The Debate Link

I didn't comment on the mini-controversy where Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) seemed to think only Black people are on medicaid. But it fit very nicely with a broader truism among scholars of American race relations, which is that programs which benefit the poor nearly invariably are seen in the public eye as programs benefiting Blacks (think welfare).

And that, in turn, connects with Victor Davis Hanson's interpretation of Obamism:

It works like this: The ghetto resident, the denizen of the barrio, the abandoned and divorced waitress with three young children, can all chart their poverty and unhappiness not to accident, fate, bad luck, bad decisions, poor judgment, illegality or drug use, or simple tragedy, but rather exclusively to a system that is rigged to ensure oppression on the basis of race, class, and gender—often insidious and unfathomable except to the sensitive and gifted academic or community organizer.

So Obama combines the age-old belief that the state is there to level the playing field (rather than protect the rights of the individual and secure the safety of the people from foreign threats), with the postmodern notion that government must recompensate those by fiat on the basis on their race or class or gender. Remember all that, and everything from the Professor Gates incident, to the dutiful attendance at the foot of Rev. Wright to Van Jones become logical rather than aberrant. Michelle Obama could make $300,000 and she will always be more a victim than the Appalachian coal miner who earns $30,000, by virtue of her race and gender.

The problem, as Matt Yglesias pointed out, is that this doesn't jive with any of Obama's actual policy initiatives -- virtually all of which would advantage Mr. Coal Miner over Mrs. Obama. The Obama administration's domestic policy agenda has been singular in its lack of focus on issues of race and racial division (or even, really, racial harmony). It has studiously ducked the issue.

But it doesn't matter, because it never was about what the country (or what Black people) did or didn't do. To a significant swath of the country, all Black political action is presumed to be partisan racial gerrymandering, and all political action geared towards the poor is also presumed to be race-based wealth redistribution. Combine the two prejudices together, and you have a powerful political hurricane.

UPDATE: Also.

After a South Carolina Republican operative was caught tweeting that an escaped zoo gorilla was an ancestor of Michelle Obama, he attempted to defend himself by saying it was only a joke. To which Michelle Cottle wrote: duh. But why do you think that helps you? Noting it was a joke just means you made a racist joke. That's still a bad thing.

Meanwhile, in Israel, Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch is under fire after calling an undercover officer a "dirty Arab". The officer doesn't appear to be Arab, the remark was apparently a crack at his appearance. Aharonovitch's apology was at least a little less equivocal than his SC peer, but he still said it was "in a moment of jest". Well, sure, but that just means you jest in a racist manner.

Oh, and I'd be far more inclined to believe such statements "did not reflect your worldview" if you weren't a member of Yisrael Beiteinu.

Neat story in The Forward: one of Michelle Obama's cousins is a Black Jewish rabbi.

Funnye (pronounced fuh-NAY) is chief rabbi at the Beth Shalom B’nai Zaken Ethiopian Hebrew Congregation in southwest Chicago. He is well-known in Jewish circles for acting as a bridge between mainstream Jewry and the much smaller, and largely separate, world of black Jewish congregations, sometimes known as black Hebrews or Israelites. He has often urged the larger Jewish community to be more accepting of Jews who are not white.
[...]
Although Funnye’s congregation describes itself as Ethiopian Hebrew, it is not connected to the Ethiopian Jews, commonly called Beta Israel, who have immigrated to Israel en masse in recent decades. It is also separate from the Black Hebrews in Dimona, Israel, and the Hebrew Israelite black supremacist group whose incendiary street harangues have become familiar spectacles in a number of American cities.

You can read about his congregation here. The New York Times also wrote up a profile on them. I'd certainly be interested in visiting them once I move to Chicago.

The Obamas rock the fist bump after cinching the nomination. Some conservatives went crazy, but I think most of us found it cute. Also, I agree that while Obama has had to take pains to prove he isn't "too Black" for the ever-skittish White voters, he's also demonstrated that -- even in timid form -- he is able to push boundaries and increase what is socially acceptable for Blacks in America, and that's important.

Also, Wes Clark apparently beat him to the dap (I've never heard the term "dap", but apparently it's in use. I'm so old!). Another sign that he's right VP choice? It was in an ad featuring Clark's views on Outkast, after all.

