Reply #235: Thank you. Your post touched our 'better side'...

[Piewhacket]

with an empathetic view.

'To Kill a Mockingbird' is a favorite of mine, with more than one message.
It is about respect. Yes. And you have shown us that.

It is also about courage. Courage to face a peril, whatever the outcome.
To stand, not in anger or opposition, but in supplication, with the humility
that comes when your principles give you no alternative but to stand up FOR a principle.

It is about a higher courage... the courage of personal sacrifice, not for yourself,
but in the service of others. The heroic courage to stand before a mob bent on violence, to stand
before their fury, yet somehow to find within yourself the ability to speak gently to
avert their anger (Atticus Finch). The courage to interpose yourself before the advancing hoard
(Leonidus of Sparta, Horatius of Rome ),to fall upon the grenade, to walk
UP the stairs in a burning and collapsing building.

These ideas are a part of monothesim, and Christianity (Matthew, John), but
not unique to them. I suggest these to be found in nearly every culture, and in ancient times.
I suggest these precepts are part of humanity. They are IN us.

Yet such deeds do not alone define heroic courage. Such courage may be found in the simplest of things.
In standing for your father as he passes.
In refusing to carry out an illegal order (Lt. Col. Darrel Vandeveld, and others re Gitmo).
In standing before the world to take humiliating blows one by one, without anger, without losing
focus on WHY YOU ARE THERE, and that its NOT ABOUT YOU.
These are also examples of the courage to stand up FOR others.

So your post also showed me something else about Barack Obama, something that he has. Courage.