Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Barack Obama and "Tokenism"   [Mark Hemingway]

I know Kathryn already linked this, but Erica Jong, who was last seen on CNN calling noted intellect and husband par excellence Charlie Sheen a "patriot" for suggesting 9/11 was an inside job, has a WaPo op-ed that deserves to be singled out for contempt:

[Obama] was lucky enough not to be in the Senate when the Iraq war resolution was floated after then-Secretary of State Colin Powell lied about WMDs. That was the true tragedy of race: a black man lying for a corrupt white administration that was using him as a token, much as they use Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice now.

Obama is also a token — of our incomplete progress toward an interracial society. I have nothing against him except his inexperience. Many black voters agree. They understand tokenism and condescension.

I understand my hopeful friends who think an Obama button will change America. But I'm sticking with Hillary. I trust her because all her life, her pro bono work has been for mothers and children. And mothers and children — of all colors — are the most oppressed group in our country. I trust her to speak for our children and grandchildren — and for us. She always has.

If I may risk of dozens of angry emails and sidestep the political minefield of whether or not the Bush admin "lied" about WMDs, I would like Ms. Jong to please explain how Powell (and to a lesser extent Secretary Rice) was being used as a "token." He was appointed to one of the most significant posts in government,.and one that deals with almost no issues related to racial issues in the U.S. He was a four-star general and his resume for Secretary of State certainly exceeds, say, Madeline Albright. If she doesn't like his conduct in office that's one thing, but it's quite another to claim him as a pawn who only occupied the position he was in because his race made him "token." If Powell wasn't qualified to be Secretary of State then who is?

As to her second point, how is Obama a "token" if the primary concern with him is inexperience, not race? Doesn't that show "progress toward an interracial society"? If she's suggesting that people won't vote for him because he's black, she offers no evidence of this. But raising the issue and letting it hang out there is, as Bill Clinton recently discovered, poisonous and not likely to be well-received. But frankly, her thinking here is so muddled I'm not sure what she's saying.

Finally, Jong wants duke it out over who's been more oppressed — black people vs. mothers and children? Seriously? I hope that Clinton and her supporters do push this because I think I know how the American people will respond to yet another pathetic attempt to derive moral authority from victimhood — not well. The reason why Obama is liked by many Republicans is that he is campaigning as if the content of his character truly is more important than any vestigial constraints imposed by the color of his skin, and no one, especially not a pretentious hack like Erica Jong, is going to tell him that he's a "token."

02/05 12:37 AMShare