In the current racial circus, the president of the United States, in addressing an assembly of upscale black professionals and political leaders, adopts the style of a Southern Baptist preacher of the 1960s. He alters his cadences and delivery to both berate and gin up the large audience — posing as a messianic figure who will “march” them out to speak truth to power. In response, the omnipresent Rep. Maxine Waters goes public yet again, to object that the president has no right to rally blacks in this way, when he does not adopt similar tones of admonishment with Jews and gays. (Should Obama try to emulate the way he thinks gays and Jews talk in his next address to them?)
Hope-and-change has now sunk into little more than a tawdry spectacle of racial spoils, as the president of the United States desperately cobbles together squabbling special-interest racial, ethnic, and gender groups in lieu of restoring the nation’s prosperity. Before the age of Obama, I don’t recall that some members of the Black Caucus were so ready to invite political opponents to “go straight to hell,” or to allege that they were veritable murderers eager to lynch blacks and restore slavery.
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Unspoken, of course, is the truth that Obama’s statism, deficits, interferences in the private sector, and spread-the-wealth rhetoric have frightened business owners into stasis — and the resulting slowdown hurts blacks most of all. But in this fantasy world of racial spoils, Obama’s profligate spending and borrowing can be faulted only for not being profligate enough. To suggest any other diagnosis would be to call into question the entire federal racial industry of the last 50 years — and those who have benefited the most by administering it.
Instead, a new insidious racism is supposedly energizing opposition to Obama, most expressly on the part of the Tea Party. Generally beloved actor Morgan Freeman alleged just that: Racism, not stupid policies, is what is hurting Obama — and by extension blacks in general.
But does the charge that racism is the basis for Obama’s current unpopularity have any empirical foundation? Barack Obama, himself half white, and a graduate of prep school and Ivy League universities, defeated Hillary Clinton in part because of the help and money of white liberals. He could not have defeated John McCain without sizable white support. The white vote, incidentally, split far more evenly than did the black vote, which went overwhelmingly for Obama, at well over 90 percent.
When presidential approval polls dipped below 40 percent, was the treatment accorded Barack Obama less charitable than that accorded his predecessor, George W. Bush? Freeman, like nearly all those who now level charges of racism, was quiet when a novel, an award-winning documentary, and an op-ed in the Guardian all speculated about assassinating the president of the United States. So far Al Gore and Sen. John Glenn have not suggested that Obama is adopting Nazi or Brownshirt tactics, as they alleged of Bush.
In fact, some of the most savage takedowns of Barack Obama have started to appear on the pages of the New York Times and the Huffington Post, where he is alleged to be an incompetent and weak purveyor of liberal values. It is almost as if some of these progressives relish critiquing Obama, in assurance that their liberal bona fides guarantees that no one will charge them with racism.
Indeed, there is something curious in the liberal argument that Obama, once deified as the ideal megaphone for progressive agendas, is now to be faulted for the current unpopularity of liberalism, given that he remains a far more effective advocate than Jimmy Carter and a far more doctrinaire leftist than Bill Clinton. It is almost as if liberal scapegoating of Obama is an attempt to shift responsibility for progressive failure from the message onto the hapless messenger — an unfairness that a Freeman would never discuss.
At almost the same time as Freeman made his divisive charges, Herman Cain won the Florida straw poll, largely because of the presence of tea-partiers, who felt the entrepreneurial Cain was more conservative than either Perry or Romney, and perhaps more authentic as well. Cain, remember, unlike Obama, is a product of the Southern black experience. His accent and cadences are real and not the studied product of self-described tutorials from the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. He knew racism in an era and place that were a world away from the 1970s Honolulu of Obama’s middle-class white upbringing. How can Herman Cain’s broad white support substantiate Freeman’s charges of a widely racist America, other than by resorting to some strange condescending notion of false consciousness: i.e., that a hapless Cain is being used by white capitalists in a way Barack Obama — the largest recipient of Wall Street cash in the history of presidential campaigns and the first general-election candidate since public campaign financing was instituted to renounce it — most surely is not?
Victor, Cain's having been a Godfather’s Pizza CEO is BY FAR proof of greater accomplishment than BHO's political career and Ivy League degree. Cain has shown his ability to do useful work for other people, to turn problems into opportunities.
