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Richard Carter
1/24/08 N.Y. Amsterdam News 11
"We're all in our private traps. Cramped in them. And none of us can
ever get out..."Anthony Perkins, "Psycho" (1960)
The presidential primary season finally gets serious in contests
that really mean something to the Democratic candidates: South
Carolina and Florida this week and next, and delegate-rich New York,
New Jersey, Illinois and California on Super-Duper Tuesday, Feb. 5.
So, will Black voters tell white America how they really feel?
Forget about lily white Iowa and New Hampshire. Feel-good wins by
Barack Hussein Obama in the Hawkeye State caucuses and Hillary
Clinton in the Granite State primary were surprising, but don't
amount to a hill of beans. Black people were not heard from.
And forget the nonsense about Hillary taking New Hampshire despite
trailing Obama in all the polls after women rallied to her phony
tears. She won there because political correctness prompted white
voters-many of whom consider Obama an honorary Black man-to lie to
pollsters. More on this later.
Significant in the aftermath, however, is that the race issue-which
the guilt-ridden, head-in-the-sand, white news media is afraid to
seriously address-has been outed. Hey ya'll, Obama is a Black man
and Clinton is a white woman. Black vs. white. Get it?
When the pathetic, blustering Bill Clinton called Obama's campaign
"a fairy tale" and Hillary diminished the role of the Rev. Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. in pushing landmark civil rights
legislation, everything hit the fan. And Black people are not
surprised.
These sleazy remarks and racial code words by Clinton
surrogates-Black and white-remind white voters that despite his
colorless appeal, Obama is Black. When push comes to shove, most
white people look down their noses at Black people. Period.
Recent offenders include New York Atty. Gen. Andrew Cuomo with his
"shuck and jive" nonsense about Obama and U.S. Rep Charlie Rangel
(D-N.Y.), who said: "How did race get into this? Because Obama said
race." He also raised the drug issue by saying Obama mentioned it in
his book because "I guess he thought it might sell books."
Next, Black Entertainment Television founder Bob Johnson called
Obama "a guy who says I want to be a reasonable, likable Sidney
Poitier in 'Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.'" He also alluded to
Obama's admitted youthful drug use first raised by silly Clinton
sycophants Mark Penn and Billy Shaheen.
This racial fire was answered by a zealous Obama backer, the Rev.
Jeremiah Wright of Chicago's Trinity Lutheran Church of Christ, who
indicated that some Black people support Hillary "because her
husband was good to us." But he added: "That's not true. He did the
same thing, to us that he did to Monica Lewinsky." Whew!
Meanwhile, tiresome white TV talking heads such as Chris Matthews,
Bill O'Reilly, Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity are clueless as to
how Black people feel about race and are afraid to acknowledge its
importance. And don't forget Tim Russert didn't ask Obama a single
racebased question in a full hour on "Meet the Press."
These people and others not worth mentioning at CNN, Fox News
Channel and MSNBC, five in an alabaster dream world. Their whiteness
means they can't see-or won't admit-that race remains the most
important issue in America. Not national security, Iraq, Iran, the
economy, health care or illegal immigration. Race.
Anyone who talks about putting the recent flurry of racial comments
in the Obama-Hillary contest behind us-including the candidates
themselves-have their heads in the sand. They refuse to face the
harsh reality of race relations in America today. They should forget
about their so-called "truce" and discuss race in depth. Don't hide
from it.
A recent piece by Bill Maxwell, a Black columnist with the St.
Petersburg (Fla.) Times, put things in perspective. Headlined "An
"Honorary White Man,'" it begins "...bis {Obama's} overnight rise to
national prominence has everything do with race, that many whites
will vote for him because he doesn't make them feel uncomfortable."
He ends it thusly: "Instead of pretending that Obama's skin color
doesn't matter, we should use this campaigp as an opportunity to be
publicly honest about race and the unique roles it plays in national
electoral politics."
In between, Maxwell says: "If he becomes the next president, hell do
so prematurely because of white support, especially by whites eager
to prove that they are fair.. .Many see Obama, like Colin Powell
before him, as a Black who has transcended race.
"Obama is what many Blacks (and some whites) pejoratively refer to
as 'an honorary white man' who can soothe white people. In the
parlance of race studies, he is a 'good Black,' rather than a "bad
Black."
Thus, far Obama, unlike Powell, hasn't dealt with this part of his
appeal to whites. And neither Powell nor Obama is ideologically
Black.
"In the Jan. 26 South Carolina primary, race will be a major factor.
Fifty-one percent of the state's registered Democrats are Black. The
Nation [magazine] calls that contest 'as close to a Black primary'
as we're going to get in 2008."
While Fm on record as decrying Obama's failure to make it clear that
he will discuss issues of importance to Black people, I totally
agree with Maxwell's logic. Indeed, Obama's colorless campaign has
avoided issues such as police brutality, housing, Black unemployment
and institutional racism. This approach appeases whites who, as
Maxwell writes, "are less prone to accuse Blacks of being too
dependent on the government."
But in South Carolina, New York, New Jersey, California and
Illinois-where Black voters can make a differenceObama must decide
how aggressively to court what should be his key constituency. He
can force the Clintons to stop taking the Black vote for granted.
And America can take giant steps toward electing the real first
Black president-not phony Bill Clinton upon whom that mantra was
foolishly conferred.
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