What’s the country coming to when an honest man can’t unfairly attack another honest man, personally, without that other man saying the unfair attack is against his whole race?

by John Holbo on August 5, 2008

Quiet around here. Alright: about that Britney/Paris ad. First, I take it to be obvious the dog whistle ‘he’s coming for your daughters’ subtext was, if not expressly intended, then well appreciated by the ad’s producers. But here’s something else about these ads in general. McCain is an old man without a lot to say, policy-wise, running against a charismatic younger man in an environment that favors the younger man for a lot of age and charisma-independent reasons. There is really no choice but to go for the ‘but he’s too young’, ‘he’s not ready’, ‘he’s all smile, no substance’ line. Obviously there isn’t really any reason to think so, and obviously the Republicans don’t actually think so. This isn’t their reason for voting McCain – namely, they’ve thought hard about the age issue and concluded it favors McCain. It’s just: what else are you going to say? Joe Lieberman: he’s a “good young man.” Who calls a 46-year old man ‘young’? Lieberman just called Obama ‘boy’, in effect. Is Lieberman racist? I doubt it, so why did he do it? Because there isn’t anything else for him to say that would make Obama sound bad, in a general sort of way. He would have done the same for John Edwards, if Edwards had gotten the nomination.

But: there’s no way for old white men to call a professionally accomplished, intelligent, articulate, younger – but not actually young – black man ‘boy’, in effect, without it being heard as racist. There’s no way for an old white man to drop hints that such a man might have a certain animal magnetism, might be qualified to be an entertainer, but should hardly be placed in a position of professional responsibility. (Perhaps someday, but for now, people like this ‘aren’t ready’, for obscure and unspoken reasons.) Again, Edwards would have gotten the same treatment: he’s a blow-dried lightweight. But the race angle changes it. And there isn’t any way for the attackers to convincingly deny they were making a racist attack because the true defense, if any, would be: ‘I wasn’t making a totally baseless attack on his race, I was making a totally baseless attack on him personally.’ That’s a funny corner to be driven back into. Hence the rather strange ‘these ads are just fun, sit back and enjoy it’ defense. But what’s the alternative? ‘What’s the country coming to when an honest man can’t unfairly attack another honest man, personally, without that other man saying the unfair attack is against his whole race, which is just plain an unkind thing to say and drags our political discourse through the mud? This is where Political Correctness has gotten us!’

So where does this leave us? A couple points. On the one hand, I’m not surprised that the response to the McCain vs. Obama over the ad has broken McCain’s way. I won’t go into that, but it makes sense that Obama’s angry response rubs a lot of white voters the wrong way. They really, really don’t like to be called racists, and they empathize with McCain when they see him accused of racism for something that might be racist but, on the other hand, might just be political mud. (I think if you think about it, the right to make baseless attacks without being accused of making a different sort of baseless attack is not such a precious pillar of democracy. But, on the other hand, not being able to make baseless attacks in politics would be a serious handicap.) There have been some murmurs to this effect on conservative blogs. What might unite the conservative base would be an identity politics of shared victimization, based on a principled opposition to any such identity politics. McCain has had his problems with ‘the base’:

But when McCain called out Obama for playing the race card, conservatives really cheered. How often have their views (on everything from opposing racial quotas to insisting on anti-fraud voting measures) been labeled “racist”? They have noted with a mixture of wry amusement and irritation as Obama declared each and every argument against him to be “inappropriate” or “unacceptable.” So when McCain blew the whistle and said, in effect, “You’re the only guy playing racial politics, Senator Obama,” the base gave a collective whoop. Finally, someone had said “enough.”

The cliché that politics makes strange bedfellows usually applies to politicians of different parties. But in this case it’s an apt description of the bonding that is taking place between McCain and his fellow Republicans in the furnace of a presidential election. The base and McCain need each other and they finally found common ground. There will be plenty of fights and irritations ahead, but for now they are joined in a common defense. And McCain has to thank the astounding overreach by both MSM and Obama for that.

So it’s going to be race card rope-a-dope. Make unfair attacks on Obama that sure sound like dog whistle politics and then swear you never heard the whistle yourself. or that the only whistle you blew was an anti-dog whistle dog whistle. And get paid on both ends: the attacks work, the innocent schtick pays off extra. (I’ve been reading Perlstein’s Nixonland, so I’m inspired with appreciation of conservative victimology rope-a-dope.) But I just don’t think it’s going to work because you can’t keep it up forever. The operative word is ‘argument’, as in “Obama declared each and every argument against him…” Obviously McCain doesn’t have an ‘argument’ that Obama is like Paris Hilton. If McCain comes up with actual arguments between now and November, Obama can hold his own and then some. But McCain can’t blanket the media with completely substance-free attack ads, all of which imply that there’s just something obscurely wrong about this Obama fellow – something not quite right about him, can’t quite put your finger on it. Because after a while the ‘it’s all just fun’ defense is going to wear thin. (By contrast, I think Republicans could have kept up substance-free ‘he’s too young and blow-dried’ attack ads on Edwards from now until forever.)

