It is a time of fear in the face of freedom, a time for the widening of previous roads and the opening of new paths, a time of an emptying country and swelling cities, yet a time when these paths are mined by knowing algorithms of the all-seeing eye. It is the time of the warrior's peace and the miser's charity, when the planting of a seed is an act of conscientious objection.
 | Barack Obama … Man, What a Speech. President? |
I’m not old by any standard, but I’m no political spring chicken. I’ve been listening to politicians speak and rolling my eyes since Defense Secretary Alexander Haig told the country that women shouldn’t be in the military or lead the country because their brains are too tiny to understand ideas like throw-weight.
This speech was different. Earlier tonight, Barack Obama said some things I’ve been waiting seven long years to hear from our national leadership. I was sincerely moved by what Senator Obama had to say. I really encourage you to watch the speech:
Tom, he’s talking to you in the last few minutes there.
If Barack Obama can keep himself focused on these ideas through the year, I believe he’ll win the Democratic nomination and the presidency.
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Two minutes of frog gargling takes the whole evening to download on my dialup– I’m never going to get a whole seventeen-minute speech to play.
I can guess, though. Hope, change, hope, transformational leadership, change, hope, I get to help pay for a national health insurance plan I won’t be able to afford to use, hope, change, glory hallelujah, oh and now “unity” as we look towards those moderate Republican voters.
Amen.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/27/2008 @ 9:35 am
And you never read the Golden Compass either, Iroquois.
Comment by Frank Liberal — 1/27/2008 @ 9:44 am
You know, Iroquois, there’s some content to what he says, and there’s something important about the visual message as well. But nobody can make you interested or curious. It’s your choice.
Comment by Jim — 1/27/2008 @ 9:50 am
Ah, visual message. That’s what I was afraid of. Lately he’s become a “transformational” type speaker. Hitler played on people’s emotions like that too. Fascinating to watch pictures of the crowds of that era and try to figure out how they were moved and manipulated. I can understand if you don’t have the time for a transcript, but sometimes it is that transcript that helps us examine the content on another level. Perhaps I will look at it later if I get the technical capability.
Was watching some friends download stuff from youtube last night and it’s amazing how fast the stuff can play and download at the same time. On dialup, I get to listen to about three words before the thing has to spend another five minutes loading more content. It makes for very disjointed listening as the visual portion is jerky too. Seriously, I’m not being critical of your choices as Frank implies, but my connection would time out long before it was finished downloading. The frogs took about forty-five minutes to load, as did the Advice from God rants. (But it was worth it to hear non-religious boyfriend say “that’s blasphemy”)
I had my sock puppets read that thing, “Frank”, and they told me not to waste my time.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/27/2008 @ 11:19 am
Words can manipulate, too. Does that make words evil, or does it mean we should consider the words? Similarly, we should consider the message an image sends.
The transcript is at barackobama.com, right on the front page, if you want to read it.
Comment by Jim — 1/27/2008 @ 12:49 pm
If it was on the front page at one time, it sure isn’t there now. The current front page is, as you might expect, an email address collection tool, and the second page a donation tool. The prepared text of the speech is not under “speeches” where you might expect it, but in the blog:
http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/samgrahamfelsen/CGxdg
Apparently the topic of the speech was race. The crowd chant before the speech was “race doesn’t matter”. I think we already knew from the OJ trial that money trumps race. There was also a brief mention of health care, wages, republicans who cross party lines, and Iraq–about one sentence each–two for wages. Looking at the design at the top of the website, you see the word “change” once and the word “believe” twice. Looking at the body of the speech, I got this word count:
change-13
believe-6
black-6
white-7
Latino-4
unity-0
Sorry, but it reads to me as a fairly mediocre speech and not particularly earth-shattering.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/27/2008 @ 4:10 pm
http://www.barackobama.com/index.php, right where it says “Barack Obama’s victory speech in South Carolina”.
You have a right to conclude what you want to conclude.
Comment by Jim — 1/27/2008 @ 5:54 pm
When a candidate’s slogan is “race doesn’t matter”, what that really means is they don’t want THEIR race to matter to you, not that YOUR race does not matter to them.
The fact remains that race is a topic that the American public has still not found a way to discuss comfortably. There are genuine issues based on race, but unfortunately no way to get them out in the open. It is the elephant in the middle of the room that no one wants to talk about.
That Obama has chosen to make race the issue is unfortunate and dishonest. The issue should be who would be the better president.
I don’t doubt in the least that this was a three-hankie speech. Many of the people posted comments saying how the speech made them all teary-eyed. It’s a sad comment on our culture that we think politics is all about providing entertainment and emotional outlets.
