It's a great speech and yes, it's inspiring. When I heard it I not only responded to what he was saying, but found myself hoping that the endless grudge match between the Obama and Clinton camps - and yes, it's coming from both sides - might be over at last. (I got the idea that he was signalling that it was time for that to end with his reference to Ferraro's comments.)

As someone who has been torn throughout the primary contest, I'd say this speech raised Obama in my view. I think you're right that he is the best communicator of the entire field of three.

I'm not convinced that this is enough - but our primary is over, so I don't actually need to be convinced; I'll enthusiastically support him if he's the nominee, just as I'll enthusiastically support Clinton if it's her - and I really hope that, given that the two candidates have nearly identical policy goals, he and his supporters also will.

Whatever happens, I expect that this is the beginning of a long and important political career for Obama. We'll all be better for that, whatever form it takes.

I wrote in my journal that I wish candidates would simply ignore one another, put their own best face forward, and let the voters decide. Why can't one of them have the courage to set that tone?

Yes, but the fear is that Kerry ignored the Swift Boat nonsense and look what happened to him. To me it's the elegance and the grace and even the humor with which you deal with your opponents' blows.

I think of Listen lunging at Ali, charging, charging, looking like a mean bully and a fool and coming up empty while Ali danced away.

That's as close as you can practically come, I think, to ignoring one another, don't you think?

Diane - you are clearly an intelligent, thoughtful and independent individual, and if only the rest of the world were like you when it comes to making decisions about the candidates... well you know what they say about wishes being horses?

Unfortunately, in the "new" media environment, where five-second sound bites are the main source of information for a frighteningly large portion of the population, and where images of Britney Spears' hoo-ha get way more attention than the words and actions of the people who are vying for what basically amounts to the leadership of the free world, it simply ISN'T possible for the candidates to just ignore the accusations of the other candidates, no matter how ridiculous or misleading they may be, because the VOTERS won't ignore those accusations (usually delivered in a five-second sound bite). And when said voters likely have no clue that the accusations are, in fact, ridiculous, they may make a voting decision based on inaccurate information. Unfortunately, stupid people get to vote too!

I have to agree with David. The best approach for the candidates to take, recognizing the nature of the world we live in, is to try to provide the real story with a calm, graceful and respectful demeanor.

It's almost stunning how difficult that actually seems to be for the candidates to manage, given how deceptively simple the sentence looks written down, no?

I think we have to recognize the role (and, I would say, failure) of the public here.

I write a political blog on the Houston Chronicle web site (they don't pay me and I'm not a staffer, this is part of their reader blogging project) and I'm just amazed at how many commenters complain that Obama "has no concrete plans." Yet there they are on his web site (as they are on Clinton's as well). When the topic of health care comes up, I get comments asserting all kinds of things about systems in other countries that are objectively incorrect (and which anybody could look up in five minutes on the web). I hear about how Hillary wants to do X and McCain wants to do Y and most of it is not true. And I get comments that make it clear that people have very fragmented knowledge of world events, foreign countries, and just about everything that's relevant to making informed political decisions.

Certainly I don't expect citizens to be experts on everything, and of course part of the idea of representative democracy is that since we can't know everything, we choose people we trust to represent us and spend their time delving into details and making good decisions.

But we do have a responsibility to have some basic knowledge of the world around us when we choose those people, and I think the lack of that knowledge is one of the reasons that the attacks work. Without substance to help form ideas about people, the attacks fill a vacuum.

Which leads to a more general question about online media: as we get more and more tools to filter the information that we get, do we risk putting ourselves into information silos which just reinforce our current views, protect us from conflicting information, and make it even harder for a healthy political culture to survive?

John, great point. Now that we have the Internet, Americans' ignorance is now willful and aggressive.

And yes, I agree that the multitude of channels is dangerous. I myself have switched from CNN to MSNBC during primary returns because I like Obama and I call MSNBC the "Obama channel"--lots of their anchors like him too--and so they're likely to be more optimistic about things.

Speaking of various perspectives, here's a good roundup of takes on Obama's race speech.

http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/03/19/782888.aspx

John, most people get their information from their friends. At least that's how it appears to me. And those same people will swear that what they heard is true. The amount of distortion out there boggles the mind.

I agree that one should refute accusations calmly, etc. But what I was referring to, I think, is the point-counterpoint that Clinton/Obama seem to be mired in, directly or indirectly. And I keep in mind that it's often not the candidate doing the work, if you know what I mean.

And to think I considered majoring in polisci . . .