Obama's Own Words: For Nonsupporters: Part III

For all those persons who had neither the time nor the
inclination to read over 480 pages of Barack Obama's first book,
here are some quotations taken from that book, "Dreams from My
Father:  A Story of Race and Inheritance", by Barack Obama,
published by Three Rivers Press, New York, New York, Copyright
1995, 2004, paperback edition, ISBN 978-1-4000-8277-3 (Original
edition ISBN 1-4000-8277-3).  For your information, in 1995,
Barack Obama was 34 years old. 

This "Part III" covers Chapters 15 to Epilogue of the book. 

[PRELIMINARY NOTE:  I have CAPITALIZED WORDS that I want to
emphasize.  These words were NOT capitalized by Obama]. 

Page 301: 
On his way to Kenya, Obama is thinking about his conversation
with a young British passenger seated beside him on the plane.
The British passenger is a student of geology who is on his way
to a mine in South Africa, and Obama states: 

"How much could I blame him for wanting to better his lot?  MAYBE
I WAS JUST ANGRY BECAUSE OF HIS EASY FAMILIARITY WITH ME, his
assumption that I, as an American, even a black American, might
naturally share in his dim view of Africa; an assumption that in
his world at least marked a progress of sorts, but that for me
only underscored MY OWN UNEASY STATUS:  A WESTERNER NOT ENTIRELY
AT HOME IN THE WEST, AN AFRICAN ON HIS WAY TO A LAND FULL OF
STRANGERS."

Bottom of page 301 to top of page 302: 
After travelled in Europe for more than a week, Obama states: 

"I began to suspect that my European stop was just one more means
of delay, one more attempt to avoid coming to terms with the Old
Man.  Stripped of language, stripped of work and routine--
stripped even of the RACIAL OBSESSIONS TO WHICH I'D BECOME SO
ACCUSTOMED AND WHICH I HAD TAKEN (PERVERSELY) AS A SIGN OF MY OWN
MATURATION--I HAD BEEN FORCED TO LOOK INSIDE MYSELF AND HAND
FOUND ONLY A GREAT EMPTINESS THERE.  WOULD THIS TRIP TO KENYA
FINALLY FILL THAT EMPTINESS?  The folks back in Chicago thought
so." 

Page 311: 
Obama, visiting Kenya for the first time, enjoying how he fit in
so comfortably in a black society, Obama states: 

"HERE THE WORLD WAS BLACK, AND SO YOU WERE JUST YOU; YOU COULD
DISCOVER ALL THOSE THINGS THAT WERE UNIQUE TO YOUR LIFE WITHOUT
LIVING A LIE OR COMMITTING BETRAYAL. 
How tempting, I thought, to fly away with this moment intact.  TO
HAVE THIS FEELING OF EASE WRAPPED UP AS NEATLY AS THE YOUNG MAN
WAS NOW WRAPPING AUMA'S NECKLACE, AND TAKE IT BACK WITH ME TO
AMERICA TO SLIP ON WHENEVER MY SPIRITS FLAGGED.  But of course,
that wasn't possible.  We finished our sodas.  Money changed
hands.  We left the marketplace.  The moment slipped away.  "

Page 312: 
In reflecting on his dislike of tourists in Kenya from Europe,
Asia, and America,  Obama states: 