Largely unspoken is the fact that BHO is himself the greatest racist in all of this, along of course with his supporters. Would any white or Asian man have had the audacity to hope to run for president on BHO's pathetic record of non-accomplishment? Would any white or Asian man so running have been taken seriously for more than a nanosecond?
BHO's skin tone was his only qualification for candidacy in 2008. We are learning to our dismay how thin a reed is that "qualification".
An excellent point that most people are too afraid to voice. There simply is no way a white freshman senator with Obama's thin resume' and questionable associations would have been seen as a serious candidate by the democratic establishment or the media, no matter how great his charisma or skills as an orator. The liberal elite fell in love with him so quickly because he was black but also "articulate and bright and clean"-- Joe Biden, and "light-skinned with no negro dialect"-- Harry Reid. Like a child who just can't wait for Christmas, he was tempting enough to make them forget about their much-loved "First Female President Hillary" doll and rush to unwrap the more-highly-prized "First Black President Barack" model. Another brilliant move by the wise, never-racist progressives.
The victim, parasite, and race hustler components of the black population are merely upset with the obama reparations administration because they feel that he has not gone far enough fast enough. Due to the distortion in the racial prism through which they view the world, they cannot, and will not identify the true causes of their condition. However, they will vote for him in any event.
Accusing those of the European persuasion as being racist by blacks is only a worn out tool of manipulation. It still causes Euros to cower in fear but it has a little less impact than before. I guess Euros have finally figured it out. It took them long enough. It also effectively cancels out any attempt to deal with real issues especially if one of the parties has no real argument.
Nowhere in this otherwise good article is there a convincing argument that blacks are hardest hit by Obama's economic (if that's the right word for it) agenda.
Asteroid strikes earth, women and minorities hardest hit, stay tuned for details.
Perhaps you could look at the unemployment rate for blacks versus whites. It has been all over the news lately.
Since the government's policies are O's (and more broadly the Democrats) then O's policies are in large measure responsible for what is happening to all of us. Since blacks are being hit hardest then O's polcies are hurting blacks more.
I’m often blissfully unaware of some hot topic “all over the news lately.” I don’t watch television news (or television at all for that matter). It’s too full of now-think-about-this-ism. I set my own priorities for what information I need and seek that information in venues in which it’s easier to skip or gloss over things that don’t strike me as important or interesting. I take in my share of lightweight info – but it’s things I’m interested in rather than things in which “the news” wants me to be interested.
I am aware that historically there is continuing higher unemployment among black Americans than among un-black Americans – this is spite of decades of government intervention in the labor and education markets ostensibly intended to change that. I’m not monitoring that statistic closely but since I just heard it’s “all over the news,” I Googled and found the numbers and graphs of historic trends. So, the already divergent unemployment rate has changed and the difference in unemployment rates is now greater. It doesn’t look like a huge change to me. In this complex world, could we pin this recent change in the difference between black and un-black unemployment rates primarily on Obama’s policies? Sure, but I was already worried about the future of a nation that would elect Obama. I was already asking myself in lament and wonder “is this the sort of people my fellow citizens are? They are taken in by this?” That a district would consider him seriously as a candidate for senate reflects poorly on that district… that he was elected President of the United States reflects poorly on our nation… in this information and media saturated age, are we a nation of literate ignoramuses?
A small change in the already differing rate of black unemployment as compared to un-black unemployment just doesn’t seem all that exciting. To read too much into it plays into the left’s race-baiting game. I have a dream that one day the unemployed will be judged not by the color of their skin by the content of their character, the marketability of their skills, and the freedom of folks to engage in free contracts and enterprises to bake more pies rather than squabble over how to divvy up the ones the rich are enjoying.
State that is, not "district" as posted above in "district would consider him..." Districts are for that other house of disrepute, he was of course elected by voters of his entire state.
I don't see any evidence that race relations have been set back by Obama. The same people--Maxine Waters, the Black caucus et al-- are crying "racism" as have always cried "racism". This is to be expected, because as we all know, race-baiting is an industry. Race-profiteers will always be with us.
Meanwhile, most people have moved on. A recent poll reports that 80% of interviewees approve of interracial marriage. We have seen that more blacks are running for office and being elected...etc.
