'm lovin' this man!
CHICAGO - President-elect Barrack Obama and his wife took their daughters to work at a food bank on the day before Thanksgiving, saying they wanted to show the girls the meaning of the holiday, especially when so many people are struggling.
Ten-year-old Malia and 7-year-old Sasha joined their parents to shake hands and give holiday wishes to hundreds of people who had been lined up for hours at the food bank on Chicago 's south side.
Sasha wore a pink stocking hat over her pigtails and Malia had on a purple striped hat as the family handed out wrapped chickens to the needy in the chilly outdoor courtyard. Those seeking food on Wednesday at St. Columbanus also received boxes with potatoes, oranges, fresh bread, peanut butter, canned goods, oatmeal, spaghetti and coffee.
The president-elect, dressed casually in a leather jacket, black scarf and khaki pants, was in a jovial mood, calling out "happy thanksgiving" and telling everyone "you can call me Barack."
He told reporters that he wants the girls "to learn the importance of how fortunate they are, and to make sure they're giving back."
The soon-to-be first lady said the Obamas wanted to give their children "an understanding of what giving and Thanksgiving is all about."
The Obama family's activities in the courtyard quickly drew the attention of schoolchildren whose windows overlooked the courtyard. They put up a sign against the glass that read: "We love our prez" and screamed when the president-elect waved to them.
Obama then turned to his wife and suggested they go visit the kids. Secret Service agents, looking surprised, disappeared inside the building to accommodate his request.
Minutes later, hundreds of children were brought down to the school auditorium, and Obama loped onstage as they screamed and cheered.
"I just wanted to come by and wish everybody a happy Thanksgiving," he said.
He then asked the children what they would be eating for Thanksgiving dinner.
So lets recap.
He took his kids to work in the cold.? Instead of getting someone to line up and dish the gifts? Instead of telling them 'You are kids of a VIP.
Therefore there are things that you can't do.
To show the kids that people are suffering? Yes, that people are suffering?
They have to live understanding the importance of giving back to the community.
Let us learn from this great family. and for those who have children, this is a wonderful example of raising our kids.
Peace out!
Monday, December 1, 2008
AIDs VACCINE FACILITY
Media Release - For Immediate Release
ICID in the Running to Develop $88-million AIDS Vaccine Facility
November 30, 2008
WINNIPEG - On the eve of World AIDS day, the Winnipeg-based International Centre for Infectious Diseases (ICID) has announced that it is has been selected for the final round of competition for an $88-million grant to build a facility that will manufacture vaccines to combat the global scourge of HIV/AIDS.
The grant is part of the Canadian HIV Vaccine Initiative (CHVI), a $139-million joint program of the Government of Canada and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, announced by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Microsoft founder Bill Gates in February, 2007. The CHVI seeks to accelerate the development of a safe, affordable and accessible vaccine by building a facility dedicated to the manufacture of HIV/AIDS vaccines.
“The Canadian HIV Vaccine Initiative will raise the battle against AIDS to a new level, and Canadians will be at the forefront,” said Terry Duguid, President and CEO of ICID. “A winning bid by the ICID will cement Winnipeg’s well-deserved reputation as a world-class centre of excellence in HIV/AIDS research. ”
If ICID’s bid is selected, the four-year, $88-million grant would fund a new facility in Manitoba to accelerate the process of taking promising vaccines from the lab to the field, to be used around the world.
Duguid said ICID’s bid is extremely competitive, in part because it builds on Winnipeg’s unique strengths in the life sciences field, as well as ICID’s own track record of working with researchers and stakeholders to prevent infectious diseases worldwide, particularly in the field of HIV/AIDS.
“Encouraging collaboration and building networks is what ICID does,” said Duguid. “We build bridges between researchers, public health agencies, and industry in order to prevent infectious diseases.”
ICID was founded in October 2004, with a mandate to foster innovation and collaboration in order to combat infectious diseases worldwide. It is home to the National Collaborating Centre on Infectious Diseases (NCCID), which has a major focus in HIV prevention, and has worked in HIV/AIDS prevention in Ukraine. It also offers biosafety training and international biosafety consulting services in conjunction with Smith Carter Architects and the National Microbiology Lab. In October ICID launched a new initiative, a Canadian Network on HPV Prevention.
-30-
Contact:
For more information, contact:
Terry Duguid
President and CEO,
International Centre for Infectious Diseases.
(204) 943-1743
ICID in the Running to Develop $88-million AIDS Vaccine Facility
November 30, 2008
WINNIPEG - On the eve of World AIDS day, the Winnipeg-based International Centre for Infectious Diseases (ICID) has announced that it is has been selected for the final round of competition for an $88-million grant to build a facility that will manufacture vaccines to combat the global scourge of HIV/AIDS.
The grant is part of the Canadian HIV Vaccine Initiative (CHVI), a $139-million joint program of the Government of Canada and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, announced by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Microsoft founder Bill Gates in February, 2007. The CHVI seeks to accelerate the development of a safe, affordable and accessible vaccine by building a facility dedicated to the manufacture of HIV/AIDS vaccines.
“The Canadian HIV Vaccine Initiative will raise the battle against AIDS to a new level, and Canadians will be at the forefront,” said Terry Duguid, President and CEO of ICID. “A winning bid by the ICID will cement Winnipeg’s well-deserved reputation as a world-class centre of excellence in HIV/AIDS research. ”
If ICID’s bid is selected, the four-year, $88-million grant would fund a new facility in Manitoba to accelerate the process of taking promising vaccines from the lab to the field, to be used around the world.
Duguid said ICID’s bid is extremely competitive, in part because it builds on Winnipeg’s unique strengths in the life sciences field, as well as ICID’s own track record of working with researchers and stakeholders to prevent infectious diseases worldwide, particularly in the field of HIV/AIDS.
“Encouraging collaboration and building networks is what ICID does,” said Duguid. “We build bridges between researchers, public health agencies, and industry in order to prevent infectious diseases.”
ICID was founded in October 2004, with a mandate to foster innovation and collaboration in order to combat infectious diseases worldwide. It is home to the National Collaborating Centre on Infectious Diseases (NCCID), which has a major focus in HIV prevention, and has worked in HIV/AIDS prevention in Ukraine. It also offers biosafety training and international biosafety consulting services in conjunction with Smith Carter Architects and the National Microbiology Lab. In October ICID launched a new initiative, a Canadian Network on HPV Prevention.
-30-
Contact:
For more information, contact:
Terry Duguid
President and CEO,
International Centre for Infectious Diseases.
(204) 943-1743
Friday, November 28, 2008
Letter to Barack Obama from Alice Walker
Letter from American author and feminist Alice Walker to President Barack
Obama:
Alice Walker on expectations, responsibilities and a new reality that is
almost more than the heart can bear.
Nov. 5, 2008
Dear Brother Obama,
You have no idea, really, of how profound this moment is for us. Us being
the black people of the Southern United States. You think you know, because you
are thoughtful, and you have studied our history. But seeing you deliver the
torch so many others before you carried, year after year, decade after decade,
century after century, only to be struck down before igniting the flame of
justice and of law, is almost more than the heart can bear. And yet, this
observation is not intended to burden you, for you are of a different time, and,
indeed, because of all the relay runners before you, North America is a
different place. It is really only to say: Well done. We knew, through all the
generations, that you were with us, in us, the best of the spirit of Africa and
of the Americas. Knowing this, that you would actually appear, someday, was
part of our strength. Seeing you take your rightful place, based solely on
your wisdom, stamina and character, is a balm for the weary warriors of hope,
previously only sung about.
I would advise you to remember that you did not create the disaster that the
world is experiencing, and you alone are not responsible for bringing the world
back to balance. A primary responsibility that you do have, however, is to
cultivate happiness in your own life. To make a schedule that permits sufficient
time of rest and play with your gorgeous wife and lovely daughters. And so on.
One gathers that your family is large.
We are used to seeing men in the White House soon become juiceless and as
white-haired as the building; we notice their wives and children looking
strained and stressed. They soon have smiles so lacking in joy that they remind
us of scissors. This is no way to lead. Nor does your family deserve this fate.
One way of thinking about all this is: It is so bad now that there is no excuse
not to relax. From your happy, relaxed state, you can model real success, which
is all that so many people in the world really want. They may buy endless cars
and houses and furs and gobble up all the attention and space they can manage,
or barely manage, but this is because it is not yet clear to them that
success is truly an inside job. That it is within the reach of almost
everyone.
I would further advise you not to take on other people's enemies. Most
damage that others do to us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings
occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or
racial devotion. We must learn actually not to have enemies, but only confused
adversaries who are ourselves in disguise. It is understood by all that you are
commander in chief of the United States and are sworn to protect our beloved
country; this we understand, completely. However,
as my mother used to say, quoting a Bible with which I often fought, "hate
the sin, but love the sinner." There must be no more crushing of whole
communities, no more torture, no more dehumanizing as a means of ruling a
people's spirit. This has already happened to people of color, poor people,
women, children. We see where this leads, where it has led.
A good model of how to "work with the enemy" internally is presented by the
Dalai Lama, in his endless caretaking of his soul as he confronts the Chinese
government that invaded Tibet. Because, finally, it is the soul that must be
preserved, if one is to remain a credible leader. All else might be lost; but
when the soul dies, the connection to earth, to peoples, to animals, to rivers,
to mountain ranges, purple and majestic, also dies. And your smile, with which
we watch you do gracious battle with unjust characterizations, distortions and
lies, is that expression of healthy self-worth, spirit and soul, that, kept
happy and free and relaxed, can find an answering smile in all of us, lighting
our way, and brightening the world.
We are the ones we have been waiting for.
In Peace and Joy,
Alice Walker
Obama:
Alice Walker on expectations, responsibilities and a new reality that is
almost more than the heart can bear.
Nov. 5, 2008
Dear Brother Obama,
You have no idea, really, of how profound this moment is for us. Us being
the black people of the Southern United States. You think you know, because you
are thoughtful, and you have studied our history. But seeing you deliver the
torch so many others before you carried, year after year, decade after decade,
century after century, only to be struck down before igniting the flame of
justice and of law, is almost more than the heart can bear. And yet, this
observation is not intended to burden you, for you are of a different time, and,
indeed, because of all the relay runners before you, North America is a
different place. It is really only to say: Well done. We knew, through all the
generations, that you were with us, in us, the best of the spirit of Africa and
of the Americas. Knowing this, that you would actually appear, someday, was
part of our strength. Seeing you take your rightful place, based solely on
your wisdom, stamina and character, is a balm for the weary warriors of hope,
previously only sung about.
I would advise you to remember that you did not create the disaster that the
world is experiencing, and you alone are not responsible for bringing the world
back to balance. A primary responsibility that you do have, however, is to
cultivate happiness in your own life. To make a schedule that permits sufficient
time of rest and play with your gorgeous wife and lovely daughters. And so on.
One gathers that your family is large.
We are used to seeing men in the White House soon become juiceless and as
white-haired as the building; we notice their wives and children looking
strained and stressed. They soon have smiles so lacking in joy that they remind
us of scissors. This is no way to lead. Nor does your family deserve this fate.
One way of thinking about all this is: It is so bad now that there is no excuse
not to relax. From your happy, relaxed state, you can model real success, which
is all that so many people in the world really want. They may buy endless cars
and houses and furs and gobble up all the attention and space they can manage,
or barely manage, but this is because it is not yet clear to them that
success is truly an inside job. That it is within the reach of almost
everyone.
I would further advise you not to take on other people's enemies. Most
damage that others do to us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings
occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or
racial devotion. We must learn actually not to have enemies, but only confused
adversaries who are ourselves in disguise. It is understood by all that you are
commander in chief of the United States and are sworn to protect our beloved
country; this we understand, completely. However,
as my mother used to say, quoting a Bible with which I often fought, "hate
the sin, but love the sinner." There must be no more crushing of whole
communities, no more torture, no more dehumanizing as a means of ruling a
people's spirit. This has already happened to people of color, poor people,
women, children. We see where this leads, where it has led.
A good model of how to "work with the enemy" internally is presented by the
Dalai Lama, in his endless caretaking of his soul as he confronts the Chinese
government that invaded Tibet. Because, finally, it is the soul that must be
preserved, if one is to remain a credible leader. All else might be lost; but
when the soul dies, the connection to earth, to peoples, to animals, to rivers,
to mountain ranges, purple and majestic, also dies. And your smile, with which
we watch you do gracious battle with unjust characterizations, distortions and
lies, is that expression of healthy self-worth, spirit and soul, that, kept
happy and free and relaxed, can find an answering smile in all of us, lighting
our way, and brightening the world.
We are the ones we have been waiting for.
In Peace and Joy,
Alice Walker
Journey of the Black Man
http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/45800,features,in-pictures-the-long-journey-of-black-americans
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Barack Obama and Maya as children
Barack's house is now a tourist attraction. People are making trips up there to take snapshots of the house. Tourism in Chicago has hit the roof but no one's complaining. It's all good for business.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Friday, November 7, 2008
Tea with Barack Obama's sister
Maya Soetoro-Ng on her 'awesome' big brother, his early presidential leanings and their mother's legacy of hope.
By Stuart Coleman
Oct. 23, 2008 |
When I met Maya Soetoro-Ng at a small cafe in Honolulu last week, we talked mostly about her brother, Barack Obama. She had been campaigning for him but had taken time off to care for their ailing grandmother. Soetoro-Ng didn't know then that 85-year-old Madelyn Dunham's health would become more fragile and that her brother would be flying back to Hawaii to visit her with less than two weeks to go before Election Day, followed by flocks of reporters and an impressive lead in the polls.
