The words continue to hang in the air. They are being talked about in cars, buses, trolleys, trains, offices, family rooms and dinner tables all across the country.

That in fact might be the best thing to come from Sen. Barack Obama’s speech on race.

People are talking about it. With each other. With family members. With co-workers. And not just among people that look just like them. Whites are talking to blacks, and vice versa. One of the first calls I got Wednesday morning was from a black man in Chester, a man I consider a friend, who wanted to talk about the speech. And the race issue. I could not have been happier.

It is a conversation this country direly needs to have. It is long past time we addressed the issues that swirl around race in America. Not the race for the White House, although that certainly frames the current discussion.

As we said on our front page yesterday, it’s simply a question of black and white. And for too long, it has been something that simmered under the surface; feelings were repressed, resentment was allowed to build.

Sen. Obama changed all that. He threw open the curtains, and laid his cards plainly on the table.

Now it’s up to all of us to pick up those cards and play the hand Obama dealt us. It’s a rare opportunity to frankly, honestly, fervently discuss one of the most pressing issues the nation faces.

And one we too often brush off out of fears of being branded racist or at least politically correct.

Obama has talked much about his message of hope and change. It hearkened the words of new Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, who promised “a new day, and a new way” shortly after taking office.

An honest, passionate, frank discussion about race in America. Now that qualifies as a new day.

Thanks, senator.