Obama: Father from Africa, Mother from Kansas

[mopaul]

a half black, half white man, an american man. we white people all have a little black blood in us, and vice versa. we all know, but rarely admit, that like thomas jefferson himself, we co-mingled by fate, as all races did when they first made contact, thousands of years ago, and recently.

i have seminole blood in my heritage i've been told, but i've always had an affinity for black music, and surely, i have some african blood. surely we can all see the beautiful brown people of our nation, and see that they are not as black as nigerians. surely we can see navajos in our faces, and italians, and chinese and irish.

in the melting pot, we've melded and cooked up a soup of diversity, by fate or on purpose. soon, within our lifetimes, all white or all black or all italian people will become more rare, and we will all become ONE RACE by simply doing what we've always done, meeting one another, falling in love, and procreating.

many of us know people of 'mixed race'. it used to be extra taboo and considered shameful by some. no more. people used to stare shocked at the site of a black man holding a white woman's hand on the street. no more.

someday, the white man will allow a president who is not his color. it won't be long, the long white line will be accentuated with some other beautiful colors too. someday, a woman, someday, a gay man, someday it won't matter anymore.

Obama inspires me, no matter what his color or race or heritage. he's on fire inside and it's contagious with him. when we speak of leaders and trustees of our precious government, we speak of people like Obama, who are too rare.

he speaks for me, he speaks like i do. he came out of nowhere, just the other day, now untold potential surrounds him, now everyone knows his name. he is blowing my mind.

maybe he's a black man, maybe he's a white man, maybe it doesn't matter. he's a good man, and he makes me proud to hear him speak.
what is it about this man that moves me like no one else does? i don't know. but he gives me the chills people.

[Melodybe]

1. The media shills were calling him the Tiger Woods of the Dem. party

for once I agree. Obama will be part of our future, and a bright future at that.

[K-W]

4. I dont like that comparison one bit.

We have had great black leaders before who have energized people of all races behind them. Why was MLK not Tiger Woods? Why was Jesse Jackson not tiger woods?

Obama seems like a bright star, but I will believe he can destroy the glass ceiling when I see it.

[lapfog_1]

2. I have

Dutch, English, a touch of Irish, 1/4 Cherokee, 1/8 Blackfoot,
and I still dream of being a Mongol warrior. So what's up
with that?

[murielm99]

3. Did you see how united everyone was when he spoke?

Everyone stood. Everyone cheered.

He's the melting pot; he's the right symbol for the party of the big tent.

I think his mixed heritage calls to us as much as his intelligence and fire. He is all of us, but with with more charisma than any of us.

[NightTrain]

5. "we white people all have a little black blood in us"

God, I hope that's true. In fact, I hope I have a *lot* of it in me!

[SmileyBoy]

6. Unfortunately, I'm pure 50/50.

I know for a fact I have no African blood in me, unfortunately. I'm half-Turkish and half-Finnish. Father is a pure-blooded Turkish immigrant, and my mother is 100% Finnish, First-Generation American.

Apparently both my parents have pure Turkish/Finnish blood going back to at least the early 19th Century.

I wish I had a little black in me.:(

[ConsAreLiars]

7. Go back far enough

and we are all from Africa.

[DrWeird]

8. Obama's a black man.

At least he's black enough to make republicans try to stop him voting, had he lived in Florida, or elsewhere.

He's black enough to get pulled over for driving.

He's black enough that there's still plenty of people who would never vote for him, based solely on the color of his skin.

[JohnnyRingo]

9. As Barack himself said it:

When asked, he says he considers himself an African-American. "The reason that I've always been comfortable with that description is not a denial of my mother's side of the family," Obama told the New York Times. "Rather, it's just a belief that the term African-American is by definition a hybrid term. African-Americans are a hybrid people. We're mingled with African culture and Native American culture and European culture."

He added later: "If I was arrested for armed robbery and my mug shot was on the television screen, people wouldn't be debating if I was African-American or not. I'd be a black man going to jail. Now if that's true when bad things are happening, there's no reason why I shouldn't be proud of being a black man when good things are happening, too."

On edit... http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/special_packages/election2004/9257533.htm

[FrenchieCat]

10. I am bi-racial.....

like Obama. I am 1/2 White French (mom) and Black Martinique French (dad).....

My father left early too...and my mom, bro and I emmigrated to U.S. when I was a teen.

My mom wanted my bro and I to have a better opportunity at education.....and many people mistook my brother and I for Algerians...which in France, at the time (and still is), was worse than Being Black in the States, due to the war France fought with Algeria.

love my background and my story....abbreviated here....for sho'.

Loved that Obama. A dynamic fellow.

[Spider Jerusalem]

11. Eh...the concept of ethnicity is kind of meaningless.

It's more a means of cultural identification than anything else, it seems..in my own case, my ancestry is English, Irish, German, Scots, Dutch, Swiss, Morwegian, Swedish, Danish, Icelandic, Polish, Hungarian, Russian, Italian, Spanish, Turkish, Arab, and possibly Native American...and that's just the part I've been able to find out. And, since culture determines who you are more than ethnicity, I tend to agree with Ralph Ellison, who said something like "Whatever else the 'true American' is, he is also somehow black."