I have had my share of frustrations with the New York Times of late, as have many people on this site, but when I read the Times' editorial on Obama's historic speech today - entitled "Mr. Obama’s Profile in Courage" - all I could do was say "right on!" The Times' main conclusion: Obama "not only cleared the air over a particular controversy — he raised the discussion to a higher plane."
Although there can be some valid debate on whether Obama's speech can be considered an "historic" political speech, the Times certainly seems to rank the speech up there with the best of them:
There are moments — increasingly rare in risk-abhorrent modern campaigns — when politicians are called upon to bare their fundamental beliefs. In the best of these moments, the speaker does not just salve the current political wound, but also illuminates larger, troubling issues that the nation is wrestling with.
Inaugural addresses by Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt come to mind, as does John F. Kennedy’s 1960 speech on religion, with its enduring vision of the separation between church and state. Senator Barack Obama, who has not faced such tests of character this year, faced one on Tuesday. It is hard to imagine how he could have handled it better.
I have to agree with that. In fact, I was doubtful that Obama could address the issues of race and religion in this country in an honest, straightforward way that would not only connect with average American but would somehow transcend the issue of race and connect this issue to the broader problems facing this country. But he somehow managed to pull it off in a masterful way. The folks at the Times admit that they now understand more than ever before what Obama means when he talks about transcending race, and I suspect others in this country now do too:
There have been times when we wondered what Mr. Obama meant when he talked about rising above traditional divides. This was not such a moment.
The Times recognized that in a single speech Obama not only managed to tackle the complex and often explosive issue of race in this country, but he also managed to overlap this with the complex and often explosive issue of religion in this country, in a way that gave one hope for the future and moved a step toward more unity, after so many years of politicans using these issues solely to divide the country for religious gain:
Mr. Obama had to address race and religion, the two most toxic subjects in politics. He was as powerful and frank as Mitt Romney was weak and calculating earlier this year in his attempt to persuade the religious right that his Mormonism is Christian enough for them.
It was not a moment to which Mr. Obama came easily. He hesitated uncomfortably long in dealing with the controversial remarks of his spiritual mentor and former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., who denounced the United States as endemically racist, murderous and corrupt.
On Tuesday, Mr. Obama drew a bright line between his religious connection with Mr. Wright, which should be none of the voters’ business, and having a political connection, which would be very much their business. The distinction seems especially urgent after seven years of a president who has worked to blur the line between church and state.
Perhaps most important, the Times editorial board clearly believes, in no uncertain terms, that Obama's speech should quell the media-driven and overhyped Wright controversy. But more than that, the editorial affirms my own view that Obama took things a big step further, by using this adversity he faced as an opportunity to address issues of race in America in a way that can help this country get out of the racial "stalemate" that it has been in for the last 20-30 years:
Mr. Obama’s eloquent speech should end the debate over his ties to Mr. Wright since there is nothing to suggest that he would carry religion into government. But he did not stop there. He put Mr. Wright, his beliefs and the reaction to them into the larger context of race relations with an honesty seldom heard in public life.
In my own lifetime I'm not sure I've seen any politician talk about race and religion in America the way that Obama did today. His speech today crystallized why he is the president this country needs at this point in time.
Someone else on this site commented yesterday that the reaction to Obama's speech by the pundits, media and powerbrokers would be as important as the speech itself. I clearly agree with that, although I think that the most important thing is how everyday voters react to it. In any case, as the Times editorial states, it's hard to imagine how Obama could have handled this situation better. It's hard to imagine anyone handling this situation better.