good times, no longer be a time of economic expansion, no longer be a time of relative international peace, but instead that the new era would begin when americans finally came into where many of our trading partners, political partners and allies had been for decades, which is into the age of contemporary terrorism. americans, of course, responded in very typically american ways to that entre into something many people in the rest of the world had already experienced. we began with a kind of nationalist fervor that was justified as reasonable patriotism. i like to point out that we clearly must have been having post traumatic stress disorder because for about a year after september 11th there were african-american men walking around the city of new york with nypd hats on. that can only be explained as a

ptsd response. i know, we'll just let you sit with that for a minute. but the other thing that happens in that moment, i don't want to miss this, is that a new version of what america typically needs emerged, and that is a racial enemy. americans in part identify who we are and who deserves what through our notions of whiteness and of the racial enemies that are the non-whites, and in this moment the new racial enemy became not so much reagan's welfare queen, who was imaginary, but instead this imagined other that is somehow muslim or arab or sheik or something else. we became willing to stomach a kind of horrific racial violence in the name of national security. it's something that we have been willing to stomach as a people

over and over again in our history. the patriot act was not an act of a republican president acting alone. the patriot act was a bipartisan decision by both parties. it was not bought and paid for by corporations, it was bought and paid for by our fear. as much as we have our eyes on the citizens united decision, we have to remember that it was our collective angst, maybe not the people in this room, but our collective angst that gave permission to democrats in the house to rally behind republicans in the white house under the banner of nationalist patriotic security with the goal of both reducing our domestic civil liberties and giving us an entrance into what is at this moment an ever lasting war. we made those choices. [ applause ]

>> so if that was september 11th, 2001, interesting thing happens a few years later. the democrats need to run a presidential candidate, and it turns out democrats are really very bad at one thing. well, actually, a couple of things, but one thing in particular, and one of the things that we're very, very bad at is trying to think about what kind of democrat republicans will vote for, right? this is our like predictive ability thing. it's really the only reason that we ended up with candidate obama is because we were in an open seat race. and so we didn't really know who we were running against so we just got all like free with our actual preferences and ended up with hillary clinton and barack obama as our final two. we never would have made those choices had we been running against an incumbent. we undoubtedly would have picked john edwards. let's just be honest about that. but in 2004 we chose what we

thought would be the good, moderate candidate, one that would get republican votes, and that of course was john kerry who showed up at the 2004 dnc and saluted and said, reporting for duty. we did not in the fall of 2004 launch as a democratic party an attempt push back against the war effort. quite the opposite, democrats decided to run a soldier under the banner under the idea that he could do even better at the war machine. so what changed that? what changed it? august 29th, 2005. august 29th, 2005, is the day that the levies failed in the city of new orleans in the aftermath of hurricane katrina. maybe it's not actually that day because on that day and on the five subsequent days immediately after the leaf have is failed and the city flooded we behaved just as we did in the immediate post 9/11 moment, we got scared

of our racial enemies. [ applause ] the governor of louisiana, a democrat, the mayor of the city of new orleans, a black democrat, jointly decided to suspend search and rescue efforts in order to focus on law and order. until -- until the national media recognized that there were people, not people actually, women, elderly, and children starving and dieing in the city center. it wasn't until the images of african-american women and children who were dehydrating in the heat of a new orleans august finally turned the language away from this kind of law and order language and into what the economists called the shaming of america. i don't know if you remember this, but i'm looking at the

image that if i had gotten myself together i would have put up as a powerpoint. the image of "the economist" magazine, an african-american woman is on the cover. she's wearing a new orleans t-shirt and it says, the shaming of america. i'd like you to pause and think about, how many black women have appeared on the cover of "the economist" mag a ensuh. i don't know her name. i lived in new orleans, i study katrina, i don't know her name. yet, there are very, very few black women that may appeared. and yet the notion that there was still a collective shaming that happens in a country that fancies itself a place where women and children are first, hurricane katrina actually shames us into an anti-war stance. here's how it goes. from september 11th, 2001, until about september 4th i'm going to give it of 2005 we are trying to

