Obama and Black Doubt

Duke Professor, Mark Anthony Neal, wrote an interesting blog recently about Senator Barack Obama. In essence he ponders whether or not the masses of Blacks are reluctant to vote/support for Obama because they don't believe that he represents their interests. Rather since he is a politician will he give minority issues, minority status? What I do know for sure is that politicians are more apt to be concerned about the ones who helped to get them elected, as opposed to those who didn't.

I usually agree with Neal, but on this one I think that there is a larger problem. First, I don't think that a President Obama, even if he is inclined, could in 4 or 8 years substantially fix all of the social and economic problems that severely impact "Black America." At best he could use the bully pulpit to rouse attention to issues, sign some executive orders, push through some legislation or veto some legislation. However, history continues to show us is that a top-down approach to governing rarely works---just because something is targeted to happen doesn't mean that it will.

Politicians respond to pressure. Thus the system will change, giving perhaps a President Obama the tools and incentive to do something different when people are ready to step forward with their feet, wallets and ballots demanding change. Right now too many folks are still hung-over from the Clinton days...thinking everything is okay and that the problems that exist are the other guy's problems. Honestly, Black Americans, in my opinion, should look for agents of change in their own backyards, not in Washington.

It is not to say that who the president is does not matter, but for the day to day lives of citizens, it probably matters more who is on their city council or who occupies the offices of mayor and governor. It is the decisions at these levels that directly affect the services that people receive, the majority of taxes that they pay and to some extent, what goods they can receive. For instance, I cannot get wine shipped to Maryland (I know it's not a great hardship, but it still proves my point).

We also need to be real---Blacks do indeed have an outdated litmus test. Obama has an exotic background and two Ivy League degrees, so despite his years of organizing in Chicago and time on the state legislature, some folks think that he is not Black enough. For some reason, older Blacks especially believe that Bill Clinton is more Black culturally than Obama. That assessment maybe true if we are framing Blackness as only about the descendants of Americans slaves, but Blackness really encompasses a wider group of folks. Not only are all Black people not poor, they all don't have roots in the South. We need a definition of Blackness that does not marginalize folks who come from the African diaspora, don't have inner-city credentials and who maybe don't like collard greens.

A Black person should not support Obama simply because he is Black, he should represent the voter's values and convictions. However some Black people never determine whether a candidate is good or bad, they get stopped because the candidate's background does not seem to jive with them being down for the people. Ironically, Blacks don't seem to use that same standard for White candidates--if so, Hillary would not have so much Black support.

Obama is a politician and at the end of the day he does have to be pragmatic. He can't win a presidential election shouting about Black Power or reparations, but politicians and activists at the local levels can discuss issues in ways that best respond to their constituents. In turn they and their followers have the ability to force Obama or whoever wins the White House to actually change course---not talk about it.


Here is Professor Neal's blog---


A Sunday Kind of Love: Romancing Barack

by Mark Anthony Neal

http://blogs.vibe.com/man/2008/01/a-sunday-kind-of-love-romancing-barack/

"I want a Sunday kind of love, a love to last past Saturday night.."—Sunday Kind of Love (as performed by Etta James)

When the legendary Etta James bought the music and lyrics of "Sunday Kind of Love" to life, she could have been singing to the fragile state of African-American psyches at the time. "Sunday Kind of Love" was recorded by James in 1961, at a moment that was increasingly defined by the demands for social and racial justice that were emanating from the American South. Indeed the song, which is credited Barbara Belle and Louis Prima (among others), is little more than an innocuous love song about desiring a love, that transcends a one night (or one primary) stand. For some African-Americans, such songs could mean so much more, often framing the critical issues in their live in a language that was easily understood. At the root of Etta James's performance of "Sunday Kind of Love" were fears of rejection and betrayal, that resonated throughout black communities even as the most visible tenets of legal discrimination began to buckle. Was this an America that could offer African-Americans and others a "Sunday Kind of Love"? I thought about that question last Thursday night as Senator Barack Obama addressed supporters--and the nation--after his historic win in the Democratic Caucus in Iowa.

Indeed Obama's warm tone and fluttery diction fit as comfortably as a warm blanket last Thursday night--America seems to be in love with the man. Ironically though, the love is not as profound in the very communities that should naturally call Obama their favorite son. The failure of established African-American leadership (broadly defined) to close ranks around Obama has been widely documented and the ocean of non-black faces that engulfed Obama in the aftermath of his victory in Iowa, easily adds to the notion that Obama's candidacy is not reflective of the concerns of everyday black folk.

But I suspect that underneath the strident calls that Obama be subjected to some sort of "black conscious" litmus test (largely by those gatekeepers who stand to lose the most by a successful Obama candidacy) lies more complex realities related to issues of betrayal, mistrust and abandonment. If we give our love unconditionally to this man, in this context, and at this moment, will our hearts be broken once again? Will our continued investment in "black faces in high places" (an admittedly old-school notion) lead us to follow a man who will sell out our dreams--and our souls? Will our unwillingness to ride the "Obama Wave" leave us out in the cold, in the event he does win?

There are no illusions here. Barack Obama is a politician--one with the capacity to inspire the masses--but nevertheless, a politician, just as the vaunted Jack Kennedy, his brother Bobby, and even Harold Washington were essentially politicians. In other words, when pressed to assure his political survival--in spite of his idealism--I expect Barack Obama to be the pragmatist that the best politicians are. That pragmatism will likely, at times, be in opposition to black expectations. There are also no illusions about our current environment with regards to racial and social justice; Whatever hope some of us can conjure in support of Obama's candidacy is regularly met by the realities of police brutality, a criminally faulty criminal justice system, the benign and conscious neglect of urban and rural public schools, and a range of other issues that rarely get any play during the candidates' debates. Given the realities of race, class and gender, as it is lived on the ground, is this actually a country that could realistically elect a black man--no matter how comfortable he makes a white majority feel about him--as its president?

Many of these questions will be answered soon enough, but until then, I'll hold off in putting on Etta James's "At Last".