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Tonya
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 6186
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 08, 2007 - 06:44 pm: | 
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Michelle/Barack Obama talks to Newsweek about race/color experiences:
One summer during law school, Obama worked in a Chicago firm where he found a soulmate who would help him navigate his difficult course. Michelle Obama's family comes from the South Side of Chicago, where her father was a city worker and her mother still lives in the humble house where Michelle was born. Like her husband, Michelle is an Ivy Leaguer (in her case, Princeton and Harvard), but she proudly calls herself a product of Chicago's public schools. Some people assume that Obama needed her entree into African-American society to break into Illinois politics. But that's not correct: by the time he met Michelle, Obama had already worked as a community organizer with black churches on the South Side for several years.
When the two first met at the law firm, Michelle was his reluctant mentor for the summer. She remembers rave reports that circulated around the office before she joined him for lunch the first time. "Yeah, he's probably a black guy who can talk straight," she recalls saying to herself. "This is a black guy who's biracial who grew up in Hawaii? He's got to be weird." Afterward, she realized she may have misjudged Obama. But it was only later that summer, when he took her to a church basement on the South Side, that she fell for him. He gave an inspiring speech about "the world as it is, and the world as it should be." Three years later, they married.
Michelle had to work through her early misperceptions about him; now, she says, the nation needs to do the same. "Barack poses this interesting dilemma because we are still a country that puts people in boxes," she tells NEWSWEEK. "Barack kind of shakes up those notions because his life has crossed so many different paths. He grew up in Hawaii but he was indeed a community organizer. He became very entrenched and rooted in the black community on the South Side. He is very much a black man, but he's very much the son of his mother, who was very much a white woman, and he grew up with white grandparents."
Full Article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19651719/site/newsweek/
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Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 9210
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, July 08, 2007 - 11:04 pm: |
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Jeeze. Even Obama's wife seems to withholds full endorsement of his black authenticity???? Maybe he would be more in his element as an ambassador to the the UN. Jussst kidding. BTW, There are rumors around Chicago that Barack also has his eye on the Governorship of Illinois, should his presidential bid fail. Word is that he would vacate his senate seat so Illinois' female attorney general cold run for it, all of which would stand him in good stead with Illnois Democrats. |
Tonya
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 6205
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, July 10, 2007 - 10:09 pm: |
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CORNEL WEST endorsed him after a two hour conversation, a meeting, and a month to think about it, that says a LOT. I don’t agree with everything West says but I find him credible.
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Yvettep
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 2143
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, July 11, 2007 - 12:50 pm: |
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Yup. Here an exceprt from a recent Newsweek interview where he talks about his meeting with Dr. West:
And you won him over. How did you react when you read what he said? And how did you win him over?
Why don't I start it this way? I have not been in national politics very long. I've been in politics for a long time, but for many people I was an unknown commodity. So as certain stories circulated about me, or what my priorities were, or where I came from, not surprisingly people were willing to give credence to some of those assumptions. So with Cornel it was just a matter of calling him up, introducing myself and having a conversation.
In some ways that's a metaphor for what this campaign is about. Me introducing myself, having a conversation, and trying to cut through the noise that is created by political opponents or media that's looking for a good story or my own fumbles and gaffes, trying to make sure by the end of this process people have a good sense of what my history is, what my values are, where I want to take the country.
Full interview: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19652107/site/newsweek/
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