I would recommend that Obama do one or the other of two things: first, nothing. Let others in the media chronicle the descent of John McCain. Second, Obama could challenge McCain to elevate the discourse – could call the conservative bluff in effect. Call for an end to all such ads, on both sides, to clear the air. Stick to arguments and policy, no personal attacks. This suits Obama but not McCain, whether McCain answers the call or not. If McCain keeps making attacks, just ignore him. Normally that’s not a good strategy, but I think it would be in this case.

I’m not worried either way. I don’t think that McCain can lash his whole base together, until November, with rope-a-dope ‘you called me a racist’ grievance. Even if McCain runs sly ‘is it a dog whistle/is it not?’ attack ads right through November, and Obama is baited into reacting angrily to every one, I think the end effect will be negative for McCain. It just isn’t going to wear well.

In other news, how do you feel about the adaptation of Johann Krauss’ character for the screen in Hellboy 2? It’s kind of an interesting case because, in effect, they already packed half of his personality into Abe Sapien’s character in the first film. The quirky-dainty Niles Crane mannerisms and nods and bobs and delicate fingers. You can’t really have two of those in the BPRD. So I think it was a wise decision to make him an absurdly jaunty, Prussian-ectoplasmic disciplinarian. I thought the film was pretty good – not as good as the comics, of course – but I hated the take-this-job-and-shove-it ending. It didn’t make a lot of sense.

{ 62 comments }

1

Matt McIrvin 08.05.08 at 3:09 am

I wish I shared your optimism. This tactic hasn’t worn thin in 40 years; why would it wear thin now?

Watch, one of McCain’s ads is going to use the word “niggardly” and we’ll be subjected to a month of op-eds pointing out that the word is etymologically innocent and only a completely brainwashed politically correct person could object to its use. Then, in the debates, McCain’s going to warn Obama that his epidermis is showing.

2

lisa 08.05.08 at 3:19 am

I don’t mean to caricature your argument but it could be read as saying something like this:

There is a kind of ridicule we could throw at person X (e.g., Edwards) but we are throwing ridicule at person Y (Obama). The ridicule we throw at person Y is qualitatively similar to the ridicule we throw at people when we are being racist against them. But it is ridicule and we would throw ridicule at person X. So it’s OK.

I’m pretty sure that’s not exactly what you are saying. But it bears a family resemblance to a common thing that white people tend to say, which is ‘we make fun of everyone so our racist fun of you is not as egregious as it would be otherwise.’

Admittedly, the slurs really stick in politics. For example, the Gore slurs really stuck. So the mud that is non-racist is damaging, perhaps even as damaging. To the candidate. However, it is not the same kind of mud because racist mud sticks all over the place. This is what is particularly sickening about racist mud. I mean, you aren’t just dipping your fingers into the pot of Nixon memes (BRILLIANT ones, if the story is true…although Buchanan tries to take the credit). You are dipping your finger into the pot of 100 years of terror and lynching. That’s a bit different, for my money.

3

John Holbo 08.05.08 at 3:56 am

” … So it’s OK.”

Well, I hope the post didn’t come out as seeming that I am arguing that McCain’s ads are ‘ok’. That’s not my point. I do think this much is true: McCain would be running the same sorts of ad against, say, Edwards. Since Edwards is white, it’s obviously not JUST a race thing. This is regarded as a solid defense on the other side. But it’s obviously more complicated. The fact that you would be doing the same thing in a different case doesn’t mean that the fact that you are doing it in this case has nothing to do with the rather unique features of this case. You could, after all, have chosen not to do it in this case.

4

Rob Weaver 08.05.08 at 4:00 am

Simply one of the Republicans’ more standard plays: turn your opponent’s assets into liabilities. Obama’s celebrity becomes airhead celebrity. An effective ploy, certainly when compared to the standard Dem play of being as much like the Republicans as possible, thereby cementing the notion that their traits – militarism, (faux) religiosity, etc – are indeed valuable assets, and then wonder why the voters choose the real thing over the cardboard cut-out.

The reaction from the netroots is an early signal of what form the “it’s someone else’s fault we lost” excuse will be this time around*. 2000 was blame Nader, 2004 was swiftboating, this time around the failure to energise sufficient voters to send another Dem “Centrist” into the White House* will be purely – purely! – because Americans are such racists, don’t you know.

Even from the other side of the globe this election is going to be super tiresome to watch.

*in the extraordinarily unlikely event Obama loses.

5

NS 08.05.08 at 4:15 am

“Alright: about that Britney/Paris ad. First, I take it to be obvious the dog whistle ‘he’s coming for your daughters’ subtext was, if not expressly intended, then well appreciated by the ad’s producers.”

Patently ridiculous. If said producers wanted to warn of a threat to white feminine virtue, why pick two characters who are universally regarded as lacking such? Real answer: because the point of the ad was to smear Obama by comparing him to Britney and Paris.

Is that the current conservative talking point? I don’t know, I’m not a conservative. What I know is that the “he’s coming for your daughters” interpretation makes no sense on the given evidence, and if racists wanted to make that allegation, they could have done a lot better job.