participate in the nationalist patriotic fervor against the imagined racial enemy that is those others over there that are activating terrorism against us. right until the leaf have is failed we realize we've allowed our own citizens to drown, to die, and to dehydrate on camera and we go, oh. if you can't get water to an american city for a week, how can you prosecute a foreign war? and the democratic party feels a little steel drop down its spine. all these media folks who live in new york city who realize that if this is how we respond to disasters, they're screwed. and for the first time we start hearing an active anti-war message, not from the people, but the people that has resonated up through a left party. this, of course, is how in 2006

democrats win back the house. they win the house in 2006 because for the first time they articulate a natural paradigm difference to the republican party for the first time in five years. of course, we remember the response to the anti-war message that would be the mid-term elections in 2006? do you guys remember what happened? the surge. right? the response to the american people saying, we want out of the war is that the white house sent more soldiers in the war. it is exactly the opposite of what happens in 2010 when by taking over the house the republican party decides that it has a mandate from the american people to turn back what they had just done in 2008. this white house in 2006 told us, we don't care what just happened in the mid terms, we are running this war effort, and we let them.

except that of course we know what happened then right after that. the young guy, he was a state senator in illinois. he had managed to make it into the u.s. senate really only because the republican party in illinois was in such shambles that their decision for a candidate to run against them was alan keys. and on wednesday i could probably be alan keys for almost any race. now this is not to say that state senator barack obama is anything short of exceptional, but the ease with which he walked into the u.s. senate had everything to do with the failures of the illinois republican party. thanks, judy. we appreciate that. in the immediate aftermath of hurricane katrina the national figure that emerges is barack obama on one hand, hillary clinton on the other, and a sense among the american people

that what we had just done and what we had been doing since 2001 was not the best of who we were. that we were capable of something else. i loved the 2008 campaign. it was great fun. it was. it just was, that 2008 campaign, great fun. but it wasn't great fun because the obama for america campaign was so brilliant. they were fine. it was great fun because of the freelancing that went on. remember i'm trying to tell a story about the people. remember the freelancing that went on. here barack obama goes and he does an amazing thing in new hampshire. he loses and then gives a victory speech which takes real gumption, right? he loses in new hampshire and he's like, screw it, i'm going to give you a, yes, we can anyway. stand up and gives, yes, we can. everyone is like, wow, that's hot. and then we walk away until a week later and what happens,

will.i.am remixes of yes, we can. when you think about why, yes, we can matters, it's not because of barack obama giving it, as great because it was, it's because will.i.am remixed it and you posted it on your facebook wall and then you sent it around and then you e-mailed it and then it became viral. the excitement of the 2008 campaign was the way in which freelance being and technology and ordinary people decided that what we had been doing since september 11th, 2001, was no longer the best of who we were and how the 2008 campaign might provide an opportunity for us to indicate the best of who we were, the exceptionalism that we defined as what made us exceptional, our willingness to think about either a white woman or a black guy, that's cool. the response from the right was the kind of anxiety about what that meant. a willingness to pull us back

into what we had been doing for the years before so that once president obama is elected, the language is that he is a see krut muslim. of course he is because remember, september 11th, 2001, our new racial enemy becomes, the muslims. you know of course you can't be a secret muslim. you can be a secret christian but not a secret muslim. christian, you have to say i love jesus, he's in my heart. you can be a secret christian. if you're a muslim there are practices you have to do. you can't be secretly doing it. you would notice him praying five times a day. you cannot be a secret muslim. okay. [ applause ] >> but along with that anxiety around this kind of secret outsider, and i'm -- i'll go very quickly here, i promise, there's also a revival of the anti-immigrant panic. and we are as much on the left

to blame for failing to recognize and stem this at the moment that it occurred. do you remember the joe wilson snoemt president obama speaking, joe wilson stands up and says, you lie. the left freaks out. it's racism. black man speaking, white guy from former confederate state says you lie. white, black man speaking that looks like ordinary old-fashioned racism. don't forget this, president obama when he was speaking in that moment, was talking about the health care reform bill. he says, when this passes, don't worry, illegals will not be allowed to partake in the health care reform that we are passing, and then joe wilson stood up and said, you lie. so the president was in that moment actually drawing a bright line, a boundary between citizens and noncitizens on this issue of a fundamental human right health care reform before joe wilson stands up and says, you lie. the terrain there is multiple

