DSR's Words Matter

This week on Presidential Words Matter - we highlight Bill Clinton’s remarks in the aftermath of the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing.On April 19, 1995 a domestic terrorist used a truck bomb to destroy the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Office Building[2] in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Perpetrated by American terrorists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, the bombing killed at least 168 people, including 19 children,[3] - and injured more than 680 others. The blast destroyed more than one third of the building, which had to be demolished.[4] In addition, The blast destroyed or damaged 324 other buildings within a 16-block radius,Until the September 11 attacks in 2001, the Oklahoma City bombing was the deadliest terrorist attack in the history of the United States. It remains the deadliest confirmed act of domestic terrorism in American history.Four days later, On April 23, 1995 - President Bill Clinton attended a memorial prayer service in Oklahoma City called “A Time for Healing”  With the 1996 presidential election less than 18 months away - President Clinton spoke of unity and healing over the politics of division and hatred. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On June 26th 2015 President Barack Obama delivered the eulogy at the funeral of the Reverend Clementa C. Pinckney, the senior pastor of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston and a South Carolina State Senator.Reverend Pinckney and 8 other Black church members had been murdered a week earlier during Bible Study in a racially motivated mass shooting perpetrated by a white supremacist. The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church is one of the oldest Black churches in the United States, and it has long been a center for organizing events related to civil rights. Founded in 1816, the church played an important role in the history of South Carolina, during slavery and Reconstruction, during the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s and in the Black Lives Matter movement. It is the oldest African Methodist Episcopal Church in the South, often referred to as "Mother Emanuel". Rev. Pinckney, was a well known activist who had held rallies after the shooting of Walter Scott by a white police officer two months earlier, in nearby North Charleston. As a state senator, Reverend Pinckney had pushed for legislation requiring police to wear body cameras.The Reverend and his church were targeted because of their history and role in civil rights activism. With a rousing eulogy and a chorus of “Amazing Grace,” President Barack Obama called on the country to honor the nine victims of the South Carolina church massacre by working toward racial healing.He said that included removing the Confederate battle flag from the South Carolina State House grounds.“It’s true, the flag did not cause these murders,” The President said, but “we all have to acknowledge the flag has always represented more than just ancestral pride. For many, black and white, that flag was a reminder of systemic oppression and racial subjugation. We see that now.”“By taking down that flag,” he said, “we express God’s grace.” But I don't think God wants us to stop there.“On July 6, 2015, the South Carolina Senate voted to remove the Confederate flag from display outside the South Carolina State House. Make no mistake - the protests we have seen in the last month are a continuation of that struggle. And none of us can stop - none of us should rest until we dismantle and remove every symbol and every fact of the systemic oppression and racial subjugation that President Obama described in his eulogy of Reverend Pinckney. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On June 4, 1965, President Johnson delivered the commencement address at Howard University, the nation’s most prominent historically black university.‪In his address, Johnson explained why “opportunity” was not enough to ensure the civil rights of disadvantaged Americans.‪The ‘To Fulfill These Rights’ speech as it is widely known was the intellectual framework for affirmative action. ‪President Johnson spoke of racial injustice and economic disparities between black and white Americans. ‪For many in the audience that day, it was one of the first times they felt a president - any president - really acknowledge the treatment of black citizens from slavery to Jim Crow.‪As one graduate - Lillian Beard -recalled on the 50th Anniversary - “I believe that afternoon in 1965 changed a lot of minds, because we felt that he spoke directly to us.”‪LBJ’s Howard University address came only a few months after he had gone before a Joint session of Congress to speak in support of the Selma to Montgomery Voting Rights March.‪It was in that message to Congress that Johnson famously identified himself with the civil rights movement when he declared, “We shall overcome.”‪The Howard speech, which was principally the work of presidential speech writer Richard Goodwin and then-Assistant Secretary of Labor Daniel Patrick Moynihan was an extension of Johnson’s March voting-rights speech.‪The goal was to take the civil rights movement from one focused on legal justice to one focused on economic justice.‪In the Howard speech, Johnson pointed out that the racial barriers to freedom were slowly tumbling down, but instead of resting on that progress and what his administration had done to that point - Johnson went a step further: “Freedom is not enough,” the President told the graduates.‪It was important for American society to achieve “equality as a fact and equality as a result.”