6

LFC 08.05.08 at 4:39 am

Perhaps I missed something, but I thought Obama’s specific response to the Spears/Hilton ad was to say, in effect: “Don’t the Republicans have anything more substantive to talk about?” — which is not an angry response. Obama then said on a separate occasion something like “McCain will try to tell you I don’t look like the other presidents on the currency,” which is what prompted the McCain camp’s charge of playing the race card. What you describe as race card rope-a-dope relates, I think, to this exchange, not directly to the Spears/Hilton ad, though it’s true that the story as reported tended to jumble everything together. In any case I agree with you that sly negative ads and race card charges are not going to work.

7

John Holbo 08.05.08 at 4:48 am

“if racists wanted to make that allegation, they could have done a lot better job.”

I think you are missing the dynamics of this sort of case, NS. The last thing you want to do is explicitly make a racist allegation. You want something that will inflame the race issue without being demonstrably an attempt to do so. You may say: how could you know that’s what it is, then? But the answer is: this sort of thing is not exactly new. Is it really likely that the ad producers aren’t making rather elementary calculations of how people are likely to respond? That’s their job.

“What you describe as race card rope-a-dope relates, I think, to this exchange, not directly to the Spears/Hilton ad, though it’s true that the story as reported tended to jumble everything together.”

Yes, I think I’m jumbling them together. Probably I shouldn’t be.

8

bad Jim 08.05.08 at 5:24 am

The fact that Paris and Britney are not regarded as paragons of virtue is irrelevant. In the infamous “Harold, call me” ad that is given credit for Harold Ford’s loss in 2006, the blonde was showing nothing but skin. The message is still “black boys rape our young girls” even if Violet goes willingly.

9

Rich Puchalsky 08.05.08 at 5:36 am

“But McCain can’t blanket the media with completely substance-free attack ads […] Because after a while the ‘it’s all just fun’ defense is going to wear thin.”

There’s a triumph of theory over observation. Just because it’s been working for a decade or more doesn’t change your idea that it shouldn’t work, right?

Of course Obama should do neither nothing, nor challenge McCain to elevate the discourse. He should go on the attack, through proxies, labeling McCain as an old, sick, corrupt, no-family-values crazy person and coward. And possibly a Manchurian Candidate. If the Democrats manage to lose, it’ll be because amazingly enough, some people still think that you should either do nothing or elevate the discourse.

10

novakant 08.05.08 at 5:56 am

Who calls a 46-year old man ‘young’?

At least over here, there’s a certain type of pensioner who will call anybody with youthful looks – say Hugh Grant or David Bowie even – “young man”, no matter what their age. You can meet them at supermarkets and coffee shops during off-peak hours (the pensioners, not Bowie and Grant). I agree, though, that it’s a bit inappropriate for a presidential candidate. What I found oddly charming was when the ladies at the local council called me “love”.

11

John Holbo 08.05.08 at 6:14 am

“Of course Obama should do neither nothing, nor challenge McCain to elevate the discourse. He should go on the attack …”

I think that’ll work, too, but not as well as my way, Rich. I do realize that I am bucking a 40-year tradition of what works for Republicans. But I think it’s also important to realize that a charismatic 46 year-old African-American candidate for President is an unprecedented situation. One of the other rules of American politics and media, besides ‘Republican smears always work’, is that you can get in a lot of trouble for saying racist stuff. This puts the Republicans under a constraint that they haven’t suffered before, when it comes to smear strategy. For the first time there’s actually a risk of going too far and having the whole thing backfire. I think it’s going to be seriously hard for them not to go too far, while piling on the substance-free personal attacks, month after month. Something is going to slip. McCain will approve some message that’s a bit more over-the-line and then that will retrospectively put all the stuff that was right-up-to-the-line in a new, harsher light. On the other hand, there is a calculation that if the campaign is racially polarized, without the Republicans getting the clear blame for it, they walk away from the table with pissed off voters. But I just don’t think McCain can keep up the over-the-top – but not too far over the top – attack style that is required.

12

John Holbo 08.05.08 at 6:16 am

“they walk away from the table with pissed off voters.” I meant: the Republican walk away with more voters in their pocket, in effect.

13

John Holbo 08.05.08 at 6:17 am

“pensioner who will call anybody with youthful looks – say Hugh Grant or David Bowie even – “young man”, no matter what their age. You can meet them at supermarkets and coffee shops during off-peak hours (the pensioners, not Bowie and Grant).”

Aw man, you are shattering my illusions. I would pay good money to watch a pensioner call David Bowie a ‘young man’ in a supermarket during an off-peak hour. That would make my week.

14

Shaun Huston 08.05.08 at 6:24 am

Since everyone else seems to be ignoring the most important paragraph in this entry … I agree about the characterization of Johann Krauss in Hellboy II being interesting given the way Abe was introduced in the first movie. In fact, I was surprised that he was selected from the books for Golden Army as opposed to, say, Kate Corrigan or Roger (though I understand why both were likely passed over; introducing Kate could complicate the Liz-Hellboy relationship that has been created for the films, and Roger, well, I’m not sure the world is ready for a live-action Roger. Daimo could have been chosen since del Toro doesn’t seem to have much regard for BPRD/Hellboy continuity, but I’m not sure what he would add to the films). I never quite got used to the Victorian diving suit they put Johann in, but I did warm to the variation on the character. I think that the ending, with the whole team essentially quitting, is indicative of the manner in which the movies have been made, which is to amp up aspects of the comics, in this case, taking Hellboy leaving the BPRD and generalizing the act to the entire core group of characters (though, as you point out, with far less clear cause than Hellboy’s exit at the end of Conquerer Worm). Anyhow, if you click through to my blog, you can read a lot more about what I think about the differences between the movies and the books.