Talking over tea, I was struck by how different she looks from her brother, who is nine years her senior. Maya is a zaftig, half-Indonesian woman with light skin, dark hair and a deep voice. Although they had different fathers and lived apart for many years, she and Barack were both raised by the same mother and grandparents.
While Barack went to Harvard, his father's alma mater, to get his law degree, Maya went to the University of Hawaii like her mother and earned a Ph.D. in education. She now teaches at a girls school in Honolulu , where she lives with her husband, Konrad Ng, and their daughter.
Did you ever imagine Barack becoming president?
There was this joke in our childhood that he was going to be the first African-American president ... but it was based on the fact that he was so bossy and he was always winning arguments! You know, he was always trying to tell people what to do so we were like, 'Oh, yes, Mr. President!' There's a difference between a family joke and having a real concrete understanding. No, I didn't think that this would happen, or even could happen, until perhaps just after the 2004 Democratic convention when he made that big speech.
What changed after that speech?
He started being recognized and people started really investing their own hopes and aspirations in him, and there were these Draft Obama movements all over the country. But even then, we thought, 'All right, the Senate, that's big -- you can effect a lot of change with that.' We weren't really thinking beyond that.
When did you first learn that he had aspirations for the nation's highest office?
I remember a few years ago going into his office, and he was pacing and frustrated, and I said, 'What's wrong?' This is in Chicago in his home office. He said, 'I don't know. I feel like I'm floundering, like I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing, that I could be doing more, that I haven't quite found my path, my mission.' I started laughing at him because I was like, 'You are the only guy who could be a state senator, a law professor and a civil rights lawyer and feel like you're underachieving.' The big joke became, 'Finally, you're not underachieving!'
What was Barack like as a big brother?
He was an amazing big brother. I've obviously said that a lot, but I mean it. He really was much more attentive than anyone his age could be expected to be.
As a teenager, you went to stay with Barack when he was working as a community organizer in Chicago . Is this when you feel like you began to know him as an adult and an individual?
He was in his 20s so he was pretty young to be taking over the care of his teenage sister. He took me to several colleges around the country to help me make the good decision about where to go to school. He let me stay with him and helped me get my first job. He took me to festivals and fairs and museums. He enrolled me in classes at the Art Institute of Chicago, and I studied dance there. He was awesome! He showed me his life and an impressive dedication to service. I was a teenager then, and our relationship really hasn't changed.
Is it strange seeing what a national and international phenomenon your brother has become?
It's kind of like I'm loaning him out to the rest of the world. I get a wee bit less of him, but he's still the same guy. I don't feel like there's a huge disconnect between the man I see on the television and the man who calls me at night. The smile is the same, the sense of humor is the same, and the ears are the same, and the voice is the same. And it's the same with his politics. He's working now to represent more people, to be more broadly inclusive in his representation. He can't really afford to think, 'Who am I?' Now, it's more like, 'Who are we as a nation? Or who do we want to be? And how can I help facilitate a stronger, broader, unified identity?'
The McCain campaign has been very aggressive. What do you say to people who say that your brother needs to fight back more?
I say that he cannot be something other than who he is. This is a man who fights by thinking about what you can do to make the country better, to enhance our will, to expand the parameters of possibility. I think he's done a fairly good job letting people know that he's not weak, that he's decisive; he's not impulsive, but he's decisive, and he's not afraid to act. But at the same time, that doesn't mean that you have to get nasty. It doesn't mean that you have to transform your personality. He can't. He can only be who he is, and who he is is somebody who is very strong and competitive, believe me, but he's not nasty.
I think a lot of people don't realize there is honor and dignity in the way that he's carried out his campaign. For the most part, I think he's done an extraordinary job. But I think there are other people who mistake the smile for softness or the civility for weakness.
Does he ever get mad?
He gets irritated. He doesn't get mad unless someone's saying something about his family. He gets protective, and then he'll get mad. You know, like a time or two, he's said, 'Leave Michelle alone.' Fortunately, there haven't been too many people who have criticized her or the kids -- that would make him mad. I haven't really seen him mad; I've seen him irritated and kind of disappointed -- disappointed in the media or disappointed in his opponents.
Has this campaign changed him?
In spite of his really hectic schedule, we speak regularly. I've been campaigning for him, of course, so I've seen him quite a bit this past year. Every year, he comes to Hawaii and spends time with his family. He makes sure that he takes me out on our sibling lunch, and we go and scatter flowers at the place where we scattered our mother's ashes. He's marvelously consistent and knows how he is. He's very rooted, and he lets us know that he's there for us.
What do you think your mother Ann Dunham's legacy was?
Definitely, without a doubt, her compassion and empathy, her ability to see the humanity of other people, her hopefulness -- she was eternally hopeful. You think about this woman with two failed marriages that she really, really wanted to work, but she still believed in marriage. She witnessed all kinds of poverty, inequality and injustice and oppression, but she still believed in human beings and their potential to do good.
Who was more influential, your mother or your grandmother?
Both. I think they each gave Barack something separate. Our mother was more of a dreamer, but she was also very pragmatic when she needed to be. And our grandmother was very practical, no nonsense, but was also our emotional tether when she needed to be. I mean, she's the reason we could make all of these choices and we could operate bravely in our own lives because we knew she was there.
He has had some strong women in his life. He couldn't help but be a feminist.
That's what I've been saying for this whole campaign! I've been calling him a feminist for the last year. People laugh, but I think it's true.
How do you think Barack has changed people's view of race in America ?
I think the impact is different for different people. My feeling is that for those who needed a strong symbol of black America , he's offered something valuable in representing race that way. But I think for those who were ready to deemphasize race, he's all for that as well. The campaign has never really been about race, from his perspective. People have tried to make it about race, but he's insisted throughout that it wasn't about race.
How does his mixed-raced identity affect his view of the world?
I think it affects me more. He is less interested in the questions of his own hybridity ... it's sort of like 'I am what I am -- let's not overanalyze.' For me, it's really important because I feel like we don't teach multicultural education in ways that are particularly meaningful.
As a feminist yourself, what do you think of Sarah Palin?
I don't care for her.
Why?
We have different politics, and that's it really. And I really don't care for the way she has been deliberately misdirecting the attention of the American people when it comes to my brother. I'm protective because I love him.
Maya Soetoro-Ng on her 'awesome' big brother, his early presidential leanings and their mother's legacy of hope.
By Stuart Coleman
Oct. 23, 2008 |
When I met Maya Soetoro-Ng at a small cafe in Honolulu last week, we talked mostly about her brother, Barack Obama. She had been campaigning for him but had taken time off to care for their ailing grandmother. Soetoro-Ng didn't know then that 85-year-old Madelyn Dunham's health would become more fragile and that her brother would be flying back to Hawaii to visit her with less than two weeks to go before Election Day, followed by flocks of reporters and an impressive lead in the polls.
Talking over tea, I was struck by how different she looks from her brother, who is nine years her senior. Maya is a zaftig, half-Indonesian woman with light skin, dark hair and a deep voice. Although they had different fathers and lived apart for many years, she and Barack were both raised by the same mother and grandparents.
While Barack went to Harvard, his father's alma mater, to get his law degree, Maya went to the University of Hawaii like her mother and earned a Ph.D. in education. She now teaches at a girls school in Honolulu , where she lives with her husband, Konrad Ng, and their daughter.
Did you ever imagine Barack becoming president?
There was this joke in our childhood that he was going to be the first African-American president ... but it was based on the fact that he was so bossy and he was always winning arguments! You know, he was always trying to tell people what to do so we were like, 'Oh, yes, Mr. President!' There's a difference between a family joke and having a real concrete understanding. No, I didn't think that this would happen, or even could happen, until perhaps just after the 2004 Democratic convention when he made that big speech.
What changed after that speech?
He started being recognized and people started really investing their own hopes and aspirations in him, and there were these Draft Obama movements all over the country. But even then, we thought, 'All right, the Senate, that's big -- you can effect a lot of change with that.' We weren't really thinking beyond that.
When did you first learn that he had aspirations for the nation's highest office?
I remember a few years ago going into his office, and he was pacing and frustrated, and I said, 'What's wrong?' This is in Chicago in his home office. He said, 'I don't know. I feel like I'm floundering, like I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing, that I could be doing more, that I haven't quite found my path, my mission.' I started laughing at him because I was like, 'You are the only guy who could be a state senator, a law professor and a civil rights lawyer and feel like you're underachieving.' The big joke became, 'Finally, you're not underachieving!'
What was Barack like as a big brother?
He was an amazing big brother. I've obviously said that a lot, but I mean it. He really was much more attentive than anyone his age could be expected to be.
As a teenager, you went to stay with Barack when he was working as a community organizer in Chicago . Is this when you feel like you began to know him as an adult and an individual?
He was in his 20s so he was pretty young to be taking over the care of his teenage sister. He took me to several colleges around the country to help me make the good decision about where to go to school. He let me stay with him and helped me get my first job. He took me to festivals and fairs and museums. He enrolled me in classes at the Art Institute of Chicago, and I studied dance there. He was awesome! He showed me his life and an impressive dedication to service. I was a teenager then, and our relationship really hasn't changed.
Is it strange seeing what a national and international phenomenon your brother has become?
It's kind of like I'm loaning him out to the rest of the world. I get a wee bit less of him, but he's still the same guy. I don't feel like there's a huge disconnect between the man I see on the television and the man who calls me at night. The smile is the same, the sense of humor is the same, and the ears are the same, and the voice is the same. And it's the same with his politics. He's working now to represent more people, to be more broadly inclusive in his representation. He can't really afford to think, 'Who am I?' Now, it's more like, 'Who are we as a nation? Or who do we want to be? And how can I help facilitate a stronger, broader, unified identity?'
The McCain campaign has been very aggressive. What do you say to people who say that your brother needs to fight back more?
I say that he cannot be something other than who he is. This is a man who fights by thinking about what you can do to make the country better, to enhance our will, to expand the parameters of possibility. I think he's done a fairly good job letting people know that he's not weak, that he's decisive; he's not impulsive, but he's decisive, and he's not afraid to act. But at the same time, that doesn't mean that you have to get nasty. It doesn't mean that you have to transform your personality. He can't. He can only be who he is, and who he is is somebody who is very strong and competitive, believe me, but he's not nasty.
I think a lot of people don't realize there is honor and dignity in the way that he's carried out his campaign. For the most part, I think he's done an extraordinary job. But I think there are other people who mistake the smile for softness or the civility for weakness.
Does he ever get mad?
He gets irritated. He doesn't get mad unless someone's saying something about his family. He gets protective, and then he'll get mad. You know, like a time or two, he's said, 'Leave Michelle alone.' Fortunately, there haven't been too many people who have criticized her or the kids -- that would make him mad. I haven't really seen him mad; I've seen him irritated and kind of disappointed -- disappointed in the media or disappointed in his opponents.
Has this campaign changed him?
In spite of his really hectic schedule, we speak regularly. I've been campaigning for him, of course, so I've seen him quite a bit this past year. Every year, he comes to Hawaii and spends time with his family. He makes sure that he takes me out on our sibling lunch, and we go and scatter flowers at the place where we scattered our mother's ashes. He's marvelously consistent and knows how he is. He's very rooted, and he lets us know that he's there for us.
What do you think your mother Ann Dunham's legacy was?
Definitely, without a doubt, her compassion and empathy, her ability to see the humanity of other people, her hopefulness -- she was eternally hopeful. You think about this woman with two failed marriages that she really, really wanted to work, but she still believed in marriage. She witnessed all kinds of poverty, inequality and injustice and oppression, but she still believed in human beings and their potential to do good.
Who was more influential, your mother or your grandmother?
Both. I think they each gave Barack something separate. Our mother was more of a dreamer, but she was also very pragmatic when she needed to be. And our grandmother was very practical, no nonsense, but was also our emotional tether when she needed to be. I mean, she's the reason we could make all of these choices and we could operate bravely in our own lives because we knew she was there.
He has had some strong women in his life. He couldn't help but be a feminist.
That's what I've been saying for this whole campaign! I've been calling him a feminist for the last year. People laugh, but I think it's true.
How do you think Barack has changed people's view of race in America ?
I think the impact is different for different people. My feeling is that for those who needed a strong symbol of black America , he's offered something valuable in representing race that way. But I think for those who were ready to deemphasize race, he's all for that as well. The campaign has never really been about race, from his perspective. People have tried to make it about race, but he's insisted throughout that it wasn't about race.
How does his mixed-raced identity affect his view of the world?
I think it affects me more. He is less interested in the questions of his own hybridity ... it's sort of like 'I am what I am -- let's not overanalyze.' For me, it's really important because I feel like we don't teach multicultural education in ways that are particularly meaningful.
As a feminist yourself, what do you think of Sarah Palin?
I don't care for her.
Why?
We have different politics, and that's it really. And I really don't care for the way she has been deliberately misdirecting the attention of the American people when it comes to my brother. I'm protective because I love him.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
From Sea to Shining Sea - Change has come to America
People from Australia to South AMerica, India to China, Africa to North America, Israel to Japan, all over the world people tune in to Barack Obama's victory and felt his spirit with laughter, tears, jubilation, dancing, whatever the spirit asked for it received that night.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Friday, October 24, 2008
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Will closet racism derail Obama?
