It's called politics, TIS. Don't be fooled. Obama uses them too. His speech about race was simply strategic. Besides it's obvious intent to diffuse the furor over Wright's comments, it was intended to do so by expanding the scope of the discussion and thus divert our attention from those comments.

Also, keep in mind that Obama refers to himself as black. Well, why doesn't he refer to himself as white? In fact, by the numbers, his daughters are more black than he is. He does it for political reasons. He's figured that he can't deny any of his blackness, so why not take advantage of it. Pure poitics.