I don’t mean this to take away from Obama as a person with substance. He is truly remarkable, and I think he will be president one day. If not this time, next time. I just don’t like the way his handlers are having him pander to emotion as if he was a Hollywood star, evangelist, or sports spectacle.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/27/2008 @ 10:58 pm
When you talk about “the American public,” who exactly are you talking about? When a politician tells me “the American people” are something or want something, I know exactly who that politician is talking about, and it isn’t me.
Comment by Jim — 1/27/2008 @ 11:02 pm
Uh, I was thinking mostly about public policy type discussions like Metropolis2020, but I suppose it would apply equally to the great unwashed masses jclifford is always complaining about who are always googling that Britney-something person, and who only know how to express their legitimate political needs through secretive supremacist groups.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/28/2008 @ 12:54 am
It was a stirring speech (and it got me fired up too).
He mentioned the lobby problem and health care and the financial woes we’re in, he spoke about getting us out of Iraq, and overcoming the past problems we’ve had in this country for decades (political rancor and rigidity, politics as usual, race, wealth, religion and gender as “divides”). i especially liked the enthusiasm of the crowd and his delivery, the chants of “yes we can”, and all the vignettes he painted and his anecdotes. i hope he’s for real, and we’ll find out as we go along. i’m still in, i’m suspending my cynicism, and i’ll give it a chance to work and do as much as i can to make it happen. Let’s see if we can change. i’m game. Heck, we have everything to lose.
Comment by Tom — 1/28/2008 @ 11:40 am
Why is anyone wasting their time responding to Iroquois? You know she is always absolutely right about everything. We should be thankful for her comments. Let’s all thank Jesus for Iroquois and the infinate wisdom he has obviously granted her.
Comment by AT — 1/28/2008 @ 6:13 pm
Woo… well, that was harsh, AT. Obviously I disagree with Iroquois, but I don’t think your sarcasm helps. I only think my sarcasm helps, see…
Comment by Jim — 1/28/2008 @ 8:08 pm
Not sarcasm, Jim. AT is paying homage to my innate reasonableness. I accept the homage.
AT is correct. I was sent by Jesus and The Goddess to keep your humdrum lives from becoming too monotonous.
Comment by Iroquois — 1/28/2008 @ 11:29 pm
Okay, I’ve had a chance to see it now and here is my reaction.
Obviously everything scripted and staged, they would be stupid not to, but he reads his lines very well and makes them sound fresh even though he has probably read some variation of them time and time again, so….good delivery.
The big thing here was “change”. Most politicians are using some variation of the change theme, but what we are supposed to change to was pretty vague. Clearly “change” is polling well, so they continue to use it.
Some obvious digs at the Clinton campaign here, referring to Michelle Obama as “the rock of my life” was overkill, wouldn’t it be nice if we could all get that, also protesting about the Reagan reference, I mean, he IS going after the Republican crossover vote as much as Hillary is.
The same things were mentioned over and over: health care, schools, jobs, wages, the mortgage market. But who is going to stand up and say we DON’T want good schools?
Then there was the age bit. Reference to young people voting brought huge cheers. A reference to “the past vs. the future”–code for what? And “seniors should retire with dignity”–well I’m old enough to have gotten on the AARP mailing list, and I’m in no hurry to “get out of the way.”
Then there was the messiah bit. Obama is an educated guy–I don’t like it when he plays the messiah card. But he says the difference between him and other candidates is the “ability to rally around a higher purpose”. Here follow resounding phrases like “battle of hearts and minds” “not easy” “setbacks” “take time” “heal the nation” “seize the future”. Ah, change you can BELIEVE in. But change to what?
Another recurring theme was the “big money and influence in Washington”. Politicians who are against this usually don’t have those kind of donations–yet–but when they do come accept them and drop that rhetoric for subsequent elections. Michelle’s WalMart connections are conveniently forgotten, and once again no concrete plan is presented, just a play on people’s distrust of business as usual. but we are “not going to let them (lobbyists) stand in the way” ..of what, he doesn’t say.
Perhaps bad-mouthing business is a crowd-pleaser, but I would rather see a politician who knows how to work with business, not antagonize them. Something along the lines of Paul Tsongas, even if that makes me a fiscal conservative.
Oh, and of course Obama is a uniter not a divider, just like Bush said he was when he swept Washington.
I do believe I’d like to have a beer with this guy. If he can get the nails out of his hands.
Comment by Iroquois — 2/8/2008 @ 2:27 am