By Laura Smith-Spark
BBC News
Two decades ago, Douglas Wilder watched as a 9% lead in the polls going into Virginia's gubernatorial election slipped to just one-tenth of 1% when the ballots were counted.
Are there some people who just cannot bring themselves to vote for an African-American? Yes
Douglas Wilder Mayor of Richmond, Virginia
He still won the election - becoming the first African-American to be elected a US state governor - but the narrowness of his victory led analysts to speculate that he had been a victim of a white hesitancy to vote for a black man.
The theory goes that some white voters tell opinion pollsters they will vote for a black candidate - but then, in the privacy of the polling booth, put their cross against a white candidate's name.
And the fear among some supporters is that this could happen to Barack Obama on 4 November, when the country votes for its next president.
The phenomenon is known as the Bradley, or Wilder effect.
Tom Bradley was an African-American mayor of Los Angeles who, running for California's governorship in 1982, saw a sizeable eve-of-polling lead evaporate on election day, giving victory to his white rival, Republican George Deukmejian.
In 1989, the year Wilder became governor of Virginia, David Dinkins was elected the first African-American mayor of New York - but he also saw an 18-point lead in the polls shrink to a winning margin of just two points on the day.
Charles Henry, a California professor who was among the first to research the Bradley effect, says Mr Obama would need a double-digit lead to feel confident of victory.
Other pundits have suggested a six- to nine-point cushion may be sufficient.
But Mr Wilder, now mayor of Richmond, Virginia, and a supporter of the Obama campaign, told the BBC News website that he believes racism will not have a major impact this time.
"Will there be some effect? Yes. Are there some people who just cannot bring themselves to vote for an African-American? Yes."
But, he said: "America has grown, people have grown."
Controversies over race have cast a shadow over this campaign.
Popular conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh has referred to Mr Obama as the "little black man-child" and a Fox News has called his wife, Michelle Obama, his "baby-mama".
One Republican senator described Mr Obama as "uppity", a word formerly used to describe blacks who had ideas above their station.
Reports of racist jibes among audiences at some recent McCain rallies led John Lewis, a Democratic congressman from Georgia, to accuse Mr McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin of "sowing the seeds of hatred and division" - a charge they deny.
The surfacing of videos showing Mr Obama's former pastor, the Rev Jeremiah Wright, preaching "God Damn America!" for its treatment of blacks, did nothing to promote the process of racial reconciliation.
Scepticism
Nonetheless, Mr Wilder remains optimistic about Mr Obama's chances for a number of reasons.
"I do think there is going to be a so-called 'reverse Bradley effect' because I think there are some Republicans who won't openly say they are going to vote for Barack Obama, but will," he said.
The 77-year-old puts that down in part to discontent with Republican President George W Bush, with polls suggesting that up to 90% of registered voters believe the country is on the wrong track.
Evidence from recent elections seems to confirm that a reverse Bradley effect could be at work.
Research by psychologist Anthony Greenwald and political scientist Bethany Albertson of the University of Washington, suggests Mr Obama benefited from a reverse Bradley effect in 12 states during the primary elections, while the Bradley effect itself was noticeable in only three.
A study by Harvard researcher Daniel Hopkins of 133 gubernatorial and senatorial elections from 1989 to 2006 also showed no recent significant Bradley-Wilder effect.
Other polls, meanwhile, suggest that white Americans have steadily become less reluctant to vote for a black person in the last few decades.
A recent Gallup poll suggested that 9% of Americans would be more likely to vote for Mr Obama, because of his race, compared with only 6% who said they would be less likely to vote for him.
'Masterful job'
Mr Wilder also believes Mr Obama is picking his way through the minefield of racial - or post-racial - politics with consummate skill.
He says he gave Mr Obama guidance a year ago - and the Illinois senator seems to have followed it.
"He never mentions race as such. He doesn't speak to race other than that particular speech, [a speech in March addressing the Jeremiah Wright controversy] in which he did a masterful job," Mr Wilder said.
"He's not running to make history. Is that going to help you [the voter] with your livelihood, pay for your kids' education?"
Mr Wilder also advised Mr Obama not to become too closely allied with longstanding African-American political figures, such as civil rights leaders the Rev Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
The key for Mr Obama now is to continue to present the same message of change to all voters, black and white, Mr Wilder adds, and the American voter will be "smarter" than to fall for last-minute attacks on his character.
"If things stay as they are, with effort and commitment and determination and drive he will win," he said.
"I always say to people, I hope the Wilder effect takes place in this election, because Wilder won - so if that's the effect it has, Obama wins."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/us_elections_2008/7675551.stm
Published: 2008/10/20 13:16:16 GMT
© BBC MMVIII
BBC News
Two decades ago, Douglas Wilder watched as a 9% lead in the polls going into Virginia's gubernatorial election slipped to just one-tenth of 1% when the ballots were counted.
Are there some people who just cannot bring themselves to vote for an African-American? Yes
Douglas Wilder Mayor of Richmond, Virginia
He still won the election - becoming the first African-American to be elected a US state governor - but the narrowness of his victory led analysts to speculate that he had been a victim of a white hesitancy to vote for a black man.
The theory goes that some white voters tell opinion pollsters they will vote for a black candidate - but then, in the privacy of the polling booth, put their cross against a white candidate's name.
And the fear among some supporters is that this could happen to Barack Obama on 4 November, when the country votes for its next president.
The phenomenon is known as the Bradley, or Wilder effect.
Tom Bradley was an African-American mayor of Los Angeles who, running for California's governorship in 1982, saw a sizeable eve-of-polling lead evaporate on election day, giving victory to his white rival, Republican George Deukmejian.
In 1989, the year Wilder became governor of Virginia, David Dinkins was elected the first African-American mayor of New York - but he also saw an 18-point lead in the polls shrink to a winning margin of just two points on the day.
Charles Henry, a California professor who was among the first to research the Bradley effect, says Mr Obama would need a double-digit lead to feel confident of victory.
Other pundits have suggested a six- to nine-point cushion may be sufficient.
But Mr Wilder, now mayor of Richmond, Virginia, and a supporter of the Obama campaign, told the BBC News website that he believes racism will not have a major impact this time.
"Will there be some effect? Yes. Are there some people who just cannot bring themselves to vote for an African-American? Yes."
But, he said: "America has grown, people have grown."
Controversies over race have cast a shadow over this campaign.
Popular conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh has referred to Mr Obama as the "little black man-child" and a Fox News has called his wife, Michelle Obama, his "baby-mama".
One Republican senator described Mr Obama as "uppity", a word formerly used to describe blacks who had ideas above their station.
Reports of racist jibes among audiences at some recent McCain rallies led John Lewis, a Democratic congressman from Georgia, to accuse Mr McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin of "sowing the seeds of hatred and division" - a charge they deny.
The surfacing of videos showing Mr Obama's former pastor, the Rev Jeremiah Wright, preaching "God Damn America!" for its treatment of blacks, did nothing to promote the process of racial reconciliation.
Scepticism
Nonetheless, Mr Wilder remains optimistic about Mr Obama's chances for a number of reasons.
"I do think there is going to be a so-called 'reverse Bradley effect' because I think there are some Republicans who won't openly say they are going to vote for Barack Obama, but will," he said.
The 77-year-old puts that down in part to discontent with Republican President George W Bush, with polls suggesting that up to 90% of registered voters believe the country is on the wrong track.
Evidence from recent elections seems to confirm that a reverse Bradley effect could be at work.
Research by psychologist Anthony Greenwald and political scientist Bethany Albertson of the University of Washington, suggests Mr Obama benefited from a reverse Bradley effect in 12 states during the primary elections, while the Bradley effect itself was noticeable in only three.
A study by Harvard researcher Daniel Hopkins of 133 gubernatorial and senatorial elections from 1989 to 2006 also showed no recent significant Bradley-Wilder effect.
Other polls, meanwhile, suggest that white Americans have steadily become less reluctant to vote for a black person in the last few decades.
A recent Gallup poll suggested that 9% of Americans would be more likely to vote for Mr Obama, because of his race, compared with only 6% who said they would be less likely to vote for him.
'Masterful job'
Mr Wilder also believes Mr Obama is picking his way through the minefield of racial - or post-racial - politics with consummate skill.
He says he gave Mr Obama guidance a year ago - and the Illinois senator seems to have followed it.
"He never mentions race as such. He doesn't speak to race other than that particular speech, [a speech in March addressing the Jeremiah Wright controversy] in which he did a masterful job," Mr Wilder said.
"He's not running to make history. Is that going to help you [the voter] with your livelihood, pay for your kids' education?"
Mr Wilder also advised Mr Obama not to become too closely allied with longstanding African-American political figures, such as civil rights leaders the Rev Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
The key for Mr Obama now is to continue to present the same message of change to all voters, black and white, Mr Wilder adds, and the American voter will be "smarter" than to fall for last-minute attacks on his character.
"If things stay as they are, with effort and commitment and determination and drive he will win," he said.
"I always say to people, I hope the Wilder effect takes place in this election, because Wilder won - so if that's the effect it has, Obama wins."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/us_elections_2008/7675551.stm
Published: 2008/10/20 13:16:16 GMT
© BBC MMVIII
Frank Shaeffer - Thoughts about Barack Obama
...
Frank Schaeffer
Obama's Minister Committed "Treason" But When My Father Said the Same Thing He Was a Republican Hero
Posted March 16, 2008 | 04:23 PM (EST)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Read More:
When Senator Obama's preacher thundered about racism and injustice Obama suffered smear-by-association. But when my late father -- Religious Right leader Francis Schaeffer -- denounced America and even called for the violent overthrow of the US government, he was invited to lunch with presidents Ford, Reagan and Bush, Sr.
Every Sunday thousands of right wing white preachers (following in my father's footsteps) rail against America's sins from tens of thousands of pulpits. They tell us that America is complicit in the "murder of the unborn," has become "Sodom" by coddling gays, and that our public schools are sinful places full of evolutionists and sex educators hell-bent on corrupting children. They say, as my dad often did, that we are, "under the judgment of God." They call America evil and warn of immanent destruction. By comparison Obama's minister's shouted "controversial" comments were mild. All he said was that God should damn America for our racism and violence and that no one had ever used the N-word about Hillary Clinton.
Dad and I were amongst the founders of the Religious right. In the 1970s and 1980s, while Dad and I crisscrossed America denouncing our nation's sins instead of getting in trouble we became darlings of the Republican Party. (This was while I was my father's sidekick before I dropped out of the evangelical movement altogether.) We were rewarded for our "stand" by people such as Congressman Jack Kemp, the Fords, Reagan and the Bush family. The top Republican leadership depended on preachers and agitators like us to energize their rank and file. No one called us un-American.
Consider a few passages from my father's immensely influential America-bashing book A Christian Manifesto. It sailed under the radar of the major media who, back when it was published in 1980, were not paying particular attention to best-selling religious books. Nevertheless it sold more than a million copies.
Here's Dad writing in his chapter on civil disobedience:
If there is a legitimate reason for the use of force [against the US government]... then at a certain point force is justifiable.
And this:
In the United States the materialistic, humanistic world view is being taught exclusively in most state schools... There is an obvious parallel between this and the situation in Russia [the USSR]. And we really must not be blind to the fact that indeed in the public schools in the United States all religious influence is as forcibly forbidden as in the Soviet Union....
Then this:
There does come a time when force, even physical force, is appropriate... A true Christian in Hitler's Germany and in the occupied countries should have defied the false and counterfeit state. This brings us to a current issue that is crucial for the future of the church in the United States, the issue of abortion... It is time we consciously realize that when any office commands what is contrary to God's law it abrogates it's authority. And our loyalty to the God who gave this law then requires that we make the appropriate response in that situation...
Was any conservative political leader associated with Dad running for cover? Far from it. Dad was a frequent guest of the Kemps, had lunch with the Fords, stayed in the White House as their guest, he met with Reagan, helped Dr. C. Everett Koop become Surgeon General. (I went on the 700 Club several times to generate support for Koop).
Dad became a hero to the evangelical community and a leading political instigator. When Dad died in 1984 everyone from Reagan to Kemp to Billy Graham lamented his passing publicly as the loss of a great American. Not one Republican leader was ever asked to denounce my dad or distanced himself from Dad's statements.
Take Dad's words and put them in the mouth of Obama's preacher (or in the mouth of any black American preacher) and people would be accusing that preacher of treason. Yet when we of the white Religious Right denounced America white conservative Americans and top political leaders, called our words "godly" and "prophetic" and a "call to repentance."
We Republican agitators of the mid 1970s to the late 1980s were genuinely anti-American in the same spirit that later Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson (both followers of my father) were anti-American when they said God had removed his blessing from America on 9/11, because America accepted gays. Falwell and Robertson recanted but we never did.
My dad's books denouncing America and comparing the USA to Hitler are still best sellers in the "respectable" evangelical community and he's still hailed as a prophet by many Republican leaders. When Mike Huckabee was recently asked by Katie Couric to name one book he'd take with him to a desert island, besides the Bible, he named Dad's Whatever Happened to the Human Race? a book where Dad also compared America to Hitler's Germany.
The hypocrisy of the right denouncing Obama, because of his minister's words, is staggering. They are the same people who argue for the right to "bear arms" as "insurance" to limit government power. They are the same people that (in the early 1980s roared and cheered when I called down damnation on America as "fallen away from God" at their national meetings where I was keynote speaker, including the annual meeting of the ultraconservative Southern Baptist convention, and the religious broadcasters that I addressed.
