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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThis Was a Different Barack Obama. A Stick-Swinging, Old-Testament Obama.
Charles Pierce:
After reviewing Lewis long life of service, and after acknowledging that some people might find what he was about to say inappropriate to the occasionit wasn'tObama got down to it.
Bull Connor may be gone, but today, we witnessed with our own eyes police officers kneeling on the necks of Black Americans. George Wallace may be gone, but we can witness our federal government sending agents to use tear gas and batons against peaceful demonstrators. We may no longer have to guess the number of jellybeans in the jar in order to cast a ballot, but even as we sit here, there are those in power who are doing their darnedest to discourage people from voting by closing polling locations and targeting minorities and students with restrictive ID laws and attacking our voting rights with surgical precision, even undermining the Postal Service in the run-up to an election thats gonna be dependent on mail-in ballots so people dont get sick...
...[But] once the Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act, some state legislators unleashed a flood of laws designed specifically to make voting hard, especially by the way, state legislators where theres a lot of minority turnout and population growth. Thats not necessarily a mystery or an accident. It was an attack on what John fought for, it was an attack on our democratic freedoms, and we should treat it as such. If politicians want to honor John, and Im so grateful for the legacy and work of all the Congressional leaders who are here, but theres a better way than a statement calling him a hero. Wanna honor John? Lets honor him by revitalizing the law that he was willing to die for.
Naming it the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, that is a fine tribute. But John wouldnt want us to stop there, getting back to where we already were. Once we pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, we should keep marching to make it even better, by making sure that every American is automatically registered to vote, including former inmates whove earned their second chance, by adding polling places and expanding early voting and making Election Day a national holiday so if you are somebody whos working in a factory, or youre a single mom whos gotta go to her job and then get time off, you can still cast your ballot, by guaranteeing that every American citizen has equal representation in our government, including our American citizens who live in Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. Theyre Americans. By ending some of the partisan gerrymandering so that all voters have the power to choose their politicians, not the other way around. If all this takes eliminating the filibuster, another Jim Crow relic, in order to secure the God-given rights of every American, then thats what we should do.
I may be forgetting some moment or another, but I dont think I ever heard a speech like that from Barack Obamadirect, forceful, and utterly uncompromising, taking on the malignancy in the White House, and the party that made that malignancy inevitable, without ever mentioning any names, situating all of them at the wrong end of the bridge across which the country once followed John Lewis, the one that passes through chaos and gets us to the other side.
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a33473426/barack-obama-john-lewis-eulogy/
The full eulogy is transcribed here: https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2020/07/john-lewiss-funeral
Damn, it's powerful.
abqtommy
(14,118 posts)laid out the extent of the tRUMP/reTHUG/sPUTIN conspiracy to ratfuck over our whole country...
CaliforniaPeggy
(149,831 posts)I could not listen today, but I got to hear it anyway, inside my heart and my head.
Pacifist Patriot
(24,654 posts)hearing and watching Obama eulogize John Lewis. I have no doubt Lewis would have approved heartily.
lunasun
(21,646 posts)tblue37
(65,552 posts)spanone
(135,950 posts)Bernardo de La Paz
(49,075 posts)MFGsunny
(2,356 posts)"good trouble" is always like that ... even the agree!
crickets
(25,993 posts)Pepsidog
(6,254 posts)LiberalArkie
(15,739 posts)Renew Deal
(81,900 posts)If Dems can accomplish this in 2 years, it will be a success. There are a few more things, but DC and PR statehood, election protections, and getting rid of the filibuster would be huge accomplishments. We also need a massive infrastructure modernization act.
Roy Rolling
(6,943 posts)He is great. This was a call to action, in another famous eulogy he sang Amazing Grace.
That is what we lovehes a genuine human being with a true range of emotions.
Response to muriel_volestrangler (Original post)
Chin music This message was self-deleted by its author.
paleotn
(18,015 posts)The John Lewis Voting Rights Act.
warmfeet
(3,321 posts)I would rather swing some sticks than roll over and die from Covid-19.
H2O Man
(73,709 posts)NNadir
(33,587 posts)it was very powerful, and seemed delivered without notes.
It was a huge contrast with that tongue tied fool in the White House and his 4th grade vocabulary.