Live By Race Baiting - the Clinton/Obama Uncivil War

By Michael P. Tremoglie (author of the critically acclaimed novel A Sense of Duty available at Barnesandnoble.com)

Liberals, generally, and liberal Democrats specifically, have always used ad hominems against their ideological or political opponents instead of arguing the merits of the issue. Very often they “poison the well” so to speak, by questioning the other person’s credibility either by claiming the other is ignorant (coupled with a veiled insult) or by alleging that their antagonist is motivated purely by a seedy self-interest.

The most famous of these is the race baiting of conservatives and Republicans. Routinely liberals and Democrats label them as racist, sexist, or homophobes. Liberal journalists and liberal academicians use this mantra with ease because there is usually no chance for a rebuttal. Democrat politicians use this just as facilely because, until recently, nearly the entire American news media was sympathetic to Democrats and rarely expressed dissenting opinions.

However, things have changed. No longer are liberals and Democrats immune from inquiry. Talk radio, the Fox News Channel, and print media such as The Bulletin provide an alternative to the liberal mainstream media monopoly that once existed. This has led to something that heretofore most thought impossible in the Democratic Party – a schism about race and racial identity politics.

The two current Democratic Party presidential candidates are each historic. Senator Hillary Clinton is the first female presidential candidate with an excellent possibility of being nominated and Senator Barack Obama is the first biracial (Obama’s father was Kenyan and his mother a white American) presidential candidate with an excellent chance of being nominated.

Prior to this, African-Americans such as Democrat Jesse Jackson or Republican Alan Keyes, did not have a very good chance of being nominated - although General Colin Powell was an exception. He was an African- American Republican, who did have an excellent chance of being nominated, however, he declined to campaign. The same could be said about female presidential candidates.

Yet, from the very beginning the race obsessed liberals have made Obama’s race more of an issue than Clinton’s gender. Consider this excerpt from an article that appeared in the February 1, 2007edition of Time magazine, titled, “Is Obama Black Enough?:”

“Ever since Barack Obama first ascended the national stage at the 2004 Democratic convention, pundits have been tripping over themselves to point out the difference between him and the average Joe from the South Side. Obama is biracial, and has a direct connection with Africa. He is articulate, young and handsome. He does not feel the need to yell “Reparations now!” into any available microphone… As much as his biracial identity has helped Obama build a sizable following in middle America, it’s also opened a gap for others to question his authenticity as a black man”

The Los Angeles Times wrote an especially poignant piece, parodied by Rush Limbaugh, titled,“Obama, the‘Magic Negro”‘… The Magic Negro is a figure of postmodern folk culture, coined by snarky 20th century sociologists, to explain a cultural figure who emerged in the wake of Brown vs. Board of Education. “He has no past, he simply appears one day to help the white protagonist…He's there to assuage white “guilt” (i.e., the minimal discomfort they feel) over the role of slavery and racial segregation in American history”

Others have written such discerning commentary as The New Republic’s Peter Beinart’s who wrote, “Why White People Like Barack Obama.” His thesis is that Barack Obama is a “good black” as opposed to Al Sharpton’s “bad black.” Or Debra Dickerson’s Salon piece, “Colorblind-Barack Obama would be the great black hope in the next presidential race -- if he were actually black.” Dickerson wrote, “Just as the Negro-friendly Bill Clinton had to gamble on retaining that base while reassuring whites that he knew how to keep blacks in line, so Obama has to reassure blacks he is unafraid to tell whites things that whites decidedly do not want to hear. Never having been "black for a living" with protest politics or any form of racial oppositionality, he'll need to assure the black powers that be that he won't dis the politics of blackness…. He didn't attain power through traditional black channels (not a minister, no time at the NAACP) so, technically, he owes the civil rights lobby nothing, but they need him in their debt. Homie has some rings to kiss and a kente-cloth pocket square to buy. …Also, and more subtly, when the handsome Obama doesn't look eastern (versus western) African, he looks like his white mother; not so subliminally, that's partially why whites can embrace him but blacks fear that one day he'll go Tiger Woods on us and get all race transcendent... Notwithstanding their silence on the subject, blacks at the top are aware (and possibly troubled?) by Obama's lottery winnings: "black" but not black…Black," in our political and social reality, means those descended from West African slaves.” Liberals – white and black – obviously are not content with Obama being biracial. No, he has to meet a certain type of black person. While pronouncements of who are real black people and who are not by white liberals and white Democrats are always amusing, such palaver by African-Americans is disconcerting because it indicates that the criterion of the white liberal has been grafted to the consciousness of African-Americans.

