Discriminations

[This post has been Updated]

Dick Meyer has an NPR blog called “Against The Grain.” He describes himself as “director of Digital Media at NPR.org,” and he describes “Against The Grain” as “a mix of sarcastic sociology and comic moral philosophy that occasionally descends into political commentary.” Judging by this example today, I would say it is comic sociology whose political commentary has descended below comic into a zone of deep pathos.

Consider:

Many undecideds haven’t really connected their negative feelings about race to Obama yet. Their view of Obama is unformed, and their negative feelings toward African-Americans could be easily triggered when they finally tune in....

.... [S]ome who have been doing recent research on race believe there is a current of racism that has not been triggered and that is likely to be — perhaps triggered intentionally by Republicans, but also as a natural consequence of the undecided voters finally focusing. And plenty of pundits and advice-givers think Obama is not doing enough to minimize or counter the racial impulses of undecided voters. (I am not convinced there is any way to spin this: What is, is.)

Does this mean John McCain, to capture the undecided vote, needs to actively trigger subterranean prejudices? Hard to say. But it is clear that many legitimate issues in the campaign also have racial angles or, to be fair, will be perceived through a prejudiced lens by some voters.

The “inexperience” issue is one of them. Obama has, in fact, less big league experience in government and politics than McCain or any other party nominee since JFK in 1960. If a voter is so inclined, this can play out as Obama coming off as an “affirmative action candidate.”

For example, in a recent column, I said, “If Obama were not black, if he were the same man (man, not woman) in white skin, he would most certainly be far ahead in the polls.” I think this is an uncontroversial assertion: All the models political scientists use to predict presidential elections have the Democrat winning in a rout. But now the polls are tied in a knot. What is the variable that none of the models take into account? Race.

After the column ran, my inbox was besieged by angry missives declaring that I was a half-wit for not understanding that Obama was given the nomination, not because he earned it by getting more votes, but because he was black and got what he didn’t deserve. He was an affirmative action candidate. These were not kind-hearted e-mails.

So as legitimate as the experience issue is, for some it triggers a notion that Obama is undeserving, presumptuous or “uppity,” to use an old and ugly word. If Democratic pollsters see that, so do Republicans.

Similarly, many people felt McCain’s famous ad that called Obama a celebrity like Paris Hilton was subliminally racist, subtly playing on racist impulses that fear black men with white women, or that preyed on the idea that black men succeed only in celebrity arenas like sports and music....

I’ve already ridiculed the “uppity” issue (here). The idea that any remotely sane person could consider the Paris Hilton/celebrity ad as “subliminally racist” is absurd (although I recognize that my “remotely sane person” standard excludes a number of liberal commentators).

I do, however, agree with one of Meyer’s points — that his statement, “If Obama were not black, if he were the same man (man, not woman) in white skin, he would most certainly be far ahead in the polls,” is “an uncontroversial assertion.” I agree. That statement is so thoroughly false that it’s hard to imagine any (reasonable) controversy about it.

First, if Obama weren’t black he never would have been selected to give the keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic convention, which is where he captivated everyone (including a number of us who are no longer captivated) with his appeal to a post-racial, post-partisan America. Next, had he been a white guy otherwise identical to the current Obama he would not have stood out from the crowd of other candidates for the Democratic nomination; he would not have secured a lock on the black vote, one of the largest if not the largest block of Democratic base voters, and thus never would have won the nomination against Hillary. Finally, a white Obama never would have excited the young voters to the degree that he has, never would have been projected to increase the turnout enough to turn some red states blue.

Do any of these people who are laying the groundwork for blaming racism for Obama’s defeat (should he lose, of course; it’s hard for it to explain his victory) really entertain any doubts that Colin Powell as the Republican nominee would have wiped the floor with Dukakis or Gore or Kerry?

UPDATE [19 Sept.]

From the Great Minds Think Alike dept.: Roger Clegg also argues that

For starters, it really cannot be seriously contended that Obama would have been nominated in the first place had he been white. A key part of his attraction, which is his charisma, is his race. Does anyone really believe that he would have attracted the same passionate support had he not been African American, or that any comparably qualified white state legislator would find himself the presidential nominee less than four years later? You don’t have to be Geraldine Ferraro, you don’t have to call this affirmative action, and at this point you don’t even have to oppose Senator Obama, to admit that this happens to be true.

Second, and for similar reasons, while there are those who will not vote for Obama in the general election because he is black, there are many who will be voting for him precisely for that reason....

Look at it this way: If Senator Obama magically became white, is it at all clear that at this point it would improve his electoral prospects? And if, at the same time, Senator McCain magically became black, does anyone think that the white Obama would then have a prayer of winning?.... Colin Powell beats John Kerry (minus 20 years political experience and a war record) any day.