15

Roy Belmont 08.05.08 at 6:35 am

“Is Lieberman racist? I doubt it…”
Racism’s an attitude, it only becomes a thing when artifacts of the attitude show up.
As an attitude it runs through a spectrum from mild almost indiscernible to overt and virulent.
It’s not some kind of binary yes-he-is/no-he-isn’t.

Soft racism, hard racism and everything in between, it’s all out there, still, from people who are just slightly uncomfortable in an elevator with a young black man, to full-blown white supremacy.
It’s likely Lieberman’s a little racist, just maybe not overtly enough to register on the media correct-o-meter.

Using Paris and Britney looks from here like more of a “blonde sluts, yeah – just what them young bucks can’t resist” kind of thing, than the cliched “He’s after your daughters.” The targets of the ad don’t see either woman as a daughter figure.

The message is delivered with enough vague latitude it’s not attackable for anything so direct, plus it carries a soupcon of “feral youth coming up behind you”.
Obama plus Britney and Paris are coming for your daughters and your sons.

That that vagueness, as visceral and specific as the images are, could be targeted at more than one susceptible demographic would be a profitable move for the film’s writers.

16

otto 08.05.08 at 6:36 am

John, I think you are talking about what Kaus called the ‘racial bonus’ to otherwise permissible political criticisms in certain circumstances. It’s a very tricky issue.

In other Obama news, did you see the recent ‘It’s time for some campaigning’ video from jibjab? Where Obama prances through the forest with bunnies, racoons, and unicorns? It also has a light-weight, young man, not-ready, even clue-less flavour. Of course it helps that it’s rather funny, and that it’s bundled with uninhibited criticism of McCain (though Hillary gets off easily). But watching it made me think that if McCain had produced such a cartoon as an ad, it would have been both ‘sufficiently fair’, hit all the points that the celebrity ad goes for, and would have been very difficult to criticise as racist.

17

Ben Alpers 08.05.08 at 6:57 am

Yes, I think I’m jumbling them together. Probably I shouldn’t be.

I think McCain and the media have lumped them together.

Obama didn’t respond to the celebrity ad by accusing McCain of racism. The dollar bill quote–itself hardly an accusation of racism–was a reference to this earlier McCain ad.

But McCain’s campaign chose to ignore this fact and portray Obama’s dollar-bill statement as “playing the race card.” And the media refused to call them on it, or even mention the ad to which Obama was referring.

My conclusion about all of this is that the McCain campaign has been waiting to accuse Obama of “playing the race” card (for all the political reasons described in this post), they took their first (rather implausible) opportunity, and the media let them have it.

All the more reason not to let McCain get away with jumbling these things together.

18

Katherine 08.05.08 at 7:04 am

“there’s no way for old white men to call a professionally accomplished, intelligent, articulate, younger – but not actually young – black man ‘boy’, in effect, without it being heard as racist”

There, fixed that for you.

19

bad Jim 08.05.08 at 7:16 am

By the way, August 4 was Obama’s 47th birthday.

20

John Holbo 08.05.08 at 7:25 am

“By the way, August 4 was Obama’s 47th birthday.”

Well, this is evidence that he sure isn’t getting any younger. McCain better hurry up to make these attacks while the attackins good.

21

Homechef 08.05.08 at 7:49 am

The response shouldn’t be “McCain started it” but rather “McCain’s an honorable man, who would never be racist… But those people who made the swiftboat attacks, those are the people you can’t trust.”

22

reason 08.05.08 at 8:00 am

I think a better response than:
“McCain will try to tell you I don’t look like the other presidents on the currency”

would be

“McCain will try to tell you I don’t look like the other presidents on the currency, but wait and see what I look like after 8 years on the job.

Very clever, as it not only would have defused the race issue but would have turned the age issue against McCane.

23

abb1 08.05.08 at 8:55 am

I dunno, I haven’t seen any adds and I only watch two US political/news shows: Jon Stewart and the Colbert Repor. Once in a while they make fun of Obama’s celebrity, but they make fun of McCain’s age restlessly, they’re really into it. Harmless fun or vicious attack against an age group?

24

ROYT 08.05.08 at 9:27 am

We keep talking about these ads (and candidate responses to ads) like we know which ones are racist or at least racially overcoded.

And that’s wonderful, but doesn’t matter much. What will matter is what they think in the real world, not at CT.

And there’s some evidence what people think — Here’s the headline at Rasmussen: “Only 22% Say McCain Ad Racist, But Over Half (53%) See Obama Dollar-bill Comment That Way.”

I hope Obama’s taking this as an indication he should change his response pattern.

