Black Voices on Barack Obama’s Presidential Bid

Posted 3 July, 2008 at 3:20 pm by Kevin
Filed Under Politics, U.S. Studies |

I thought it would be a good idea to compile a set of links to what Black bloggers and members of the Afrospear are thinking about Sen. Obama these days, especially in light of his Father’s Day Speech, his actions on Fisa, and his reaction to Sen. Wesley Clarke. I want to do this for several reasons:

a) Maybe, just maybe, one or two people will get it into their heads that Black folks are not The Borg. We don’t all think alike, we don’t all hold the same exact values, and we don’t all go, “ooh, he looks like me, I’mma vote for him!”

b) I hope that maybe if some folks see the wealth of intelligent conversations going on amongst Black bloggers on the web, they’ll be inclined to go back to those blogs, rather than thinking all political opinion on the web comes from DKos, MyDD, and The Huffington Post.

c) I’ve wanted to comment on a lot of these blog posts myself, but I haven’t had the time. So, at the very least, I want to share them with you.

At first, I was going to separate the links into pro-Obama/anti-Obama lists, but it occurred to me, while looking through all the posts that I wanted to hi-light, how incredibly simplistic such a separation really is. There’s so much complex, middle-ground, at the crossroads type thinking going on, that I decided that it would be insulting to these writers and thinkers to box them into such easy categories. So instead, they will come as they come, regardless of chronology or viewpoint. I’m also not going to comment on any of the posts. Instead, I will just pick a quotation that I hope adequately sums up what the post is about. I may agree or disagree with a post, but that’s not the issue here. And please, don’t take the link and quotation I’ve provided as the end-all of that person’s stand. Take the time to read more of what these people have to say.

So here goes. I hope you take the time to check these folks out.

Francis L. Holland writing at The African American Political Pundit Blog:

This is what I said at DailyKos, just before I was banned there:

I define “white male supremacy”:  as “the belief that white males, no matter how much and how often they fail, are still, by virtue of their male gender and white skin, inherently more qualified than blacks and women who succeed.”  – Francis L. Holland, December 13, 2006 at DailyKos.

And everything about this election in 2008, shows that I was correct:  Barack Obama runs not just against a man, John McCain, but also and much more importantly, against the white male supremacy paradigm.  Barack Obama has to show NOT ONLY that he will be a better president than John McCain, but also and more importantly, that John McCain is not inherently superior to Obama by virtue of John McCain’s white skin.

It ought not be hard to demonstrate that the Party that prefers to end an expensive and futile was that is wildly unpopular is preferable to the party that proposes to continue that war indefinitely.  It ought not be hard to convince the public that the party whose current president has a 29% approval rating ought not be selected to perpetuate the policies of that same lousy-ass president.

And polls show that when adding undecided voters to the McCain column, (as might arguably happen in November) the race is actually a dead heat.

Mark Anthony Neal, Obama, the Father:

The Obama campaign has tried throughout this year’s presidential campaign to downplay the significance of the senator’s race, yet he stands as such a stark counterpoint to long-held stereotypes about African-American men as fathers and husbands. In this regard, his ascendency challenges myths not only about the capacity of African-Americans to serve as commander-in-chief, but also about black men as fathers.

With Father’s Day almost upon us, Barack Obama, the African-American father, offers needed affirmation of the black men who toil and struggle to be effective parents.

The Freeslave, The Politics of Change:

Never has a political candidate shed so much to receive so little from so few. He offers “CHANGE,” but he is the one who has become a veritable contortionist, wrenching and masticating his value system, his support system, his backers, HIMSELF, to gain the succor of the (white) world…The Last Poets warned of niggas incessant penchant for change -shape-shifting, flip-flopping and mind-melding to their white betters, staying just ahead of or barely behind the latest trends, curves, possibilities, fashion.

Carmen at All About Race, Bill Clinton to Obama, Kiss My Ass:

So this is the lion in winter? Is this what a denied and now all red and inflamed sense of entitlement looks like? During the primary campaign, former President Bill Clinton has already heaped a mountain of tarnish on his own legacy. And now, he’s about to insure that his prolonged toddler tantrum will eclipse all remembrance of the positive aspects of his terms in office.

Shark-Fu, On Acting White:

If a black person is running for office that does not automatically mean that she or he is going to make affirmative action, poverty and pay-day loan scams the foundation of their platform. For the record – black America is also complex and there are a lot of policy issues that impact the lives of a majority of black people, which include but are not limited to poverty, affirmative action and pay-day loan scams.

Brotherpeacemaker at the Afrospear Think Tank, Any Fool Can Be A Politician:

Black and white people alike argue that it is not in Mr. Obama’s best interest to affiliate himself with the black community. Many black people say that black people who want assurances from Mr. Obama are defeatist who want nothing more than to sabotage Mr. Obama’s historic presidential bid. Black people who are willing to jeopardize the historic opportunity of America getting her first black president are doing the bidding for white people. The fact that it isn’t about Mr. Obama but about the black community is lost on these people. The chance to make history is more important than assurances for the black community.

Rijyrah at Jack and Jill Politics:

I have written several posts about Obama courting the religious vote. I have no problem with this, mainly because I’m not a secularist. I’m a Christian who has been pissed at the Democrats completely ceding the ‘religious’ vote and the ‘religious’ voice to the GOP. Allowing them to narrowly define Christianity on two issues: abortion and homosexuality.

Yobachi at Blackperspective.net (referring to the FISA issue):

As I’ve noted here before, being for someone and criticizing them are not mutually exclusive. But I’m far more for my priniciples and beliefs than I am for any individual; and I do not belong to the Cult of Obama.

Right now he’s still probably getting my vote, but he’s working on making me stay home with bullshit like this.

