The Zen of Obama, Part 2

Now, however, Obama doesn't seem bowed by the weight of expectations.
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So my question is, are you travelling around with him on the Fast Train to President Town?
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I mean, it sounds like, from your post, that you were a little closer to him then - a church setting, as opposed to part of a crowd of millions. Or is there context that I'm missing?

I don't know a lot of African Americans who see Obama as the new King so who exactly are you talking about?
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MLK was a religious figure, a civil rights leader, and a moral guide to all of America. Obama is the next president of the U.S. and while I see him as a civil man and a leader, he is not a civil rights leader. He is a politician who has taken a number of clearly moral positions but other than that or are you saying that civil rights leader is the only role for an African American to play?

MLK was working for a world where there is no Official Black Person of the United States of America.

When you were in seminary, I assume you were warned about the danger of attempting to psychologize Jesus (see "Historical Jesus, Quest For the"). Doesn't work real well with people, either.

What the good Friar said.
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And, I don't think you want an apostrophe in the theirs in the next to last sentence. Or, perhaps you do.

Very well written Amy. I think that Obama is the successor to Martin Luther King Jr, but now it isn't civil rights and equality for African Americans that is his burden. It's the weight of the world. All of us desperately need a figure we can pin our hopes on because it looks so bleak right now. Barack can't even appear to be bowed by the expectations we have of him. He realizes that his words and calm, self-control are part and parcel of the assurances we need that everything is going to eventually turn around. All Americans want to run so that our children can fly again. I can't even imagine the pressure Obama is under. I also can't believe how well he is handling it.

I have to believe Obama has a relative perspective. If you're an average, untrained driver then running around an oval at over two hundred miles an hour inches from other cars that are doing the same and doing it for hours would probabably be impossible to even comprehend. If you are unafraid of people and especially people with power, if you understand the psychology of great and small, understand their motives, and understand why others don't want them to succeed then you can apply that to everything from running a lemonade stand to President of the United States. If you have confidence and imagination that helps too.

At least going in, I don't think Obama feels the weight as much as we might think. If you're open minded and a pragmatist the solution will reveal itself. Obama knows that. Sometimes it's enough to try to find the best way down the rapids. You're not going to go upstream. Obama knows that too.

By the way, I think he's a President that happens to have black skin. Isn't that true, or are his beliefs, speech, eating habits, mode of dress, and the kind of car he drives predetermined by his skin color? Is that why he's supposed to be Martin Luther King?

"It seemed not quite preposturous but definitely a heavy burden to place on the slight shoulders of the young man from Illinois."
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"preposterous," I tkink, although "preposturous" sounds intriguing.

FWIW, here's the speech from an earlier thread:
http://www.barackobama.com/2008/01/20/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_40.php

I'm thinking the copy editors have been out confirming reports of the DC bars being open around the clock.
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And, btw, Joshua had things pretty well in hand by Jericho. So there's that.

I am white, so there is no way I would even try to work out or imagine how the election and thankfully soon to come inauguration of Barack Obama appears and feels to African Americans, especially those around my age (mid 50s) and older. I revere Martin Luther King, Jr.'s life and legacy, and Obama may be a realization of parts of King's dreams (and of the dreams of the brave and bloodied civil rights movement he and others led), but I think the greatest success of that work comes from the fact that Obama can step from that historical platform to a much larger stage. Irrespective of race and background, Barack Obama is the President of the United States, he is my President, if you like (and I am enormously happy that he is). I think to see Obama and his role in the world today through a lens based in part on the role of Martin Luther King in US history is fundamentally mistaken. That may be the way to tell the historical story, the "narrative arc" as they say, but Obama as a political leader and as a political agent stepped away from that arc a long time ago. This is not to say that the joy with which people of all races view Obama's success is unrelated to the admiration they feel for the cruel struggles that Dr King and the civil rights movement fought. But I frankly think that incessant discussion of Obama as the "heir of King" etc does more to shackle Obama's possibilities and opportunities than to enlarge and clarify them.

Also, while Obama may be "young," Dr. King was younger at the time of his death.