Today we have a marriage of convenience between the right wing fundamentalists who hate Obama, and the "progressive" Clintons who are playing the race card through their own smear machine. As Jane Smiley writes in the Huffington Post "[The Clinton's] are, indeed, now part of the 'vast right wing conspiracy.' (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/im-already-against-the-n_b_90628.html )
Both the far right Republicans and the stop-at-nothing Clintons are using the "scandal" of Obama's preacher to undermine the first black American candidate with a serious shot at the presidency. Funny thing is, the racist Clinton/Far Right smear machine proves that Obama's minister had a valid point. There is plenty to yell about these days.
Frank Schaeffer is a writer and author of "CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back
Frank Schaeffer
Posted October 8, 2008 | 02:45 PM (EST)
Obama Will Be One of The Greatest (and Most Loved) American Presidents
Read More:
Great presidents are made great by horrible circumstances combined with character, temperament and intelligence. Like firemen, cops, doctors or soldiers, presidents need a crisis to shine.
Obama is one of the most intelligent presidential aspirants to ever step forward in American history. The likes of his intellectual capabilities have not been surpassed in public life since the Founding Fathers put pen to paper. His personal character is also solid gold. Take heart, America: we have the leader for our times.
I say this as a white, former life-long Republican. I say this as the proud father of a Marine. I say this as just another American watching his pension evaporate along with the stock market! I speak as someone who knows it's time to forget party loyalty, ideology and pride and put the country first. I say this as someone happy to be called a fool for going out on a limb and declaring that, 1) Obama will win, and 2) he is going to be amongst the greatest of American presidents.
Obama is our last best chance. He's worth laying it all on the line for.
This is a man who in the age of greed took the high road of community service. This is the good father and husband. This is the humble servant. This is the patient teacher. This is the scholar statesman. This is the man of deep Christian faith.
Good stories about Obama abound; from his personal relationship with his Secret Service agents (he invites them into his home to watch sports, and shoots hoops with them) to the story about how, more than twenty years ago, while standing in the check-in line at an airport, Obama paid a $100 baggage surcharge for a stranger who was broke and stuck. (Obama was virtually penniless himself in those days.) Years later after he became a senator, that stranger recognized Obama's picture and wrote to him to thank him. She received a kindly note back from the senator. (The story only surfaced because the person, who lives in Norway, told a local newspaper after Obama ran for the presidency. The paper published a photograph of this lady proudly displaying Senator Obama's letter.)
Where many leaders are two-faced; publicly kindly but privately feared and/or hated by people closest to them, Obama is consistent in the way he treats people, consistently kind and personally humble. He lives by the code that those who lead must serve. He believes that. He lives it. He lived it long before he was in the public eye.
Obama puts service ahead of ideology. He also knows that to win politically you need to be tough. He can be. He has been. This is a man who does what works, rather than scoring ideological points. In other words he is the quintessential non-ideological pragmatic American. He will (thank God!) disappoint ideologues and purists of the left and the right.
Obama has a reservoir of personal physical courage that is unmatched in presidential history. Why unmatched? Because as the first black contender for the presidency who will win, Obama, and all the rest of us, know that he is in great physical danger from the seemingly unlimited reserve of unhinged racial hatred, and just plain unhinged ignorant hatred, that swirls in the bowels of our wounded and sinful country. By stepping forward to lead, Obama has literally put his life on the line for all of us in a way no white candidate ever has had to do. (And we all know how dangerous the presidency has been even for white presidents.)
Nice stories or even unparalleled courage isn't the only point. The greater point about Obama is that the midst of our worldwide financial meltdown, an expanding (and losing) war in Afghanistan, trying to extricate our country from a wrong and stupidly mistaken ruinously expensive war in Iraq, our mounting and crushing national debt, awaiting the next (and inevitable) al Qaeda attack on our homeland, watching our schools decline to Third World levels of incompetence, facing a general loss of confidence in the government that has been exacerbated by the Republicans doing all they can to undermine our government's capabilities and programs... President Obama will take on the leadership of our country at a make or break time of historic proportions. He faces not one but dozens of crisis, each big enough to define any presidency in better times.
As luck, fate or divine grace would have it (depending on one's personal theology) Obama is blessedly, dare I say uniquely, well-suited to our dire circumstances. Obama is a person with hands-on community service experience, deep connections to top economic advisers from the renowned University of Chicago where he taught law, and a middle-class background that gives him an abiding knowledgeable empathy with the rest of us. As the son of a single mother, who has worked his way up with merit and brains, recipient of top-notch academic scholarships, the peer-selected editor of the Harvard Law Review and, in three giant political steps to state office, national office and now the presidency, Obama clearly has the wit and drive to lead.
Obama is the sober voice of reason at a time of unreason. He is the fellow keeping his head while all around him are panicking. He is the healing presence at a time of national division and strife. He is also new enough to the political process so that he doesn't suffer from the terminally jaded cynicism, the seen-it-all-before syndrome afflicting most politicians in Washington. In that regard we Americans lucked out. It's as if having despaired of our political process we picked a name from the phone book to lead us and that person turned out to be a very man we needed.
Obama brings a healing and uplifting spiritual quality to our politics at the very time when our worst enemy is fear. For eight years we've been ruled by a stunted fear-filled mediocrity of a little liar who has expanded his power on the basis of creating fear in others. Fearless Obama is the cure. He speaks a litany of hope rather than a litany of terror.
As we have watched Obama respond in a quiet reasoned manner to crisis after crisis, in both the way he has responded after being attacked and lied about in the 2008 campaign season, to his reasoned response to our multiplying national crises, what we see is the spirit of a trusted family doctor with a great bedside manner. Obama is perfectly suited to hold our hand and lead us through some very tough times. The word panic is not in the Obama dictionary.
America is fighting its "Armageddon" in one fearful heart at a time. A brilliant leader with the mild manner of an old-time matter-of-fact country doctor soothing a frightened child is just what we need. The fact that our "doctor" is a black man leading a hitherto white-ruled nation out of the mess of its own making is all the sweeter and raises the Obama story to that of moral allegory.
Obama brings a moral clarity to his leadership reserved for those who have had to work for everything they've gotten and had to do twice as well as the person standing next to them because of the color of their skin. His experience of succeeding in spite of his color, social background and prejudice could have been embittering or one that fostered a spiritual rebirth of forgiveness and enlightenment. Obama radiates the calm inner peace of the spirit of forgiveness.
Speaking as a believing Christian I see the hand of a merciful God in Obama's candidacy. The biblical metaphors abound. The stone the builder rejected is become the cornerstone... the last shall be first... he that would gain his life must first lose it... the meek shall inherit the earth...
For my secular friends I'll allow that we may have just been extraordinarily lucky! Either way America wins.
Only a brilliant man, with the spirit of a preacher and the humble heart of a kindly family doctor can lead us now. We are afraid, out of ideas, and worst of all out of hope. Obama is the cure. And we Americans have it in us to rise to the occasion. We will. We're about to enter one of the most frightening periods of American history. Our country has rarely faced more uncertainty. This is the time for greatness. We have a great leader. We must be a great people backing him, fighting for him, sacrificing for a cause greater than ourselves.
A hundred years from now Obama's portrait will be placed next to that of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. Long before that we'll be telling our children and grandchildren that we stepped out in faith and voted for a young black man who stood up and led our country back from the brink of an abyss. We'll tell them about the power of love, faith and hope. We'll tell them about the power of creativity combined with humility and intellectual brilliance. We'll tell them that President Obama gave us the gift of regaining our faith in our country. We'll tell them that we all stood up and pitched in and won the day. We'll tell them that President Obama restored our standing in the world. We'll tell them that by the time he left office our schools were on the mend, our economy booming, that we'd become a nation filled with green energy alternatives and were leading the world away from dependence on carbon-based destruction. We'll tell them that because of President Obama's example and leadership the integrity of the family was restored, divorce rates went down, more fathers took responsibility for their children, and abortion rates fell dramatically as women, families and children were cared for through compassionate social programs that worked. We'll tell them about how the gap closed between the middle class and the super rich, how we won health care for all, how crime rates fell, how bad wars were brought to an honorable conclusion. We'll tell them that when we were attacked again by al Qaeda, how reason prevailed and the response was smart, tough, measured and effective, and our civil rights were protected even in times of crisis...
We'll tell them that we were part of the inexplicably blessed miracle that happened to our country those many years ago in 2008 when a young black man was sent by God, fate or luck to save our country. We'll tell them that it's good to live in America where anything is possible. Yes we will.
Frank Schaeffer is the author of CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back. Now in paperback.
Frank Schaeffer
Obama's Minister Committed "Treason" But When My Father Said the Same Thing He Was a Republican Hero
Posted March 16, 2008 | 04:23 PM (EST)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Read More:
When Senator Obama's preacher thundered about racism and injustice Obama suffered smear-by-association. But when my late father -- Religious Right leader Francis Schaeffer -- denounced America and even called for the violent overthrow of the US government, he was invited to lunch with presidents Ford, Reagan and Bush, Sr.
Every Sunday thousands of right wing white preachers (following in my father's footsteps) rail against America's sins from tens of thousands of pulpits. They tell us that America is complicit in the "murder of the unborn," has become "Sodom" by coddling gays, and that our public schools are sinful places full of evolutionists and sex educators hell-bent on corrupting children. They say, as my dad often did, that we are, "under the judgment of God." They call America evil and warn of immanent destruction. By comparison Obama's minister's shouted "controversial" comments were mild. All he said was that God should damn America for our racism and violence and that no one had ever used the N-word about Hillary Clinton.
Dad and I were amongst the founders of the Religious right. In the 1970s and 1980s, while Dad and I crisscrossed America denouncing our nation's sins instead of getting in trouble we became darlings of the Republican Party. (This was while I was my father's sidekick before I dropped out of the evangelical movement altogether.) We were rewarded for our "stand" by people such as Congressman Jack Kemp, the Fords, Reagan and the Bush family. The top Republican leadership depended on preachers and agitators like us to energize their rank and file. No one called us un-American.
Consider a few passages from my father's immensely influential America-bashing book A Christian Manifesto. It sailed under the radar of the major media who, back when it was published in 1980, were not paying particular attention to best-selling religious books. Nevertheless it sold more than a million copies.
Here's Dad writing in his chapter on civil disobedience:
If there is a legitimate reason for the use of force [against the US government]... then at a certain point force is justifiable.
And this:
In the United States the materialistic, humanistic world view is being taught exclusively in most state schools... There is an obvious parallel between this and the situation in Russia [the USSR]. And we really must not be blind to the fact that indeed in the public schools in the United States all religious influence is as forcibly forbidden as in the Soviet Union....
Then this:
There does come a time when force, even physical force, is appropriate... A true Christian in Hitler's Germany and in the occupied countries should have defied the false and counterfeit state. This brings us to a current issue that is crucial for the future of the church in the United States, the issue of abortion... It is time we consciously realize that when any office commands what is contrary to God's law it abrogates it's authority. And our loyalty to the God who gave this law then requires that we make the appropriate response in that situation...
Was any conservative political leader associated with Dad running for cover? Far from it. Dad was a frequent guest of the Kemps, had lunch with the Fords, stayed in the White House as their guest, he met with Reagan, helped Dr. C. Everett Koop become Surgeon General. (I went on the 700 Club several times to generate support for Koop).
Dad became a hero to the evangelical community and a leading political instigator. When Dad died in 1984 everyone from Reagan to Kemp to Billy Graham lamented his passing publicly as the loss of a great American. Not one Republican leader was ever asked to denounce my dad or distanced himself from Dad's statements.
Take Dad's words and put them in the mouth of Obama's preacher (or in the mouth of any black American preacher) and people would be accusing that preacher of treason. Yet when we of the white Religious Right denounced America white conservative Americans and top political leaders, called our words "godly" and "prophetic" and a "call to repentance."
We Republican agitators of the mid 1970s to the late 1980s were genuinely anti-American in the same spirit that later Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson (both followers of my father) were anti-American when they said God had removed his blessing from America on 9/11, because America accepted gays. Falwell and Robertson recanted but we never did.
My dad's books denouncing America and comparing the USA to Hitler are still best sellers in the "respectable" evangelical community and he's still hailed as a prophet by many Republican leaders. When Mike Huckabee was recently asked by Katie Couric to name one book he'd take with him to a desert island, besides the Bible, he named Dad's Whatever Happened to the Human Race? a book where Dad also compared America to Hitler's Germany.
The hypocrisy of the right denouncing Obama, because of his minister's words, is staggering. They are the same people who argue for the right to "bear arms" as "insurance" to limit government power. They are the same people that (in the early 1980s roared and cheered when I called down damnation on America as "fallen away from God" at their national meetings where I was keynote speaker, including the annual meeting of the ultraconservative Southern Baptist convention, and the religious broadcasters that I addressed.
Today we have a marriage of convenience between the right wing fundamentalists who hate Obama, and the "progressive" Clintons who are playing the race card through their own smear machine. As Jane Smiley writes in the Huffington Post "[The Clinton's] are, indeed, now part of the 'vast right wing conspiracy.' (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/im-already-against-the-n_b_90628.html )
Both the far right Republicans and the stop-at-nothing Clintons are using the "scandal" of Obama's preacher to undermine the first black American candidate with a serious shot at the presidency. Funny thing is, the racist Clinton/Far Right smear machine proves that Obama's minister had a valid point. There is plenty to yell about these days.
