I am not one to drool over “The Dream” and the way the speech is pandered about during the King holiday. It’s warmed over far too much in today’s way of remembrance. King’s message was often hard and not so easily digestible as the way it’s made to seem. As Michael Eric Dyson often says, one segment of America (mostly African-Americans) wants to deify King as if he were a god who had no flaws, while the other half (often white conservatives) seek to soften his message up into a little dream speech. In reality King was a great and flawed leader, no more human than the rest of us… and yet he lived and died accomplishing more than most.
I heard it said that Martin Luther King was the greatest American she has ever produced. I agree wholeheartedly. And with the inauguration of Barack Obama on tomorrow, I have to think he’s smiling a bit right about now.
BB&Gcmac's Weblog 
yes i agree MLK’s “dream” speech appears easily digestible–but when considered more closely, there is a lot that’s going on and it’s taken 40 years to even get close to what he’s talking about…
in my MLK post, i chose to include 2 versions which i can listen to over and over and enjoy. whenever i hear the moodswings song on the radio (and at KCRW they play it al year, not just around MLK’s birthday) i am reminded of the whole speech.
as a CA community college teacher, i have found that many of my students have never actually read the whole speech. when they read it, they are freqeuntly inspired and amazed.
MLK certainly was one of the greatest men this nation has ever produced.
It is a beautiful thing that this holiday is falling on the eve of the swearing in of our country’s first black president.
God bless America.
~C-Haze
The MLK Dream is a prophetic interlude to what is going to occur tomorrow. We, as a people first, then as a nation, better wake up and realze some of us are just a few years older or younger than the Dream speech. Don’t discount the paths of our paretns and grandparents who struggled and paid a high price for our recognitiion and finally acknowledgement as a formidable group of people who should be valued for what and who we are. These last few months have been joyous and I’m sure Martin and Coretta are embracing the harvest of their reward especially tomorrow.