Oh Lord here it comes.....

[TERA]

Obama tells black fathers to engage their children

By CHRISTOPHER WILLS, Associated Press Writer Sun Jun 15, 3:31 PM ET

CHICAGO - Barack Obama celebrated Father's Day by calling on black fathers, who he said are "missing from too many lives and too many homes," to become active in raising their children.
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"They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it," the Democratic presidential candidate said Sunday at a largely black church in his hometown.
Reminding the congregation of his firsthand experience growing up without a father, Obama said he was lucky to have loving grandparents who helped his mother. He got support, second chances and scholarships that helped him get an education. Obama's father left when he was 2.
"A lot of children don't get those chances. There is no margin for error in their lives," said Obama, an Illinois senator.
"I resolved many years ago that it was my obligation to break the cycle — that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father to my girls," added Obama, whose daughters, Sasha and Malia, and his wife, Michelle, watched from the audience.
Obama's appearance at the Apostolic Church of God was his first address to a church since he ended his membership at Trinity United Church of Christ, where he had worshipped for 20 years, following inflammatory remarks there by his former longtime pastor and others.
Obama frequently emphasized the importance of God in his life and ended the speech by asking the congregation to "Pray for me. Pray for Michelle."
Obama often speaks about the importance of parental involvement. In Washington, he sponsored legislation to get more child support money to children by offering a tax credit for fathers who pay support, more efficient collection and penalties for fathers who don't meet their obligations.
The issue adds to his family values credentials and lets voters see him delivering a stern message to black voters.
"We can't simply write these problems off to past injustices," Obama said Sunday. "Those injustices are real. There's a reason our families are in disrepair ... but we can't keep using that as an excuse."
Obama urged black parents to demand the best from themselves and their children.
He compared it to his own presidential campaign and early comments from black voters who said they liked him but didn't think a black man could ever be elected president. He said they were admitting defeat before the competition had even begun.
"That was when I wasn't black enough. Now I'm too black," he said in a joking aside.
He said parents who proudly tell him their child gets great grades, all B's, should encourage them even more.
"All B's? Is that the highest grade?" Obama said. "It's great that you can get a B, but you can get a better grade. It's great that you've got a job, but you can get a better job."

[TERA]

Dare I say it.....but, all those who voted for Obama...many of you are going to end up wishing you voted for Clinton.

[outdoors]

awwww......fuck.....

[TERA]

Yep. There's so much wrong with what Obama just said that I don't even know where to start.

[RedRooster]

a good start would be for Obama's daddy to come out of the shadows and whip his black ass!

This man has father issues. From the widest abstractions to the make-up of an individuals character, the truth shines through.

[TERA]

There is something about this guy that is deeply unsettling, and before any of you accuse me of being racist, nothing could be further from the truth. What is unsettling, I think, is that his words and his behavior do not sem to match his beliefs...what is he really going to do once he's president? Does anyone really know?

[TERA]

A woman's intuition isn't always correct, I know....but I sense he has a fairly large, elaborate hidden agenda.

[gwallan]

Get ready folks...

"In many ways, he really will be the first woman president," Megan Beyer of Virginia, a charter member of Women for Obama, told reporters.

Think the Gender War Is Over? Think Again
By SUSAN FALUDI
Published: June 15, 2008

FOR months, our political punditry foresaw one, and only one, prospective gender contest looming in the general election: between the first serious female presidential candidate and the Republican male “warrior.” But those who were dreading a plebiscite on sexual politics shouldn’t celebrate just yet. Hillary Clinton may be out of the race, but a Barack Obama versus John McCain match-up still has the makings of an epic American gender showdown.

The reason is a gender ethic that has guided American politics since the age of Andrew Jackson. The sentiment was succinctly expressed in a massive marble statue that stood on the steps of the United States Capitol from 1853 to 1958. Named “The Rescue,” but more commonly known as “Daniel Boone Protects His Family,” the monument featured a gigantic white pioneer in a buckskin coat holding a nearly naked Indian in a death’s grip, while off to the side a frail white woman crouched over her infant.

The question asked by this American Sphinx to all who dared enter the halls of leadership was, “Are you man enough?” This year, Senator Obama has notably refused to give the traditional answer.

