Posted on 03/18/2008 7:30:10 AM PDT by Nutmeg08
"A More Perfect Union" Remarks of Senator Barack Obama Tuesday, March 18th, 2008 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
10:17:53 ET
“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.
(Excerpt) Read more at drudgereport.com ...
Very interesting. I really had no idea who owned the IHT. I was doing a search for the article from the NYT that the WSJ excerpted in the Best of the Web, a day later.
He talked about his Christian faith more than most politicians. I hope America was listening.
Even if he doesn't get the nominiation (I think he will) and even if he loses the Presidency (I think he will) that was a brilliant, truthful, agonizing yet uplifting and ultimately unifying speech in a country that still labors under the groaning weight of racism.
Yet he was careful to repeat over and over that nowhere on earth is the hope of peace and prosperity more attainable than in these United States.
"The past isn't even past."
Amen.
thanks. it was an interesting case.
I'm in the same boat as you; I read it. I didn't hear it.
I think the speech will answer for the controversy. The people for whom this is a major issue (his association with the preacher) are never going to be assuaged---Obama would have to shoot the preacher dead to win them over. Additionally, a certain type of voter---i.e., most of us here---would never vote for Obama under any circumstance, so he wasn't talking to us.
He was talking to the swing voters, and swing voters, by definition, are the sheep---the idiots easily swayed by rhetoric. And at delivering the words, Obama is an out-and-out master. He separates himself from the preacher's hate speech but doesn't throw the man under the bus; but most strikingly, he addresses the issue of race relations by tacitly admitting that racism claims blacks and whites as victims.
Few modern liberals have the balls to admit that, and for that, we must give him credit. That might win him some lunch-pail dems as well.
“be like me”
I would title what you wrote and publish it. Very well put and sheds light on the real problems in America. Be Like Me is the message of change and here is how you can get there.
Barry Voldemort Obama
I thought it was a good speech, but I’ve heard better speakers. He dealt with some important issues, but I never felt I was in the presence of “Wow! What a gifted speaker!”
The one thing I listened for but didn’t hear was, “I didn’t leave when I rejected Wright’s words, because....”
He didn’t answer that.
The easy answer is: “We have other friends there and it’s been our church for so long.”
That would get him partly there, but it doesn’t address HOW he can ignore racist comments and maintain integrity.
It’s a shame. The media found a fake black grandmother in Africa who lied about being a Christian to say Obama’s not a Muslim, but his white grannie is thrown under the bus.
I just realized what "hope" he's talking about. It's the hope to extend the racial blackmail of whites that had nothing to do with slavery or Jim Crow as long as possible. Along the way, he'll throw a bone to really poor whites while taxing anyone with a legitimate job.
I guess I would have felt that had I not really understood the meaning of his socialist agenda and how the blame Whitey routine is common plance in black Urban communities.
Obama has adopted the Rhetoric of the civil rights era and is painting a new class of victims, it is the victim hood of the WE and who exactly is he talking about? Who are WE. He is so cryptic that unless you understand his true agenda you cannot see it coming until you are swept up in it and then you are forced to comply.
“Give me liberty or give me death” It is not the place of the Federal Government to tax us to death to pay some form of reparations.
In that regard his speech flopped.
"ELOQUENT, BUT OUTRAGEOUS"!!!!
First, he proved himself to be a blatant liar! He had claimed prior to this speech that he had only heard one or two comments. Now he admits he DID attend some of those racists rants. HE IS BY HIS OWN WORDS--A LIAR.
Second, he refused to disassociate himself from Wright. That in itself is outrageous.
Third, he attempted to defend Wright's comments by asking everyone to put Wright's comments in the "BLACK PERSPECTIVE"!! That is absolutely outrageous--and it is an indirect endorsement (back door) of the hate and venom that was spewed there and other black churches.
Fourth, he insulted everyone listening by saying that he could not disassociate himself from his GRANDMOTHER--therefore, he could not disassociate himself from his Pastor either. How outrageous can you possibly get?
I guess that Obama has never heard the phrase, "YOU CAN PICK YOUR FRIENDS--YOU CANNOT PICK YOU FAMILY"!
The entire speech was "ELOQUENT, BUT OUTRAGOUS"!--basically telling the white community, "That's just the way black churches are--DEAL WITH IT"!
You pegged it I call it the audacity of truth... May the Obama campaign crash and burn quickly... because if “He Overcomes” the struggle be very aware that in the general election...
Those Republicans that disagree with his socialist agenda will be painted as Hateful, intolerant, racist, bigotted, homophobic, white christian conservative republicans.
In other words if your not with us; Your a Racist.
Many libs act as if America started the practice of slavery. Any Tom, Dick or Moses can tell them it’s not true.
Obama's mother was a leftist who married two black men, so Obama did not hear any racism from her. Is he seriously comparing a woman who must have been born in the early 1900's with the public statements of a leading black figure in the 21st century? Didn't Obama learn anything more positive about race from his mother? Does he really think a woman of an entirely different America, maybe raised in the 1920's, justifies his tolerance of public racism in 2008?
Yeah, they just need to read Exodus to realize that. Slavery is almost as old as prostitution.
[[In his recent speech, Obama mentions that “to the untrained ear”, a congregation such as his may indeed seem foreign, offensive or
confusing to people unfamiliar with the “process”.]]
Yep- who are we to criticise a congregation who stands in unison cheering a preacher who tells America God should damn us? That we got whgat we deserved on 9/11? We just ‘don’t understand’ that whitey is a pig that needs to die.
Obama’s NON-Apology started off by saying “Tsk Tsk Rev. Wright” then breaks into the old “If it wasn’t ofr bad whitey, Rev. Wright wouldn’t be liek he is, therefore Rev. is justified in hating on whitey.”
Cal Thomas made a greatp oint this A.M stating that Obama did absolutely nothign to ‘bring the two sides togetehr’ & infact just justified the seperation by insinuating htat we all must pay atonements for past ills. He said it’s people like Bill Cosb6y who are the real healers because it is they who recognize the real problem- drug use, absent fathers, gangs, crime, broen homes, and htis problem is NOT a color problem, and htose stuck in the situations NEED to quit blaming everyone else and start taking responsibility for hteiro wn shortcommings. Rev Wright and Obama are enablers- encouragers of whiners and excuse makers, and they want America to pay regardless of how slick Obama may sound on the platform.
Make NO mistake about it- Obama and Michelle blame America! Michelle just made hte mistake of being open about it, but Obama believes as she does and indeed the whole congregation of Wrights.
“Obama mentions that “to the untrained ear”, a congregation such as his may indeed seem foreign,”
Sure we don’t
Obama’s speech was a lecture for whitey on race relations in America. Obama tried to justify his preachers racism. I don’t want anyone near the white house who would even sit and listen to one sermon of Rev. Wright and not walk out in disgust! Sorry Obama, you’re not qualified to sit in the white house!
DIXIE'S CENSORED SUBJECT
BLACK SLAVEOWNERS
By Robert M. Grooms
© 1997
And they didn't even bat an eye.
[[Yeah, they just need to read Exodus to realize that. Slavery is almost as old as prostitution]
The slavery of the old testament was a MUCH different issue than the one in our recent past. Don’
t even try to compare the two- God was VERY specific abotu how masters should treat servants, and it was MUCH much different than we did in our past here.
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