To be blunt (always a bad idea, I know) I think you are too emotionally involved. It looks to me like you're always trying to put the most negative spin on Obama. Do you really think to presuade or are you just venting? My grandmother used to say inappropriate things about african americans. She certainly had cause with respect to a few individuals. But not with respect to everybody who is black. I can still love and revere my crazy old hungarian grandmother, but I can see her faults too. I don't think less of Obama's grandmother either, because I'm adult enough to know that people are complex and have the lightness and darkness inside them. Just like me. It looks to me that Obama's grandmother did a pretty good job. Her grandkid is running for president.

You're too into this Bipolar purity stuff where you are either a saint or a fraud.

Why don't you bend over and check out what's bothering your unsettled ass?

<<Hillary Supporters, or How to Look Small

Reading through the obvious hit letters, pounded out by the gnarled, irrational fingers of wizened HRC supporters makes me sad. Mainly because sometimes in life there are times to just Shut Up and appreciate the moment in which we live. This speech is one of those times.

Take a break, get a breath of air, and dare to dream a bit. Just for a day. You can all go back in a day or two to claiming Hillary is a Victim of her own Vagina even as she smears a great man, tries to rig a convention, and steal an election.

But just for once take politics out of the equation and Hope for once. To do anything else makes everyone look Small.>>

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Is this parody you quoted? I mean it has to be, no? Advising HRC supporters to take the "higher ground" while insulting them every other word? Hilarious...

And, a small point perhaps, but Obama did vote in favor of rescinding the sentencing laws (and making them retroactive) for the disparities in crack vs. powder cocaine sentencing. At best, it would have been but a small step toward righting a larger, greater wrong.

And, no small point this time: the other Democratic candidate voted against it.

One of the most important things I have learned in arguing and posting online since before even usenet is that what people do not say is often far more revealing than what they do say.

That no one will reply to my points shows that I'm having an impact..

If I was wrong, people would be quick to jump on me and tell me so in no uncertain terms..

If they even felt they had a leg to stand on they would defend themselves.

It is when I get totally ignored that I know I'm scoring the most telling points.

You are born with your grandmother- you're stuck with her. A pastor is your choice. There's a big difference.

Ha! you reminded me of Tom Leher and National Brotherhood Week

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIlJ8ZCs4jY

Over at the Huffington Post, they had there in the tank for

Obama gang ready to proclaim it the new Gettysburg Address

before it was even made, they didn't have time for a little

thing like telling you what he said.

The Obama supporters are almost as laughable here in the

letters section. Let's be blunt: it's a fairly well nuanced

attempt to stem the damage of the Wright thing. Great speech?

Hardly.

The bottom line is it's not a big deal in the first place

and will die down without doing him too much damage.

Please Salon, for the love of all that is holy, find some way to either police these threads more closely or allow us the option of ignoring the obvious trolls.

Free speech is one thing, but this ain't exactly the public square. You've got astroturf posters here comparing Obama to Hitler, for fuck's sake. Hitler. It flies in the face of what this website was supposed to be founded on -- the exchange of ideas.

You're being used. Friggin do something about it.

Any speech loses its luster when it's given for damage control.

This speech was more of the same from Oprahma the empty suit.

Your point is understood, but I hope you don't think I was ignoring your earlier points. I was trying to address them, insofar as Obama was concerned, based on the information I had.

For what it's worth - here is my disclaimer :-) I'm a first generation brown-skinned immigrant who is still coming to grips with the complexities of this country's history....so I may not have full context for some of these topics.

See white people! Not all black people love Obama! (You are black, right?)

You know, I do have to agree with you about the whole vote for me aspect of his speech, but it is a campaign speech. Heck, even his own wife says he's pretty self-absorbed. And he's cocky.

However, I disagree with you about the whole "pretty words" and not doing the "hard work." I don't want to resort to Obama talking points, but don't you think speeches like I Have a Dream, chock full of pretty words, galvanized a lot of people? If one white suburban youth who heard the speech decided to volunteer during Freedom Summer because of MLK's words, wouldn't that negate the whole idea of just pretty words and not backing it up with action?

Very true, very true what you have said. And Obama voices it extremely well. Here is my argument, though.

Who is to say that _he_ is the only one who can bring this about? Only him? No one else? I don't get that part. He is voicing a _common_ desire for _everyone_ in the world, I would argue. It's when you get down to the nitty-gritty, the real-world _implementation_ of that desire where the going gets tough, compromises have to be made and some people come out unhappy.

What really gets me is his own admission that "he doesn't want aides to hand him policy papers until he absolutely needs them, because he knows that he will lose them" (his own words).

What this attitude tells me is that he manages from a 10,000ft level and doesn't want to get his hands soiled by the "dirty work". But if you've never dealt with the day-to-day you will never have a good understanding of how the process works. I actually have a manager here at work that everyone hates because he manages just like that -- ideas that sound good, but just don't work because they haven't been thought through. He sounds increasingly like that kind of a person.

So, in summary, he gives voice to people's aspirations. But can he deliver? I doubt that part.