"I took the opportunity to study the tourists as Auma and I sat
down for lunch in the outdoor cafe of the New Stanley Hotel.
THEY WERE EVERYWHERE--GERMANS, JAPANESE, BRITISH, AMERICANS--
TAKING PICTURES, HAILING TAXIS, FENDING OFF STREET PEDDLERS, MANY
OF THEM DRESSED IN SAFARI SUITS LIKE EXTRAS ON A MOVIE SET.  I
HAWAII, WHEN WE WERE STILL KIDS, MY FRIENDS AND I LAUGHED AT
TOURISTS LIKE THESE, WITH THEIR SUNBURNS AND THEIR PALE SKINNY
LEGS, BASKING IN THE GLOW OF OUR OBVIOUS SUPERIORITY.  HERE IN
AFRICA, THOUGH, THE TOURISTS DIDN'T SEEM SO FUNNY.  I FELT THEM
AS AN ENCROACHMENT, SOMEHOW; I FOUND THEIR INNOCENCE VAGUELY
INSULTING.  IT OCCURRED TO ME THAT IN THEIR UTTER LACK OF SELF-
CONSCIOUSNESS, THEY WERE EXPRESSING A FREEDOM THAT NEITHER AUMA
NOR I COULD EVER EXPERIENCE, A BEDROCK CONFIDENCE IN THEIR OWN
PARCHIALISM, A CONFIDENCE RESERVED FOR THOSE BORN INTO IMPERIAL
CULTURES." 

From the bottom of Page 316 to the top of Page 317: 
Discussing some aspects of his life back in America with his
relatives at dinner,  Obama states: 

"After the introductions were over, Jane pushed me toward a small
table set with bowls of goat curry, fried fish, collards, and
rice.  As we ate, people asked me about everyone back in Hawaii,
and I tried to describe my life in Chicago and my work as an
organizer.  They nodded politely but seemed a bit puzzled, SO I
MENTIONED THAT I'D BE STUDYING LAW AT HARVARD IN THE FALL."

Page 422: 
Obama recounts a narrative from his grandmother begun on page 406
about his father Barack senior and his grandfather, Barack
senior's father, named Onyango.  About his grandmother's
narrative, Obama states: 

"What happened in America, I cannot say.  I know that after less
than two years WE RECEIVED A LETTER FROM BARACK SAYING THAT HE
HAD MET THIS AMERICAN GIRL, ANN, AND THAT HE WOULD LIKE TO MARRY
HER.  Now, Barry, you have heard that your grandfather
disapproved of this marriage.  This is true, but it is not for
the reasons you say.  YOU SEE, ONYANGO DID NOT BELIEVE YOUR
FATHER WAS BEHAVING RESPONSIBLY.  HE WROTE BACK TO BARACK,
SAYING, "HOW CAN YOU MARRY THIS WHITE WOMAN WHEN YOU HAVE
RESPONSIBILITIES AT HOME?  WILL THIS WOMAN RETURN WITH YOU AND
LIVE AS A LUO WOMAN?  WILL SHE ACCEPT THAT YOU ALREADY HAVE A
WIFE AND CHILDREN?  I HAVE NOT HEARD OF WHITE PEOPLE
UNDERSTANDING SUCH THINGS." ."

Page 438: 
About his return to Chicago after his graduation from Harvard Law
School in about 1991, Obama states: 

"Upon my return to Chicago, I would find the signs of decay
accelerated throughout the South Side--the neighborhoods
shabbier, the children edgier and less restrained, more middle-
class families heading out to the suburbs, the jails bursting
with glowering youth, MY BROTHERS WITHOUT PROSPECTS.  All too
RARELY DO I HEAR PEOPLE ASKING just what it is that we've done to
make so many children's hearts so hard, or WHAT COLLECTIVELY WE
MIGHT DO TO RIGHT THEIR MORAL COMPASS--what values we must live
by.  INSTEAD I SEE US DOING WHAT WE'VE ALWAYS DONE--PRETENDING
THAT THESE CHILDREN ARE SOMEHOW NOT OUR OWN." 

Page 441: 
Describing his wedding to Michelle Robinson and one of the
guests, his half-brother Roy, Obama states: 

"THE PERSON WHO MADE ME PROUDEST OF ALL THOUGH, WAS ROY.
Actually, now we call him Abongo, his Luo name, for two years ago
HE DECIDED TO REASSERT HIS AFRICAN HERITAGE.  HE CONVERTED TO
ISLAM, and has sworn off pork and tobacco and alcohol.  He still
works at his accounting firm but TALKS ABOUT MOVING BACK TO KENYA
ONCE HE HAS ENOUGH MONEY."

