By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

"Race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore
right now," Obama asserted. "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 37-minute speech had consumed Obama in recent days. For the first
time in a year, he was faced with a potentially lethal threat to his
candidacy that was only partly within his control. Wright's racially
charged rhetoric, a throwback the militant 1970s, threatened to
sabotage a campaign built around the ideas of unity and change. Obama
denounced Wright's comments when they surfaced on Friday, but he knew
interviews wouldn't be enough. And so he began crafting today's
speech, at once pained and unnerved by the task at hand.

Obama spoke with a serious voice, reading each word carefully from the
teleprompter. The audience sat silently until halfway through the text
-- an eternity for an Obama event, where casual one-liners are often
met with a standing ovation.

"I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from
Kansas," Obama declared to the hushed auditorium. "And for as long as
I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my
story even possible," he said.

In his 20s, after years of struggling with his racial identity, Obama
began attending Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's
South Side. It provided him with a community and identity that was
missing in his itinerant upbringing. And after being raised by his
white grandparents, it also brought him deeper into the African
American fold.

"As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me," said Obama
of Wright. "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."

Obama again denounced the inflammatory statements that have dominated
cable news and talk radio coverage in recent days. "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."

But he added, "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black
community. I can no more disown him than I can disown 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 her by 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."

He tackled the rich subculture of the African American church
experience. "Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of
raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing,
and clapping, and 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 biases that make up
the black experience in America."

There also is anger. And "that anger is not always productive," said
Obama. "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."

He added, "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."

Wright's mistake, said Obama, "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."

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ts_racial.html

On Mar 18, 3:44*pm, Kathy Bush wrote:
By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

"Race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore
right now," Obama asserted. "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 37-minute speech had consumed Obama in recent days. For the first
time in a year, he was faced with a potentially lethal threat to his
candidacy that was only partly within his control. Wright's racially
charged rhetoric, a throwback the militant 1970s, threatened to
sabotage a campaign built around the ideas of unity and change. Obama
denounced Wright's comments when they surfaced on Friday, but he knew
interviews wouldn't be enough. And so he began crafting today's
speech, at once pained and unnerved by the task at hand.

Obama spoke with a serious voice, reading each word carefully from the
teleprompter. The audience sat silently until halfway through the text
-- an eternity for an Obama event, where casual one-liners are often
met with a standing ovation.

"I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from
Kansas," Obama declared to the hushed auditorium. "And for as long as
I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my
story even possible," he said.

In his 20s, after years of struggling with his racial identity, Obama
began attending Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's
South Side. It provided him with a community and identity that was
missing in his itinerant upbringing. And after being raised by his
white grandparents, it also brought him deeper into the African
American fold.

"As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me," said Obama
of Wright. "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."

Obama again denounced the inflammatory statements that have dominated
cable news and talk radio coverage in recent days. "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."

But he added, "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black
community. I can no more disown him than I can disown 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 her by 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."

He tackled the rich subculture of the African American church
experience. "Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of
raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing,
and clapping, and 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 biases that make up
the black experience in America."

There also is anger. And "that anger is not always productive," said
Obama. "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."

He added, "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."

Wright's mistake, said Obama, "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."

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ma_speech_conf...

Wow. Nice speech.

Ralph Kennedy

"This is rsfc, not the Algonquin roundtable."
-xyzzy, 2/16/07

On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:44:02 -0700 (PDT), Kathy Bush
wrote:

I was going to vote for Barack but since it turns out that he's so low
class that he hires people to post political messages in non-political
newsgroups I'm now voting for Hillary.
Good job stooge!


--

Why settle for the lesser evil?
Cthulhu for president 2008.

On Mar 18, 3:47*pm, Huck Kennedy wrote:
On Mar 18, 3:44*pm, Kathy Bush wrote:





By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

"Race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore
right now," Obama asserted. "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 37-minute speech had consumed Obama in recent days. For the first
time in a year, he was faced with a potentially lethal threat to his
candidacy that was only partly within his control. Wright's racially
charged rhetoric, a throwback the militant 1970s, threatened to
sabotage a campaign built around the ideas of unity and change. Obama
denounced Wright's comments when they surfaced on Friday, but he knew
interviews wouldn't be enough. And so he began crafting today's
speech, at once pained and unnerved by the task at hand.

