Wednesday, July 28, 2004

Barack Obama 

I just caught a video of Illinois State Senator Barak Obama's keynote address from last night's DNC. The official DNC website doesn't yet have his video posted, but his transcript is up now and his video will be added to the page soon, I'm sure. For now, NECN has a video of the speech up on their site.

I wasn't sure whether he'd be able to live up to the massive hype he's been getting of late, but in my opinion he exceeded it. He's being touted as one of the up and coming bright lights of the Democratic Party, and hopefully he'll be able to continue on that path. I'd like to see a lot more of him on the American political scene, starting with his bid this fall to become a U.S. Senator. His campaign site also has a blog.

Here's an excerpt from his speech:

A belief that we are connected as one people. If there’s a child on the south side of Chicago who can’t read, that matters to me, even if it’s not my child. If there’s a senior citizen somewhere who can’t pay for her prescription and has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer, even if it’s not my grandmother. If there’s an Arab American family being rounded up without benefit of an attorney or due process, that threatens my civil liberties. It’s that fundamental belief—I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sisters’ keeper—that makes this country work. It’s what allows us to pursue our individual dreams, yet still come together as a single American family. “E pluribus unum.” Out of many, one.

Yet even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters and negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes. Well, I say to them tonight, there’s not a liberal America and a conservative America—there’s the United States of America. There’s not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there’s the United States of America. The pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I’ve got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don’t like federal agents poking around our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and have gay friends in the Red States. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and patriots who supported it. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America.

The words themselves are great, but check out the video if you haven't yet already. He's an enthralling speaker, and he really pulled the crowd into the spirit with him. He also has an autobiography, published in 1995, called Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. I haven't read it, so if anyone out there has maybe you can let me know what you thought.

Amazon links:

|
Posted by Rogueslayer at 9:27 AM