African-American Voters Video & Audio
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Tough campaigning
ABC political consultant Torie Clarke talks with WBZ's Ed Walsh about John McCain's new campaign tactics.
Audio|Thu, 31 Jul 2008|More from WBZ's More on This
|African American Votefound at3:11
“…for elegance and he certainly has completely wrapped up the in the African American vote. . So how does McCain countered that. …”
Braude Beat: McCain's health a concern for voters?
(NECN: Jim Braude) - In this segment of the Braude Beat we're discuss presidential politics. Barack Obama is back on US soil and John McCain changing his position on affirmative action. Jim Braude joins us now to talk more. Obama's tr...
Video|Mon, 28 Jul 2008|More from Boston.com
|African American Votefound at3:03
“…should say but I think it's pretty safe to say that the African American vote is pretty well locked up from -- Obama's side of things what could he could be a serious medical issues that -- …”
The American Exception, Again
Barack Obama at the Victory Column in Berlin just now marks another stage of "rejoining the world" and "rebranding" the American voice out there on the globe. It's an astonishingly rapid transition in these dog days of July, 2008. Obama on tour is becoming "the cause of all mankind," as Thomas Paine once said of our country. What would it mean, or require, for Americans to see ourselves this way again? This is the puzzle Ted Widmer sets himself in Ark of the Liberties , whose title comes with express irony from lines that Herman Melville wrote with irony as well, in White Jacket : "And we Americans are the peculiar, chosen people -- the Israel of our time; we bear the ark of the liberties of the world... We are the pioneers of untried things, to break a new path in the New World that is ours." Click to listen to Chris's conversation with Ted Widmer (38 minutes, 17 mb p3) Ted Widmer     Ted Widmer, curator of the John Carter Brown Library at Brown, is a connoisseur of political rhetoric -- an American historian and, among other things, editor of the Library of America's compendium of great speeches. I put it to him in conversation: who thinks we're "the last best hope of earth" after the war in Iraq? Who looks at our pretty lowly rank in international measures of equality and life expectancy, and says: "lead on, America!" What is it that is still exceptional about this world nation of ours? Do we even want to be exceptional anymore? And would a President Obama make us feel more comfortable with the neighbors, more like them, or yet rarer, more blessedly peculiar? The world has become a lot more like us. We are more like the world and the world is more like us. Democracy is successful on every continent, immigration exists everywhere, most countries have constitutions and very few monarchies are left on earth. One hundred years ago, it was still a relatively rare thing to have a self-sustaining democracy with its own constitution. So our model has won. We won in a million ways in the 20th century and other countries are like us. I'm hopeful that if [Obama] is elected, it will lead to the latest American renaissance and that it will inspire people again in our capacity to lead. I think that was badly damaged, but I now object to a lot of books by liberals, even though I am a democrat. There's this huge wave of pessimism crashing over the marketplace and you can't walk into a bookstore without seeing 20 books about how we blew it... Ted Widmer in conversation with Chris Lydon at Brown University, July, 2008. I reminded Ted Widmer, and myself, that the great William James thought we'd blown it, and exposed the fraud of "exceptionalism," in the occupation of the Philippines a century ago. "God dam the U.S. for its vile conduct," James fulminated (anticipating Reverend Jeremiah Wright in the taking of prophetic liberties with his language). James went to the heart of the "exceptional" question: We used to believe... that we were of a different clay from other nations, that there was something deep in the American heart that answered to our happy birth, free from that hereditary burden which the nations of Europe bear, and which obliges them to grow by preying on their neighbors. Idle dream! pure Fourth of July fancy, scattered in five minutes by the first temptation. In every national soul there lie potentialities of the most barefaced piracy, and our own American soul is no exception to the rule. Angelic impulses and predatory lusts divide our heart exactly as they divide the hearts of other countries. It is good to rid ourselves of cant and humbug, and to know the truth about ourselves. Political virtue does not follow geographical divisions. It follows the eternal division inside of each country between the tory and the liberal tendencies, the jingoism and animal instinct that would run things by main force and brute possession, and the critical conscience that believes in educational methods and in rational rules of right. William James, "Address on the Philippine Question" in William James: Writings 1902 - 1910, Library of America. Ted Widmer remembered that Mark Twain, too, went volcanic about the Philippines and the imperial transformation of the American eagle. Twain's revision of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" began, "Mine eyes have seen the orgy of the launching of the Sword / He is searching out the hoardings where the stranger's wealth is stored..." Mark Twain was very angry about the Philippines. America's most beloved writer in many ways, and yet he had a most acute political conscience… He might have had to explain to a judge in 2008 why he was writing the anti-governmental things that he was writing around the time of the Philippines insurrection, which was the ugly aftermath to the Spanish American War. Those guys are brilliant and, I think, with William James you get something closer to what the Puritans would have said, which I find a more honest message, and it's what Lincoln was saying too, which is that if you believe that God is favoring you more highly, then you also have further to fall and you have a higher accountability. It seems to me that we're lacking the accountability. We're trying to take the good part of this and we're rejecting the other part that comes with it. Lincoln, many of the Puritans and William James all felt that if we're failing to live up to our incredible, special position in the world - we're so lucky, we live far from all these other wars, we have so many natural resources, we have this great system of government - if we're screwing it up, God's going to be very angry at us. And that I just find a more honest way of looking at it. There's a dark side of exceptionalism as well as a light side. Ted Widmer in conversation with Chris Lydon at Brown University, July, 2008.
