Barack Obama is, of course, not America’s first ‘black’ president but its first mixed-race president, brought up by a white mother in a white middle-class home. Those who subscribe to the former description must presumably also subscribe to the profoundly racist ‘one drop of blood‘ view of race.
OK, so I’m being mischievous; and I’m on the whole delighted that a fraction over half (52.92%) of US registered voters had the courage to elect Obama, despite some of what appear to be his regressive conservative views, for example, his opposition to gay marriage on the grounds that it conflicts with his “Christian faith”. And on that latter point, I’m also a little uncomfortable with the statement on his campaign web site Fight the Smears (http://my.barackobama.com/page/invite/christian) that:
Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised as a Muslim, and is a committed Christian
so reminiscent of the declarations made to the House Committee on Un-American Activities during the McCarthy witch-hunt years:
“I am not now a Communist. I never been a Communist and I am not in sympathy with the Communist movement.”
Why on earth could he not have had the courage to declare–citing the First Amendment to the US Constitution that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof“–that religious faith is a matter of private and personal conviction and practice? why did he have to insist so vehemently that he is a Christian, thus tacitly endorsing the mindless prejudice that an individual espousing any other religious faith is unfit for public office? Back in June, Andrea Elliott wrote in The New York Times:
While the senator has visited churches and synagogues, he has yet to appear at a single mosque. Muslim and Arab-American organizations have tried repeatedly to arrange meetings with Mr. Obama, but officials with those groups say their invitations — unlike those of their Jewish and Christian counterparts — have been ignored. Last week, two Muslim women wearing head scarves were barred by campaign volunteers from appearing behind Mr. Obama at a rally in Detroit. … Even some of Mr. Obama’s strongest Muslim supporters say they are uncomfortable with the forceful denials he has made in response to rumors that he is secretly a Muslim.
Well, OK, let’s not dwell too much on that … probably nothing much to worry about, huh? Nor his support, in July of this year, for Bush’s unconstitutional wiretap bill. Nor his declared readiness to bomb Iran. Nor his appointment of the notoriously anti-worker Jason Furman of the Brookings Institution to lead his economic team. Nor that his Senior Working Group on Foreign Policy includes such luminaries as Lee Hamilton, co-chair of the Iraq Study Group which recommended occupying Iraq until US-based oil companies has secured legal access to all of Iraq’s oil fields. And, as noted by Ramzi Kysia (‘The Team Obama Should Have Picked‘), “With Henry Kissinger and Bill Kristol endorsing Obama’s team – you know we’re in for trouble”
Nor, I suppose, need one feign too much surprise at his declaration on CNBC that “I am a pro-growth, free-market guy. I love the market” since we already knew from his fund-raising campaign–note that 21 billionaires gave the maximum amount to his campaign–that he loves the ruling top 1 per cent of the population that controls 20 per cent of the country’s income and almost 40 per cent of the country’s wealth (who will be looking the reap the rewards of supporting him) while little of his financial backing came from the 60 per cent of the population that controls only 25 percent of the income and a dismal 5 per cent of the wealth (tough luck, guys). Slightly embarrassing, though, to boast one’s love of the market in the present economic climate. (Parenthetically, I suppose I might mention that I’m less interested in the colour and class of he who is elected than in the colour and class of those whom he serves; and Wall Street is not obviously over-represented by the working-class poor and the descendants of the enslaved.)
My principal misgiving is that two quite separate facts are being promiscuously conflated to generate a mythical view of the world the consequences of which could prove disastrous:
- the US has elected its first non-white President. I understand the feel-good excitement and pride of African Americans (and of black people throughout the world) that for the first time in the country’s history a non-white candidate has been elected to the presidency.
- Obama will lead a mainstream party administration. The mainstream parties, whether Democrat or Republican, have an historically very dismal record–FDR’s ‘New Deal’ apart–of implementing policies that benefit the poor and marginalised in society; and current indications are that the incoming administration is unlikely to be any different.
To use the first of these facts as a basis for glossing over the second fact is an act of dangerous mythomania. As American political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal wrote of Obama recently:
What also distinguishes Obama from his predecessors [i.e., Black candidates such as Eldridge Cleaver, Dick Gregory, and Dr. Lenora Fulani] is he doesn’t come from civil rights, Black liberation, socialist or anti-war movements. (He often remarks at speeches, “I’m not against all wars, I’m just against dumb wars.”)
Indeed, although his detractors may try to paint him as a leftist liberal, this is hardly true. On issues both foreign and domestic he would’ve been more at home in the Republican Party of his senatorial forebear, Edward Brooke of Massachusetts. For though he is Black by dint of his African father, he has studiously avoided Black political groups in his long, harrowing climb to the rim of the White House.
He has studiously avoided the very real and long-standing grievances of Black America.
‘Real change that you can believe in’ would be an end to Empire and an end to wars for corporate greed, not just a change in the shade of the political managers.
Listen to Abu-Jamal’s full talk below:
So, much as I wish Obama well and trust that the expectations the world has of him will be fulfilled, I’ll be even more impressed when one day–undoubtedly not in my lifetime–[a] a working-class African American of slave descent–preferably a woman, and my money is on Cynthia McKinney–emerges as the nation’s first black president; [b] he or she is lauded not as a ‘black president’ but quite simply as the best man, or woman, for the job; and [c] being a Communist or a Muslim … or an atheist, for that matter … is no longer considered an “un-American” activity.
Cynthia McKinney for (America’s first black) President!
See also:
Matt Gonzalez, ‘The Trail of Broken Promises’
» http://counterpunch.org/gonzalez10292008.html
Andrea Elliott, ‘Muslim Voters Detect a Snub From Obama’.
» http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/24/us/politics/24muslim.html
Glen Ford, ‘Obama’s ‘Center-Right’ Presidency: The Die is Cast’, Black Agenda Report, 10th December 2008
» http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=929&Itemid=1
Cynthia McKinney, ‘Statement by Cynthia McKinney on the nomination of Barack Obama’
» http://www.allthingscynthiamckinney.com/node/375
Ralph Nader, ‘Between Hope and Reality’
» http://counterpunch.org/nader11032008.html
Kim Petersen, ‘Beyond the Rhetoric of an Audacity to Hope for Change’, Dissident Voice 4th November 2008
» http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/11/is-the-rhetoric-of-an-audacity-of-hope-for-change-enough/
Adolph Reed Jr, ‘Obama No’, The Progressive, May 2008
» http://www.progressive.org/mag_reed0508
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