My most recent iteration of those points was yesterday on the Obama, Hillery [sic] thread and kind of got lost in a bunch of other stuff anyway, so I'll go ahead and put it here:
I don't know if this is the best place for it, but it kinda-sorta ties in to something I'd been thinking of already...
I've mentioned before that Obama's black and not-black experience reminds me a lot of my own deaf and not-deaf experience. One feature of that is being in situations where one "side" of your identity is demonizing the other "side." That was something that really resonated with me from Obama's first book -- accounts of how he'd talk to his black friends about how white people are not actually always that horrible, much the way that I talk to Deaf friends about how all hearing people are not necessarily horrible. While also being aware of the larger injustices that of course do exist, and recognizing the basis of why these feelings are there. And so at the same time arguing against people from the other "side" -- the ones who say "those Deaf people are just so reactionary and unrealistic," and you say, "Yes, but, you have to understand that they have dealt with prejudice and oppression for much of their lives -- that woman over there, she's not even 50, she had her hands tied behind her back when she was in school to prevent her from signing." Etc.
So you find yourself in this position, often, where you are talking to people who are quite sure they are right -- and are willing to tell you that because you're one of them, fully or partially -- but you see the other side of it. It instills in you a deep distrust of absolutism.
I saw this quote recently, and liked it:
Mrs. Vandeventer is a Republican who "is tired" of being a Republican. More from her here:
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/15/the-republicans-in-the-crowd/