Frank Schaeffer is a writer and author of "CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back
Frank Schaeffer
Posted October 8, 2008 | 02:45 PM (EST)
Obama Will Be One of The Greatest (and Most Loved) American Presidents
Read More:
Great presidents are made great by horrible circumstances combined with character, temperament and intelligence. Like firemen, cops, doctors or soldiers, presidents need a crisis to shine.
Obama is one of the most intelligent presidential aspirants to ever step forward in American history. The likes of his intellectual capabilities have not been surpassed in public life since the Founding Fathers put pen to paper. His personal character is also solid gold. Take heart, America: we have the leader for our times.
I say this as a white, former life-long Republican. I say this as the proud father of a Marine. I say this as just another American watching his pension evaporate along with the stock market! I speak as someone who knows it's time to forget party loyalty, ideology and pride and put the country first. I say this as someone happy to be called a fool for going out on a limb and declaring that, 1) Obama will win, and 2) he is going to be amongst the greatest of American presidents.
Obama is our last best chance. He's worth laying it all on the line for.
This is a man who in the age of greed took the high road of community service. This is the good father and husband. This is the humble servant. This is the patient teacher. This is the scholar statesman. This is the man of deep Christian faith.
Good stories about Obama abound; from his personal relationship with his Secret Service agents (he invites them into his home to watch sports, and shoots hoops with them) to the story about how, more than twenty years ago, while standing in the check-in line at an airport, Obama paid a $100 baggage surcharge for a stranger who was broke and stuck. (Obama was virtually penniless himself in those days.) Years later after he became a senator, that stranger recognized Obama's picture and wrote to him to thank him. She received a kindly note back from the senator. (The story only surfaced because the person, who lives in Norway, told a local newspaper after Obama ran for the presidency. The paper published a photograph of this lady proudly displaying Senator Obama's letter.)
Where many leaders are two-faced; publicly kindly but privately feared and/or hated by people closest to them, Obama is consistent in the way he treats people, consistently kind and personally humble. He lives by the code that those who lead must serve. He believes that. He lives it. He lived it long before he was in the public eye.
Obama puts service ahead of ideology. He also knows that to win politically you need to be tough. He can be. He has been. This is a man who does what works, rather than scoring ideological points. In other words he is the quintessential non-ideological pragmatic American. He will (thank God!) disappoint ideologues and purists of the left and the right.
Obama has a reservoir of personal physical courage that is unmatched in presidential history. Why unmatched? Because as the first black contender for the presidency who will win, Obama, and all the rest of us, know that he is in great physical danger from the seemingly unlimited reserve of unhinged racial hatred, and just plain unhinged ignorant hatred, that swirls in the bowels of our wounded and sinful country. By stepping forward to lead, Obama has literally put his life on the line for all of us in a way no white candidate ever has had to do. (And we all know how dangerous the presidency has been even for white presidents.)
Nice stories or even unparalleled courage isn't the only point. The greater point about Obama is that the midst of our worldwide financial meltdown, an expanding (and losing) war in Afghanistan, trying to extricate our country from a wrong and stupidly mistaken ruinously expensive war in Iraq, our mounting and crushing national debt, awaiting the next (and inevitable) al Qaeda attack on our homeland, watching our schools decline to Third World levels of incompetence, facing a general loss of confidence in the government that has been exacerbated by the Republicans doing all they can to undermine our government's capabilities and programs... President Obama will take on the leadership of our country at a make or break time of historic proportions. He faces not one but dozens of crisis, each big enough to define any presidency in better times.
As luck, fate or divine grace would have it (depending on one's personal theology) Obama is blessedly, dare I say uniquely, well-suited to our dire circumstances. Obama is a person with hands-on community service experience, deep connections to top economic advisers from the renowned University of Chicago where he taught law, and a middle-class background that gives him an abiding knowledgeable empathy with the rest of us. As the son of a single mother, who has worked his way up with merit and brains, recipient of top-notch academic scholarships, the peer-selected editor of the Harvard Law Review and, in three giant political steps to state office, national office and now the presidency, Obama clearly has the wit and drive to lead.
Obama is the sober voice of reason at a time of unreason. He is the fellow keeping his head while all around him are panicking. He is the healing presence at a time of national division and strife. He is also new enough to the political process so that he doesn't suffer from the terminally jaded cynicism, the seen-it-all-before syndrome afflicting most politicians in Washington. In that regard we Americans lucked out. It's as if having despaired of our political process we picked a name from the phone book to lead us and that person turned out to be a very man we needed.
Obama brings a healing and uplifting spiritual quality to our politics at the very time when our worst enemy is fear. For eight years we've been ruled by a stunted fear-filled mediocrity of a little liar who has expanded his power on the basis of creating fear in others. Fearless Obama is the cure. He speaks a litany of hope rather than a litany of terror.
As we have watched Obama respond in a quiet reasoned manner to crisis after crisis, in both the way he has responded after being attacked and lied about in the 2008 campaign season, to his reasoned response to our multiplying national crises, what we see is the spirit of a trusted family doctor with a great bedside manner. Obama is perfectly suited to hold our hand and lead us through some very tough times. The word panic is not in the Obama dictionary.
America is fighting its "Armageddon" in one fearful heart at a time. A brilliant leader with the mild manner of an old-time matter-of-fact country doctor soothing a frightened child is just what we need. The fact that our "doctor" is a black man leading a hitherto white-ruled nation out of the mess of its own making is all the sweeter and raises the Obama story to that of moral allegory.
Obama brings a moral clarity to his leadership reserved for those who have had to work for everything they've gotten and had to do twice as well as the person standing next to them because of the color of their skin. His experience of succeeding in spite of his color, social background and prejudice could have been embittering or one that fostered a spiritual rebirth of forgiveness and enlightenment. Obama radiates the calm inner peace of the spirit of forgiveness.
Speaking as a believing Christian I see the hand of a merciful God in Obama's candidacy. The biblical metaphors abound. The stone the builder rejected is become the cornerstone... the last shall be first... he that would gain his life must first lose it... the meek shall inherit the earth...
For my secular friends I'll allow that we may have just been extraordinarily lucky! Either way America wins.
Only a brilliant man, with the spirit of a preacher and the humble heart of a kindly family doctor can lead us now. We are afraid, out of ideas, and worst of all out of hope. Obama is the cure. And we Americans have it in us to rise to the occasion. We will. We're about to enter one of the most frightening periods of American history. Our country has rarely faced more uncertainty. This is the time for greatness. We have a great leader. We must be a great people backing him, fighting for him, sacrificing for a cause greater than ourselves.
A hundred years from now Obama's portrait will be placed next to that of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. Long before that we'll be telling our children and grandchildren that we stepped out in faith and voted for a young black man who stood up and led our country back from the brink of an abyss. We'll tell them about the power of love, faith and hope. We'll tell them about the power of creativity combined with humility and intellectual brilliance. We'll tell them that President Obama gave us the gift of regaining our faith in our country. We'll tell them that we all stood up and pitched in and won the day. We'll tell them that President Obama restored our standing in the world. We'll tell them that by the time he left office our schools were on the mend, our economy booming, that we'd become a nation filled with green energy alternatives and were leading the world away from dependence on carbon-based destruction. We'll tell them that because of President Obama's example and leadership the integrity of the family was restored, divorce rates went down, more fathers took responsibility for their children, and abortion rates fell dramatically as women, families and children were cared for through compassionate social programs that worked. We'll tell them about how the gap closed between the middle class and the super rich, how we won health care for all, how crime rates fell, how bad wars were brought to an honorable conclusion. We'll tell them that when we were attacked again by al Qaeda, how reason prevailed and the response was smart, tough, measured and effective, and our civil rights were protected even in times of crisis...
We'll tell them that we were part of the inexplicably blessed miracle that happened to our country those many years ago in 2008 when a young black man was sent by God, fate or luck to save our country. We'll tell them that it's good to live in America where anything is possible. Yes we will.
Frank Schaeffer is the author of CRAZY FOR GOD-How I Grew Up As One Of The Elect, Helped Found The Religious Right, And Lived To Take All (Or Almost All) Of It Back. Now in paperback.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Why not a Black man for President
A Black Man
Why is it that a Black Man can create a tiny piece called a filament (electric light - Lewis Latimer) that allows people to see in the dark?
But can't be seen fit to lead a country to the true light.
Why is it that a Black Man can create an instrument (clock - Benjamin Banneker) that all people use to tell time?
But peo ple don't think it is time for him to run a country.
Why is it that a Black Man can design a place for the high authorities to meet in and a place for the president to live in (The Capital and the White House Phillip Reid (a slave) and Pierre L'Enfant)?
But not good enough to lead these meetings or live in himself.
Why is it that a Black Man was brilliant enough to do the first open heart surgery (Dr. Daniel Hale Williams) and show the world how to get and preserve plasma (Dr. Charles Drew)?
But not good enough to put a program in place where everyone can afford this surgery.
Why is it that a Black Man was creative enough to design an instrument (traffic light - Garrett Morgan) to bring multiple people (traffic) to a halt?
But not seen creative enough to design a plan to bring all this unnecessary and worthless fighting between countries.
Why is it that a Black Man could create the soles (shoes - Jan Matzeliger) that people walk on every day?
But not seen good enough to fill the shoes of a bad president.
Why is it that a Black Man was smart enough and brave en ough to teach himself (Fredrick Douglas and Thomas Fuller - both slaves) and others how to read, write and/or calculate math?
But not seen smart enough and bold enough to calculate a platform to be President to a country that sure needs another first by us.
So you see my Brother and Sisters what I am saying is let us not forgot our past, which led us to our present and can definitely be the backbone to our future. We were good enough, smart enough, creative enough, and bold enough then, so let us all give Obama the chance to show that we are still these things and more. We all are as strong as our weakest link, so do not be that weak link that denies our people that chance to show we still can OVERCOME AND BE THE FIRST!
OUR NEXT P RESIDENT OF THESE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA !
Why is it that a Black Man can create a tiny piece called a filament (electric light - Lewis Latimer) that allows people to see in the dark?
But can't be seen fit to lead a country to the true light.
Why is it that a Black Man can create an instrument (clock - Benjamin Banneker) that all people use to tell time?
But peo ple don't think it is time for him to run a country.
Why is it that a Black Man can design a place for the high authorities to meet in and a place for the president to live in (The Capital and the White House Phillip Reid (a slave) and Pierre L'Enfant)?
But not good enough to lead these meetings or live in himself.
Why is it that a Black Man was brilliant enough to do the first open heart surgery (Dr. Daniel Hale Williams) and show the world how to get and preserve plasma (Dr. Charles Drew)?
But not good enough to put a program in place where everyone can afford this surgery.
Why is it that a Black Man was creative enough to design an instrument (traffic light - Garrett Morgan) to bring multiple people (traffic) to a halt?
But not seen creative enough to design a plan to bring all this unnecessary and worthless fighting between countries.
Why is it that a Black Man could create the soles (shoes - Jan Matzeliger) that people walk on every day?
But not seen good enough to fill the shoes of a bad president.
Why is it that a Black Man was smart enough and brave en ough to teach himself (Fredrick Douglas and Thomas Fuller - both slaves) and others how to read, write and/or calculate math?
But not seen smart enough and bold enough to calculate a platform to be President to a country that sure needs another first by us.
So you see my Brother and Sisters what I am saying is let us not forgot our past, which led us to our present and can definitely be the backbone to our future. We were good enough, smart enough, creative enough, and bold enough then, so let us all give Obama the chance to show that we are still these things and more. We all are as strong as our weakest link, so do not be that weak link that denies our people that chance to show we still can OVERCOME AND BE THE FIRST!
OUR NEXT P RESIDENT OF THESE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA !
Friday, August 29, 2008
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Post-Race - Is Obama the End of Black Politics? - NYTimes.com
Forty-seven years after he last looked out from behind the bars of a South Carolina jail cell, locked away for leading a march against segregation in Columbia, James Clyburn occupies a coveted suite of offices on the second and third floors of the United States Capitol, alongside the speaker and the House majority leader. Above his couch hangs a black-and-white photograph of the Rev. Martin Luther King ... read the article below:
Post-Race - Is Obama the End of Black Politics? - NYTimes.com
Post-Race - Is Obama the End of Black Politics? - NYTimes.com
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Re: Lyching party comment
Subject: Star Jones Reynolds responds to Bill O'Reilly/Fox News about Michelle Obama
Below is Star Jones' informed and provocative response to Bill O'Reilly's
comment about 'having a lynching party for Michelle Obama if he finds out
that she truly has no pride in her country.'
Bill O'Reilly said: 'I don't want to go on a lynching party against
Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how
the woman really feels. If that's how she really feels - that is a bad
country or a flawed nation, whatever - then that's legit. We'll track it
down.'
Star said: 'I'm sick to death of people like Fox News host, Bill
O'Reilly, and his ilk thinking that he can use a racial slur against a black
woman who could be the next First Lady of the United States, give a
half-assed apology and not be taken to task and called on his crap. What the
hell? If it's 'legit,' you're going to 'track it down?'
And then what do you plan to do? How dare this white man with a microphone
and the trust of the public think that in 2008, he can still put the words
'lynch and party' together in the same sentence with reference to a black
woman; in this case, Michelle Obama? I don't care how you 'spin it' in the
'no spin zone,' that statement in and of itself is racist, unacceptable and
inappropriate on every level.
