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yawarakaijin
Joined: 08 Aug 2006
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 Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:43 pm Post subject: |
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| spliff wrote: |
Obamma who?  |
Obama Bin Laden! Where have you been man!?  |
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Milwaukiedave
Joined: 02 Oct 2004
Location: Goseong
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| Posted: Tue Mar 18, 2008 11:09 pm Post subject: |
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| I only had a chance to watch the first few mins..will watch it tonight |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 2:32 am Post subject: |
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I was impressed. He hit every note that needed to be hit. He wasn't mealy mouthed like most politicians, spinning to make his position look good. He condemned what needed to be condemned and praised what was worthy of praise. He was even-handed, honest and open.
Biden is quoted somewhere as saying it was one of the great speeches of recent years. I have to agree.
That's the only commentary so far that I've seen or read, except for what the other posters on this thread have said, so I'm curious how it will be received across the country. I think it will go down well. I'm not creative enough to figure out how the Rush Limbaugh's of the world will treat it, but I would think they'd be relieved to finally hear some common sense on this issue. |
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Tiger Beer
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 10:03 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| Biden is quoted somewhere as saying it was one of the great speeches of recent years. I have to agree. |
That was my impression when watching the speech. It was one of the best speeches I've seen in a seriously long time.
But then Fox News predictably and quickly brought out all the right-wing guys you can imagine to 'comment' on it. Even Newt Gingrich began by saying it was an incredible speech, then said he re-read it afterwards and was greatly disturbed. (In other words, he had to re-read it to find all the weakest points to try to make anything not far-right-wing look bad).
When I heard the speech however, I was inspired to be an American again. A strong message of unity and politics that aren't going to be divisive, and even addressing the taboo topic of race (which he was pretty much forced to address anyways), but he spoke it perfectly. |
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yawarakaijin
Joined: 08 Aug 2006
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| Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 11:07 pm Post subject: |
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I was even more impressed when I watched it on youtube when I got home. I would like to see Bush give a speech like that. I would like to see him even attempt it without basically having to read every single line from a teleprompter.
I don't quite understand this right wing philosophy that all Obama is doing is offering hope. Isn't that what America is supposed to be about? Hope?
After years and years of observing the political process in both Canada and America I have come to the simple conclusion that talk about issues and policies is mere hogwash.
Oh yes, we pledge to get rid of the G.S.T. Didn't happen.
Oh, we stand for a strong and a robustlyfunded military. Didn't happen.
Won't somebody please think of the children? Didn't happen.
We will bring jobs back to the people. Didn't happen.
All that political speech is utter bullshit. Some might call Obama's speech calculated and they may have a point but the fact is, he is giving a fair segment of the American population hope. Just read some of the comments people have made in regards to his speech. For that fact alone, I would vote for him. If I were an American. |
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daskalos
Joined: 19 May 2006
Location: The Road to Ithaca
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| Posted: Wed Mar 19, 2008 11:55 pm Post subject: |
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Here's my first and last word on the topic, from an email I sent to people I like.
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Words matter. They are far from the only things that matter, but they matter. They can show us the difference between people who get things and those who don't. The words that follow happen to be strung together beautifully and logically to lead us to inescapable conclusions, but it's not their construction that make them powerful, it's the keenly insightful guts of them. What makes this speech remarkable is that it treats us as though we are all adults (to echo the words of at least two commentators, Jon Stewart and Bay Buchanan, two more opposites it would be difficult to imagine, much less name).
The first thing that struck me in this whole controversy over Obama's preacher's sermons is that, stripped of the fiery rhetoric, nothing of the substance of what Reverend Wright said was demonstrably false, if you consider those words from where he himself has stood and lived his life. (The only reason this is at all a controversy is that comfortable white people don't like their home truths to come from agitated, uppity black folk.)
And instead of calculating which constituency he could do without, Obama chose to look not only at Wright's words but at the historical forces behind them and at the forces animating those who were most likely to be offended by them. In his speech he speaks to us all.
There was a point in this campaign at which I was just fine with the idea of shoving Hillary Clinton down the throats of those who hate her. My primary reason for this was that I thought most of those who hate her are nothing more than parrots miming the hatred of idiots like Rush Limbaugh, et al. My secondary reason was that I hate Limbaugh and any politician he and his ilk endorse. "It would serve them right. Let the games begin."
This speech, though, has humbled me out of such a stance. I think Barack Obama is the last best hope America has, and if we pass this chance up, I believe we are truly fucked. We may be truly fucked even if we do elect him, but we certainly are if we elect anyone else. There is no one else today who stands any chance of uniting the polarized forces at play in today's polity.
That's all I have to say, except that I think the speech that follows should be required reading for anyone who wishes to vote in November and for anyone who has a stake in this election's outcome. Everyone on Earth, that is. It's less than 5000 words. I dare you to read it.
