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"The hole in your heart when you don?t have a male figure in the home who can guide you and lead you."

Barack Obama, speaking from personal experience... and deviating from politically correct feminism.

Mr. Obama cited the need for stronger law enforcement services and resources for education, more job opportunities and other resources for communities.

?But we also need families to raise our children,? he said. ?We need fathers to realize that responsibility doesn?t just end at conception. That doesn?t just make you a father. What makes you a man is not the ability to have a child. Any fool can have a child. That doesn?t make you a father. It?s the courage to raise a child that makes you a father.?

There are a lot of women raising children alone ? or with another woman ? who don't like to think that their children are missing some special "guide" or "leader" because there is no male parent figure. This is not to say that such women don't see the value of a good father, only that they find something offensive in saying that the "male figure" in particular is needed. And Obama is saying that it is so important that it left a hole in his heart:

?I know the toll it took on me, not having a father in the house,? he continued. ?The hole in your heart when you don?t have a male figure in the home who can guide you and lead you. So I resolved many years ago that it was my obligation to break the cycle ? that that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father to my children."

Now, I know what he is trying to do is to push more men to be involved in their children's lives, but the way he is saying it, he is siding with traditionalists who think the male role is special, distinctive, and necessary.

ADDED: Matt Yglesias strains this out:

This one will, I expect, be a pretty big hit politically, too, since it has certain conservativish resonances about the centrality of family conditions to our social problems.

Pussyfooting is so loud. You'll have to click on the link to figure out whether Matt agrees with the NYT that Obama was talking about black men.

Full post as published by Althouse on June 15, 2008 (boomark / email).