Audio|Thu, 24 Jul 2008|More from Open Source
|Black Votersfound at20:17
“…At the very beginning of his campaign it was very unclear that black voters would vote for him he had seen black enough. Then they switched very quickly in huge numbers that he certainly seemed like …”
07/17/08
Jim and Margery Podcast for 07/17/08 - Margery talks about Jesse Jackson reportedly using the "N word" in an off-air conversation during a television interview. Is there a double standard when it comes to language and race in America?
Audio|Thu, 17 Jul 2008|More from Jim & Margery Podcast
|Black Votersfound at10:09
“…'cause their women here's couple of these numbers. It is that before black voters have. A favorable opinion of Barack Obama by 80% only 30%. A white voters that they had a favorable. Opinion of Barack …”
Poll finds racial divisions on Obama's candidacy
(NECN: Alison King) - A New York Times/CBS News poll shows a majority of Americans agree that the country is ready for a black president. But, at the same time, the poll also finds racial divisions surrounding Barack Obama's candidacy. Th...
Video|Wed, 16 Jul 2008|More from Boston.com
|Black Votefound at1:35
“…Obama has been holding strong in national polls. With 94% of the black vote he still has a long way to go among whites you. …”
Obama meets with potential running mates
(NECN/ABC) - A new ABC news-Washington Post polls finds Barack Obama trailing John McCain when the subject is national security. So it's not surprising that senator Obama went campaigning today on precisely that theme--. Tough it may have ...
Video|Wed, 16 Jul 2008|More from Boston.com
|Black Votersfound at0:05
“…for the White House Senator John McCain is reaching out to black voters today speaking at the NAACP convention in Ohio. Meanwhile senator Barack Obama is talking national security as Christy -- Klein tells us …”
7/13/08: Guest: Faye Morrison
Jimmy Myers with guest: Faye Morrison, local delegate re; Jesse Jackson's controversial comments about Sen. Obama. 7/13/08.
Audio|Tue, 15 Jul 2008|More from Jimmy Myers
|Black Votefound at6:39
“…the the incident and religious. You know ninety some percent of the black vote has been the article that 3% obviously it's somewhere -- and that's their that's their right to do so the -- on …”
Obama to lay out opposition to Iraq war
(NECN) - Barack Obama will lay out his opposition to the Iraq war in a speech on Tuesday. The speech will set the stage for his upcoming visit to Iraq with Senators Jack Reed and Chuck Hagel. On Monday night, Obama renewed his call that...
Video|Tue, 15 Jul 2008|More from Boston.com
|African American Votefound at0:47
“…While Obama was courting the African American vote John McCain courted Hispanic vote yesterday he spoke to -- national council of the process. And defended his work with Senator Ted …”
6/04/08:V.P. = Not Hillary
Michael Graham has spoken. Hillary Clinton will not be Barack Obama's running mate. Here's why...
Audio|Wed, 4 Jun 2008|More from Michael Graham, WTKK, Boston, MA
|Black Votersfound at8:32
“…ain't gonna open a black guy he more than makes up from black voters -- guilty to White liberals who are going to vote form because he's black just as they did for double -- your …”
5/25/08 - Jimmy Myers Speaks With Faye Morrison
- Jimmy speaks with political analyst Faye Morrison. 5/25/08
Audio|Sun, 25 May 2008|More from Jimmy Myers
|African American Votersfound at6:55, 7:35
“…changes list. You know here's the candidate that is that in Africa African American voters in their thirties who have never vote in never been registered to register. And I think that's fantastic. …”
“…in Iowa she was beating it's almost from the one with the African American vote in those states. He has proved themselves against spot people on board he's been a good candidate and as saying. That he …”