mouseyfox:

whitehouse:

Watch President Obama’s statement on the Ferguson grand jury decision.

You can tell in this video that he’s trying to play the middle ground and acknowledge all sides of the argument people have been having regarding Ferguson - which I can’t blame him on I mean he’s the President he kinda has to toe the middle ground a lot - but there are things that he did in this discussion that I appreciated:

-He addressed the fact that there may be violent reactions to the grand jury announcement and that these would only be a minor group of people who would be working against the positive actions taken so far in Ferguson.
- He made sure to specify that there are peaceful protesters in Ferguson working towards making positive change, and advised people to help and support these groups.
-He acknowledged the loss that Mike Brown’s family is facing and the positive steps they have taken.
-He acknowledges (and calls them out on this too) that the media has been focusing on the looting and such instead of the peaceful protesters and advised them to focus on that group.
-He acknowledges that there needs to be chance in our justice and police organizations, and that even though there has been progress over the years there is still more to do.

Basically, like always, President Obama has to deal with pleasing incredibly different sides of an argument: both people supporting the protesters as well as the people that want to sensationalize the initial looting and then later sweep this all under the rug and deny that change needs to happen and I think he did a good job of it in this speech.