A short while back, I predicted that Michelle Obama would become the latest target for GOP attackers desperate to slow her husband's momentum. The Tennessee GOP quickly verified that hypothesis by running an attack ad questioning her patriotism.

To their credit, both of Tennessee's Republican Senators, Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander, have come out against the ad. Corker explicitly calls for it to be taken down, Alexander is more tepid, merely saying that "There are probably better ways to communicate our pride in America, and we need to focus on those."

Corker already has had run-ins with controversial GOP ads, particularly the infamous "call me" ad put out by the RNC in his 2006 senate race against Harold Ford (an ad which he also opposed). And this the second foray the Tennessee GOP has already made this cycle into sleazy campaign tactics: the first being a mailer entitled "anti-Semites for Obama" featuring him in "Muslim" (actually traditional Somali) garb. That ad was taken down only after repeated efforts by Senator Alexander.

Michelle Obama enjoyed a long grace period from the national media. A smart, engaged women who has formidable accomplishments of her own wholly aside from those of her husband -- what's not to like? Well, being an outspoken Black women is always a position fraught with peril, and Michelle does not have her husband's naturally conciliatory personality. We saw her previously sterling image take a hit with the infamous comments about how her husband's candidacy represented the first time she'd been proud of America. And with a pair of articles out trying to paint her with a tar brush, I think we safely say that conservatives think Michelle Obama may be a point of vulnerability for the Obama campaign.

That doesn't mean that the attacks are just, though. The first is a projection piece by Yulal Levin at the National Review complaining that Michelle Obama articulates a sense of "bitterness" (the ultimate insult!). The warrant is that Michelle's speeches often hit on themes regarding how people no longer feel like they're in control of their destiny, that they can't make change in the world (obviously, the fulcrum to Obama's message that "yes, we can" make change). It's a pretty silly argument, that boils down to "there's no anxiety in America, because many of the people Michelle Obama is talking to are middle class or wealthy, and if there is, it's because we rock that much the harder," which I feel misreads the current sentiment of the American people by reducing the only possible source of anxiousness to money concerns. In any event, as in all arguments that flow from a perception that something is wrong with America, Michelle is being critiqued for daring to mention that all Americans might not exist in a state of ecstatic joy, all the time (how can we not? This is the greatest nation in the history of the world!).

The second is an article by equal-opportunity religion-hater Christopher Hitchens, who tries to blame Michelle for Barack's membership in Rev. Wright's church -- a membership which can only be explained by sympathy to radical Black separatist ideology. Since Barack clearly doesn't believe in separatism (nor, I'd wager, does Rev. Wright, but no matter), it must be Michelle. He spends literally one half of a paragraph providing evidence for this -- and (I'm not making this is up), that one piece of evidence consists of Michelle Obama's 1985 senior thesis (my senior thesis is online for all to see -- am I doomed?). That's it, and it's in the last paragraph. Contrast that to the two opening paragraphs, dedicated to wholly gratuitous references to Louis Farrakhan. This the best you've got? [Note: I strongly recall my argument here being made in a post at The Plank, but I can't find it. Apologies for the appropriation -- particularly if the post wasn't at The Plank and I'm effectively stealing from somewhere else. There it is! Publius from Obsidian Wings. Sorry 'bout that.].

While I'm on that last point, the discussion by PG and myself on the prospect of a Bobby Jindal VP position reminds of something. In addition to the latest go around of "is Obama a closet Muslim or a radical Christian Black separatist? Or both!?", there's been a persistent rumor fest that Obama only converted to Christianity and joined his church as a furtherance of his political ambition. Would Jindal, who converted from Hinduism to Christianity, face the same scrutiny of political motive? I mean, good luck getting elected as a Hindu Republican in Louisiana. Still, my guess is no, both because the pre-existing narrative of a 5th column (radical Hindus are trying to subvert America and Jesus!) isn't there (oddly enough, since Hinduism, as a non-monotheistic [or at least not traditionally monotheistic] religion would seem to be more theologically dangerous to Christianity), and because the arbiters of who is sufficiently close to Jesus to be allowed to participate in American democracy (i.e., the Christian right) seem to have given him the a-okay. Still, fascinating contrast.