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Editorial: Obama eloquently addresses race issues

March 19, 2008

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It was a speech Barack Obama had to give. There was no way a black man within striking distance of a major party nomination for president of the United States was going to get much closer to the nation's ultimate political prize without, at some point, talking frankly about race in America.

Obama did that yesterday. He did it honestly. He did it eloquently. And the nation will be better for it if enough of us accept his challenge to strive to "form a more perfect union," by dealing forthrightly with the uncomfortable and explosive issue.

Obama condemned, as he should, the racially incendiary statements of his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. He decried Wright's "profoundly distorted view of the country ... that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America." Still, Obama refused to disown the man who, he said, expressed the anger and bitterness of many blacks who, like Wright, came of age in a segregated America. Many black people may like that Obama didn't flinch.

But he was really trying yesterday to reach across the racial divide. Obama was talking to white voters in an effort to regain the high ground for his candidacy, which has been roiled in recent days by the controversy Wright's comments ignited.

Obama candidly observed that a similar anger exists within some segments of the white community, for instance, when people are told that a very real fear of crime in urban areas is prejudiced. And in a bid for the votes of white working-class men, he cited their anger when they believe an African-American is getting an advantage in landing a good job because of an injustice they themselves never committed.

The complex calculus of racial animus in this nation is real. And it is powerful. And, as Obama said, "to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races." This nation needs to bridge that chasm. One speech won't do it. Nor will one candidacy. But it would help if we stop using race as a political cudgel.

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