Obama spoke with a serious voice, reading each word carefully from the
teleprompter. The audience sat silently until halfway through the text
-- an eternity for an Obama event, where casual one-liners are often
met with a standing ovation.

"I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from
Kansas," Obama declared to the hushed auditorium. "And for as long as
I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my
story even possible," he said.

In his 20s, after years of struggling with his racial identity, Obama
began attending Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's
South Side. It provided him with a community and identity that was
missing in his itinerant upbringing. And after being raised by his
white grandparents, it also brought him deeper into the African
American fold.

"As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me," said Obama
of Wright. "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."

Obama again denounced the inflammatory statements that have dominated
cable news and talk radio coverage in recent days. "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."

But he added, "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black
community. I can no more disown him than I can disown 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 her by 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."

He tackled the rich subculture of the African American church
experience. "Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of
raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing,
and clapping, and 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 biases that make up
the black experience in America."

There also is anger. And "that anger is not always productive," said
Obama. "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."

He added, "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."

Wright's mistake, said Obama, "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."

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ma_speech_conf...

* * *Wow. *Nice speech.

Ralph Kennedy

"This is rsfc, not the Algonquin roundtable."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *-xyzzy, 2/16/07- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -
I'm an Obama fan. I campaign for him and will vote for him; however,
when you go on a very serious list that is geared ONLY to tea drinkers
and is only meant to have posts tea, you just hurt your cause and
will find noting but anamosity from the posters on this list.
PLEASE!! For the candidate's sake, do not do this again.
Thanks.

On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:47:53 -0700, Huck Kennedy wrote
(in article
):

On Mar 18, 3:44*pm, Kathy Bush wrote:
By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

"Race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore
right now," Obama asserted. "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 37-minute speech had consumed Obama in recent days. For the first
time in a year, he was faced with a potentially lethal threat to his
candidacy that was only partly within his control. Wright's racially
charged rhetoric, a throwback the militant 1970s, threatened to
sabotage a campaign built around the ideas of unity and change. Obama
denounced Wright's comments when they surfaced on Friday, but he knew
interviews wouldn't be enough. And so he began crafting today's
speech, at once pained and unnerved by the task at hand.

Obama spoke with a serious voice, reading each word carefully from the
teleprompter. The audience sat silently until halfway through the text
-- an eternity for an Obama event, where casual one-liners are often
met with a standing ovation.

"I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from
Kansas," Obama declared to the hushed auditorium. "And for as long as
I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my
story even possible," he said.

In his 20s, after years of struggling with his racial identity, Obama
began attending Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's
South Side. It provided him with a community and identity that was
missing in his itinerant upbringing. And after being raised by his
white grandparents, it also brought him deeper into the African
American fold.

"As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me," said Obama
of Wright. "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."

Obama again denounced the inflammatory statements that have dominated
cable news and talk radio coverage in recent days. "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."

But he added, "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black
community. I can no more disown him than I can disown 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 her by 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."

He tackled the rich subculture of the African American church
experience. "Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of
raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing,
and clapping, and 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 biases that make up
the black experience in America."

There also is anger. And "that anger is not always productive," said
Obama. "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."

He added, "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."

Wright's mistake, said Obama, "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."

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ma_speech_conf...

Wow. Nice speech.

He's a glib one, no doubt about it. Too bad is all bullshit.
--
Obama '08 = Osama '09

George Graves wrote:
On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:47:53 -0700, Huck Kennedy wrote
On Mar 18, 3:44*pm, Kathy Bush wrote:
By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ma_speech_conf...

* * *Wow. *Nice speech.

He's a glib one, no doubt about it. Too bad is all bullshit.
--
Obama '08 = Osama '09

Obama '08 = Osama '09?

Why don't you just put a neon sign on your forehead that says
you're a drooling-moron kid brother of Hoover's with nothing to offer
at all by way of reasoned debate?

*plonk*

Ralph Kennedy

"This is rsfc, not the Algonquin roundtable."
-xyzzy, 2/16/07

"Huck Kennedy" wrote in message
...
George Graves wrote:
On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:47:53 -0700, Huck Kennedy wrote
On Mar 18, 3:44 pm, Kathy Bush wrote:
By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ma_speech_conf...

Wow. Nice speech.

He's a glib one, no doubt about it. Too bad is all bullshit.
--
Obama '08 = Osama '09

Obama '08 = Osama '09?

Why don't you just put a neon sign on your forehead that says
you're a drooling-moron kid brother of Hoover's with nothing to offer
at all by way of reasoned debate?

*plonk*

Ralph Kennedy

You didn't like his opinion? Tough Shit.

On Mar 18, 7:41*pm, "z ara" wrote:
You didn't like his opinion? *Tough Shit.

Did you stay up to 2 am crafting that eloquent prose?

-Junior

On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 17:41:30 -0700, z ara wrote
(in article ):


"Huck Kennedy" wrote in message
...
George Graves wrote:
On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:47:53 -0700, Huck Kennedy wrote
On Mar 18, 3:44 pm, Kathy Bush wrote:
By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a deeply
personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the gulf that race
continues to represent in U.S. society.

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ma_speech_conf...

Wow. Nice speech.

He's a glib one, no doubt about it. Too bad is all bullshit.
--
Obama '08 = Osama '09

Obama '08 = Osama '09?

Why don't you just put a neon sign on your forehead that says
you're a drooling-moron kid brother of Hoover's with nothing to offer
at all by way of reasoned debate?

*plonk*

Ralph Kennedy

You didn't like his opinion? Tough Shit.



Look, My "opinion" is not really an opinion. ALL politicians LIE all the time
when they're trying to get elected. That's FACT. Obama's no different ,
Hillary's no different, McCain's no different. If you think any of them are,
you need a serious reality adjustment. Obama happens to be very glib. That
means, for you English language impaired, that he has an easy way with words.
He can spin this Pastor Wright affair to make it look like he's never even
HEARD of the man! It's just politics as usual and only the very gullible
amongst us buys a minute of it.

--
Obama '08 = Osama '09

What a horrible speech. He revealed to the world that his white
grandmother was a racist for things she said in private. What a
coward! He still associates himself with an America-hating
anti-Semite racist. Obama is either full of hate himself or has
incredibly bad judgment. Considering who his other close friends are,
I'd say he is a closet black militant.

"unclejr" wrote in message
...
On Mar 18, 7:41 pm, "z ara" wrote:
You didn't like his opinion? Tough Shit.

Did you stay up to 2 am crafting that eloquent prose?

Nah - 10 seconds, maybe.

"The Grand Beckoning" wrote in message
...

What a horrible speech. He revealed to the world that his white
grandmother was a racist for things she said in private. What a
coward! He still associates himself with an America-hating
anti-Semite racist. Obama is either full of hate himself or has
incredibly bad judgment. Considering who his other close friends are,
I'd say he is a closet black militant.

He's just another politician, saying the right things to his bros to get
elected. But he's now lost all chance of winning the white vote.

Who lives in a pineapple under the sea, Kathy Bush
?

By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a
deeply personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the
gulf that race continues to represent in U.S. society.

"McCain was running so fast from President Bush, he ran into Barack
Obama, who was running from his minister." -Jay Leno

--
Cheers,
--Jeff
Read the damb FAQ.
http://www.rsfckers.com/faq.htm

"You know Foghorn Leghorn wouldn't pee in no jar!"
--Mojo Nixon

In article ,
OrangeDood wrote:

Who lives in a pineapple under the sea, Kathy Bush
?

By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a
deeply personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the
gulf that race continues to represent in U.S. society.

"McCain was running so fast from President Bush, he ran into Barack
Obama, who was running from his minister." -Jay Leno

"Obama was talking to Americans about race as though they were adults."
- John Stewart

--
Timberwoof me at timberwoof dot com http://www.timberwoof.com
"When you post sewage, don't blame others for
emptying chamber pots in your direction." ‹Chris L.

On Mar 19, 12:51*pm, OrangeDood wrote:
Who lives in a pineapple under the sea, Kathy Bush
?

By Shailagh Murray
PHILADELPHIA -- Sen. Barack Obama sought to quell the political
firestorm stirred by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright with a
deeply personal speech about black anger, white anger, and the
gulf that race continues to represent in U.S. society.

"McCain was running so fast from President Bush, he ran into Barack
Obama, who was running from his minister." -Jay Leno

His line the other night was good "Obama is trying to distance himself
from his minister -- Romney called him up and said 'good luck with
that'"

Marty