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yawarakaijin
Joined: 08 Aug 2006
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| Posted: Thu Mar 20, 2008 12:31 am Post subject: |
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| daskalos wrote: |
Here's my first and last word on the topic, from an email I sent to people I like.
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Words matter. They are far from the only things that matter, but they matter. They can show us the difference between people who get things and those who don't. The words that follow happen to be strung together beautifully and logically to lead us to inescapable conclusions, but it's not their construction that make them powerful, it's the keenly insightful guts of them. What makes this speech remarkable is that it treats us as though we are all adults (to echo the words of at least two commentators, Jon Stewart and Bay Buchanan, two more opposites it would be difficult to imagine, much less name).
The first thing that struck me in this whole controversy over Obama's preacher's sermons is that, stripped of the fiery rhetoric, nothing of the substance of what Reverend Wright said was demonstrably false, if you consider those words from where he himself has stood and lived his life. (The only reason this is at all a controversy is that comfortable white people don't like their home truths to come from agitated, uppity black folk.)
And instead of calculating which constituency he could do without, Obama chose to look not only at Wright's words but at the historical forces behind them and at the forces animating those who were most likely to be offended by them. In his speech he speaks to us all.
There was a point in this campaign at which I was just fine with the idea of shoving Hillary Clinton down the throats of those who hate her. My primary reason for this was that I thought most of those who hate her are nothing more than parrots miming the hatred of idiots like Rush Limbaugh, et al. My secondary reason was that I hate Limbaugh and any politician he and his ilk endorse. "It would serve them right. Let the games begin."
This speech, though, has humbled me out of such a stance. I think Barack Obama is the last best hope America has, and if we pass this chance up, I believe we are truly fucked. We may be truly fucked even if we do elect him, but we certainly are if we elect anyone else. There is no one else today who stands any chance of uniting the polarized forces at play in today's polity.
That's all I have to say, except that I think the speech that follows should be required reading for anyone who wishes to vote in November and for anyone who has a stake in this election's outcome. Everyone on Earth, that is. It's less than 5000 words. I dare you to read it.
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The parts I agree wholeheartedly with. I applaud this man for speaking to Americans like they were adults instead of 7 year old children who can't hold a complex thought in there head for more than three seconds. This alone is why this man should be president. Americans have, for far too long, been spoken too as if they were children by their politicians. Quite ironic for a country that produces more nobel prize winners and leading scientists than any other nation on earth. |
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Tiger Beer
Joined: 07 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Thu Mar 20, 2008 6:23 am Post subject: |
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| Looks like Clinton is winning in the polls though by a much larger margin. Nothing to do with the speech, but just the association with Rev Wright more than anything. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:22 pm Post subject: |
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Powerline blog drags the early enthusiasts of the "More Perfect Union" speech through the coals.
| Scott wrote: |
For Wills, Obama's speech stood with Abraham Lincoln's 1860 Cooper Union Speech. Lincoln's speech was a remarkable work of original scholarship reconstructing the views of the founding fathers on slavery. Obama's speech was a Clintonian triangulation seeking to negotiate his way through an inconvenient personal controversy, and not very honestly at that. Wills presented himself as the voice of moderation in the media hosannas over Obama's Philadelphia speech:
| Wills wrote: |
| Obama's speech has been widely praised�compared with JFK's speech to Protestant ministers, or FDR's First Inaugural, even to the Gettysburg Address. Those are exaggerations. But the comparison with the Cooper Union address is both more realistic and more enlightening. |
Lincoln's Cooper Union speech is still looking good 150 years later. Obama's Philadelphia speech didn't last 150 days. It failed upon the reeentry of Wright to reiterate the views that had prompted Obama to give the Philadelphia speech in the first place. Thus Obama's press conference on April 29.
Every installment of this saga reveals Obama to be a deeply opportunistic politician, ready to beat a hasty retreat from yesterday's statement of cherished principle in order to fight another day. Each installment of the saga also reveals the organs of the mainstream media to be Obama's handmaidens. From March 18 forward they have cheered on Obama's every step, even when Obama's succeeding steps proved them fools. |
The post here is a bit harsh on Obama himself, but I think he's right: the speech does not hold up as well 150 days later. Moreover, the post is dead-on about the media being smitten with Obama. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:36 pm Post subject: |
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| I'm not convinced 'determined to tear down' is an improvement on 'smitten with'. "Nixonian" and "Clintonian triangulation" are not neutral terms. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
| I'm not convinced 'determined to tear down' is an improvement on 'smitten with'. "Nixonian" and "Clintonian triangulation" are not neutral terms. |
Do you think the More Perfect Union speech is comparable to any of Lincoln's great speeches? I don't. |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:53 pm Post subject: |
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| Do you think the More Perfect Union speech is comparable to any of Lincoln's great speeches? I don't. |
I thought it was a good speech and said so up front. It wasn't in Lincoln's class but then, how many speeches in all of history are? Not more than a handful. I think it's kind of seamy to toss around 'Nixonian' to describe Obama. I detect no used-car salesman air about him. If possible, it's even more devious to label him a 'Clintonian triangulator' as if compromising and living the idea of politics being the art of the possible as something bad.
