Nader: Obama’s ‘Whitening’ Himself

If you ever needed more reasons on why voting for Ralph Nader is a waste of a vote (not third party candidates in general, just Ralph Nader) check out this interview with the Rocky Mountain News. It’s a prime showing of this self-styled people’s champion and his ignorance of racial politics, as well as his apparent inability to swallow the concept of what an idyllic post-racial state is.

There’s only one thing different about Barack Obama when it comes to being a Democratic presidential candidate. He’s half African-American. Whether that will make any difference, I don’t know. I haven’t heard him have a strong crackdown on economic exploitation in the ghettos. Payday loans, predatory lending, asbestos, lead. What’s keeping him from doing that? Is it because he wants to talk white? He doesn’t want to appear like Jesse Jackson? We’ll see all that play out in the next few months and if he gets elected afterwards.

First of all Obama is not half African-American. He’s fully African-American. In this country race is based on perception, not on the purity of ones ethnicity. The fact is that fewer that 6% of African-Americans who can trace their history to a slave heritage are of purely African descent. 94% of African Americans have a white ancestor.

Second, the issues he mentioned are hardly just issues in the “ghettos”. Predatory lending made the front page of the local paper here in rural Alabama, and instances of lead and asbestos related illnesses are just as high amongst rural poor as they are among urban poor.

Finally, I hardly see why Obama must “talk black” because he is black, nor am I entirely certain what that means. It is a fairly bold assumption to say that all black Americans talk in Ebonics or the lingo of Black-baptist churches (though his rhetorical style is borrowed from Trinity Church, as he admits in his auto-biographies). As Nader so astutely pointed out, half of Obama’s lineage is white – the half of his lineage which was proactive in his raising. Why then would we expect him to “talk black?” It’s not as if Obama has been silent about black issues either; check out his many Cosby-esque speeches about more responsibility amongst black fathers. Those speeches follow the tradition of black nationalism; of blacks creating and strengthening their own communities.

But Barack Obama is not running for President of the Black Nation. Not trying to be George Washington Carver, Marcus Garvey, Martin Luther King Jr., Elijah Muhammad, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton all rolled up into one. He is running for president of the United States of America, a diverse, multi-ethnic nation faced with issues which transcend one race or people. So it’s a little ridiculous to expect him to copy-paste the black congressional caucus platform onto his presidential platform and expect to win anything.

Nader tried to widen the scope of Obama’s issues, saying as a black politician poverty should be his concern:

“I mean, first of all, the number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency should be is to candidly describe the plight of the poor, especially in the inner cities and the rural areas, and have a very detailed platform about how the poor is going to be defended by the law, is going to be protected by the law, and is going to be liberated by the law. Haven’t heard a thing.”

First, it is more than a little condescending for a white, wealthy American to tell a black politician what his concerns should be. However, this is not the core mistake in his argument.

In this country we do not create laws (in theory at least) which govern the wealthy and the poor differently because when such precedents are set, those laws almost always come out favoring the wealthy. When such inequities exist we handle them through programs and services which provide opportunities for the poor. The eyes of the law should be blind to money. This is obviously not the case, especially amongst the judiciary, but Obama’s plans for universal health-care, housing relief, a more balanced tax strategy and alternative energy solutions which will invigorate rural areas hardly show an ignorance of the plight of the poor. In fact his policies have earned the title of “Marxist” from the right, an honor that not even do-gooder Nader has earned, to the extent that I am aware.

The final nail in Nader’s coffin is his discussion of Obama using “white guilt.”

“He wants to show that he is not a threatening . . . another politically threatening African-American politician. He wants to appeal to white guilt. You appeal to white guilt not by coming on as black is beautiful, black is powerful. Basically he’s coming on as someone who is not going to threaten the white power structure, whether it’s corporate or whether it’s simply oligarchic. And they love it. Whites just eat it up.”

Now correct me if I am wrong but did I not witness one white Senator and a white former President go kicking and screaming out of the primaries that Obama wasn’t electable?

Is Obama supposed to tear apart some white power structure and replace it with some nascent black one? If he is, can anyone indicate what that new power structure may be? After more than 40 years of trying to integrate the two races I can hardly see how we should be celebrating the competition of two apparently contradicting power structures (or so how things are seen in the Nader mind). Separate cultures existing peacefully is the sign of a successful democracy. Should Obama be trying to aggressively advocate one race over another?

Obama is proud of his race, as was evident when he gave his speech at Philadelphia and has been evident ever since then. He’s also using an aggressive fifty state grassroots campaign strategy to “break” into the white oligarchy, and if he does so no one will ever be able to say America is unable to elect a white president; or white governor, or mayor, or senator, or fireman, or CEO… I’m all too familiar with the unease most minorities have with their race in a white world, and that many minorities feel they must hide racial cultural characteristics and where they grew up to fit in. That is wrong.

Obama, has not, at any point, hidden who he is. He has two books about his past. He has been candid about his relationships to controversial figures in both the black (Wright) and white (Ayers) worlds. Is he supposed to act “blacker” than he is merely to satisfy Ralph Nader? How about he start using hip-hop lingo in his speeches. Changizzle my polizzle for rizzle.

Barack Obama is not acting as if he is black or white. He’s just being who he feels he should be: Barack Obama.

Comments made by people like Ralph Nader really do remind us that we do not yet live in a post-racial America. In our rush post-civil rights to be proud and boastful of our race some would seek to brand us with it. Some are still denied the rightful pride in their race. However, that does not mean we should be denied the opportunity to be who we want to be; we cannot trapped by our pride. Those who would trap us by the color of our skin, even if to attach to us the better aspects of our ethnicity, are still racists even if they are racists of another name. I’ll close this with a quote of what a post-racial America should be like:

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I compel Ralph Nader to remember this dream.

-Marc-