The particulars of that masculine myth were established early in American politics. While the war hero-turned-statesman is a trope common to many countries in many eras, it has a particular quality and urgency here, based on our earliest history, when two centuries of Indian wars brought repeated raids on frontier settlements and humiliating failures on the part of the young nation’s “protectors” to fend off those attacks or rescue captives. The architects of American culture papered over this shaming history by concocting what would become our prevailing national security fantasy — personified by the ever-vigilant white frontiersman who, by triumphing over the rapacious “savage” and rescuing the American maiden from his clutches, redeemed American manhood.

Aspirants to the White House have long known they must audition for the Boone role in the “Rescue” tableau. Those who have pulled off a persuasive performance, from Jackson to Teddy Roosevelt to Dwight Eisenhower to John F. Kennedy, have proved victorious at the ballot box. Even candidates lacking in martial bona fides have understood the need to try to fake it with the appropriate accessories — riding high in the saddle (Ronald Reagan), commanding tanks (Michael Dukakis), wielding shotguns (John Kerry) or brandishing chainsaws and donning flight suits (you know who).

Senator McCain may fit the model better than anyone. After all, he actually starred in a real-life captivity narrative, having withstood five and a half years of imprisonment by non-white tormentors, declining special treatment and coming home a hero. “I have seen men’s hopes tested in hard and cruel ways that few will ever experience,” he declared from the hustings. A 12-minute video on his Web site dwells on how his faith in the “fathers” and his will “to fight to survive” got the young Navy pilot through Vietcong bayonetings, bone smashings and bondage.

The story’s appeal is evident in the flood of news media adulation. The worshipful tone of the last Newsweek cover article on Mr. McCain is typical. The subtitle: “He’s Endured the Unendurable and Survived.” As the liberal television watchdog group Media Matters for America has noted, the press is most reverent about the candidate’s humble refusal to trumpet his captivity — even as his campaign advertises it freely.

Although Senator McCain didn’t rescue any helpless maidens, he outdid even Daniel Boone in averting emasculating domination. Boone was a captive for only a few months, and was widely suspected by his contemporaries of having enjoyed his time with the Shawnees rather too much (he was adopted by the Shawnee chief and evidently passed up several opportunities for escape).

Senator Obama, for his part, will not be cast as the avenging hero in “The Rescue” any time soon — and not because of the color of his skin or his lack of military experience. He doesn’t seem to want the role. You don’t see him crouching in a duck blind or posing in camouflage duds or engaging in anything more gladiatorial than a game of pick-up basketball. If Mr. Obama’s candidacy seeks to move beyond race, it also moves beyond gender. A 20-minute campaign Web documentary showcased a President Obama who would exude “a real sensitivity” and “empathy” and provide a world safe for the American mother’s son. Mr. Obama is surrounded in the video by pacifist — not security — moms.

If Mr. Obama’s campaign has fashioned any master narrative, it’s that of the young man in the bower of a matriarchy — raised by a “strong” mother, bolstered by a “strong” sister, married to a “strong” wife and proud of his “strong” daughters. (Bill Clinton had a similar story, although his handlers highlighted his efforts to save his mother from domestic violence.)

“In many ways, he really will be the first woman president,” Megan Beyer of Virginia, a charter member of Women for Obama, told reporters. An op-ed essay in The New York Post headlined “Bam: Our 1st Woman Prez?” came to a similar conclusion, if a tad more snidely: “Those shots of Barack and Michelle sitting with Oprah on stools had the feel of a smart, all-women talk panel.”

Hillary Clinton’s candidacy showed that a woman, too, can play the tough-guy protector. But Mr. Obama takes the iconoclasm a step further — by suggesting that martial swagger isn’t what America needs anymore.

In the campaign ahead, expect a fierce Republican effort to reinstate the nation’s guardian myth — by demonstrating how the other party’s candidate fails to fit the formula. Had Mrs. Clinton been the candidate, she would no doubt have faced more attacks for being too mannishly abrasive or, conversely, too emotional to play the manly role. But Mr. Obama should expect similar damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t gender assaults. He will be cast either as the epicene metrosexual who can’t protect the country or else as the modern heathen with a suspicious middle name.

The attacks are already under way, as is evident if one enters the words “Obama” and “effeminate” into a search engine. The effeminacy canard lurks in Mike Huckabee’s imaginings of Mr. Obama tripping off a chair and diving for the floor when confronted by a gunman, and in the words of Tucker Bounds, Mr. McCain’s campaign spokesman, who depicted Mr. Obama as “hysterical.”