25

virgil xenophon 08.05.08 at 10:04 am

BTW, I don’t have the exact quote or the date at hand, but it was Obama himself, who, several months ago, first broached the subject of Paris Hilton by publicly lamenting the fact that he was being painted in some quarters as a mere celebrity like Paris. Given that fact, the McCain campaign can hardly be tagged as being the first to unfairly dredge up what so many “intellectuals” consider to be a frivolous comparison when it was Obama himself who was the first to do so by initiating the comparison game by mentioning Paris by name (I am not passing judgment on the intrinsic merits/demerits of the substance of the ad itself).

26

SJ 08.05.08 at 10:48 am

“I would pay good money to watch a pensioner call David Bowie a ‘young man’ in a supermarket during an off-peak hour. That would make my week.”

You can watch Kenny Everett pretending to be a pensioner doing that here.

Of course, it could be argued that Bowie actually was fairly young back then.

27

Slocum 08.05.08 at 12:28 pm

I think you all are missing how this backfires on Obama — it backfires not so much because people are outraged at the insult to McCain and feel sympathy. It backfires because a lot of voters look at this and think, “So is this how it would be? 4-8 years of hair-trigger racial sensitivity? Every criticism of Obama having to be carefully scrutinized to see how it could be construed? Do we really want to have to deal with all that crap?” It backfires because instead of promising that Obama will help the U.S. transcend race, it suggests an Obama election may mean an unending racial sensitivity training re-education course of the kind that many Americans have occasionally found themselves sentenced to as a condition of employment or higher education.

In this sense, I think the ‘dollar bill’ comment on Obama’s part was an unforced error. If I were advising Obama, I’d recommend that he refuse to take the bait, loudly insist that his campaign is in no way about race, and try to get as many of his supporters as possible to follow suit.

28

Steve LaBonne 08.05.08 at 12:36 pm

And there’s some evidence what people think—Here’s the headline at Rasmussen: “Only 22% Say McCain Ad Racist, But Over Half (53%) See Obama Dollar-bill Comment That Way.”

That’s because the lying MSM have not told them about the referent of that dollar-bill comment”, this McCain campaign ad from June.

29

Rich Puchalsky 08.05.08 at 12:41 pm

“I think it’s going to be seriously hard for them not to go too far, while piling on the substance-free personal attacks, month after month.”

There’s only three months left.

As far as I can see, Obama is running a lousy campaign in everything except ground organization. It’s the same losing playbook that the Democrats love: try to act Presidential by not replying, not attacking, letting a natural advantage slip away. Rob Weaver, above, says that the netroots are going to blame the loss, if Obama loses, on American racism. Well, of course the American public is racist; this election wouldn’t be at all close otherwise. But it’s also that Obama is losing it.

30

richard 08.05.08 at 12:59 pm

what they think in the real world, not at CT.
I love comments like this. Firstly because the real world must be a very small place: it excludes every specific gathering of people everywhere. Secondly because what it really says is “you people are freaks. Everyone else is normal, and they think one way, but you people don’t get it, and you don’t count,” while the person talking casts themselves in the role of translator between the freaks and the real. Paging Ben Anderson, I think.

31

Danielle Day 08.05.08 at 1:13 pm

Dear Senator Obama,

ATTACK ATTACK ATTACK. McCain is a frail, old, cancer-ridden relic. Portray him that way or you will lose.

PS

Most American are racist swine.

32

Thom Brooks 08.05.08 at 1:23 pm

Am I the only one who thinks Obama will win in part because the 2008 election is shaping up in similar ways to the 1996 election between the more youthful, articulate, and charismatic Democratic running against an old war veteran Republican who spent decades in the US Senate?

Like all politicians who have been around a long time, Obama may have a field day looking into McCain’s voting record.

http://the-brooks-blog.blogspot.com/2008/08/is-john-mccain-new-bob-dole.html

33

Slocum 08.05.08 at 1:31 pm

Well, of course the American public is racist; this election wouldn’t be at all close otherwise.

Right — because Democrats from the progressive wing of the party have traditionally won the presidency by wide margins in the past (Stevenson, McGovern, Mondale). If only Obama were white, he’d be a shoe-in.

34

Rich Puchalsky 08.05.08 at 1:52 pm

Slocum, the GOP has the most unpopular President ever, or, at least, matching Nixon’s level. The GOP candidate is a poor campaigner. There’s an unpopular war. A lousy economy and exceptionally high gas prices. Democrats are winning just about every other electoral position out there. Yes, if the Democratic candidate for President doesn’t win, it’s a) his lousy campaign, and b) racism.

But really, your remark comes from a long tradition of denial. Who’d think that the Southern Strategy would work? But of course it works and it keeps working. Because of racism.

35

Slocum 08.05.08 at 2:12 pm

Slocum, the GOP has the most unpopular President ever, or, at least, matching Nixon’s level.

But the Democratic congress is even less popular.

There’s an unpopular war.

As in 1972 — but Nixon won in a 49-state landslide.

A lousy economy

As in 1992 — but Clinton, running as a ‘triangulating’ centrist, won a close race with a plurality.

Yes, there is certainly a minority of the electorate who will not vote for Obama due to racial animus. But I do not believe that is larger than the minority who will vote for Obama unconditionally in racial solidarity.

Obama has every opportunity to win or lose this election on policy, style, personality, strategy, debate performance, etc.

36

Rich Puchalsky 08.05.08 at 2:28 pm

More denial. Who would think that racism was an important factor in American life?

