Dublin Opinion

“Americans never elect policy proposals; they choose the men behind them. What Barack Obama achieved Thursday night was something unimaginable in Martin Luther King’s day or even in the 1990s. In a football stadium at the foot of the Rockies, this product of a marriage between Kenya and Kansas rewrote the history of a nation that has been struggling for three centuries with the legacy of slavery and segregation. Obama’s gift is that he makes it all seem natural — that his rise to the heights of a presidential nomination was an inevitable consequence of 21st century America. The fireworks that were going off over Mile High Stadium were, in truth, more than equaled by the glow in the hearts of Democrats who leave Denver alight with hope.”

So says, Walter Shapiro writing in Salon today.

I didn’t go out of my way to look for a particular egregious example of overblown praise and myopic hyperventilating…. honestly. Okay, so there is no doubt that the nomination is historic because Obama is black. He really is and as even Jonathan Schwarz says, who expected that. But is this the only reason it’s historic? It’s hardly a corrective measure, nor does it indicate a sea change in race relations in the US, and considering the connection between race and class in America and the staggering disparity between the wealthy and the working class, its clear (to me) that this is not going to change either. But the colour of his skin is significant. Indeed, with 8 years of George Bush and a seriously ropey image internationally the only thing that could potentially make America look good at the moment is a black man in the White House.

And the deliberate invocation of Martin Luther King is interesting too. The extolling of King as a Black leader with a ‘vision’ for change is very much a retrospective affair. But his status is one denuded of his understanding of race and economics.

Which brings us back to Salon again, and for fear of repeating myself, to an interview with Jonathon Walton about King and economics:

“Didn’t King become more radical in the course of his career, in the period leading up to his assassination?

It was largely because of the fact that he moved from civil rights to human rights. One of King’s famous quotes after desegregation laws had been passed was that he began to find out that it mattered little if African-Americans — he said Negroes, of course — have the right to eat at the counter if they don’t have a dollar to spend at the lunch counter.”

Whereas with Obama its all about accepting the market mindfuck.

Well, the market is all about choice and having the freedom to choose, so it’s either vote for a black president or start up the cold war again.