Rosa Parks sat so Martin Luther King could walk.

Martin Luther King walked so Obama could run.

Obama’s running so we all can fly.

–Jay-Z, at an event in Philadelphia. (Text, audio about 4 minutes in)

 

I think Leon Wieseltier said it best when he commented that Obama was not the seed of the civil rights movement, but its flower. It is amazing to think that barely a generation after Martin Luther King marched on Washington, an African American has been elected to the highest office in the land – not, as Mike Huckabee points out, because of his race of even in spite of it, but with indifference to it. I wish Obama’s grandmother had managed to live just a few more days to see what happened today. I can’t possibly imagine what it must feel like to see the child you once raised chosen to be president of the United States.

Listening to Obama’s acceptance speech I am reminded of the first thing that attracted me to him – he speaks not in sound bites and one liners, but in a more traditional (and less media friendly) oratorical style. His sentences are sometimes long and involve multiple dependent clauses, but they have the ring of sincerity and reflect the deliberate thought that goes into what he says. He gives off the look that he was born to lead, and he has the ability to inspire like few other politicians do. More than any other contemporary leader, he makes me proud to be an American. Let’s see what the next four years brings.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 at 12:40 am by Ari and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.