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29 Apr 2008 05:37 pm

The Right, Race, And Obama

Brendan Loy makes an obvious point:

The truth is that Obama is speaking to black people, too -- he's speaking to everyone -- and he is sending a very clear message: enough with the bullshit. Haven't conservatives been waiting for a black leader to do that for, like, forever?

This is the promise of the Obama candidacy, encapsulated and made real. Obama is urging blacks to leave behind, once and for all, the politics of conspiratorial victimhood -- the politics of Jeremiah Wright and, although Obama can't afford politically to say so explicitly, of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton -- and embrace the politics of unity and hope and, ultimately, self-empowerment.

It's extremely depressing that the first major national black politician who takes on the victimology of Sharpton and Jackson is greeted by the right with the kind of cynicism you see at Malkin or the Corner or Reynolds. It reveals, I think, the deeper truth: the Republican right only wants a black Republican to do this. They are not as interested in getting beyond the racial question, in changing the hopes and dreams of black America, as they are in exploiting it for partisan advantage. Their response to the first major black candidate for president tackling the old racial politics? "We don't believe him."

Brendan expresses dismay at Glenn Reynolds. But Reynolds voted against Harold Ford. There's no black Democrat who could ever pass muster. Because they're Democrats.

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