‪The next day President received a telegram from Martin Luther King Jr., telling him, “Never before has a president articulated the depths and dimensions of the problems of racial injustice more eloquently and profoundly.”Dr. King was not exaggerating the importance of the Howard speech.  In August Johnson would sign the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law, and two years later, he would appoint Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court, making him the nation’s first black justice. But unfortunately- the racial transformation Johnson had promised and hoped to bring about when he spoke at Howard did not take place. 55 years later the same underlying conditions exist and the economic disparities LBJ described have not gotten better - far from it. They have gotten exponentially worse.If we are to fulfill the promise of social and economic justice made By LBJ to Black Americans more than a half century ago - all of us must commit ourselves to radical and immediate change. Anything less would be a monumental failure.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we highlight presidential leadership and one of the most important civil rights speeches ever delivered by a sitting American president.By June of 1963, John F. Kennedy has been president for nearly two and a half years.While Kennedy had long privately expressed his deep moral objections to the treatment of black people in American society and indicated support for New federal legislation. His public comments ranged from cautious moderate criticism to a 1950s version of “both sides-ism” but were mostly nonexistent.In June of 1963, however the man and the moment met.Alabama Governor George Wallace’s staged photo op definance of federal law by standing in the school house doorway had lasted less than 90 minutes. On June 11th 1963 two black students were peaceful enrolled at the University of Alabama under the protection of a federalized Alabama National Guard commanded by US Marshals under the direction of the Department of Justice and the Attorney General of the United States.Kennedy’s advisors recommended and Fully expected that the president would NOT address the American people that evening. With a little less than 18 months until to the 1964 elections, the President’s legislative agenda and his political future depended upon the votes Southern Democrats in Congress and those of their politically unforgiving constituents. The President had other ideas. Kennedy saw a way to exercise moral leader on an issue where he had to that point failed. He would request Network Television airtime to address the nation on the issue of civil rights. The facts and statistics on racial inequality in the United States described by President Kennedy to the American people that evening had even never been acknowledged by a President before - much less spoken in such a detailed and direct language. In a telegram to the White House after watching the President’s remarks in Atlanta with other civil rights leaders, the Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr. described the address as ONE OF THE MOST ELOQUENT, PROFOUND, AND UNEQUIVOCAL PLEAS FOR JUSTICE AND FREEDOM OF ALL MEN, EVER MADE BY ANY PRESIDENT.Dr King knew that Kennedy was moved by his now famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” - written just weeks before. To President Kennedy and many Americans Dr. King’s letter was more than than a spirited defense of civil disobedience. It was an indictment of white indifference.As you listen to the speech, you will hear Kennedy echoing King’s “Letter”The President rejects the idea that Black Americans should have to wait for equality. "Who among us," Kennedy asks the American people, "would then be content with counsels of patience and delay?"Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we highlight one of the most significant and consequential calls for racial equality and social justice in American History - “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”On Good Friday, April 12, 1963 - the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and fellow civil rights leaders were arrested in Birmingham, Alabama as they lead a now famous Campaign of non-violent direct action to protest racial segregation and oppression in that Southern City.In the early 1960s, Birmingham was one of the most racially segregated cities in the United States - enforced by both law and culture. Black citizens faced legal and economic oppression, and violent retribution when they attempted to even draw attention to these conditionsThe Birmingham Campaign would become a pivotal moment in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. President Kennedy’s Address to the Nation on Civil Rights, the August 1963 March on Washington and many other events were a direct result of this campaign and Dr. King’s now famous letter. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we focus on leadership and comfort in a time of national tragedy, crisis and mourning.On September 14th 2001 - President George W. Bush spoke at the National Cathedral in Washington at a National Day of Prayer and Remembrance Service.Just 72 hours earlier - more than 3,000 Americans had been killed during the most lethal terrorist attack in US history. The country was still shut down - commercial air travel was grounded. The dead were still being counted. But the president talked of unity. The tragedy whose full toll had yet to be reckoned, could have torn the country apart, but instead it had united the American people and their leadership.He expressed both empathy for those who lost family, friends and loved ones and a steady resolve that they shall not have died in vain.In the interest of full disclosure - I joined President Bush’s White House staff less than three months after this speech. I was a Democrat from New York who had worked at both ABC and NBC News. Not the most likely candidate to serve in the West Wing under a Republican President from Texas. In the weeks, months and years that followed this speech - the President, his advisors and his Administration myself included - make some serious and consequential mistakes. We will spend the rest of our lives trying to rectify those errors and atone for those failings. But in the immediate aftermath of that national tragedy- President Bush provided leadership and resolve as well as a few things that the American people desperately needed - comfort, empathy and hope. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we highlight presidential leadership and one of the most important civil rights speeches ever delivered by a sitting American president.By June of 1963, John F. Kennedy has been president for nearly two and a half years.While Kennedy had long privately expressed his deep moral objections to the treatment of black people in American society and indicated support for New federal legislation. His public comments ranged from cautious moderate criticism to a 1950s version of “both sides-ism” but were mostly nonexistent.In June of 1963, however the man and the moment met.Alabama Governor George Wallace’s staged photo op definance of federal law by standing in the school house doorway had lasted less than 90 minutes. On June 11th 1963 two black students were peaceful enrolled at the University of Alabama under the protection of a federalized Alabama National Guard commanded by US Marshals under the direction of the Department of Justice and the Attorney General of the United States.Kennedy’s advisors recommended and Fully expected that the president would NOT address the American people that evening. With a little less than 18 months until to the 1964 elections, the President’s legislative agenda and his political future depended upon the votes Southern Democrats in Congress and those of their politically unforgiving constituents. The President had other ideas. Kennedy saw a way to exercise moral leader on an issue where he had to that point failed. He would request Network Television airtime to address the nation on the issue of civil rights. The facts and statistics on racial inequality in the United States described by President Kennedy to the American people that evening had even never been acknowledged by a President before - much less spoken in such a detailed and direct language. In a telegram to the White House after watching the President’s remarks in Atlanta with other civil rights leaders, the Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr. described the address as ONE OF THE MOST ELOQUENT, PROFOUND, AND UNEQUIVOCAL PLEAS FOR JUSTICE AND FREEDOM OF ALL MEN, EVER MADE BY ANY PRESIDENT.Dr King knew that Kennedy was moved by his now famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail” - written just weeks before. To President Kennedy and many Americans Dr. King’s letter was more than than a spirited defense of civil disobedience. It was an indictment of white indifference.As you listen to the speech, you will hear Kennedy echoing King’s “Letter”The President rejects the idea that Black Americans should have to wait for equality. "Who among us," Kennedy asks the American people, "would then be content with counsels of patience and delay?"Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Everyone needs a reminder about just how good people can be. On Wondery’s new series The Daily Smile, host Nikki Boyer brings you stories that will make you feel good each weekday morning. With interviews, inspiring clips, and chats with special guests and passionate friends, The Daily Smile takes you on a journey into goodness, gives you all the feels, and will leave you with a smile on your face. Listen to the full episode: wondery.fm/dailysmilewordsSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In January of 1989 after 8 years in office, President Ronald Reagan delivered his 34th and final Oval Office address.His tenure was not without controversy - and there is much about Reagan and his policies for historians and commentators to rightly criticize.But more than anything else Ronald Reagan understood the power and importance of words.For his final presidential address Reagan wanted to end on a note of what had become his trademark - optimism.All of his political life The Gipper had talked about America as a Shining City on a Hill. But he never really defined what he’d meant.As he prepared to leave office - Reagan finally communicated that vision.Pay attention to his words - in Reagan’s view America was made great by free trade and the contributions of immigrants.“If that City had to have walls, those walls had doors and those doors were open to all who had the heart and the will to get here.”It is a very different message than we hear from those who claim his legacy three decades later.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Katie and Joe sit down with best-selling author and political analyst Doug Sosnik. He has advised presidents, senators, governors, Fortune 100 corporations and universities for 35 years.Doug also served as a senior advisor to President Clinton for six years as Senior Advisor for Policy and Strategy, White House Political Director and Deputy Legislative Director.He is the co-author of New York Times bestseller Applebee’s America: How Successful Political, Business and Religious Leaders Connect with the New American Community.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/words-matter. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices