WP, pg1: President-Elect Sees His Race as An Opportunity

[DeepModem Mom]

President-Elect Sees His Race as An Opportunity
By Michael A. Fletcher
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 19, 2009; A01

Throughout his barrier-breaking presidential campaign, Barack Obama avoided calling direct attention to race, long a divisive force in electoral politics. But now, as he stands on the verge of becoming the nation's first African American president, Obama is talking more about how his racial identity can unify and transform the country.

"There is an entire generation that will grow up taking for granted that the highest office in the land is filled by an African American," Obama said in an interview last week with The Washington Post. "I mean, that's a radical thing. It changes how black children look at themselves. It also changes how white children look at black children. And I wouldn't underestimate the force of that."

Beyond the symbolism of his historic achievement, Obama said, he hopes to use his presidency as an example of how people can bridge differences -- racial and otherwise. "What I hope to model is a way of interacting with people who aren't like you and don't agree with you that changes the temper of our politics," he said. "And then part of that changes how we think about moving forward on race relations. Race relations becomes a subset of a larger problem in our society, which is we have a diverse, complicated society where people have a lot of different viewpoints."...

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During the campaign, some black leaders grumbled that Obama was not vocal enough in articulating an African American agenda. But many of the initiatives Obama has championed -- creation of construction and manufacturing jobs, middle-class tax breaks, expansion of health care, increased funding for education -- would disproportionately benefit working-class people, many of them black. "I think a lot of the biggest challenges in terms of the African American community or Latino community have to do with economics," Obama said in the Post interview. "And if we get our economics right, then in my mind that is always a mechanism to improve race relations."

At the same time, Obama has been able to use the reality of being biracial as a unifying fact, something he has been able to do for much of his political career....

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"I think what you'll see in the White House will reflect Barack's view of the world," said Obama's longtime friend Marty Nesbitt. "It will be open and accommodating, and it will reflect what America looks like, which is broad and diverse. That is not because of some overt strategy, but that is because of who Barack is."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/18/AR2009011802547_pf.html

[GetTheRightVote]

1. In my family Obama is thought to be white, black and Hawaian

as well. He is so many things at one time in one man that he is a living example of the mix that makes us the United States of American. In him is represented so much of what we are together. He represents all of us not just those who share in his being black

:kick: