Article: Live Mandela legacy: Obama

US president Barack Obama issued a challenge to world leaders and ordinary people to live up to the values championed by former president Nelson Mandela.

"We, too, must act on behalf of justice. We, too, must act on behalf of peace," Obama said in his tribute at a memorial service for Mandela at the FNB Stadium in Soweto on Tuesday.
 
An excellent speech, I enjoyed watching him.

Of course, going from the sublime to the ridiculous, was to watch JZ stumble through his speech, obviously written for him, and not fully comprehended by the reader...
 
A decent speech. Some deep words spoken.

Trevor Noah
2 hours ago via mobile
Obama just gave one of the most powerful speeches I've ever heard. "Mandela freed not only the prisoner but also the guard"
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What resonated with me was when Obama said something along the lines of:

"Looking up to Madiba has made me a better man, a better father and a better president."
 
practice what you preach i.e. do what you say, not speak it and not do anything about it.
 
ghoti said:
Trevor Noah
2 hours ago via mobile
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IIRC he said "Mandela freed not only the prisoner but also the jailer"

Pedantic, I know. :o

But that was a beautiful sentiment that he shared. It was one of the most poignantly insightful speeches I've heard in a long time...
 
DJ... said:
IIRC he said "Mandela freed not only the prisoner but also the jailer"

Pedantic, I know. :o

But that was a beautiful sentiment that he shared. It was one of the most poignantly insightful speeches I've heard in a long time...
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You are right, thanks for the correction. Awesome words.
 
DarkSpectre said:
Do you think that Obama actually wrote this speech?
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Nope, if its anything like every other politician, he tells the speech writer what he is looking for, the speech writer writes the speech. Obama then proofs it, and then probably practices it about 10-20 times... and only then is ready for public consumption.

If you dont do that, you end up looking like Zuma.
 
DarkSpectre said:
Do you think that Obama actually wrote this speech?
Click to expand...

I actually heard that he had written the speech himself - apparently, he has been working on it since the day Madiba died.

As an ex lawyer, getting up and making a 20 minute speech is not too threatening.

As far a JZ bumbling through his totally unrehearsed speech, that was definitely |NOT| written by him, I wanted to be ill! :sick:
 
falcon786 said:
I wonder if Mandela would approve of Obama's insistence on using drones which sometimes murder civilians.

Hmmmm.....
:whistle:
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Was supposedly vehemently against Bush's detaining without trial. I think you would have found the usual hypocrisy....

The willingness of Democrats to embrace and defend this power is especially reprehensible because of how completely, glaringly and obviously at odds it is with everything they loudly claimed to believe during the Bush years. Recall two of the most significant “scandals” of the Bush War on Terror: his asserted power merely to eavesdrop on and detain accused Terrorists without judicial review of any kind. Remember all that? Progressives endlessly accused Bush of Assaulting Our Values and “shredding the Constitution” simply because Bush officials wanted to listen in on and detain suspected Terrorists — not kill them, just eavesdrop on and detain them — without first going to a court and proving they did anything wrong. Yet here is a Democratic administration asserting not merely the right to surveil or detain citizens without charges or judicial review, but to kill them without any of that: a far more extreme, permanent and irreversible act. Yet, with some righteous exceptions, the silence is deafening, or worse.

How can anyone who vocally decried Bush’s mere eavesdropping and detention powers without judicial review possibly justify Obama’s executions without judicial review? How can the former (far more mild powers) have been such an assault on Everything We Stand For while the latter is a tolerable and acceptable assertion of war powers? If Barack Obama has the right to order accused Terrorists executed by the CIA because We’re At War, then surely George Bush had the right to order accused Terrorists eavesdropped on and detained on the same ground.

That the same Party and political faction that endlessly shrieked about Bush’s eavesdropping and detention programs now tolerate Obama’s execution program is one of the most extreme and craven acts of dishonesty we’ve seen in quite some time. By stark contrast, right-wing leaders, pundits and bloggers are being commendably consistent: they cheered for Bush’s due-process-free eavesdropping and detention programs and, based on exactly the same reasoning, they now lavishly praise President Obama for extending that mentality to assassinations.
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http://www.salon.com/2012/03/06/attorney_general_holder_defends_execution_without_charges/
 
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