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In Obama's Own Words:  for Nonsupporters:  Part II

For all those persons who had neither the time nor the
inclination to read over 480 pages of Barack Obama's first book,
here are some quotations taken from that book, "Dreams from My
Father:  A Story of Race and Inheritance", by Barack Obama,
published by Three Rivers Press, New York, New York, Copyright
1995, 2004, paperback edition, ISBN 978-1-4000-8277-3 (Original
edition ISBN 1-4000-8277-3).  For your information, in 1995,
Barack Obama was 34 years old. 

This "Part II" covers Chapters 9-14 of the book. 

[PRELIMINARY NOTE:  I have CAPITALIZED WORDS that I want to
emphasize.  These words were NOT capitalized by Obama]. 

Page 193: 
Relating to tensions in the black community between color
consciousness between blacks, such as good hair, bad hair; thick
lips or thin; if you're light, you're alright, if you're black,
get back, Obama states: 

"Later, I would realize that the position of most black students
in predominantly white colleges was already too tenuous, OUR
IDENTITIES TOO SCRAMBLED, to admit to ourselves that our black
pride remained incomplete.  And to admit our doubt and confusion
to whites, to open up our psyches to general examination by those
who had caused so much of the damage in the first place, seemed
ludicrous, itself AN EXPRESSION OF SELF-HATRED--for there seemed
no reason to expect that whites would look at our private
struggles as a mirror into their own souls, rather than yet MORE
EVIDENCE OF BLACK PATHOLOGY." 

Page 199: 
In writing about his discussions with a Black Muslim named Rafiq,
Obama states: 

"In a sense, then, RAFIQ WAS RIGHT when he insisted that, DEEP
DOWN, ALL BLACKS WERE POTENTIAL NATIONALISTS.  The anger was
there, bottled up and often turned inward.  And as I though about
Ruby and her blue eyes, the teenagers calling each other 'n i g g e r'
and worse, I wondered whether, for now at least Rafiq wasn't also
right in preferring that the anger be redirected; WHETHER A BLACK
POLITICS THAT SUPPRESSED RAGE TOWARD WHITES GENERALLY, or one
that failed to elevate race loyalty above all else, WAS A
POLITICS INADEQUATE TO THE TASK." 

Page 211: 
After Barack and his white girl friend, that he loved, whom he
had been seeing for almost a year, had seen a play by a black
playwright, they discussed the play, and Obama states: 

"After the play was over, my friend started talking about WHY
BLACK PEOPLE WERE SO ANGRY ALL THE TIME.  I said it was a matter
of remembering--NOBODY ASKS WHY JEWS REMEMBER THE HOLOCAUST, I
think I said--and she said that's different, and I said it
wasn't, and she said that anger was just a dead end.  WE HAD A
BIG FIGHT, RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE THEATER.  When we got back to
the car she started crying.  She couldn't be black, she said.
She would if she could, but she couldn't.  She could only be
herself, and wasn't that enough." 

Page 220: 
In describing personal attributes he desired, Obama states: 

"Yes, I'd seen weakness in other men--Gramps and his
disappointments, Lolo and his compromise.  But these men had
become object lessons for me, men I might love but never emulate,
WHITE MEN AND BROWN MEN WHOSE FATES DIDN'T SPEAK TO MY OWN.  IT
WAS INTO MY FATHER'S IMAGE, THE BLACK MAN, SON OF AFRICA, THAT
I'D PACKED ALL THE ATTRIBUTES I SOUGHT IN MYSELF, THE ATTRIBUTES
OF MARTIN AND MALCOLM, DUBOIS AND MANDELA."

Page 265: 
Relating to the death of his father, Obama's brother Roy told him
about some details about the father's burial that happened in
Kenya, since Obama had not attended the funeral, Obama states the
words of his brother Roy: 
"The government wanted a Christian burial.  THE FAMILY WANTED A
MUSLIM BURIAL." 

Page 282: 
After having having discussions with Rev. Wright, Obama states
about Rev. Wright: 

"He had grown up in Philadelphia, the son of a Baptist minister.
He had resisted his father's vocation at first, joining the
Marines out of college, DABBLING WITH liquor, ISLAM, AND BLACK
NATIONALISM in the sixties. 

Page 284
Having left a meeting with Rev. Wright, Obama was reading a
brochure that he had picked up in the reception area, and
referring to the brochure, Obama states: 

"It contained a set of guiding principles--a "BLACK VALUE
SYSTEM"--that the congregation had adopted in 1979.  At the top
of the list was a commitment to God, "who will give us the
strength to give up prayerful passivism and BECOME BLACK
CHRISTIAN ACTIVISTS, soldiers for Black freedom and the dignity
of all humankind."  Then a commitment to the black community and
black family , education, the work ethic, discipline, and self-
respect." 

[and later on ths same page]

"There was one particular passage in Trinity's brochure that
stood out, though, a commandment more self-conscious in its tone,
requiring greater elaboration.  "A DISAVOWAL OF THE PURSUIT OF
MIDDLECLASSNESS," the heading read.  "While it is permissible to
chase "'middleincomeness' with all our might," the text stated,
those blessed with the talent or good fortune to achieve success
in the American mainstream must AVOID THE PSYCHOLOGICAL
ENTRAPMENT OF BLACK 'MIDDLECLASSNESS' that hypnotizes the
successful brother or sister into believing they are better than
the rest and TEACHES THEM TO THINK IN TERMS OF 'WE' AND 'THEY'
INSTEAD OF 'US'!" "

Bottom of page 286 to top of page 287: 
In thinking about faith as discussed by Reverend Philips and
Reverend Wright, Obama states: 

"And I would shrug and play the question off, unable to confess
that I COULD NO LONGER DISTINGUISH BETWEEN FAITH AND MERE FOLLY,
between faith and simple endurance; that while I believed in the
sincerity I heard in their voices, I REMAINED A RELUCTANT
SCEPTIC, DOUBTFUL OF MY OWN MOTIVES, WARY OF EXPEDIENT
CONVERSION, having too many quarrels with God to accept a
salvation too easily won." 

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In Obama's Own Words, for Nonsupporters: Part I

For all those persons who have neither the time nor the
inclination to read over 480 pages of Barack Obama's first book,
here are some quotations taken from that book, "Dreams from My
Father:  A Story of Race and Inheritance", by Barack Obama,
published by Three Rivers Press, New York, New York, Copyright
1995, 2004, paperback edition, ISBN 978-1-4000-8277-3 (Original
edition ISBN 1-4000-8277-3).  It is noted that in 1995, Barack
Obama was 34 years old. 

This "Part I" covers Chapters 1-8 of the book. 

[PRELIMINARY NOTE:  I have CAPITALIZED WORDS what I want to
emphasize.  These words were NOT capitalized by Obama]. 

Page 24: 
About his grandfather, Gramps, his mother's father, in discussing
how Gramps would deal with his customers as a furniture salesman,
Obama, states: 

"I would hear in him the breezy, chatty style that he must have
decided would help him with his customers.  He would whip out
pictures of the family and offer his life story to the nearest
stranger; he would pump the hand of the mailman or make off-color
jokes to our waitresses at restaurants.  Such antics USED TO MAKE
ME CRINGE, but people more forgiving than a grandson appreciated
his curiosity; so that while he never gained much influence, he
made himself a wide circle of friends." 

Bottom Page 25 to top of Page 26: 
About stories his grandparents told Obama about his absent father
who had returned to Kenya, Obama states:  

"The stories gave voice to a spirit that would grip the nation
for that fleeting period between Kennedy's election and the
passage of the Voting Rights Act:  the seeming triumph of
universalism over parochialism and narrowmindedness, a bright new
world where differences of race or culture would instruct and
amuse and perhaps even ennoble.  A USEFUL FICTION, ONE THAT
HAUNTS ME NO LESS THAN IT HAUNTED MY FAMILY, evoking as it does
some lost Eden that extends beyond mere childhood."  

