CHICAGO — I was curious what language Barack Obama would speak after last week’s “Presumptive Nominee World Tour” that included stops in Germany and the Middle East.
But when he showed up at a last-minute session of the “Unity: Journalists of Color” convention, B.O. looked predictably tired and jetlagged. He could have been sleepwalking.
Maybe Obama took the journalists of color for granted. After all, most of the 7,000 conventioneers were absent themselves, unable to change their plans after Obama delayed his appearance date from Thursday to Sunday; I’d be surprised if more than 10 percent of convention goers were present. Then there was the embarrassing fact that Unity leadership had to remind those present to refrain from anything more than polite applause so as not to indicate the journalists’ knee-jerk bias for a candidate of color.
Regular readers of my column know I retain a healthy skepticism when it comes to B.O. But here’s a surprise after hearing Obama in front of all those journalists of color: The candidate of color is only a mild advocate of color.
Obama’s Immigration Stand
The new twist here was Obama’s insertion of class into the immigration issue, though he brought it up normally enough. “The problem is when you have a legal immigration system parallel with an illegal system,” Obama said. “I have said I’m strongly in favor of a comprehensive immigration approach.”
Obama believes in a crackdown on employers who hire undocumented workers, serious border security, pathways to citizenship that levy fines and an English requirement for immigrants.
He did mention the long waits for family unification that could take ten years or more. It’s “pushing people into the illegal system,” said Obama, who implied he might change that but didn’t say how.
Instead, he indicated there may be new restrictions on countries that have hundreds of immigrants (perhaps from Asia). “We’re probably underrepresenting immigrants from certain parts of the world,” Obama said. “It’s harder for Haitians than those from other parts despite similarities in need. That’s something we should examine.”
There he goes courting that Haitian vote.
The class twist came as he brought up the cost of immigration. “It’s harder for the ambitious hardworking, well-qualified poor folks coming into this country,” Obama said. “And that makes it a lot easier for….”
Here he paused to think up an example. And then he came up with the unlikely illegal immigrant. “Mick Jagger,” said Obama.
Frankly, I think the rich would prefer the tax laws in the Cayman Islands. But the subtext here was that in immigration, your class not your race, may endear you more in an Obama administration.
More Race Avoidance
A tougher question came when asked if he was overdoing his proclamation of Christianity and actually doing more harm to the Muslim community.
“This is a classic example of a no-win situation, right?” Obama said to laughter in the audience from reporters/supporters. “So I try to correct something false, and then people say why are you correcting this thing in a way that isn’t sufficiently….” His thoughts trailed off, but he did say he has been at the forefront of Muslim American and Arab American rights, an idea that brought loud clapping from reporters/supporters.
Frankly, he should have just answered it without appearing defensive. Being president is a no-win situation.
Then came a tough follow-up question: “Do you think you could have come this far if you weren’t Muslim?”
Obama used it to show what’s become his new way to avoid race issues. He says American people are more tolerant than most people think, and that they’re interested in someone who can get them a job, help send their kids to college. Essentially, it boils down this new class equation: He has their support, if he can make their lives better. “If on the other hand, I can’t help them do that, then it doesn’t matter what my religion is or what my skin color is.”
There was dead silence. Did he just make race totally irrelevant?
Asians Bring Up Affirmative Action
For good measure, in the role of the Asian American representative, asked a question about McCain backing Ward Connerly’s anti-affirmative action initiative in Arizona, and whether a black man’s rise to be a presidential nominee showed that affirmative action was passé.
Obama said he was a strong supporter of affirmative action when properly structured “so it’s not a quota.” He also chastised McCain for backing the divisive wedge politics of Connerly.
But B.O.’s affirmative action stand is hardly radical. He believes we need to craft it “so some of our children aren’t getting more favored treatment than a poor white who has struggled more.”
He clarified: “I think a university or college should take into account race but also class.”
There was no applause. Or reaction. It may just take a while to sink in that race seems less relevant than ever in the first person of color’s quest for the White House.
For more about Unity, comments from CNN President Jonathan Klein and The New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., studies on Asian American underrepresentation and the dirty jokes of Nightline’s Martin Bashir, check out the blog at amok.asianweek.com.
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Obama is the leader of all people. Everybody somehow finds connections to him. Americans are lucky to have such a candidate. Support Obama, visit WHYOBAMA08.org!
Just for starters in what’s wrong with this piece:
1. Obama didn’t delay his appearance from Thursday to Sunday. You make it sound he agreed to Thursday and then pushed it back. The Thursday appearance was never confirmed. He wasn’t even in the country on Thursday.
2. The headline of this column is not based in fact. Obama never said he puts class above race; and he never said anything that would imply that. All he’s saying is that race and class should be considered.
And of course his affirmative action stand isn’t radical. The guy needs to win. And to do that, he needs to speak to a broader range of people. I personally have a more aggressive position on affirmative action. But I’m not running for president.
