From my inbox: "I am a white man with an African American daughter"

I received this from a friend yesterday right after Obama's speech. The author has given me permission to post it.

You know, Kim, I have been reading and following political speeches for almost 50 years. Yup, I was the kind of weird eight year-old who even sat there parsing John F. Kennedy’s acceptance of the democratic nomination at Los Angeles in 1960. And I really am realistic about what one speech can accomplish.

On the other hand, I know the power of a speech to turn a moment on its head and take an entire society and culture in a different direction. Most of the time, speeches are calculated, cautious, boilerplate that try to be all things to all people, and consequently become nothing to nobody.

But I really do believe that Obama’s speech this morning was a deeply important moment in the history of race in America . I’m not saying it will do what it needs to do for him. But it just might.

Think back. When have you ever heard a politician speak in such a straightforward manner about the persistent and insidious racism that hides and multiplies in the nooks and crannies of private discourse and exists alongside all the public declarations of tolerance? This speech was like a laser that penetrated directly to our darkest core. Malcolm did it brilliantly, but long before a broad segment of America was ready.

This is the first speech I have ever heard in the midst of a of an American presidential campaign that laid out a rough road map for eventually escaping the tyranny and horror of persistent racism.

It really was a gutsy strategy. I have worked in politics and I know that that temptation to simply throw Revered Wright over the side of the boat must, among Obama’s advisers, have been at least discussed seriously. But not only did he not do that, he made a high stakes bet that white and black Americans might be ready for a much more difficult and painful speech, in which the rawness of racism was exposed rather than glossed over, in which he would turn over other rock with all the worms underneath rather than piling a bunch of new rocks on top.

You want to talk raw? He even referred to the racial stereotypes and comments he heard from the family members who were his earliest and most generous providers of love and support.

Right now, I could not be more interested in how this speech is received. For once, a politician did not deny all this ugliness, and make some meaningless statement about all the progress that has been made, but brought our darkest places out into the sunlight.

I am a white man with an African-American daughter. And I have never really had much hope that I would ever be able to walk through my neighborhood without someone assuming either that she was my housekeeper or my experiment in jungle fever.

I know that Obama’s raw speech is no magic elixir. But he opened a door that cautious and cowardly politicians for decades – afraid of the perilous racial divide and afraid of offending – have never opened before.

I just wonder. Is America ready for these kinds of raw and naked emotions? Do they (we) want to face the racial ugliness and jokes and stereotypes that still thrive at our dinner tables, in locker rooms, or at family reunions. I just don’t know. This was a challenge to walk with him down a very perilous and scary road.

I’m ready.