In the 5 months or so that I've been watching Obama (sort of) I haven't seen anything that merits smearing him with adjectives like deceitful or lacking in integrity. Lincoln after all was also a politician--he packed the Chicago convention hall that played a significant role in his nomination. Politicians are not saints, although I do hope for a good person. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 9:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
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| Do you think the More Perfect Union speech is comparable to any of Lincoln's great speeches? I don't. |
I thought it was a good speech and said so up front. It wasn't in Lincoln's class but then, how many speeches in all of history are? Not more than a handful. I think it's kind of seamy to toss around 'Nixonian' to describe Obama. I detect no used-car salesman air about him. If possible, it's even more devious to label him a 'Clintonian triangulator' as if compromising and living the idea of politics being the art of the possible as something bad.
In the 5 months or so that I've been watching Obama (sort of) I haven't seen anything that merits smearing him with adjectives like deceitful or lacking in integrity. Lincoln after all was also a politician--he packed the Chicago convention hall that played a significant role in his nomination. Politicians are not saints, although I do hope for a good person. |
12-27-07
| Obama wrote: |
I chose to run because I believed that the size of these challenges had outgrown the capacity of our broken and divided politics to solve them; because I believed that Americans of every political stripe were hungry for a new kind of politics, a politics that focused not just on how to win but why we should, a politics that focused on those values and ideals that we held in common as Americans; a politics that favored common sense over ideology, straight talk over spin.
We've already beaten odds that the cynics said couldn't be beaten. When we started ten months ago, they said we couldn't run a different kind of campaign. |
1-26-08
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We are looking for more than just a change of party in the White House. We're looking to fundamentally change the status quo in Washington - a status quo that extends beyond any particular party. And right now, that status quo is fighting back with everything it's got; with the same old tactics that divide and distract us from solving the problems people face, whether those problems are health care they can't afford or a mortgage they cannot pay.
So this will not be easy. Make no mistake about what we're up against.
We are up against the belief that it's ok for lobbyists to dominate our government - that they are just part of the system in Washington. But we know that the undue influence of lobbyists is part of the problem, and this election is our chance to say that we're not going to let them stand in our way anymore.
We are up against the conventional thinking that says your ability to lead as President comes from longevity in Washington or proximity to the White House. But we know that real leadership is about candor, and judgment, and the ability to rally Americans from all walks of life around a common purpose - a higher purpose.
We are up against decades of bitter partisanship that cause politicians to demonize their opponents instead of coming together to make college affordable or energy cleaner; it's the kind of partisanship where you're not even allowed to say that a Republican had an idea - even if it's one you never agreed with. That kind of politics is bad for our party, it's bad for our country, and this is our chance to end it once and for all.
We are up against the idea that it's acceptable to say anything and do anything to win an election. We know that this is exactly what's wrong with our politics; this is why people don't believe what their leaders say anymore; this is why they tune out. And this election is our chance to give the American people a reason to believe again. |
1-30-08
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I am running for President because I believe that we need fundamental change in America. Not just a change of Party in the White House, but change in Washington that the American people can believe in - unity instead of division; hope instead of fear; a politics that leaves behind the fights of the past so that we can finally take hold of our future.
We began this campaign one year ago on the steps of the old statehouse in Springfield. At the time, we made a bet on the American people. That bet was simple - we weren't going to change anything by relying on the same Washington games; instead, we were betting on the American people's hunger for change, and your ability to make change happen from the bottom-up. |
2-13-08
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I realize that politicians come before you every election saying that they'll change all this. They lay out big plans and hold events with workers just like this one, because it's popular to do and it's easy to make promises in the heat of a campaign.
But how many times have you been disappointed when everyone goes back to Washington and nothing changes? Because the lobbyists just write another check. Or because politicians start worrying about how they'll win the next election instead of why they should. Because they're focused on who's up and who's down instead of who matters - the worker who just lost his pension; the family that just put up the For Sale sign; the young woman who gets three hours of sleep a night because she works the late shift after a full day of college and still can't afford her sister's medicine.
These are the Americans who need real change - the kind of change that's about more than switching the party in the White House. They need a change in our politics - a leader who can end the division in Washington so we can stop talking about our challenges and start solving them; who doesn't defend lobbyists as part of the system, but sees them as part of the problem; who will carry your voices and your hopes into the White House every single day for the next four years. And that is the kind of President I want to be. |
Shouldn't it be clear that Obama has already failed on at least one of his promises? |
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Ya-ta Boy
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: Established in 1994
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| Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 9:15 pm Post subject: |
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| I don't think I take political campaign promises quite as seriously as you seem to, especially not a promise not to play politics in order to win a political contest for a political job. |
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