Commentary: Obama and America's 'patchwork heritage'

[struggle4progress]

By Jennifer Brea
Special to CNN

... Tuesday, he boldly declared it. In his inaugural address, Obama said, "...our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve ..."

When Obama took the stage at Grant Park in Chicago, Illinois, on election night, with his family, it was the first time in my 26 years of living I felt like America really belonged to people like me.

If you were to ask me, at that moment, if I was African-American, even though I have blue eyes and fair skin, even though my grandparents came to this country from Haiti, with their own language, their own concepts of race, my answer to you would be a resounding "Yes!" ...

And yet if you were to ask me, in that same moment, if I were black, or biracial, or a woman of Haitian, Chinese, Egyptian, English and Irish descent, my answer would have been the same ...

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/21/brea.patchwork.q...

[bemildred]

1. He's a uniter, not a divider. nt