The McCain and Obama Speeches: Gracious Both in Defeat and in Victory

November 5, 2008 at 12:11 am PT

Both President- Elect Barack Obama and the man he beat in an historic election, Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, gave the kinds of speeches at the end of last night that make one proud to be part of a country where stark differences still can mean grace can prevail when it's all over.

But don't take my word for it--the Internet makes it possible to consider them again and again.

Thus, here is a video of McCain's concession speech (try hard to ignore the inane booing at the start by some very sore losers in the crowd at the Biltmore Hotel in Arizona, which McCain quickly tamped down), as well as Obama's appropriately calm victory speech in Chicago below it.

They serve as perfect bookends to each other and is an amazing example of how to fight hard without killing each other, which is--in this fractious world--still a modern miracle.

Or as Obama quoted our greatest president (in my estimation, at least), Abraham Lincoln: "We are not enemies, but friends, though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection."

Here that is, in living color:

McCain:

Obama:

Tagged with: Abraham Lincoln, Arizona, Barack Obama, Biltmore Hotel, BoomTown, Chicago, digital, election, Internet, John McCain, Kara Swisher, president, Republican, speech, video

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http://blog.macb.net Mac Beach

As a realists, and to rationalize that which happens in the years after such speaches, it is always good to remember that they don’t write these things.

I also thought both speeches were too long, coming to what sounded like concluding remarks several times and then starting up again. A sign that the works of several speech writers were merged.

Now it’s time for the media to start asking a lot of questions they should have been asking a year ago. From my reading so far today that’s exactly what they are doing. Rather sad.
Sam Harrison

mccain sounded like he was speaking his own words for the first time in his whole campaign