Page 47: 
Telling some of the things he learned from his mother, Obama
states: 

"She had always encouraged my rapid acculturation in Indonesia:
It had made me relatively self-sufficient, undemanding on a tight
budget, and EXTREMELY WELL MANNERED WHEN COMPARED TO OTHER
AMERICAN CHILDREN.  She had taught me to DISDAIN THE BLEND OF
IGNORANCE AND ARROGANCE THAT TOO OFTEN CHARACTERIZED AMERICANS
ABROAD."   

Page 50: 
In describing some aspects of his mother, Obama states: 

"In a land where fatalism remained a necessary tool for enduring
hardship, where ultimate truths were kept separate from day-to-
day realities, she was a lonely witness for SECULAR HUMANISM, a
soldier for New Deal, Peace Corps, position-paper liberalism."  

Page 122: 
In describing some of the ways he spent time when living in New
York City, Obama states: 

"Political discussions, the kind that at Occidental had once
seemed so intense and purposeful, came to take on the flavor of
the SOCIALIST CONFERENCES I SOMETIMES ATTENDED at Cooper Union or
the African cultural fairs that took place in Harlem and Brooklyn
during the summers--a few of the many diversions New York had to
offer, like going to a foreign film or ice-skating at Rockefeller
Center."  

Page 133: 
In 1983, after deciding to become a community organizer, Obama
states: 

"When classmates in college asked me just what a community
organizer did, I couldn't answer them directly.  Instead, I'd
pronounce on the need for CHANGE.  Change in the White House,
where REAGAN and his minions were carrying on their DIRTY DEEDS.
Change in the CONGRESS, COMPLIANT AND CURRUPT.  Change in the
MOOD OF THE COUNTRY, MANIC AND SELF-ABSORBED.  Change won't come
from the top, I would say.  Change will come from a mobilized
grass roots.  That's what I'll do, I'll ORGANIZE BLACK FOLKS.  AT
THE GRASS ROOTS. FOR CHANGE." 

Page 139: 
After some short-term jobs in Chicago, Obama was unemployed, and
he states: 

"In six months I was broke, unemployed, eating soup from a can.
IN SEARCH OF SOME INSPIRATION, I went to hear Kwame Toure,
formerly Stokely Carmichael of SNCC and BLACK POWER FAME, speak
at Columbia." 


Page 154: 
Describing some aspects of his education in Indonesia, Obama
states: 

"In Indonesia, I had SPENT TWO YEARS AT A MUSLIM SCHOOL, two
years at a Catholic School.  In the Muslim School, the teacher
wrote to tell my mother that I made faces during KORANIC STUDIES.

My mother wasn't overly concerned.  'Be respectful,' she said." 

Page 163, first paragraph:
At the age of about 22, thinking and imagining about different
men that he knew who had differing opinions, Obama states: 

"Each image carried its own lesson, each was subject to differing
interpretations.  For there were many churches, many faiths.
There were times, perhaps, when those faiths seemed to converge--
the crowd in front of the Lincoln Memorial, the Freedom Riders at
the lunch counter.  But such moments were partial, fragmentary.
With ours eyes closed, we uttered the same words, BUT IN OUR
HEARTS WE EACH PRAYED TO OUR OWN MASTERS; we each remained locked
in our own memories; WE ALL CLUNG TO OUR OWN FOOLISH MAGIC." 

Page 163, last paragraph:   
In comparing his feelings to the feelings of others about
religion, Obama states: 

"I realized then, standing in an emply McDonald's parking lot in
the South Side of Chicago, that I WAS A HERETIC. OR WORSE--FOR
EVEN A HERETIC MUST BELIEVE IN SOMETHING, if nothing more than
the truth of his own doubt." 

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