Tammy Johnson of RaceWire writes: Barack Obama “. . . is not a scary black man. He won’t make white people confront racial inequities, deal with issues of privilege or the structural racism that undergirds this country.”
With Hillary’s injection of Dr. Martin Luther King smack dab in the middle of presidential politics, it’s entirely fitting to note that Dr. King was hardly a “scary black man” either. And it’s illuminating to note that Dr. King usually found genuine ways— often through his eloquence— to make not just white people, but all people, “confront racial inequities . . . or the structural racism that under-girds this country.”
It’s not a stretch to believe that Barack Obama can too.
“. . .when white Iowans went into those voting booths they did punch the card for a brother. But was that a calculation that he was a safe bet?”
Of course it was! But in many minds, it was based on a willingness to trust and believe in the power of hope, not just in Obama, but also in our selves.
“In the minds of white voters, is Obama really Black?”
Let’s take it upstairs—
In the mind of God, is Obama really black?
No; he’s not black. He’s not white; he’s not half this and half that.
We can say with spiritual and intellectual confidence that God sees him the same way God sees all his children: as his sons and daughters. And that’s the way anyone who believes in hope should see him as well.
“Will Obama, the beneficiary of the struggle, push the party on key issues of race? Will he do what Shirley Chisholm was unable to do, and force the party’s platform to reflect the needs of all the people?”
Will he “push”? . . will he “force”? I certainly hope not. I “hope” not, precisely because that’s the tried and truly wrong way to bring about the confrontation that will cause a change in heart in those who are capable of changing their hearts; something we should have already learned through “the struggle”; there’s a right way and a wrong way to use the force of change.
“. . .will he play it safe and talk about racial unity with great eloquence, but very little substance? Jackson didn’t go there in his public speculation, but somebody should.”
Very well: Why does a writer consider that talk— words written, or spoken— hold “very little substance”? Was no one moved to action when the truth was spoken to power through the eloquence of Dr. King? Should anyone not recognize that Barack Obama’s eloquence in speaking truth to power has just begun to galvanize a new generation— and perhaps an old one— to action that can change the course of history?
The reason some maxims become clichéd and time worn is because they become the work horses of evolving insight. “It’s always darkest before the dawn” in one such maxim, and Jesse Jackson’s recent recitation of the factors of the “state of emergency in Black America” is yet another incident of the darkest days, now upon us, being exposed to our personal experience; and Barack Obama, unless I miss my guess, could be this nation’s living and breathing herald of that dawn so long awaited, our best “calculation,” our “safest bet” for the solutions of our nation’s multiple states of emergency, born on the wings of new hope and belief in our selves; not just in Barack Obama, or his eloquent plea, to do just that.
