Why I'm Pushing It
Okay, this one is going to be tough to express without doing my own unintended race-baiting, but I think the issue is interesting so I'll give it a shot.
VG and I have been having a very enjoyable and informative (for me, anyway) back and forth about the Ayers/Obama connection and whether it means anything, should mean anything, etc. Read the whole posts for context, please, but what I take to be the gist of the good VG's perspective is that there's enough "there there" in the Ayers connection to give reasonable people "a moment's pause and a slight case of anxiety," about Obama, particularly when considered in the context of Obama's very short, thin, liberal resume of public service. Speeches don't count nearly as much as actions, and we don't have nearly enough of Obama's actions, and the actions we do have are already pretty far to the left. I get that and I respect it.
I won't repeat my perspective on the broader Ayers issue, but one point that I keep harping on is that if you do feel anxious about Obama, it's important to think about precisely what it is you're anxious might happen. I think that's key because it's a necessary part of deciding whether your anxiety is rational -- i.e. based on legitimate concerns about issues of governance, political judgment, fitness for office, etc
Why is it important for folks to analyze that? Because if you don't, you're at some risk of falling into this trap. However coyly phrased, what John Moody did was use a racial attack between two private citizens to attempt to tap into people's unspecified discomfort with Obama being black, while soothing them that in reconsidering their support for Obama, it wasn't because they were racists "but because they suddenly feel they do not know enough about the Democratic nominee." As it turns out, there was no attack, Ms. Todd is obviously disturbed, and I hope she gets help. The police here, by calmly investigating the case and finding out the truth, proved that we've come an incredible distance in color-blind criminal justice in this country, and are to be applauded. But Mr. Moody is a smart, sane, politically savvy guy, and it's worth thinking about the angle he was taking. He's aware that there are a lot of white people who, while wishing no harm to black people, simply do not feel completely comfortable being around them. That's not racism in a way that should make people feel ashamed of themselves, but it's certainly irrational, and no good basis on which to pick a president.
My concern is that the strategy of pushing vague innuendo about Ayers "raising doubts," rather than expressing precisely what it is you're afraid would happen, similarly opens the door for people who are not so deeply involved in this election to simply fall back on their unconscious prejudices or discomfort with black people rather than considering each candidate as an individual. If you follow the train of thought and get to "well, no, I don't really believe that it's possible Obama's going to follow Ayers' political views if he's elected," maybe reconsider whether the anxiety really is justified.
Please note that I am NOT trying to say that VG is being racist here -- unconsciously or otherwise -- or that he himself has any discomfort with black people for any reason. I have zero reason to believe either of those things. He has expressed more than enough good, rational reasons to oppose Obama's candidacy. And if this all sounds like white-guilt navel-gazing, feel free to ignore it. I probably haven't expressed the thought well enough to get past that. But maybe before you do, just consider what you think would have happened if a large black man actually had attacked a small, white college student based on her support for McCain and carved a B in her face for Barack.
posted by QueensGuy @ 5:37 AM
5 Comments:
Aren't you falling into the opposite trap? Once Obama got the nomination, perhaps before, since it happened to our first black President Bill Clinton when he bothered to defend his wife, it looked like any criticism of Obama would be met with the claim that it was somehow tinged with racism. Isn't this happening with the Ayers connection? What could criticizing Obama's connection with a former domestic terrorist have to do with that? Any more than saying he's a socialist have to do with racism, and has been claimed as well?
The Ayers connection raises three questions, none of them having to do with race. It goes to politics. How close was Obama politically with this guy whose politics are radical left, and who hasn't truly apologized or even paid for blowing up buildings? Obama has sold himself as almost a centrist, or a unifier who will transcend politics. Shouldn't this be a central issue for someone with so slight a record?
It goes to judgment. Shouldn't Obama, who must have known sooner or later about this guy's past some point along the way, have distanced himself, and I mean before the connection was discovered and caused his campaign trouble?
It goes to honesty. Obama didn't seem to be forthright about his relation to Ayers, giving a false impression and only revealing what he had to as the information came out.
