Obama: ‘A More Perfect Union’

Stirring — dare I say historic — speech from Barack Obama today here in Philadelphia, addressing racial issues head-on, and, more importantly, challenging the level of political discourse in our news media:

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.”

Not this time, indeed. (Excerpt via Greg Sargent.)

★ Tuesday, 18 March 2008