Based on legal reasoning that to my ears sounds too bizarre to be real, 53 years after the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that segregated education is inherently unequal, the Court essentially said that white students being denied access to the school of their choice is equivalent to the experience of black students being denied access to equal educational opportunity prior to the 1954 Brown decision.

This case will have far reaching implications. There are an estimated 1000 school districts–about 1 in 15–that use race as a factor in making school assignments.

Not surprisingly, the first question of the night dealt with the High Court’s radical and potentially watershed decision. Every one of the candidates condemned the Court’s ruling.

I thought to myself, what a great start.

Here is what else I liked about the forum:

First of all, the format was fairer than any of the other two previously nationally televised presidential debates. The other debates tended to favor the top three contenders: Clinton, Obama, and Edwards. In contrast, here everyone got equal time to answer questions.

Second, the forum featured three journalists of color asking questions you’re unlikely to hear at any other presidential debate, including questions about the criminal (in)justice system, AIDS in the black community, Katrina, and genocide in Darfur.

“Okay, here is what I disliked about the forum:

First, the introduction lasted much too long. After all of the speeches, shout outs, and plugs for the sponsors, about 15 minutes had passed by. This was valuable time that could have been used more productively. This leads to my second gripe.

The quality of the debate suffered because there were simply too many candidates. What started out as 60 second responses got even worse when it turned into 30 second sound bytes with very little substance. Just when someone started to hint at something interesting, their time expired. Moreover, because there was no time for the candidates to respond to each other or for the journalists to ask follow up questions, it just did not feel like a debate.

Third, the camera work reinforced my hatred of the cult of celebrity in the black community. Seeing Al Sharpton and Michael Eric Dyson frown at a response by Sen. Joe Biden or Cornell West and Congresswoman Maxine Waters nod approvingly at a something Hillary Clinton said was plain annoying. Okay, maybe it was fun to see their reactions the first one-hundred times the camera panned over to one of them or some other black celebrity in the audience.

Here is what I did learn:

This is a three-way race: Clinton, Obama, and Edwards. They are not necessarily my three favorite candidates, but the reality is that they have all the money. With the frontloading of the primary/caucus season, when things really heat up in January, the candidates with the most money will be left standing. Connecticut’s favorite son, Christopher Dodd, though easily the most qualified of the bunch–but with little money and no name recognition–does not have a shot.

Second, Obama might be great when it comes to giving speeches in the small towns of New Hampshire and Iowa, but Clinton is the best debater out of the bunch. Obama did not finish second on my scorecard.

In many ways, this forum should have been a place for Obama to shine. Nothing he said made him stand out. Indeed, every time he answered in his middle-of-the-road kind of way, I kept thinking about 1984 and how exciting it was to chant, “Run Jesse Run” and hear Jackson yell back, “Our Time … Has Come.” I am pretty sure we will not hear “Run Obama Run” much. It’s not that kind of campaign.

Most importantly, I learned from the enthusiasm of the crowd (and, in general, the buzz around the All-American Presidential Forum) that the black community desperately wants a president who will address their needs and aspirations, someone who will turn the nation’s attention toward the continuing problems of racial, social, and economic inequality.

On nearly ever indicator of social and economic well-being blacks lag far behind whites. For example, according to a 2006 Census Bureau report, 37 million people or 12 percent of the nation’s population live below the poverty line, surviving on less than $20,000 a year for a family of four. Forty-three percent of America’s poor are black.

According to the independent activist organization, United for a Fair Economy (UFE), the official black unemployment rate of 8.6 percent is more than double that of the white unemployment rate of 3.9 percent. The black unemployed also tend to be jobless for longer periods of time than the white unemployed. Because the unemployment rate only counts those actively seeking a job not those who have given up on work or who are incarcerated, the situation is really much worse.

As another example, also reported by UFE, blacks make up more than a quarter of the 46 million people who are uninsured. Blacks depend disproportionately on public insurance: 27.5 percent of blacks (compared to 11 percent of whites) participate in a federal health insurance program; nearly half of all black children (46.9 percent) are insured through the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).

Finally, there is the educational system. Historically, schools have been the great equalizer. Access to equal educational opportunity, however, has always been a struggle for black people. The Court’s recent ruling does not make things any easier.