Obama courts Haitians, McCain courts Koreans:
http://politicomafioso.blogspot.com/2008/04/we-must-support-our-korean-allies-op-ed.html
Recently, there was a renewed row between Korea and Japan over the Dokdo/Takeshima Islands in the East Sea/Sea of Japan. Interestingly, Bush came quickly to the Koreans’ side, the Japanese are slightly angered.
I speculate that Bush was siding with Koreans partly because Koreans are a GOP constituency and McCain backers, whereas the Japanese are a Democratic constituency and back Obama.
Thus, the fate of those islands remains under the cloud: Obama’s victory will help the Japanese claim, McCain’s victory will shore up the Korean claim.
Frankly, Emil, you’re dancing a fox-trot, and this is a waltz?
Well, the foregoing is about as clear and as penetrating an observation as anything this reader could discern in your “report.:
Contrariwise, at least it is less irrelevant and less superficial than what the MSM, cable channels?, are “reporting” these days. Any days? ALL days.
Daze.
Emil,
an article on the Wall Street Journal quotes Obama endorsing Reparations for Slavery and Indian Genocide:
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB121743626734197371-lMyQjAxMDI4MTM3MTQzMzE2Wj.html
You were there at the event, can you tell us the context in which Obama made the quoted comment? Do you believe that Obama was making specific demand for reparations?
“I personally would want to see our tragic history, or the tragic elements of our history, acknowledged,” the Democratic presidential hopeful said.
“I consistently believe that when it comes to whether it’s Native Americans or African-American issues or reparations, the most important thing for the U.S. government to do is not just offer words, but offer deeds.”-Obama at the Unity event.
I would like to offer a non-PC view on reparations for slavery and genocide:
The history of mankind, is basically about groups of people killing and enslaving one another, going back millions of years. Whichever group prevailed in organized violence routinely “replaced” the defeated populations and/or enslaved the vanquished.
We, the member of Homo Sapiens, are here today because our ancestors had the gumption and wherewithal to wipe out the more physically imposing Homo Erectus or Neanderthals, in a contest of kill-or-be-killed ruthlessness for the mastery of the globe.
Within the more recent history, the Greeks, Romans, Chinese, Mongols, Republican French, Spanish/Portuguese conquistadores, etc. successfully decimated and subjugated conquered populations. I have read that the renowned conqueror Ghenghis Khan slaughtered 1/3 of the population of the known world. (He apparently sired half-million children, but that’s another story.)
Slavery, too, existed at all times and all places, including present-day African countries such as Sudan and Mauritania. Too, with the unique exception of last few centuries, the vast majority of humanity lived under the sword, in actual or de facto or slavery, under the brutal feudal order maintained by military chieftains and their close allies. This was true not only in the European West, but also Asia, Africa, pre-Columbian South America and everywhere else on the globe. The Incas and Aztecs are known for their mass human sacrifices of subject tribes.
At no other place, and no other times, however, has a group of people other than African-Americans sought huge financial reparations for universal cultural instituions like slavery, especially long after the end of the institution, an end which was a gift by the white Americans to blacks, purchased by the blood of hundreds of thousands of white lives. No other nation, of course, ever caved in to such naked blackmail, either.
It’s quite disappointing that, after the gratuitous liberation of slaves, extension of civil rights, War on Poverty, racial preferences, PC protection, etc. which cost many trillions of dollars (the cost of Civil War, War on Poverty, etc.), after all that whites have done for blacks, a half-white African, who is not even a descendant of slaves, the first black nominee of a major party, and by far the least qualifed presidential candidate in American history, has the “audacity” to blackmail 87% of non-black Americans to turn over most of their hard-earned assets and savings to meet his demands.
Another problem with reparations for slavery: 90% of African slaves were sent to SOUTH America, and fewer than 5% to the U.S.
If African-Americans receive reparations for transatlantic slavery, what about the black South Americans? Should they make similar demands to Mexican, Brazilian, Columbian, Cuban and other governments?
What about the Conquistadores’ genocide of Aztec, Mayan, and Incan tribes hundreds of years ago? Who pays and who gets the compensation for that?
Why doesn’t Obama go back to Africa and stop the slavery going on all over that black continent (Sudan, Mauritania, etc.)? Why are his fellow black Kenyans so poor in the absence of white oppressors? Kenyans of Indian descent are as dark as black Kenyans but fare very well, controlling most of the Kenyan economy and the professions. How does Obama or Jesse Jackson explain that?
I’ve heard some US journalists in stories about the plight of Shanghai Jews of WWII suggest that China should be forced to pay reparations to them? Because the communists forced them to leave after finding refuge from Nazi Germany in Shanghai. Problem is poor Chinese were forced out of their homes to make way for these Jewish refugees. I notice everytime I see or hear someone suggest China owes Jews reparations, they seem to forget that very important fact. If the West ever makes his an issue of this, then forceing the West to pay reparations to African slaves, Native Americans, Chinese coolies, etc. would be every bit right to do so.