hands off that bible

I don't agree with every point Cornel West makes in this impromptu speech, protesting the fact that Obama will be using Martin Luther King's bible to take the oath of office. But my god, this guy can testify:

It's always been possible to detect a little scepticism or even resentment of Obama's implicit positioning of himself and his presidency as the consummation of MLK's dream, among African-American scholars and politicians. You can hear it in West's invocation of his grandmother - Obama, after all, is not the descendant of slaves, or of blacks involved in the civil rights struggle. He adopted his cultural and political parents. He's not quite one of us. But then, as Obama himself has recognised, he is a sojourner, not fully at home in any one community or tradition.

Comments

[simon]

Crikey, this is the stuff!