I’m tired of this whole discussion, from John’s well-meaning but vacuous start to its predictable end. If people can’t see the awful, never-to-be-fixed mess that the American dream has become, let them not see. Here’s some poetry to express what I think:

Two roads have diverged, and at last we can see
That Langston’s America never will be
Our song of ourselves is a jingle of lies
And hope is a thing that will peck out your eyes

37

abb1 08.05.08 at 3:26 pm

Rich, but it’s always like that and it’s everywhere. It’s not like the Americans are more racist than everybody else; if anything, I wouldn’t be surprised if on average they are less. It’s just how the political system operates in the US, and it’s understandable – the stakes are astronomical and winning is everything. Too much concentration of power in too few hands.

38

Dan Simon 08.05.08 at 3:44 pm

I give John and the commenters credit for the creativity of their narrative, but there are a couple of things that I’m having trouble with:

1) A few months ago, when virtually the only thing that anybody knew about Barack Obama was that he’s black, his poll numbers were positively stratospheric. Now they’ve come down to earth. Is it being claimed that racist Americans had to be reminded that Obama’s black by subtly coded McCain ads, before recoiling in revulsion?

2) Obama’s rise and fall in the national polls mirrors the pattern of the Democratic candidacy race–early on, as a virtual unknown, he looked ready to sweep, but concerns about his inexperience and perceived arrogance brought his poll numbers down to rough parity with his opponent. Does that mean that even Democratic primary voters are racist, that Hillary Clinton’s attacks were in fact coded appeals to that racism, and that racist Democrats needed those reminders to be convinced not to vote for a black man?

39

bianca steele 08.05.08 at 4:51 pm

I know I’m not very media-literate, but I find the Britney/Paris juxtaposition baffling. Britney-Paris-Barack: huh? I had been hearing about the ad on NPR for a couple of days before I finally saw it, and it was not what I expected. I had to hit “rewind” on the DV-R to be sure I’d seen what I thought I saw.

They’re really nothing at all alike. Britney is an entertainer with no moral sense who is constantly photographed by paparazzi and enjoys the attention. Paris is a nobody who happens to be vacuously beautiful and who is living on her father’s money. Sure, they’re both blonde, young, and photogenic. Obama is plainly not blond. So what is the juxtaposition supposed to be telling us?

Jennifer Rubin in the linked Commentary blog thinks it’s a dig at the media, which many conservatives see as thoroughly morally corrupt and corrupting, existing only because Hollywood liberals are so interested in making money that they’ve forgotten those moral principles they may or may not have been taught growing up. To a degree, that’s along the lines of the best I could come up with, so in the absence of any better hypothesis I’d go with this.

Or, it could mean something like, “You media-loving Democrats like Britney and Paris so much, don’t you think it’s a little silly to vote for a presidential candidate for the same reasons you like them?” Of course, it’s more than a little insulting to say, “You Democrats all love Britney Spears.” (Obviously, this is just speculation, I have nothing to substantiate it.)

40

bianca steele 08.05.08 at 5:45 pm

Not that I think race isn’t an issue. Race is plainly the major reason Obama can even be painted as a lightweight, as someone whose only plus is their bare celebrity and charisma, as someone who isn’t smart enough not to become a demagogue.

41

ROYT 08.05.08 at 6:07 pm

“what it really says is “you people are freaks. Everyone else is normal, and they think one way, but you people don’t get it, and you don’t count,” while the person talking casts themselves in the role of translator between the freaks and the real.”

richard @ 30, get a grip man! I don’t see CT as freaks, but mostly as self-selecting intellectuals and academics. Which does mean there will be the occasional blind spot. For Obama, the way he and McCain are regarded by CT is irrelevant. The survey information is relevant. Both it and my post only say people “think one way” if you’re unwilling to read. I made no attempt to “translate” anything.

Steve @ 28, thanks for that. I hadn’t seen that one. Seeing it does go toward making Obama’s response clearer, but he clearly can’t count on voters knowing/being told.

42

Cliffy 08.05.08 at 6:28 pm

John, I think you’re on to something. But at the end of the day, I think making a criticism of your black opponent that infantalizes him, knowing that there’s a centuries-long history of racists doing exactly this, and being aware that this criticism is going to therefore particularly resonate with the racist tendencies in your audience, then I’m going to be comfortable in calling you a racist shitbag, period, regardless of whether your behavior would be different if Edwards had won the primary. That’s what racism is. It’s not the only thing racism is, but it counts.

43

Roy Belmont 08.05.08 at 6:44 pm

It is an artifact of the endemic racism that was once an integral feature of the American polis that Obama is referred to by so many on both sides as “black”.
He’s only “black” through a ractist lens.

His father was “black”. His mother “white”. That only makes him “black” if blackness is a taint on the purity of whiteness.
Otherwise it would be equally valid to call him “white”, which no one seems to find possible. Because that endemic racism’s still with us. Soft and subtle, but still there.

44

Dave 08.05.08 at 7:11 pm

Anyone for rehabilitating “mulatto”? Kinda sounds like a nice exotic coffee… OTOH, that wouldn’t play well with those who think plain ol’ latte is unconstitutional….

