Quite The Speech (JM)

Ben Smith over at Politico posted the full text of Obama's race and religion speech he gave in Philly today. It was a shockingly good defense of the entire Rev. Wright situation and just an excellent speech in general. It got a bit too Obamaesque towards the end, but as someone who just hasn't been as impressed by his speechmaking as pretty much everyone else the universe let me say, this was very very impressive. He took a strong stand in defense of Wright, he rejected certain viewpoints and he contextualized the place where Rev. Wright and the black community was coming from. It was sophisticated and nuanced, something I have thought lacking in much of Obama's campaign rhetoric heretofore.

The media is going to eat this speech up. The question is, will it make a difference? Racism is racism and in the end this speech, while a rousing defense and explanation of the entire situation, serves in the end to remind people of division. It comes down to just how sophisticated are voters with racially biases. So in the end I am not sure this takes Wright out of Hillary or the GOP's arsenal, but it does make me feel much more comfortable about how Obama will handle GOP attacks going forward.