levels. yes, there's probably some of that old-fashioned jim crow race i mean but there's this brand new anti-racism panic. notice this week when the president was again interrupted by a journalist in the rose garden, that that interruption came when he was talking about? immigration. that laying on of our anxieties is about this new fear, this old fear, and mixed together with american racism. but then of course there's plenty of old-fashioned american racism going on still among us as people. again, not talking about the elites but the shoot to kill laws that took trayvon martin's life are the same shoot to kill laws that were enacted in the days immediately following hurricane katrina, that are based in our same great fear that emerged immediately post september 11th. this kind of vilification of

bodies that we assume to be criminal. lay on top of all of that the war on women. a war on women that i notice was occurring for the first -- i wasn't sure it was coming but i started seeing it, when president obama nominated sonya soto may our to the supreme court. if you can take yourself back and remember the gauntlet that she was forced to walk through those senate confirmation hearings. like just for fun, for kicks and giggles this afternoon, watch the jamie dimon testimony right next to the sonya soto mayor confirmation hearings. just watch them. right after she was put through what i like to call the elizabeth ekford moment. she was the teenage girl that

had to walk the gauntlet with the screaming yelling faces behind her, so much what i saw when i was watching sonya sotomayeur, right after that we have the vilification of shirley sherrard. on this one i'm not making a critique of the administration, i'm making a critique of the naacp. an organization that does extraordinary and exceptional work especially recently, but who in that moment when shirley sherrard was first presented to the american people by andrew breitbart as a racist, the leadership of the naacp initially, although they came around pretty quickly, but initially saying she should be ashamed of herself for her comments. now that had to have happened because they just didn't know who shirley sherrard was. see, that's fine if you didn't know who shirley sherrard was, i

did know that. if you've ever watched "eye on the prize" which i assume anybody on naacp did, the name sherrard should have wrung a bell. they liberated georgia while king was taking care of atlanta. that willingness to see a rural woman from georgia as inherently expe expendable. and then, of course, post 2010, the full assault on women through the personhood amendments, through the fight between koman and planned parentho parenthood. you have to laugh. seriously, we're talking about the pill in 2012. the outlawing of abortions that never actually occur. telling sandra fluke that she has to defend against being a

slut in order to speak to the american people as though we are in egypt and she has to submit to a virginity test in order to be in the public sphere. oh, yeah, by the way, that 2010 year of the gop woman is the first year that we actually lost ground in the u.s. house of representatives and senate in terms of women's representation in more than 30 years. we did that. and when i say we, i just mean the american people in the broadest sense. that our fear, our anxiety, our willingness to frame others whether they are unruly women, illegal immigrants, lazy black people, terrorist muslims, our willingness to not see ourselves in them but to see them as the other make possible all of these policy moments. this is the last thing i say and then i will run from this building. there is no reason to lose hope.

we are just not a perfect people. we're just not. kind of like an adolescent country. we sort of -- remember adolescence? my daughter is almost 11. i had forgotten. adolescence is hard. you just randomly feel bad and get a phrase and wonder about the security of childhood that you once had. and particularly for a country that became so dominant so quickly, that became so wealthy in the context of such inequality, that understood itself as standing on a shining hill. we are in our adolescence and we're making a bit of a mess of it. [ applause ] >> that said, there is no reason to lose hope. the fear that has activated the

past decade cannot be countered with more fear of what is coming. is there money in the is the supreme court friendly? nope. are there folks willing to actually damage the very core of our democratic principles in order to win short-term gains? uh-huh. yep. maybe it's coming from people who were slaves and mormons, white people were mormons, black people were slaves, everybody was basically after them, the mormons got ejected out of missouri and had to put carts across the west, the black folks were -- what i do know is that my enslaved grandmother who was sold on a street corner in

