Jolted by Deaths, Obama Found His Voice on Race

[DonViejo]

Tensions across the country prompted the president
to abandon his early reticence on race again and again.

By MICHAEL D. SHEAR and YAMICHE ALCINDOR

JAN. 14, 2017

WASHINGTON — Only weeks after 70 million Americans chose a black man for president, shattering a racial barrier that had stood for the entirety of the nation’s 232-year history, no one in the White House, especially the man in the Oval Office, wanted to talk about race.

President Obama had made a pragmatic calculation in January 2009, as the financial crisis drove communities across the United States toward economic collapse. Whatever he did for African-Americans, whose neighborhoods were suffering more than others, he would not describe as efforts to specifically help Black America.

Mr. Obama made the decision knowing how powerfully his election had raised the hopes of African-Americans — and knowing that no matter what he did, it would not be seen as enough.

“I remember thinking, ‘They are going to hate us one day,’” said Melody Barnes, who is black and served as Mr. Obama’s first domestic policy adviser, recalling her sadness when she stood in an auditorium in those early months as a crowd cheered for the success of the new president. “I knew that we couldn’t do everything that people wanted to meet those expectations.”

Continue reading the story
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/14/us/politics/obama-presidency-race.html?emc=edit_ta_20170114&nlid=57435284&ref=cta&_r=0

[underthematrix]

1. This is one of the reasons me and my husband read the entire Bible every year

because otherwise I would hate pretty much every one Dem, Repub, Indie, and undeclared.

There's something evil about ignorant people. They can't seem to appreciate the complexity of the world. They only see it in terms of their own feelings or interests.

[Wellstone ruled]

2. This is what the real truth looks like

my friends.