45

Iraq War 08.05.08 at 7:37 pm

I don’t believe in astrology. The only stars I can blame for my failures are those that walk about the stage.SirNo%EBlCowardSir No?l Coward

46

va 08.05.08 at 7:42 pm

“Only 22% Say McCain Ad Racist, But Over Half (53%) See Obama Dollar-bill Comment That Way.”

Yeah, & how do you explain the fact that 44% of black people thought Obama’s response was racist? If McCain continues this way, by the time the election rolls around, there will be a national consensus that if racism exists in America, it’s black people’s fault.

47

Flippanter 08.05.08 at 7:57 pm

Could we perhaps devise a speed-commenting system that would symbolize the most common comments, accelerating thread-reading without harming the communication of that certain CT something? “A:r” could stand for “Americans are racist.” Combinations would provide sufficient flexibility for all but the most original propositions: e.g., “Americans are racist, but this [for whatever ‘this’] is the Democrats’ fault; they’re so contemptible” could be more elegantly rendered as “A:r|D:<“.

48

Patrick 08.05.08 at 8:27 pm

Barack Obama is biracial, which in the racially coded U.S. context makes him black, especially to older white folks.

I still think that he ought to run an ad that reminds everybody that the main purpose of Republican tax policy is to provide benefits to Paris Hilton (she won’t have pay inheritance tax) and Britney Spears (much of her income, unless she’s stupider than I take her for, is now investment income). Oh, and if he could find the video of the two of them praising George Bush, as each has done in the past, that would be cool.

Paris Hilton’s mom is really pissed. The family’s Republican to the core (inherited wealth, don’t you know) and their daughter’s being slagged using their campaign contributions. Surely the Dems can and should use that.

49

Seth Finkelstein 08.05.08 at 8:36 pm

Flippanter: I’ve sometimes wondered if there’s a way to mildly improve the quality of a comment thread by putting the most obvious responses at the top of the post and as notices in the comment field. Sort of like:

“These thngs have BEEN SAID. We HAVE HEARD THEM:
[blah blah blah]
Please consider not saying them again. Thank you”.

50

virgil xenophon 08.05.08 at 9:48 pm

Appros of racial identity and mixed-races, someone years ago made the point on a television special that the difference between the US and Brazil was that in the US, anybody who is not seen as purely “white” is considered “black”; in Brazil anyone not perceived as totally “black” is considered “white.” In fact the Brazilian social viewpoint is seen as such a threat by the NAACP (because viewing mixed race people as something other than black would dilute blacks’ political clout) that it has a team of lawyers down in Brazil even now trying thru the courts to establish a legal basis for legally labeling mix-raced people as “black” for purposes of preferred univ. admissions, etc. (was a PBS special on the subject not to long ago.) Bottom line, as more and more progeny of multi-racial marriages occur, (see Tiger Woods)the pressure for a category other than the black-white-Latina schema grows apace. (Witness the NAACP fierce opposition to mixed-race categories on US Census forms.) The NAACP fears that as more and more Brazilians immigrate to the US (as is the case here in New Orleans, which has a vibrant and growing Brazilian community) their “take” on race will infect the mainstream–hence their Brazilian legal court-challenge project to “raise” the “conscious” of Brazilians. Or rather, to disabuse them of their “false consciousness.” This is no small savage irony, sitting here in Louisiana, to see the NAACP now
CHAMPIONING the “one drop” rule they historically fought so hard against, the culmination of which was a Supreme Court case brought and won by a female Creole right here in Louisiana.

51

virgil xenophon 08.05.08 at 9:56 pm

PS: Wiki, for once, has an excellent discussion of the history of the “one drop” rule here in America and elsewhere.

52

john in california 08.05.08 at 10:13 pm

Regardless of the intent of the ad, or even how various people interpret it, Obama’s biggest problem is that he is that he is answering it in a way that actually reinforces the thrust of the ad, that is that Obama is a lightweight, a celebrity girly-man, someone who daren’t express the righteous anger that McCain or any winger would if a similar ad was made about them. In fact, McCain gets a two-fer by being able to be righteously angry about the ad being called racist (though Obama himself never levels the charge) and as well humorously belittling Obama for being thin skinned and always trying to inject race into the debate. If Edwards had been the object of such an ad how long do you think it would have taken Elizabeth to cry foul? But, of course, if Michele says anything, its that hypersensitive black woman again. Since Obama has built his career by not being the ‘angry back man’ I suppose it is to much to ask him to now change his stripes. He is using the same tactic he used against Hillary, albeit more overtly, and that is mildly condescending mockery. Even his surrogate, Daschle and Kerry, seem unable to muster real outrage.
Why does all this work for McCain? Because he is the original ‘Angry Old Man’ and the mood of the public is not comedic, it’s angry. Angry at everybody in government, regardless of political stripe. When they fork over fifty bucks for a fill up they are angry, when they pay four dollars for a loaf of bread, ten dollars for a pound of salmon and five dollars for a pound of cheese they are angry. And if that wasn’t enough, either there rent is going up or their equity is going down while their wages are going nowhere. And when they watch Obama being whisked around the world to adoring crowds instead of being back here spending some time on isle 7, talking to someone trying to live on a budget, they are angry. And angry is what McCain and the winger do best.
Ironically, Obama has built his whole political career, maybe even his real personality, on not being the Angry Black Man. (Remember how he was so quick not only to dissociate himself from Rev. Wright’s words but, even more from Wright’s angry performance.) He wouldn’t be the dem nominee if he hadn’t assured a lot of powerful whites that he wasn’t the kind of guy who would guilt trip them by being righteously angry. Now he need anger, not about the ads but about the state of the country and the obvious failure of the political class to have prevented the situation or come up with real solutions. Mavericky and angry McCain can, on the other hand, portray himself as the real outsider and someone who is mad as hell and not going to take it anymore. And the polls show it is working. I don’t know where it is going to come from, but Obama better start changing his tune. He had better start sounding more like ludicrous lest he be taken as ridiculous.

