Quotable

"Many commentators, and Obama’s own staff, seem to think the whole Wright association is a non-issue if Obama claims he does not agree and denounces Wright’s views, but I dissent: it is precisely because he does not agree that Obama’s two-decade participation in Rev. Wright’s church makes me question his character. I do not for one second believe the blatant fib that Obama was unaware of Wright’s beliefs or that he really considered Wright’s statements out-of-context. To Wright’s credit this week, he has been consistent: he has not hidden his positions or tried to nuance them, and I suspect they’ve been fairly consistent for the past two decades and then some. It’s obvious that Obama must have sat through some prime Wright rants, and whether he was smiling and applauding or maintaining a stoic silence we will never know, but it is irrelevant; he stayed because it was to his benefit, it fed his local base of power. Rev. Wright no longer feeds his power, and knows it; but Rev. Wright’s worldview is not subservient to the political ambitions of Barack Obama."

~ Pan Metron, The Democratic Daily

"If you help her rise, we will all rise together"

“I know that Sen. Clinton is a long-distance runner and however the odds may go and the polls may show, from day to night to tomorrow morning, I know she is in it for the long run," Angelou said. "I am with her for the long run."

Angelou ended the visit with some words of encouragement for her friend.

“If you help her rise, we will all rise together,” she said.

~ Maya Angelou

If being a progressive means anything

"In other words, this was a disgraceful episode. It was particularly sad to see a number of Obama supporters (though not the Obama campaign itself) join enthusiastically in the catcalls against Mrs. Clinton’s good-faith effort to put a human face on the cruelty and injustice of the American health care system.

Look, I know that many progressives have their hearts set on seeing Barack Obama get the Democratic nomination. But politics is supposed to be about more than cheering your team and jeering the other side. It’s supposed to be about changing the country for the better.

And if being a progressive means anything, it means believing that we need universal health care, so that terrible stories like those of Monique White, Trina Bachtel and the thousands of other Americans who die each year from lack of insurance become a thing of the past."

~ Paul Krugman, "Health Care Horror Stories"