News media blatherers and bloggers are taking up the theme. On MSNBC, Tucker Carlson called Mr. Obama “kind of a wuss”; Joe Scarborough, the morning TV talk show host, dubbed Mr. Obama’s bowling style “prissy” and declared, “Americans want their president, if it’s a man, to be a real man”; and Don Imus, the radio host, never one to be outdone in the sexual slur department, dubbed Mr. Obama a “sissy boy.”

Will such attacks succeed? The wild card in the campaign drama to come is 9/11, which for a while kicked us into Daniel Boone overdrive. But in recent years, the dangers and costs of that prolonged delusion have become painfully apparent. In the primaries, a substantial portion of Democratic voters turned away from the dictates of “The Rescue.” In choosing between Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain in the general election, Americans will pass a referendum on 200 years of bedrock gender mythology.

[shaazam]

"There is something about this guy that is deeply unsettling, and before any of you accuse me of being racist, nothing could be further from the truth. What is unsettling, I think, is that his words and his behavior do not sem to match his beliefs...what is he really going to do once he's president? Does anyone really know?"

a clue would be to see who was sponsoring him !

aka Oprah

[TERA]

Here are some comments posted about this story:

In a stern Father's Day address, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., told an African-American congregation today that too many fathers -- including his own -- have failed their children. "They've abandoned their responsibilities," said Obama, the putative Democratic nominee for president. "They're acting like boys instead of men, and the foundations of our families have suffered because of it. You and I know this is true, but nowhere is it more true than in the African-American community." The... < Back to Story

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The Church I go to is well mixed if you want to know: my Pastor is first Christian, second a strong American, and and third Spanish. Our United Pentecostal Church closely represents the population percentages but not exactly. So what! I hope Mr. Obamas new church is alot better than his last one. Their pride goes before their fall. Mr. Obama spoke well about the fatherless issues, not in pride, but in a sincere humility. Unfortunately, if I were to say this or that 29% of federal prison inmates are illegal mexicans, since I look white, well then I'd be a racist, wouldn't I? Yes, and you know it! What i'm saying is that let's all take the chip off our shoulder and let's really hear what a persons' heart is saying, not how they look! No, I won't vote for Mr. Obama but at times he certainly does seem like a fine person!
Posted by:
jose-canyousee 1:02 AM
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Obama: which is it? Have an abortion "to avoid being punished with a baby" or "step up and be a dad"? Any wind will blow this man - he is not a man of principle. A man as fickle as Obama should not become president.
Posted by:
ServusMariae 12:50 AM
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Obama seems to be the kind of leader that always sets the right tone. For me the presidency is less about experience and more about leadership and management. If you give Obama and McCain the same cabinet, I think he will do a better job of setting them in the right direction and allowing them to function as a team. He has all the signs of a great one.
Posted by:
StaffordAp 12:49 AM
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Amen my brother!
Posted by:
StaffordAp 12:45 AM
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Excellent Speech! I hope his presidency helps to elevate all people. As an african american I am happy to hear this message and agree with him wholeheartedly.
Posted by:
Rustacan 12:38 AM
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Why is it every time there's an article on Obama it has to be seasoned by a bunch of no-hopers whose posts amount to no more than "I don't like him". I'm interested in him. I have no interest in you whatsoever.
Posted by:
panorama276 12:19 AM
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See you have clowns on here talking about Sen.Obama speaking at a church, well if you'll would walk thru a door of a church then you can open your mouth. And next on the list is that, I'm glad to see him back in church and the message he gave in church today was a very fine one and to the point. You'll need to get McSane in a church because I think he don't remember where on is "C-Nile" and take Cindy with you'll she need Jesus because stealing is a sin. Anyone have her number I need them good drugs. I'm in pain
Posted by:
pookieduke1 12:18 AM
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dantheman, if I want a know-nothing "school-of-life" president I'll vote for a New York cab driver. They're the ones who think they "really" know how to tun the country. Do I want my president to be "elite"? You bet your life. We've tried eight years with an idiot. Let's have a few with an intelligent man.
Posted by:
panorama276 12:12 AM
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As a member of the BAR association, Obama is as guilty as the next BAR member of turning families in America upside down and divorce into a $700B/yr industry. This issue is broad and not racially based as far as I can see. The legal bias against men in this society has damaged the family unit beyond comprehension. Obama does not have a clue as he is part of the ruling class, members of the BAR association, whose first obligation is to the bench and everything else second. Unfortunately we have no real choice for leader this election season. I will write in Ron Paul if nothing else.
Posted by:
Guesswhotoo6 12:09 AM
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