It is not race that matters to the white liberal - it is politics. This attitude is being manifested in the current Democratic Party presidential nomination process. Finally, the public can see what African-American commentators such as Thomas Sowell, Larry Elder, and Shelby Steele have been saying for years – blacks are only important to Democrats and liberals inasmuch as election day is concerned.

Hillary Clinton’s campaign is the epitome of this. The Clinton’s have always been masters of the politics of personal destruction. When Obama started being the preferred candidate of Democrats, Senator Clinton, former President Clinton, and their campaign people, resorted to what they know best – slurs.

Senator Clinton, wife of the first “black” president Bill Clinton (he was pronounced so by the Nobel Prize winning, African-American author Toni Morrison), tried to demean Obama’s relationship to the civil rights movement of two generations ago. Clinton implied that President Lyndon Johnson’s role in the civil rights movement was more important than that of Martin Luther King’s. “It took a president to get it done,” Clinton said. Whether one can infer that she parenthetically meant a “white” president is subject to debate.

Nonetheless, this remark drew criticism from black leaders, such as United States Congressman James E. Clyburn, a Democrat from South Carolina, which happens to be the next primary election state. Clyburn is one of the most influential members of the Democratic Party Congressional caucus. His criticism of Clinton is significant because of his home state and his ranking as a Democrat.

Clinton needed to do damage control quickly. She cashed in her chips among the black establishment – people such as black billionaire Ben Johnson. Defending Clinton he recently said, “As an African American, I am frankly insulted that the Obama campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary and Bill Clinton, who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues, when Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood, that I won't say what he was doing in the neighborhood but he said it in his book ( referring to Obama’s drug use)...to say these two people would denigrate the accomplishments of civil rights marchers.”

The Obama campaign issued a statement by former state representative Leevy Johnson of Columbia, one of the first three African Americans elected to the S.C. legislature after Reconstruction. He expressed his opinion that Ben Johnson’s reference to Obama’s drug use was hypocritical and an ad hominem. Leevy Johnson said, “It’s offensive that Senator Clinton literally stood by and said nothing as another one of her campaign’s top supporters launched a personal, divisive attack on Barack Obama…For someone who decries the politics of personal destruction, she should’ve immediately denounced these attacks on the spot.” Clinton then appeared on a Sunday political news show to further mitigate the damage from her comment. She praised Martin Luther King and said that he knew that it took a president to accomplish what he wanted. (An historical note here, since Democrats are being self-congratulatory and misrepresenting history. It was President Eisenhower who created and passed the 1957 Civil Rights Act - the law that started the modern civil rights movement – even though the final legislation was greatly altered by the Democrat controlled Congress and Senate. Also, LBJ could not have passed his bill without the help of Republicans, since many of his Democrat colleagues refused to vote for it.)

The irony of liberals and Democrats calling each other the names they have reserved for conservatives and Republicans for so long is indescribable. Their accusing one another of being racist or of race baiting is a caricature of itself.

It is absolutely absurd that white liberal Democrats are actually trying to convince African-American voters that they are more “black” than African-American politicians. It is even more absurd that some African-American leaders are trying to help them do so.

It’s bewildering watching the Democratic candidates destroying one another. The Democrats should have gotten rid of Hillary a long time ago.

The Clintons are vicious and unprincipled and will do anything to win. Obama dared to challenge the coronation of queen Hillary and will feel the fury of the Clinton machine.

Why do I feel this is all an act between Hillary and Obama?

Neither one of them is acceptable as POTUS.

There is no war between Democrats. It’s a sham game for suckers.

Obama’s sole purpose is to make Hillary’s coronation interesting. Obama won’t even be on the final ticket in ‘08.

Remember when Hillary Clinton in an attempt to make a joke said “Ghandi probably owned a gas station down south.” That was one of the most racist comments I’ve heard from a dem in awhile, yet how many major media outlets mentioned it? Not a single one.

Meanwhile ‘Macacca’cost us a Senate seat.

.............................................

The “D” Stands for Demagogue

Liberal Democrats, especially, must keep blacks fearful of racism everywhere, including in an administration whose Cabinet includes people of Chinese, Japanese, Hispanic, and Jewish ancestry, and two consecutive black Secretaries of State. Blacks must be kept believing that their only hope lies with liberals.

Why do I feel this is all an act between Hillary and Obama?

Because it probably is. Notice how neither one of them resigned their Senate seat so they can devote their time to campaigning? Neither one of them is acceptable as POTUS.

IMHO, neither one is acceptable as Senator either.

Thanks much.

You're welcome. Such a fine writer AND a FReeper, willing to defend/debate what he has written. It is GRRRRRREAT to be able to discuss an author's work with him. Thanks for your work, Mike.

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