O'Reilly claims his comments were taken out of context. Please don't
insult my intelligence while you're insulting me. I've read the comments and
heard them delivered in O'Reilly's own voice; and there is no right context
that exists. So, his insincere apology and 'out-of-context' excuse is not
going to cut it with me.
And just so we're clear, this has nothing to do with the 2008 presidential
election, me being a Democrat, him claiming to be Independent while talking
Republican, the liberal media or a conservative point of view. To the
contrary, this is about crossing a line in the sand that needs to be drawn
based on history, dignity, taste and truth.
Bill, I'm not sure of where you come from, but let me tell you what the
phrase 'lynching party' conjures up to me, a black woman born in North
Carolina .. Those words depict the image of a group of white men who are
angry with the state of their own lives getting together, drinking more than
they need to drink, lamenting how some black person has moved forward
(usually ahead of them in stature or dignity), and had the audacity to think
that they are equal. These same men for years, instead of looking at what
changes they should and could make in their own lives that might remove that
bitterness born of perceived privilege, these white men take all of that
resentment and anger and decide to get together and drag the closest black
person near them to their death by hanging them from a tree - usually after
violent beating, torturing and violating their human dignity. Check your
history books, because you don't need a masters or a law degree from Harvard
to know that is what constitutes a 'lynching party.'
Imagine, Michelle and Barack Obama having the audacity to think that they
have the right to the American dream, hopes, and ideals. O'Reilly must think
to himself: how dare they have the arrogance to think they can stand in
front of this nation, challenge the status quo and express the frustration
of millions? When this happens, the first thing that comes to mind for
O'Reilly and people like him is: 'it's time for a party.'
Not so fast...don't order the rope just yet.
Would O'Reilly ever in a million years use this phrase with reference to
Elizabeth Edwards, Cindy McCain or Judi Nathan? I mean, in all of the
statements and criticisms that were made about Judi Nathan, the one-time
mistress turned missus, of former presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, I
never heard any talk of forming a lynch party because of something she said
or did.
So why is it that when you're referring to someone who's African-American
you must dig to a historical place of pain, agony and death to symbolize
your feelings? Lynching is not a joke to off-handedly throw around and it is
not a metaphor that has a place in political commentary; provocative or
otherwise. I admit that I come from a place of personal outrage here having
buried my 90 year-old grandfather last year. This proud, amazing
African-American man raised his family and lived through the time when he
had to use separate water fountains, ride in the back of a bus, take his
wife on a date to the 'colored section' of a movie theater, and avert his
eyes when a white woman walked down the street for fear of what a white man
and his cronies might do if they felt the urge to 'party'; don't tell me
that the phrase you chose, Mr. O'Reilly, was taken out of context.
To add insult to injury, O'Reilly tried to 'clarify' his statements, by
using the excuse that his comments were reminiscent of Supreme Court Justice
Clarence Thomas' use of the term 'high-tech lynching' during his
confirmation hearing. I reject that analogy. You see Justice Thomas did mean
to bring up the image of lynching in its racist context. He was saying that
politics and the media were using a new technology to do to him what had
been done to black men for many years -- hang him.
Regardless of if you agreed with Justice Thomas' premise or not, if in
fact -- Bill O'Reilly was referencing it â?" the context becomes even
clearer.
What annoys me more than anything is that I get the feeling that one of
the reasons Bill O'Reilly made this statement, thinking he could get away
with it in the first place, and then followed it up with a lame apology in a
half-hearted attempt to smooth any ruffled feathers, is because he doesn't
think that black women will come out and go after him when he goes after us
Well, he's dead wrong. Be clear Bill O'Reilly: there will be no lynch party
for that black woman And this black woman assures you that if you come for
her, you come for all of us.'
-- Star Jones Reynolds
Below is Star Jones' informed and provocative response to Bill O'Reilly's
comment about 'having a lynching party for Michelle Obama if he finds out
that she truly has no pride in her country.'
Bill O'Reilly said: 'I don't want to go on a lynching party against
Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how
the woman really feels. If that's how she really feels - that is a bad
country or a flawed nation, whatever - then that's legit. We'll track it
down.'
Star said: 'I'm sick to death of people like Fox News host, Bill
O'Reilly, and his ilk thinking that he can use a racial slur against a black
woman who could be the next First Lady of the United States, give a
half-assed apology and not be taken to task and called on his crap. What the
hell? If it's 'legit,' you're going to 'track it down?'
And then what do you plan to do? How dare this white man with a microphone
and the trust of the public think that in 2008, he can still put the words
'lynch and party' together in the same sentence with reference to a black
woman; in this case, Michelle Obama? I don't care how you 'spin it' in the
'no spin zone,' that statement in and of itself is racist, unacceptable and
inappropriate on every level.
O'Reilly claims his comments were taken out of context. Please don't
insult my intelligence while you're insulting me. I've read the comments and
heard them delivered in O'Reilly's own voice; and there is no right context
that exists. So, his insincere apology and 'out-of-context' excuse is not
going to cut it with me.
And just so we're clear, this has nothing to do with the 2008 presidential
election, me being a Democrat, him claiming to be Independent while talking
Republican, the liberal media or a conservative point of view. To the
contrary, this is about crossing a line in the sand that needs to be drawn
based on history, dignity, taste and truth.
Bill, I'm not sure of where you come from, but let me tell you what the
phrase 'lynching party' conjures up to me, a black woman born in North
Carolina .. Those words depict the image of a group of white men who are
angry with the state of their own lives getting together, drinking more than
they need to drink, lamenting how some black person has moved forward
(usually ahead of them in stature or dignity), and had the audacity to think
that they are equal. These same men for years, instead of looking at what
changes they should and could make in their own lives that might remove that
bitterness born of perceived privilege, these white men take all of that
resentment and anger and decide to get together and drag the closest black
person near them to their death by hanging them from a tree - usually after
violent beating, torturing and violating their human dignity. Check your
history books, because you don't need a masters or a law degree from Harvard
to know that is what constitutes a 'lynching party.'
Imagine, Michelle and Barack Obama having the audacity to think that they
have the right to the American dream, hopes, and ideals. O'Reilly must think
to himself: how dare they have the arrogance to think they can stand in
front of this nation, challenge the status quo and express the frustration
of millions? When this happens, the first thing that comes to mind for
O'Reilly and people like him is: 'it's time for a party.'
Not so fast...don't order the rope just yet.
Would O'Reilly ever in a million years use this phrase with reference to
Elizabeth Edwards, Cindy McCain or Judi Nathan? I mean, in all of the
statements and criticisms that were made about Judi Nathan, the one-time
mistress turned missus, of former presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, I
never heard any talk of forming a lynch party because of something she said
or did.
So why is it that when you're referring to someone who's African-American
you must dig to a historical place of pain, agony and death to symbolize
your feelings? Lynching is not a joke to off-handedly throw around and it is
not a metaphor that has a place in political commentary; provocative or
otherwise. I admit that I come from a place of personal outrage here having
buried my 90 year-old grandfather last year. This proud, amazing
African-American man raised his family and lived through the time when he
had to use separate water fountains, ride in the back of a bus, take his
wife on a date to the 'colored section' of a movie theater, and avert his
eyes when a white woman walked down the street for fear of what a white man
and his cronies might do if they felt the urge to 'party'; don't tell me
that the phrase you chose, Mr. O'Reilly, was taken out of context.
To add insult to injury, O'Reilly tried to 'clarify' his statements, by
using the excuse that his comments were reminiscent of Supreme Court Justice
Clarence Thomas' use of the term 'high-tech lynching' during his
confirmation hearing. I reject that analogy. You see Justice Thomas did mean
to bring up the image of lynching in its racist context. He was saying that
politics and the media were using a new technology to do to him what had
been done to black men for many years -- hang him.
Regardless of if you agreed with Justice Thomas' premise or not, if in
fact -- Bill O'Reilly was referencing it â?" the context becomes even
clearer.
What annoys me more than anything is that I get the feeling that one of
the reasons Bill O'Reilly made this statement, thinking he could get away
with it in the first place, and then followed it up with a lame apology in a
half-hearted attempt to smooth any ruffled feathers, is because he doesn't
think that black women will come out and go after him when he goes after us
Well, he's dead wrong. Be clear Bill O'Reilly: there will be no lynch party
for that black woman And this black woman assures you that if you come for
her, you come for all of us.'
-- Star Jones Reynolds
Friday, July 4, 2008
Letter to the Editor - Black America
-----
Here is a letter to the editor, written by a young 78 year old American of African descent
To The Editor: As a 78 year old American of African descent, I feel compelled to respond to all this much ado about nothing when it comes to the statement that Michelle Obama made about the fact that this is the first time in her adult life that she has been proud to be an American.
The country needs to hear this from the Black perspective.
Long before I was born, my grandfather Joseph Burleson, owned a considerable amount of land in oil rich Texas .. Because during that era, Blacks could not vote, nor could they contest anything in the courts of the United States , my grandfather's land was STOLEN by his White neighbor. My grandfather, who was literate and better educated than my grandmother, drove to town. Seeing my grandfather leave, the covetous neighbor asked my grandmother to show him the deed to the property. He snatched it. She could not insist that he give it back, nor could she have reported this THEFT to the sheriff because of the fact that Blacks had no rights in the 1800s. The prevailing law at that time was, he who held the deed owned the land. Do you think that is something that I am PROUD OF? Right now I should be living off the oil and gas royalties.
In 1934 when my dad drove us to Texas to meet his family, when he stopped to purchase gasoline, his daughters and wife were not allowed to use the washroom. As a man it was easier for his to relieve himself in the bushes, than for the females. We were, however, reduced to having to go in the bushes, also. Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT?
In 1938 when my oldest sister went to enroll in Hyde Park High School , she was told by the counselor that she did not want to take college preparatory courses, she wanted to study domestic science. Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT? Of course, when Beatrice Lillian Hurley-Burleson went to school the next day, that was the last time anyone thought that the Burleson girls wanted to study domestic science.
When in 1943 my parents attempted to buy the 2 bedroom flat at 5338 South Kenwood, where we had lived since 1933, in Hyde Park, Chicago, IL we were told that we could not buy it because there was a restrictive covenant that said that the property was never to be sold to Negroes. Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT?
In 1950 when I graduated from college, I was unable to get a job because I was considered overqualified, the code word for they would not hire me because of my race. All of the want ads called for Japanese Americans or Neisis (the word given to Japanese Americans at that time). Do you think that was something that I should have been PROUD OF? I understood that America was trying to make up for the interring of innocent and patriotic Americans who were our enemy by association.
My cousin's barbershop was bombed in Mississippi in the 50's because he was encouraging Black people to register to vote. His wife who had earned a Masters Degree from Northwestern University lost her position as the principal of the local school because of the voter registration activities. Is that something I should be PROUD OF?
Now we get to Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the pastor of the Obama family. Rev. Wright like so many religious zealots overstates many things that many of his members do not agree with. To suggest that Senator Obama should leave the church of his choice is not only a double standard, but it is absurd. Would any of the talking heads who are so alarmed by Rev. Wright's thoughts and speeches suggest that Catholics should abandon their faith or denounce and reject the Pope because so many priests have molested children. These children were exploited and taken advantage of and they had no choice to even know they could resist, reject and denounce. To me the situations are parallel, except for the fact that the priests' behavior is a physical violation of the innocence of children who are marred for life; and the priests' behavior was a crime. Rev. Wright's speeches are just words, that one can listen to or not, the members have a choice. Should Governor Romney denounce and reject the Mormon Church because some of their members practice polygamy?
As Senator Obama has previously stated, we have entered the silly season.
Barack Obama is an adult, and most importantly, he is an exceptionally intelligent adult. Like most of us adults, fortunately, we do not accept all we hear or see. If we did, the world would be more amoral, debased and perverted than the world of today is.
I see all these so called ponderings an attempt to marginalize the candidacy of Senator Barack Obama. I cannot truly call this racism because some ignorant Blacks have also spoken disparagingly about him.
I accept this as the darker side of mankind who because of their own inadequacies, they project their deficiencies on others. Barack Obama is a very rare individual, the likes of whom the world seldom sees. Like most geniuses, they are often misunderstood. They are objects of envy and jealousy. They are suspect because they soar above the average man who does not have the intellectual ability to understand the greatness of special people. They are also targets to be pulled down to the level of the mediocre who cannot stand to see an individual with deep convictions and high standards.
We have not seen a phenomena like Barack Obama in many years and many generations. Like Ghandi, like Jesus, like Einstein, like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., like Mother Theresa, genetically, intellectually and spiritually, these people offer the world so much, but they are often maligned and misunderstood.
Barack Obama is a Christian in the true sense of the word. A true Christian loves his fellow man unconditionally. A true Christian wants the best and tries to bring out the best in his fellow man. A true Christian wants to unite and bring the world together in peace and harmony. This is what Senator Obama stands for; but, unfortunately, he has had to get off point to answer these false charges, innuendoes, and just plain lies.
We are in the presence of an angel unaware in Senator Barack Obama; and this country needs him, more than he needs us. He is the only person at this time in history who can restore respect for America with the world's people. Because of his family background, the influence of his beloved mother who instilled great values in him, the influence of his absent father who vicariously inspired a son to go to Harvard as the father had done, the influence of a minister who brought him to an understanding of the value and meaning of Christianity, the influence of a brilliant Princeton educated wife who inspires him and keeps him grounded; he is the epitome of a citizen of the world. He is of the world because the world is in him; and this is what America needs to bring us out of the abyss to which we have sunk in the eyes of the world.
