I’m sure many of you have already had a chance to form some sort of emotional response to an out of context half-sentence quote from Barrack Obama this last week.
If you want the rational side of the analysis to help reflect your knee jerk reaction, you can see below some of the context for the remarks. Funny how looking at the question and the answer gives a fuller picture of the story that just looking at a small part of the answer, and assuming that small segment to be the whole conversation.
Yes, our media sucks. And yes, it would have get strong emotional reactions from you than give you reasoned and vetted information. Ultimately the media just wants you to watch. Knee jerks and real jerks are the easiest way to get to that goal.
Obama’s response to the questioner was that there are many, many different sections in Pennsylvania comprised of a range of racial, geographic, class, and economic groupings from Appalachia to Philadelphia. So there was not one thing to say to such diverse constituencies in Pennsylvania. But having said that, Obama went on say that his campaign staff in Pennsylvania could provide the questioner (an imminent Pennsylvania volunteer) with all the talking points he needed. But Obama cautioned that such talking points were really not what should be stressed with Pennsylvania voters.
Instead he urged the volunteer to tell Pennsylvania voters he encountered that Obama’s campaign is about something more than programs and talking points. It was at this point that Obama began to talk about addressing the bitter feelings that many in some rural communities in Pennsylvania have about being brushed aside in the wake of the global economy. Senator Obama appeared to theorize, perhaps improvidently given the coverage this week, that some of the people in those communities take refuge in political concerns about guns, religion and immigration. But what has not so far been reported is that those statements preceded and were joined with additional observations that black youth in urban areas are told they are no longer “relevant” in the global economy and, feeling marginalized, they engage in destructive behavior. Unlike the week’s commentators who have seized upon the remarks about “bitter feelings” in some depressed communities in Pennsylvania, I gleaned a different meaning from the entire answer.
First, I noted immediately how dismissive his answer had been about “talking points” and ten point programs and how he used the question to urge the future volunteer to put forward a larger message central to his campaign. That pivot, I thought, was remarkable and unique.
Funny how when some people meet a sraight-talking politician, they immediately crucify him for it.
Robot Pirate Ninja 