Hi x-point,
I certainly understand your point.
I'll give you a counterpoint. After losing New Hampshire, many people said Obama should play the race card in South Carolina. That way, he could take the black vote, win the state and knock Hillary Clinton onto the back foot.
I watched carefully to see if he did that. Because I was interested to see if he was willing to go there. It was a kind of litmus test of whether he was the kind of candidate I might believe in. In the way that Jesse Jackson was not.
Well, he didn't. Not that I saw. In fact, he has consistently disavowed it. This is a man who, in my view at least, clearly believes in the principle of homonoia.
The Oath at Opis
“Now that the wars are coming to an end, I wish you to prosper in peace. May all mortals from now on live like one people in concord and for mutual advancement. Consider the world as your country, with laws common to all and where the best will govern irrespective of tribe. I do not distinguish among men, as the narrow-minded do, both among Greeks and Barbarians. I am not interested in the descendance of the citizens or their racial origins. I classify them using one criterion: their virtue. For me every virtuous foreigner is a Greek and every evil Greek worse than a Barbarian. If differences ever develop between you never have recourse to arms, but solve them peacefully. If necessary, I should be your arbitrator. You must not consider God like an autocratic despot, but as a common Father of all; so your behavior may resemble the life siblings have in a family. On my part I should consider all equals, white or blacks, and wish you all to be not only subjects of the Commonwealth, but participants and partners. As much as this depends on me, I should try to bring about what I promised. The oath we made over tonight’s libations hold onto as a Contract of Love”.
Or put another way:
"We are one people; we are one nation; and together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast; from sea to shining sea --
Yes. We. Can."
