Fractured America can and must be reunited

A shift in focus can lead to national consensus that might extend the America described in Obama’s speech into a place its citizens can be proud to call home, writes Peniel Joseph

US PRESIDENT Barack Obama proclaimed to the American people, “we are not as divided as we seem”, in a soaring and mournful address in Dallas, Texas, to honour the lives of five police officers killed by sniper fire when a peaceful protest went horribly awry.

“This is the America I know,” said Obama, pointing out the way in which the Dallas police department has been on the cutting edge of criminal justice reform and community-policing initiatives nationally.