Moments after the speech, I spoke to the UK Independent via telephone to share my thoughts. They were looking for an Op Ed that I didn’t have time to write, but with the help of their writer Ed Howker, the paper converted my stream of consciousness conversation into this piece.

What a day.

via Baratunde Thurston: Obama has united a divided country – Commentators, Opinion – The Independent.

If America has been divided, by the economy, by religion, and by security, it has been even more profoundly estranged by race. And Obama deals with race in just the same way as it exists here – it may rarely be front and centre but it is always there. It is underlying essence of wealth disparities, of community relations, and now our President. The visual, on the steps of the Capitol built by slave labour, was obvious and he recognised his background in a very personal way. But what is different now is that those issues that once divided us are no longer on the outside, their advocates no-longer peering through the windows of those buildings of power. Obama is not agitating the White House, he is the White House. And everything he does will reflect on the black population outside. In many ways, although unifying, this further complicates America’s uneasy racial history. How he reacts when injustice strikes, in the form of police brutality, or through discrimination will be intriguing to watch. It will be no small test of President Obama and this welcome new politics.

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