Like, Michelle Obama, after living in this country all of my 78 years, loving my country and not understanding why my country has not loved me, I now for the first time in my adult life feel PROUD OF MY COUNTRY because I sense a maturing, a recognition of talent and character, and not color, and a field of candidates aspiring to lead this nation coming from very diverse backgrounds of gender, religious beliefs, national origin, ethnicity, age and experiences. This to me is the HOPE that America is coming into her own and will begin to CHANGE and will embrace the philosophy upon which this country was founded, where all men are created equal and are entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Now I truly believe, YES WE CAN!
Here is a letter to the editor, written by a young 78 year old American of African descent
To The Editor: As a 78 year old American of African descent, I feel compelled to respond to all this much ado about nothing when it comes to the statement that Michelle Obama made about the fact that this is the first time in her adult life that she has been proud to be an American.
The country needs to hear this from the Black perspective.
Long before I was born, my grandfather Joseph Burleson, owned a considerable amount of land in oil rich Texas .. Because during that era, Blacks could not vote, nor could they contest anything in the courts of the United States , my grandfather's land was STOLEN by his White neighbor. My grandfather, who was literate and better educated than my grandmother, drove to town. Seeing my grandfather leave, the covetous neighbor asked my grandmother to show him the deed to the property. He snatched it. She could not insist that he give it back, nor could she have reported this THEFT to the sheriff because of the fact that Blacks had no rights in the 1800s. The prevailing law at that time was, he who held the deed owned the land. Do you think that is something that I am PROUD OF? Right now I should be living off the oil and gas royalties.
In 1934 when my dad drove us to Texas to meet his family, when he stopped to purchase gasoline, his daughters and wife were not allowed to use the washroom. As a man it was easier for his to relieve himself in the bushes, than for the females. We were, however, reduced to having to go in the bushes, also. Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT?
In 1938 when my oldest sister went to enroll in Hyde Park High School , she was told by the counselor that she did not want to take college preparatory courses, she wanted to study domestic science. Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT? Of course, when Beatrice Lillian Hurley-Burleson went to school the next day, that was the last time anyone thought that the Burleson girls wanted to study domestic science.
When in 1943 my parents attempted to buy the 2 bedroom flat at 5338 South Kenwood, where we had lived since 1933, in Hyde Park, Chicago, IL we were told that we could not buy it because there was a restrictive covenant that said that the property was never to be sold to Negroes. Do you think I am PROUD OF THAT?
In 1950 when I graduated from college, I was unable to get a job because I was considered overqualified, the code word for they would not hire me because of my race. All of the want ads called for Japanese Americans or Neisis (the word given to Japanese Americans at that time). Do you think that was something that I should have been PROUD OF? I understood that America was trying to make up for the interring of innocent and patriotic Americans who were our enemy by association.
My cousin's barbershop was bombed in Mississippi in the 50's because he was encouraging Black people to register to vote. His wife who had earned a Masters Degree from Northwestern University lost her position as the principal of the local school because of the voter registration activities. Is that something I should be PROUD OF?
Now we get to Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the pastor of the Obama family. Rev. Wright like so many religious zealots overstates many things that many of his members do not agree with. To suggest that Senator Obama should leave the church of his choice is not only a double standard, but it is absurd. Would any of the talking heads who are so alarmed by Rev. Wright's thoughts and speeches suggest that Catholics should abandon their faith or denounce and reject the Pope because so many priests have molested children. These children were exploited and taken advantage of and they had no choice to even know they could resist, reject and denounce. To me the situations are parallel, except for the fact that the priests' behavior is a physical violation of the innocence of children who are marred for life; and the priests' behavior was a crime. Rev. Wright's speeches are just words, that one can listen to or not, the members have a choice. Should Governor Romney denounce and reject the Mormon Church because some of their members practice polygamy?
As Senator Obama has previously stated, we have entered the silly season.
Barack Obama is an adult, and most importantly, he is an exceptionally intelligent adult. Like most of us adults, fortunately, we do not accept all we hear or see. If we did, the world would be more amoral, debased and perverted than the world of today is.
I see all these so called ponderings an attempt to marginalize the candidacy of Senator Barack Obama. I cannot truly call this racism because some ignorant Blacks have also spoken disparagingly about him.
I accept this as the darker side of mankind who because of their own inadequacies, they project their deficiencies on others. Barack Obama is a very rare individual, the likes of whom the world seldom sees. Like most geniuses, they are often misunderstood. They are objects of envy and jealousy. They are suspect because they soar above the average man who does not have the intellectual ability to understand the greatness of special people. They are also targets to be pulled down to the level of the mediocre who cannot stand to see an individual with deep convictions and high standards.
We have not seen a phenomena like Barack Obama in many years and many generations. Like Ghandi, like Jesus, like Einstein, like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., like Mother Theresa, genetically, intellectually and spiritually, these people offer the world so much, but they are often maligned and misunderstood.
Barack Obama is a Christian in the true sense of the word. A true Christian loves his fellow man unconditionally. A true Christian wants the best and tries to bring out the best in his fellow man. A true Christian wants to unite and bring the world together in peace and harmony. This is what Senator Obama stands for; but, unfortunately, he has had to get off point to answer these false charges, innuendoes, and just plain lies.
We are in the presence of an angel unaware in Senator Barack Obama; and this country needs him, more than he needs us. He is the only person at this time in history who can restore respect for America with the world's people. Because of his family background, the influence of his beloved mother who instilled great values in him, the influence of his absent father who vicariously inspired a son to go to Harvard as the father had done, the influence of a minister who brought him to an understanding of the value and meaning of Christianity, the influence of a brilliant Princeton educated wife who inspires him and keeps him grounded; he is the epitome of a citizen of the world. He is of the world because the world is in him; and this is what America needs to bring us out of the abyss to which we have sunk in the eyes of the world.
Like, Michelle Obama, after living in this country all of my 78 years, loving my country and not understanding why my country has not loved me, I now for the first time in my adult life feel PROUD OF MY COUNTRY because I sense a maturing, a recognition of talent and character, and not color, and a field of candidates aspiring to lead this nation coming from very diverse backgrounds of gender, religious beliefs, national origin, ethnicity, age and experiences. This to me is the HOPE that America is coming into her own and will begin to CHANGE and will embrace the philosophy upon which this country was founded, where all men are created equal and are entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Now I truly believe, YES WE CAN!
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Barack Obama's Father's Day Speech
Remarks of Senator Barack Obama
(As prepared for delivery)
Apostolic Church of God
Sunday, June 15th, 2009
Chicago, IL
Good morning. It’s good to be home on this Father’s Day with my girls, and it’s an honor to spend some time with all of you today in the house of our Lord.
At the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus closes by saying, “Whoever hears these words of mine, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man who built his house upon a rock: the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock.” [Matthew 7: 24-25]
Here at Apostolic, you are blessed to worship in a house that has been founded on the rock of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. But it is also built on another rock, another foundation – and that rock is Bishop Arthur Brazier. In forty-eight years, he has built this congregation from just a few hundred to more than 20,000 strong – a congregation that, because of his leadership, has braved the fierce winds and heavy rains of violence and poverty; joblessness and hopelessness. Because of his work and his ministry, there are more graduates and fewer gang members in the neighborhoods surrounding this church. There are more homes and fewer homeless. There is more community and less chaos because Bishop Brazier continued the march for justice that he began by Dr. King’s side all those years ago. He is the reason this house has stood tall for half a century. And on this Father’s Day, it must make him proud to know that the man now charged with keeping its foundation strong is his son and your new pastor, Reverend Byron Brazier.
Of all the rocks upon which we build our lives, we are reminded today that family is the most important. And we are called to recognize and honor how critical every father is to that foundation. They are teachers and coaches. They are mentors and role models. They are examples of success and the men who constantly push us toward it.
But if we are honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that what too many fathers also are is missing – missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.
You and I know how true this is in the African-American community. We know that more than half of all black children live in single-parent households, a number that has doubled – doubled – since we were children. We know the statistics – that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and twenty times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, or run away from home, or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.
How many times in the last year has this city lost a child at the hands of another child? How many times have our hearts stopped in the middle of the night with the sound of a gunshot or a siren? How many teenagers have we seen hanging around on street corners when they should be sitting in a classroom? How many are sitting in prison when they should be working, or at least looking for a job? How many in this generation are we willing to lose to poverty or violence or addiction? How many?
Yes, we need more cops on the street. Yes, we need fewer guns in the hands of people who shouldn’t have them. Yes, we need more money for our schools, and more outstanding teachers in the classroom, and more afterschool programs for our children. Yes, we need more jobs and more job training and more opportunity in our communities.
But we also need families to raise our children. We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child – it’s the courage to raise one.
We need to help all the mothers out there who are raising these kids by themselves; the mothers who drop them off at school, go to work, pick up them up in the afternoon, work another shift, get dinner, make lunches, pay the bills, fix the house, and all the other things it takes both parents to do. So many of these women are doing a heroic job, but they need support. They need another parent. Their children need another parent. That’s what keeps their foundation strong. It’s what keeps the foundation of our country strong.
I know what it means to have an absent father, although my circumstances weren’t as tough as they are for many young people today. Even though my father left us when I was two years old, and I only knew him from the letters he wrote and the stories that my family told, I was luckier than most. I grew up in Hawaii, and had two wonderful grandparents from Kansas who poured everything they had into helping my mother raise my sister and me – who worked with her to teach us about love and respect and the obligations we have to one another. I screwed up more often than I should’ve, but I got plenty of second chances. And even though we didn’t have a lot of money, scholarships gave me the opportunity to go to some of the best schools in the country. A lot of kids don’t get these chances today. There is no margin for error in their lives. So my own story is different in that way.
Still, I know the toll that being a single parent took on my mother – how she struggled at times to the pay bills; to give us the things that other kids had; to play all the roles that both parents are supposed to play. And I know the toll it took on me. So I resolved many years ago that it was my obligation to break the cycle – that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father to my girls; that if I could give them anything, I would give them that rock – that foundation – on which to build their lives. And that would be the greatest gift I could offer.
I say this knowing that I have been an imperfect father – knowing that I have made mistakes and will continue to make more; wishing that I could be home for my girls and my wife more than I am right now. I say this knowing all of these things because even as we are imperfect, even as we face difficult circumstances, there are still certain lessons we must strive to live and learn as fathers – whether we are black or white; rich or poor; from the South Side or the wealthiest suburb.
The first is setting an example of excellence for our children – because if we want to set high expectations for them, we’ve got to set high expectations for ourselves. It’s great if you have a job; it’s even better if you have a college degree. It’s a wonderful thing if you are married and living in a home with your children, but don’t just sit in the house and watch “SportsCenter” all weekend long. That’s why so many children are growing up in front of the television. As fathers and parents, we’ve got to spend more time with them, and help them with their homework, and replace the video game or the remote control with a book once in awhile. That’s how we build that foundation.
We know that education is everything to our children’s future. We know that they will no longer just compete for good jobs with children from Indiana, but children from India and China and all over the world. We know the work and the studying and the level of education that requires.
You know, sometimes I’ll go to an eighth-grade graduation and there’s all that pomp and circumstance and gowns and flowers. And I think to myself, it’s just eighth grade. To really compete, they need to graduate high school, and then they need to graduate college, and they probably need a graduate degree too. An eighth-grade education doesn’t cut it today. Let’s give them a handshake and tell them to get their butts back in the library!
It’s up to us – as fathers and parents – to instill this ethic of excellence in our children. It’s up to us to say to our daughters, don’t ever let images on TV tell you what you are worth, because I expect you to dream without limit and reach for those goals. It’s up to us to tell our sons, those songs on the radio may glorify violence, but in my house we live glory to achievement, self respect, and hard work. It’s up to us to set these high expectations. And that means meeting those expectations ourselves. That means setting examples of excellence in our own lives.
The second thing we need to do as fathers is pass along the value of empathy to our children. Not sympathy, but empathy – the ability to stand in somebody else’s shoes; to look at the world through their eyes. Sometimes it’s so easy to get caught up in “us,” that we forget about our obligations to one another. There’s a culture in our society that says remembering these obligations is somehow soft – that we can’t show weakness, and so therefore we can’t show kindness.
But our young boys and girls see that. They see when you are ignoring or mistreating your wife. They see when you are inconsiderate at home; or when you are distant; or when you are thinking only of yourself. And so it’s no surprise when we see that behavior in our schools or on our streets. That’s why we pass on the values of empathy and kindness to our children by living them. We need to show our kids that you’re not strong by putting other people down – you’re strong by lifting them up. That’s our responsibility as fathers.
And by the way – it’s a responsibility that also extends to Washington. Because if fathers are doing their part; if they’re taking our responsibilities seriously to be there for their children, and set high expectations for them, and instill in them a sense of excellence and empathy, then our government should meet them halfway.
We should be making it easier for fathers who make responsible choices and harder for those who avoid them. We should get rid of the financial penalties we impose on married couples right now, and start making sure that every dime of child support goes directly to helping children instead of some bureaucrat. We should reward fathers who pay that child support with job training and job opportunities and a larger Earned Income Tax Credit that can help them pay the bills. We should expand programs where registered nurses visit expectant and new mothers and help them learn how to care for themselves before the baby is born and what to do after – programs that have helped increase father involvement, women’s employment, and children’s readiness for school. We should help these new families care for their children by expanding maternity and paternity leave, and we should guarantee every worker more paid sick leave so they can stay home to take care of their child without losing their income.
