[Note: This diary was written in the immediate aftermath of Obama's Philadelphia speech on race, "A More Perfect Union."]
In the fall of 2000, as a second-year student at the University of Chicago Law School, I was one of about twenty students in a seminar called "Current Issues in Racism and the Law," taught by Professor (and then-state senator) Barack Obama.
It was my favorite class, and Obama my favorite professor, in my three years in Chicago. Obviously it's been exciting tracking the ol' prof since then (I can proudly say that I attended the now-famous "I'm against dumb wars" speech in person in 2002, and I was not one of the many Democrats "caught by surprise" by the power of the 2004 convention keynote address). The Speech today, though, has sent me back to my notes from my class in 2000.
Of course I was aware--more from the 2002 experience than the seminar, really--that Obama has an enormous talent for inspiring people; that's hardly news. But what was so exciting to me this morning was that the Obama of today's speech was the one who taught that seminar at the end of 2000.
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