richmond, virginia believed in god. i'm not asking you to believe in god, i'm asking you to think about this. this is a woman who never knew anything but slavery for herself, never expected anything but slavery for anyone she knew. there is no empirical evidence that any being cared about her circumstances. there was no empirical evidence that there was a loving god that had any power, i mean if there was a loving god, he was pretty pitiful, or if he was powerful, he didn't seem to love her. i'm not asking you to believe in god or to accept any sort of supreme being, i'm asking you to think about the faith that is associated with the hope that is not necessarily around this empirical moment. we can still be part of

something that is bigger than ourselves and something that we cannot necessarily see at this moment, but simply requires us not to be afraid of each other. because it is our fear of each other -- it's our fear of each other that makes us exceptionally easy to divide. i really am going to go off and talk to the bushes now. because i am not afraid of them. i am angry with them, i often disagree, but i am not afraid of any person with whom we are struggling. we can get to another place, there's no reason to lose hope. >> she is literally running to make that airplane.

all right, we're going to leave you with one final speaker this morning. you all know van jones i assume. he's a public schoolboy, grew up to be a graduate of yale law school. but i would like to tease him and tell him that he roads above it. co-founder of color for change, co-founder for green for all. we joined him in launching his new venture, rebuilding of american green. the effort to restore good jobs and economic opportunity and to build a movement necessary to make that happen. he has neither amassed a great personal fortune, he has not held an elected public office.

and yet "time" magazine has named him one of the world's 100 most influential people, give it up for van jones. >> good morning. >> good morning. >> that was kind of bad. give up some applause for melissa. [ applause ] >> i tell you what, i love getting up when i can and see her on television, she doesn't just speak that way with that much clarity, that much insight, that much courage to us, she gets a chance to speak that way to the whole of the american people on saturdays and sundays. and i these that is a part of what i want to talk about today, the voice that's been missing.

the voice that's been missing. rodney king passed away over this weekend. and it's hard for me to imagine that it's been 20 years since he became a household name on planet earth, just a regular brother, with regular brother problems and regular brother issues, put in a situation that all too common, the only difference was it was caught on camera. we know what happened with the verdicts, we know what happened with the uprising, but we sometimes don't think about what it must have been like for him to get pushed out in front of television cameras, no speech in hand. no pollsters.

with the whole world watching. and have to speak from his true heart. a lot of things about his life that you could easily dismiss him and discount him for, but in those moments, who you really are comes through? and he just said five words, and they're the same five words that i think melissa tries to bring us back around to, can we all get along? a prayer, a plea, for some kind of sanity to emerge from the catastrophe that was unfolding all around him. for some kind of wisdom, some kind of higher purpose, to somehow be pulled from the mess, to be pulled from the wreckage of america. can we all get along? he went on with his life, he did good things, he did bad things,

he did things he regretted and he passed away. but i think his question -- can we all get along? we have this extraordinary moment now, as we look at november, and the months beyond, who are we as a country? in this mess, this in catastrophe. are we going to each other to each other or are we going to turn on each other. that is the great question. that the world is now looking at us to answer. and i appreciate dr. perry for pointing out that it's not just about the corporations, it's about us here in this courtroom. so we have a responsibility, some people felt that four years ago that we were too emotional.

and we just got a little bit of dope -- doped up on hopy stuff. and we just got too hopy, and we got two emotional and we weren't thinking clearly and we want to have a reaction to that. >> now fighting the least. i'm seeing a movement that was built up over that decade. that stood up against rove, that stood up against cheney, that stood up against bush, that stood up for the people in katrina, that saw african-american mothers and mothers on rooftops and whose

hearts were broken to see an american city drowning when they stood up when there was nothing in washington, d.c. that answered the call. i'm watching that movement that broke the back of karl rove's strangle hold. who elected the -- that inspired the world, that shocked the world, that stunned the world. in the moment of maximum peril now, sit down. there are people in this country who were drowning on dry land. they're drowning economically on dry land. they need a movement that is willing to stand with them -- and yet, there is this reluctan reluctance, we s