We should take all of these steps to build a strong foundation for our children. But we should also know that even if we do; even if we meet our obligations as fathers and parents; even if Washington does its part too, we will still face difficult challenges in our lives. There will still be days of struggle and heartache. The rains will still come and the winds will still blow.
And that is why the final lesson we must learn as fathers is also the greatest gift we can pass on to our children – and that is the gift of hope.
I’m not talking about an idle hope that’s little more than blind optimism or willful ignorance of the problems we face. I’m talking about hope as that spirit inside us that insists, despite all evidence to the contrary, that something better is waiting for us if we’re willing to work for it and fight for it. If we are willing to believe.
I was answering questions at a town hall meeting in Wisconsin the other day and a young man raised his hand, and I figured he’d ask about college tuition or energy or maybe the war in Iraq. But instead he looked at me very seriously and he asked, “What does life mean to you?”
Now, I have to admit that I wasn’t quite prepared for that one. I think I stammered for a little bit, but then I stopped and gave it some thought, and I said this:
When I was a young man, I thought life was all about me – how do I make my way in the world, and how do I become successful and how do I get the things that I want.
But now, my life revolves around my two little girls. And what I think about is what kind of world I’m leaving them. Are they living in a county where there’s a huge gap between a few who are wealthy and a whole bunch of people who are struggling every day? Are they living in a county that is still divided by race? A country where, because they’re girls, they don’t have as much opportunity as boys do? Are they living in a country where we are hated around the world because we don’t cooperate effectively with other nations? Are they living a world that is in grave danger because of what we’ve done to its climate?
And what I’ve realized is that life doesn’t count for much unless you’re willing to do your small part to leave our children – all of our children – a better world. Even if it’s difficult. Even if the work seems great. Even if we don’t get very far in our lifetime.
That is our ultimate responsibility as fathers and parents. We try. We hope. We do what we can to build our house upon the sturdiest rock. And when the winds come, and the rains fall, and they beat upon that house, we keep faith that our Father will be there to guide us, and watch over us, and protect us, and lead His children through the darkest of storms into light of a better day. That is my prayer for all of us on this Father’s Day, and that is my hope for this country in the years ahead. May God Bless you and your children. Thank you.
(As prepared for delivery)
Apostolic Church of God
Sunday, June 15th, 2009
Chicago, IL
Good morning. It’s good to be home on this Father’s Day with my girls, and it’s an honor to spend some time with all of you today in the house of our Lord.
At the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus closes by saying, “Whoever hears these words of mine, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man who built his house upon a rock: the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock.” [Matthew 7: 24-25]
Here at Apostolic, you are blessed to worship in a house that has been founded on the rock of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. But it is also built on another rock, another foundation – and that rock is Bishop Arthur Brazier. In forty-eight years, he has built this congregation from just a few hundred to more than 20,000 strong – a congregation that, because of his leadership, has braved the fierce winds and heavy rains of violence and poverty; joblessness and hopelessness. Because of his work and his ministry, there are more graduates and fewer gang members in the neighborhoods surrounding this church. There are more homes and fewer homeless. There is more community and less chaos because Bishop Brazier continued the march for justice that he began by Dr. King’s side all those years ago. He is the reason this house has stood tall for half a century. And on this Father’s Day, it must make him proud to know that the man now charged with keeping its foundation strong is his son and your new pastor, Reverend Byron Brazier.
Of all the rocks upon which we build our lives, we are reminded today that family is the most important. And we are called to recognize and honor how critical every father is to that foundation. They are teachers and coaches. They are mentors and role models. They are examples of success and the men who constantly push us toward it.
But if we are honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that what too many fathers also are is missing – missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.
You and I know how true this is in the African-American community. We know that more than half of all black children live in single-parent households, a number that has doubled – doubled – since we were children. We know the statistics – that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and twenty times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, or run away from home, or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.
How many times in the last year has this city lost a child at the hands of another child? How many times have our hearts stopped in the middle of the night with the sound of a gunshot or a siren? How many teenagers have we seen hanging around on street corners when they should be sitting in a classroom? How many are sitting in prison when they should be working, or at least looking for a job? How many in this generation are we willing to lose to poverty or violence or addiction? How many?
Yes, we need more cops on the street. Yes, we need fewer guns in the hands of people who shouldn’t have them. Yes, we need more money for our schools, and more outstanding teachers in the classroom, and more afterschool programs for our children. Yes, we need more jobs and more job training and more opportunity in our communities.
But we also need families to raise our children. We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child – it’s the courage to raise one.
We need to help all the mothers out there who are raising these kids by themselves; the mothers who drop them off at school, go to work, pick up them up in the afternoon, work another shift, get dinner, make lunches, pay the bills, fix the house, and all the other things it takes both parents to do. So many of these women are doing a heroic job, but they need support. They need another parent. Their children need another parent. That’s what keeps their foundation strong. It’s what keeps the foundation of our country strong.
I know what it means to have an absent father, although my circumstances weren’t as tough as they are for many young people today. Even though my father left us when I was two years old, and I only knew him from the letters he wrote and the stories that my family told, I was luckier than most. I grew up in Hawaii, and had two wonderful grandparents from Kansas who poured everything they had into helping my mother raise my sister and me – who worked with her to teach us about love and respect and the obligations we have to one another. I screwed up more often than I should’ve, but I got plenty of second chances. And even though we didn’t have a lot of money, scholarships gave me the opportunity to go to some of the best schools in the country. A lot of kids don’t get these chances today. There is no margin for error in their lives. So my own story is different in that way.
Still, I know the toll that being a single parent took on my mother – how she struggled at times to the pay bills; to give us the things that other kids had; to play all the roles that both parents are supposed to play. And I know the toll it took on me. So I resolved many years ago that it was my obligation to break the cycle – that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father to my girls; that if I could give them anything, I would give them that rock – that foundation – on which to build their lives. And that would be the greatest gift I could offer.
I say this knowing that I have been an imperfect father – knowing that I have made mistakes and will continue to make more; wishing that I could be home for my girls and my wife more than I am right now. I say this knowing all of these things because even as we are imperfect, even as we face difficult circumstances, there are still certain lessons we must strive to live and learn as fathers – whether we are black or white; rich or poor; from the South Side or the wealthiest suburb.
The first is setting an example of excellence for our children – because if we want to set high expectations for them, we’ve got to set high expectations for ourselves. It’s great if you have a job; it’s even better if you have a college degree. It’s a wonderful thing if you are married and living in a home with your children, but don’t just sit in the house and watch “SportsCenter” all weekend long. That’s why so many children are growing up in front of the television. As fathers and parents, we’ve got to spend more time with them, and help them with their homework, and replace the video game or the remote control with a book once in awhile. That’s how we build that foundation.
We know that education is everything to our children’s future. We know that they will no longer just compete for good jobs with children from Indiana, but children from India and China and all over the world. We know the work and the studying and the level of education that requires.
You know, sometimes I’ll go to an eighth-grade graduation and there’s all that pomp and circumstance and gowns and flowers. And I think to myself, it’s just eighth grade. To really compete, they need to graduate high school, and then they need to graduate college, and they probably need a graduate degree too. An eighth-grade education doesn’t cut it today. Let’s give them a handshake and tell them to get their butts back in the library!
It’s up to us – as fathers and parents – to instill this ethic of excellence in our children. It’s up to us to say to our daughters, don’t ever let images on TV tell you what you are worth, because I expect you to dream without limit and reach for those goals. It’s up to us to tell our sons, those songs on the radio may glorify violence, but in my house we live glory to achievement, self respect, and hard work. It’s up to us to set these high expectations. And that means meeting those expectations ourselves. That means setting examples of excellence in our own lives.
The second thing we need to do as fathers is pass along the value of empathy to our children. Not sympathy, but empathy – the ability to stand in somebody else’s shoes; to look at the world through their eyes. Sometimes it’s so easy to get caught up in “us,” that we forget about our obligations to one another. There’s a culture in our society that says remembering these obligations is somehow soft – that we can’t show weakness, and so therefore we can’t show kindness.
But our young boys and girls see that. They see when you are ignoring or mistreating your wife. They see when you are inconsiderate at home; or when you are distant; or when you are thinking only of yourself. And so it’s no surprise when we see that behavior in our schools or on our streets. That’s why we pass on the values of empathy and kindness to our children by living them. We need to show our kids that you’re not strong by putting other people down – you’re strong by lifting them up. That’s our responsibility as fathers.
And by the way – it’s a responsibility that also extends to Washington. Because if fathers are doing their part; if they’re taking our responsibilities seriously to be there for their children, and set high expectations for them, and instill in them a sense of excellence and empathy, then our government should meet them halfway.
We should be making it easier for fathers who make responsible choices and harder for those who avoid them. We should get rid of the financial penalties we impose on married couples right now, and start making sure that every dime of child support goes directly to helping children instead of some bureaucrat. We should reward fathers who pay that child support with job training and job opportunities and a larger Earned Income Tax Credit that can help them pay the bills. We should expand programs where registered nurses visit expectant and new mothers and help them learn how to care for themselves before the baby is born and what to do after – programs that have helped increase father involvement, women’s employment, and children’s readiness for school. We should help these new families care for their children by expanding maternity and paternity leave, and we should guarantee every worker more paid sick leave so they can stay home to take care of their child without losing their income.
We should take all of these steps to build a strong foundation for our children. But we should also know that even if we do; even if we meet our obligations as fathers and parents; even if Washington does its part too, we will still face difficult challenges in our lives. There will still be days of struggle and heartache. The rains will still come and the winds will still blow.
And that is why the final lesson we must learn as fathers is also the greatest gift we can pass on to our children – and that is the gift of hope.
I’m not talking about an idle hope that’s little more than blind optimism or willful ignorance of the problems we face. I’m talking about hope as that spirit inside us that insists, despite all evidence to the contrary, that something better is waiting for us if we’re willing to work for it and fight for it. If we are willing to believe.
I was answering questions at a town hall meeting in Wisconsin the other day and a young man raised his hand, and I figured he’d ask about college tuition or energy or maybe the war in Iraq. But instead he looked at me very seriously and he asked, “What does life mean to you?”
Now, I have to admit that I wasn’t quite prepared for that one. I think I stammered for a little bit, but then I stopped and gave it some thought, and I said this:
When I was a young man, I thought life was all about me – how do I make my way in the world, and how do I become successful and how do I get the things that I want.
But now, my life revolves around my two little girls. And what I think about is what kind of world I’m leaving them. Are they living in a county where there’s a huge gap between a few who are wealthy and a whole bunch of people who are struggling every day? Are they living in a county that is still divided by race? A country where, because they’re girls, they don’t have as much opportunity as boys do? Are they living in a country where we are hated around the world because we don’t cooperate effectively with other nations? Are they living a world that is in grave danger because of what we’ve done to its climate?
And what I’ve realized is that life doesn’t count for much unless you’re willing to do your small part to leave our children – all of our children – a better world. Even if it’s difficult. Even if the work seems great. Even if we don’t get very far in our lifetime.
That is our ultimate responsibility as fathers and parents. We try. We hope. We do what we can to build our house upon the sturdiest rock. And when the winds come, and the rains fall, and they beat upon that house, we keep faith that our Father will be there to guide us, and watch over us, and protect us, and lead His children through the darkest of storms into light of a better day. That is my prayer for all of us on this Father’s Day, and that is my hope for this country in the years ahead. May God Bless you and your children. Thank you.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Should the Democratic party choose Senator Hilary Clinton as Barack's running mate? If anyone had asked me this a few months ago, I would not have hesitated to agree that that would be a winning combination, but senator Clinton has not played fair. She has tried every low-down trick in the book to win the nomination and that's not what real winners do. Barack has proven that you could win with grace and that when you're under fire grace can spell the difference between success and failure. With so much under the bridge between these two people, I am not sure they would make a winning team. It will be like oil and water. I also suspect that senator Clinton being such a sore loser will still try to second guess the president-in-waiting and undermine his authority. So no, I do not think this combination will present a unified front. I would much rather see Senator Edwards as his running mate. He is a great guy with a good heart and is fights for the ordinary people. I am surprised he did not do as well in the polls but I think he will make the best VP.
Obama makes it to the finish line - he speaks he scores!
It is not surprising to me that Barack Obama has won the Democratic Presidential Nomination. This win is not about women against men. It is not racism vs sexism. It is about change. America must be tired of their history of racism against Blacks and they need to put it behind them. They want to show the world they can change and want to change. This win signifies that America is ready to cross that threshold of race. They have voted for a Black man. Barack could not have won without a substantial amount of white voters. To you I say you have done well. America is a great nation and for it to maintain that greatness and leadership it has to shed the image of a racist country. You can do it people! The world is changing and you have to change with it and Barack is the man to lead that change. He is all of you, all of us - white, black, yellow and in-between. He sees the world not in black and white but in colours, issues, policies that are not limited to a narrow vision. I urge you to stand behind him all the way and you will not regret it.
You will get your woman President but that will not be Hilary - It will be a young woman with a fresh vision and without the baggage that Hilary unfortunately brings to the table that has dogged her throughout her campaign. Having said that, I say hats off to her for showing women in America what it takes to reach the finish line. She has laid down some solid tracks for women to follow and she has left a great legacy but she can throw that all away if she persists in trying to undermine democracy and fairness. Take a bow Hill with the grace of a lady.
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