand, I remind myself that the pundits fell over themselves praising Edward Everett's 3-hour oration and not even mentioning the greatest political document in American history, the Gettysburg Address, and I remember that the radio "fireside" of Roosevelt's great speeches was the YouTube of its day. So I'm confident that the world will note and remember Obama's great speech. Whether his contemporaries have the intellectual maturity to do that is a barely open question.
Here's the reality in my home town:
I am taking an American Presidency course at my local university. Yesterday, our professor decided that the Obama speech would dovetail perfectly with our current discussion on the role of religion in presidential politics. So he set up a computer and attempted to access the speech online. Due to our inadequate internet infrastructure at the school, he was unable to access the speech BUT he learned that half the class had already seen the speech in whole at least once, with about a third of the class having seen it multiple times. The others all planned on watching it when they could get home where they had real internet connectivity.
Don't be so pessimistic. There's a sea change happening in this country, and abandoning TV and newspapers aren't necessarily a bad thing. Concensus in our class was that the Obama speech was excellent, certainly on par with the other great speeches given in America over the past hundred years or so. The next generation is SAVVY, dude.
Good one, but I think the Republicans have gotten used to living with cognitive dissonance. I've been to a few black churches, including one in New Orleans a few months after Katrina, and I hafta say, I wasn't all that shocked by Rev. Wright, especially considering it was 2-3 days after 9/11 ( raise your hand if something stupid fell out of your mouth right about that time. I know I'm not proud of some of the things I said about the Arabs )
Anyways, Rev. Wright will be speaking at a church here in Tampa early next week, & I'm gonna go down and hear what the man has to say for myself. There is a chance I'll be the only white guy there not waving a protest sign, but somehow I doubt it....
Obama 08
Posted March 20, 2008 | 01:54 PM (EST)