53

Michael Drake 08.05.08 at 10:23 pm

“an identity politics of shared victimization, based on a principled opposition to any such identity politics.”

Alas, victimhood elicits more sympathy when you are in the majority.

54

Flippanter 08.05.08 at 11:12 pm

The range of comments best summarized as “[Candidate] must say what I am saying” would be rendered “[C]:I”.

55

Slocum 08.06.08 at 12:52 am

Barack Obama is biracial, which in the racially coded U.S. context makes him black, e specially to older white folks.

Actually, blackness is something that Obama chose to embrace. Here’s Matthew Yglesias’s take:

…before Obama was a half-black guy running in a mostly white country he was a half-white guy running in a mostly black neighborhood. At that time, associating with a very large, influential, local church with black nationalist overtones was a clear political asset (it’s also clear in his book that it made him, personally, feel “blacker” to belong to a slightly kitschy black church).

I’d also say that, at this point, it’s African Americans and the left generally who have the greatest interest in maintaining the ‘one drop’ rule. When your politics depends on racial solidarity, you want your racial block to be as big as possible, with none if this wishy-washy ‘biracial’ nonsense.

BTW, I think it’s pretty clear that his race has helped Obama so far — he’s doing much better than Edwards would running on the same platform. In the abstract, Americans like the idea of voting for a black candidate and electing a black president as a way of absolving themselves personally of any potential claim of racism as well as demonstrating that racism is no longer a major issue in the U.S. and putting a stake into the heart of racial grievance politics. A side benefit would be the ability to tell Europeans and others to STFU about race in America until such time as they elect their own person of color to head of state. So Obama’s race helps so long as he’s offering absolution and promising post-racial politics.

BUT…if it looks like electing Obama is going to intensify racial politics rather than diminish them, then a lot of Americans are going to reject the deal and Obama’s race could work against rather than for him.

56

richard 08.06.08 at 1:05 pm

in Brazil anyone not perceived as totally “black” is considered “white.”
No, there’s a category of “brown.” There are plenty of white racists and black racists in Brazil, but the consensus position (at least in the media) is a lot more colourblind, or acknowledges that the mixtures are so varied and uncategorisable that there’s no point worrying about them: there’s no room for a “not one drop” doctrine because it would exclude practically everyone.

57

W. Kiernan 08.06.08 at 1:49 pm

Roy Belmont: He’s only “black” through a racist lens.

He’s black on his driver’s license.

58

Rich Puchalsky 08.06.08 at 4:41 pm

Jeez, this is funny. Any of the commenters above obsessing about the one-drop rule and whether Obama chose to be black would have no trouble immediately identifying someone who looked just like him as black if they, say, were walking through an area of town that they were worried about.

59

virgil xenophon 08.06.08 at 5:23 pm

To be sure, Obama(as he has said himself) really didn’t have a choice
as to which racial identity he chose, society did it for him. OTOH, however, Obama has worked both sides of the racial street when he thought it to his advantage, so one can hardly feel sorry for him–or condemn those who point out and criticize his cynical tactics in this regard.

60

Barry 08.06.08 at 5:44 pm

“…has worked both sides of the racial street when he thought it to his advantage…”

Oh, jeez.

61

Roy Belmont 08.06.08 at 5:58 pm

W. Kiernan #57:
“He’s black on his driver’s license.”
Well then.
And race is an important category on driver’s licenses in the first place because?
Because the bureaucratic culture that produces driver’s licenses is still carrying the artifacts of racism.
Out of moral soupiness come many dysfunctional things.

Rationalizations to the contrary there’s little forensic benefit to these broad categories. Hispanics come in many hues, some blend right in with Caucasians, visually, making that useless for id purposes.

There are among us children of one white/black parent one white parent, what were once called for statistical purposes “quadroons”.
Sometimes those children present with “black” features. Causing turmoil by their difficult classifiability.
This is important because?
Because racism is still with us.

Unless there’s some CDC/medical connection, which I doubt, the reason that category’s even on the license is residual, racist however inadvertent.

When I was a kid I lived near an active army base. Soldiers would get weekend leave and spend it in the sleaze ghetto downtown. Sometimes they got in trouble.
The local paper would identify the arrested as “Pvt. William Bland, 27” as opposed to “Cpl. Tyler Monroe, a Negro, 27″.
This stopped sometime in the 70’s.
So we’re all done with racism now, yeah?

62

David 08.07.08 at 4:09 am

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