The press should have been all over this, but they've only covered it reluctantly, and then to mostly excuse Obama for anything he might have done. This is the same press that couldn't wait to investigate every angle of Sarah Palin's life (there was one day I believe she got three negative front page stories in the New York Times and another she got three negative editorials, not to mention their recent earth-shattering expose on her wardrobe ttp://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/us/politics/23palin.html--would that they gave Obama's hundreds of millions of dollars spent on his campaign half the attention, after decades of the Times crusading for campaign finance reform). Even the past of Joe the plumber is getting more scrutiny these days.
It looks like the press is going to make sure their favorite candidate wins. Still, it's not enough that they've let us down in investigating his past connections, they got to try to claim anyone looking into it is doing something wrong. I say the people who are bringing up Ayers are doing what the press should have been doing all along. Since it looks like he's going to be president, I can only hope something changes after the election, because they need to start holding his feet to the fire at some point.
Nice post, QG, and anonymous, very good response. I, too, very much appreciate the sparring that we've been doing about Obama and the current election. It's no small joy that we can do this without the usual name-calling and ad-hominem arguments that tend to go with these posts. That said, I find you completely full of shit and...kidding, just kidding!
There are a number of things about this election that have my dander up - maybe others, as well - and most of them have to do with the mainstream media (MSM). I have never seen an election in which the supposedly neutral media has been so unabashadly partisan. Without question, the MSM has chosen sides and are doing their best to get Obama elected.
Obama has run as a center-left candidate but all available information about his record in office suggest that he will govern as a hard-left President. With only allies in Congress - who will no doubt try to use his inexperience to their own ends - there is nothing to stop him from introducing the greatest expansion of government since the great depression and nothing to suggest he won't do just that.
There is plenty of information about Obama out there but the Guardians at the Gate (AKA the MSM) have chosen to investigate Sarah Palin's wardrobe instead. Right now, the Narrative rules and the Narrative dictates that we will have our first black President.
If we continue to ignore his past, then we deserve the future he brings. As time permits between now and election day, I will continue to press my arguments about Obama, and with you help, maybe they'll become sharp enough to draw blood.
Aren't you falling into the opposite trap?
I might be. I just might be. And believe it or not, when the McCain campaign finally started openly calling him a socialist, it made me quite happy, because then the issue was out in the open to be confronted -- do you, the voters, believe Obama's a socialist or not? It is just when the discussion of an issue is limited to an appeal to the gut instincts and niggling discomfort that I start to worry that some folks will use that as an excuse to dismiss him based on race without a fair hearing as an individual. But I'd hazard a guess that such appeals to unspecified discomfort have been a part of election politics ever since there have been elections, so there's really nothing inherently nefarious about it here. I guess it just gave me a moment's pause and a slight case of anxiety, to borrow a phrase.
Regarding media coverage, I will readily agree that it has been biased toward Obama. I really feel for the McCain campaign when they complain that any attacks they make on Obama are blunted by the reporters before the Obama campaign itself even has a chance to respond, while Obama attacks are pursued with relentless vigor. I was skeptical of that claim when I first heard it in August, but have paid closer attention since, and have seen it in action on numerous occasions. The wardrobe bullshit it only the most recent, blatant example. That said, whether it matters or not is a subject we could debate for a while. I think the coverage has not been so biased as to silence McCain's point of view, and everyone in America has access to plenty of other media to hear a fuller, counter-spun version of the story. Whether they prefer tv, radio or a series of tubes, no story has been -- or could be -- effectively buried. E.g. William Ayers -- I'd bet public name recognition is above 50% at this point, and even if you misspell it in The Google, it'll suggest the right sources to get you as much info as you'd ever want.
Just to add a third perspective: I find the Ayers thing troubling, not because it says anything about Obama's radical views, but because it shows how easy it is for Obama to lie convincingly. If I knew nothing else, Obama's strong, unequivocal, and persuasive-sounding dismissal of the Ayers connection in the debates would have convinced me.
But this newspaper clipping alone proves he lied. It doesn't prove he lied about anything important! It just proves that he lied... and did so very convincingly.
(Disclaimer: I utterly oppose Obama, and consider McCain the distinct lesser of two evils. And yet twenty years ago I proudly hung Bernardine Dohrn's mug shot up on my office wall. Even today, I am always disappointed when the media mentions Ayers and not Dohrn. According to the best available evidence, she's the one who set off the pipe bomb in the men's room of the U.S. Senate building!)
Wait, Lawrence, you're anti-Obama and pro-Dohrn? And here I thought MY politics were tough to explain at cocktail parties....
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