Skeptical Brotha:

I voted today and did as I said I would do and voted no preference for the Democratic nomination for President because I am profoundly dismayed and angered by the lack of backbone shown by Barack Obama during the recent attacks upon his faith and the Black Church.

I struggled mightily. The twenty minutes I stared at my ballot seemed like an eternity. I went back and forth several times. Surrounded by other blackfolks, I became self-conscious. I wrestled with the lie I told the cheerful White Obama canvasser who ambushed me as I left my home. I then struggled with the commitment that I felt strongly enough to tell all of you about and my twenty-five year desire for a black President.

African American Political Pundit (the old blog, you should check out his new digs):

AAPP: Candidly, both Hillary and Bill Clinton have alienated black voters and other Obama supporters with their continued attacks on his character, race and cultural background. It would be a mistake to have Clinton or her husband to be back in the White House. This Independent swing voter would not vote for a Obama-Hillary Ticket.

Eddie G. Griffin:

I endorse your candidacy because it is the only visible means of returning to the days of Our Honor. Some, however, would have us to fight on indefinitely, even if we started this war by mistake. However, we cannot reclaim our honor unless we first admit to our mistakes and shortcomings.

The War in Iraq was a mistake and the American public was deceived.

The Angry Black Woman:

So Obama’s finally the party nominee, with a 50% chance of actually becoming the President of the United States. Dare I hope for it? Of course. But I’ll be blunt: Obama’s far more conservative than I like. I know he needs to be that way to get elected, and I’m willing to tolerate it for now, but he’s very much the best of three underwhelming choices in my eyes.

And yet I admit it: I’m caught up in the Obamamania. I feel the hope. But when I listen to most of my fellow Obama supporters, I can’t help but shake my head at some of the things they expect him to do. I feel for the man; as many people as there are out there who seem to think he’s some kind of “inadequate” poster child for Affirmative Action, there are more who are clearly expecting him to part the Persian Gulf and conjure up cheap gas to feed the multitudes (of SUVs).

Yeah. Well, I wish them good luck with that. In the meantime, let me tell you what I’m hoping for right now, whether Obama wins or not.

Margaret Kimberly at Black Agenda Report
:

Barack Obama is coming out of the corporate closet, so to speak - in an unseemly rush! Having finally made his nomination inevitable, the Democratic standard bearer-to-be is going public with what was also inevitable: a full unveiling of his pro-business, pro-imperial, don’t-give-a-damn about Black folks policies. Yet Obama’s free pass remains in effect in Black America, where he “is held to no standard at all.” With nearly five months of campaigning to go, Blacks and progressives are surely in for many more bitter disappointments. “Obama has gotten away with making a 180 degree turn because he is now the only Democratic game in town.”

Ask This Black Woman:

Ralph Nader had this to say about Barack Obama, and while I am supporting Obama’s candidacy, I completely agree with Nader.  Barack has not touched on some of the real issues that effect the Black community.

Exodus Mentality:

I really dislike politics. I think Democrats and Republicans are two sides of the same busted coin. I can’t in good conscience support such nonsense.

But I like what Barak is doing here. Got to be proactive in this day and age of instant information access, where a rumor can get wings and cross the oceans in an instant. If somebody is going t lie on you, you best have the truthful information readily available.

So even though I can’t support Barak because he is a Democrat, and I simply can’t, no matter how much I might hope and wish and pray that maybe this time will be different, I just can’t support this foolishness, I will do my part to help him get his truthful information out there in the face of the smears that have already begun.

DP at There…Already:

Now that’s what I’m talking about. For years this type of religious bullying has been an integral part of national politics, and the typical Democratic response has been to offer some sort of mealy mouth response, or cower in fear. I’m glad that Obama is calling this out for what it is. Politics. And Obama is not the only one calling Dobson and his ilk on their nonsense.

Pam Spaulding:

In reference to Barack Obama’s proposal to “expand” Bush’s Office of Faith Based Initiatives. Or, perhaps, to replace the program with a federally funded religious program of his own?

It has been a consistent pattern since Barack Obama first began to be considered a major player for the Democratic nomination for some people (myself, digby, others) to be concerned at least initially with the religious tone of many of his statements.

Unfortunately, false Republican attacks on which faith Obama follows, along with racist undertones, has had a tendency of allowing many otherwise credible people to mock these concerns as “right wing talking points” at best.

I want to be clear that I am not writing this in the spirit of arguing whether John McCain or Barack Obama is best suited to be president. Of course, I believe that whatever Obama’s faults on any particular subject, McCain’s will be worse. But I do wish to bring up the following quote - and so note that my primary motivation in questioning Barack Obama’s recent gambit is from the following place:

MsLadyDeborah at From My Brown Eyed View:

Both Obama and Nader have a common bind. They are both graduated from Harvard’s Law School. Isn’t it interesting that pro-Affirmative Action Nader would insist that Obama cast that reality aside during this phase of the national campaign? He wants Barack to be isolated into the image of a Black candidate that only represents Black interests. I believe that was already tried by Team Clinton during the primary elections. And that attempt did not win HRC any more black support than she originally had. In fact it cost her votes for playing the race card.

Via Purple Zoe Questlove on why he supports Obama

Terrance, at Republic of T:

I only glanced at the headline, because I was up to my ears in work.
But what I read was enough to give me a sick feeling; the kind you get
when you begin to wonder whether you’ve made a disastrous choice, or
cast your lot with exactly the wrong person. (It’s a feeling at least
some Bush voters, circa 2004, should be familiar with.) The headline? “Obama to Expand Bush’s Faith Based Programs.”

Now keep in mind, this is only a small sampling of the Black voices out there. You might want to spend some time checking out the Afrospear blog roll and the Bloggers of Color blog roll for more.

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