Many commentators consider Senator Obama's speech a unique, even historic event, an exceptionally open discussion of the most sensitive subject in American politics and American civil society. Others have either condemned it or brushed it aside as a smokescreen by a master of rhetorical illusion. We believe it is important to provide you, our readers, with the complete text so that you might better judge the discussion about this event. Interestingly, the full text of the speech has been the second most "emailed" item on the site of the New York Times in many months.

Read the speech that endeavors to shatter not only the barriers between men, nations and countries, young and old, rich and poor, but an address that is sure to breach the barriers of time and become a permanent fixture of American history, as it has already claimed near-instant fame.