The most notable change--as compared to the 1960s-- is the far greater respect and civility with which blacks and whites treat each other.
As to Obama's administration devolving to "little more than a tawdry spectacle of racial spoils", anyone listening in 2007 and 2008 would have realized that Obama was peddling precisely that. Of course, his dulcet tones packaged this message in more palatable terms.
I disagree. It seems that race huckstering, which was always a play on guilt, is seen for what it was, a perverse attempt to keep race at the fore.
Obama has demonstrated that a black man can be elected to the highest office in the land (and Herman Cain is demonstrating that the black man doesn't need to be liberal).
Only if one subscribes to the notion that "white guilt" is a necessary precondition to a non-racist society can this presidency be considered a set back.
The race card was been played so many times that it is now clear that an entire deck of them is up the sleeves of the charlatans. The Obama presidency trumps them all.
I wasn't around in the slave days, but I really don't think things are that bad now. I think the people who see everything through the prism of race first are the real racists, and that includes Morgan Freeman, a fine actor who is apparently convinced that racism never goes away.
Most of us don't care what color anyone is. We care more about whether a person is willing to be a good person and a good citizen. Tell the truth, help a neighbor, that kind of thing.
How does one prove one isn't a racist? Even whites married to blacks or other non-whites are accused of racism. The blacks etc. are accused of being "oreos" if they fail to blame alleged racists for any dissent.
If we really believe in "innocent until proven guilty", then we should be demanding people like Freeman and Garofalo prove racism by citing racist acts performed by Tea Party members. There are no Tea Party activities that are racist. There are occasional signs that express racist sentiments, and the people carrying them are told to leave. The signs represent individual acts, not Tea Party group acts. Contrast that with footage of Aryan Brotherhood or American Nazi Party meetings, where everyone is quite open about disparaging blacks and calling for their elimination.
Perhaps Freeman has never seen real racists? That would be a surprise.
But in slave days, blacks had far fewer legal rights and much more (justifiable) fear of whites. They aren't afraid now, which is a huge step forward, and as a nation we should be proud.
Obama is like George Bush, unpopular for his ideas, not his skin color. Cain would be a refreshing change I can hope for.
Should Cain win the GOP nomination, as I hope he will, the spectacle will be awesome to behold.
Wealthier white liberals truly will be put off by Cain's Blacker-than-Obama Blackness. Combined with their tin ear toward business success, this will draw their ridicule. ("Pizza? You're kidding. PIZZA? How declasse. How unhealthy.") That ridicule will have the effect of exposing their racism.
Among poorer white liberals, this won't work. Pizza came from poor white ethnics, after all. Their voices have accents, too. They run small businesses.
Cain will electrify the old Reagan Democrats and create a new wave of Cain Democrats.
Meanwhile, Cain will split the Black vote. Maybe not 50-50, but at least 65-35. Many Blacks will recognize Cain as much more one of our own than Obama. It'll be Bobby Rush time all over again. Except that Cain has one qualification that will resonate in the Black community. He's a Baptist minister. He'll use that status, and that skill set, and win quite a large group of Black voters.
For liberalism, a Cain campaign might be the death knell they feared when Sarah Palin emerged.
Unfortunately this doesn't sound very realistic. The dirty little secret is that blacks would prefer as president someone who they think is better than them and expressly NOT like them. In that sense, Obama's Ivy League background and yes, his lighter skin, carry a lot more weight than Cain's authentic life experience and blackness. (Just check out what the leaders of overwhelmingly black countries like Jamaica and Haiti usually look like.) And anyway, Obama represents the fruits of affirmative action, which too many still prefer over what Cain represents, genuine achievement.
As Churchill said, "It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning". I can't help but think that quote is true in regards to the democrats almost complete control of the African-American vote. I'm not saying that democrats will lose the black vote this coming election, but perhaps we'll start peeling them away bit by bit.
The failure of Barrack Obama is the very thing that was needed to show the black community that it isn't from the top down white racism that is holding them back, but they themselves. Certainly this is going to be one of the ugliest campaigns in my memory.
Good point, that Cain represents beautifully the logical outcome of the civil rights movement: an accomplished man rising in the world as far as his skills, hardwork and inclinations take him, regardless of race -- yet perversely the liberals do not see it.
