Bush At The NAACP

This morning the radio had an NAACP spokesperson saying the President's speech would be a great "opportunity for dialogue between our two organizations." The remark was spontaneous and whoever it was grasped for words a little, so maybe I shouldn't be too hard on him, but it seemed a telling comment. The NAACP leadership sees America as a competing organization. Bush preached a very different gospel to them this morning. I haven't seen any eye-witness accounts of how it went, but there are loads of lines in the transcript where the audience applauded. RTWT, but here's one excerpt:

Government can hand out money -- and we do -- but it cannot put hope in a person's heart, or a sense of purpose in a person's life. That's why I strongly support institutions of faith and community service all around our country. I believe in the neighborhood helpers and healers.
And I put this policy in place. We've provided more than $5 billion to faith-based groups that are running the soup kitchens and sheltering the homeless, and healing the addicted, and helping people reenter our society -- people who are providing compassionate care and love. Organizations of faith exist to love a neighbor like they'd like to be loved themselves. And I believe it's important for government to not only welcome, but to encourage faith-based programs to help solve the intractable problems of our society.
And this faith-based initiative is being challenged in the courts. They claim that -- they fight the initiative in the name of civil liberties, yet they do not seem to realize that the organizations they are trying to prevent from accessing federal money are the same ones that helped win the struggle of civil rights. I believe if anorganization gets good results, that helps people turn their lives around, it deserves support of government. We should not discriminate based upon religion. We ought to welcome religious institutions into helping solve and save America, one soul and one heart at a time. (Applause.)