Obama is Finished!

Obama has made two fatal mistakes in his handling of recent race related episodes. The first is his response to acquittal of the officers in the Sean Bell murder. Obama responded:

"Well, look, obviously there was a tragedy in New York. I said at the time, without benefit of all the facts before me, that it looked like a possible case of excessive force. The judge has made his ruling, and we're a nation of laws, so we respect the verdict that came down," he said in response to a question at a gas station in Indianapolis, where he was holding a news conference.

"The most important thing for people who are concerned about that shooting is to figure out how do we come together and assure those kinds of tragedies don't happen again," he continued. ... "Resorting to violence to express displeasure over a verdict is something that is completely unacceptable and counterproductive."

Obama appears to be comforting white voters more than blacks with this response. Obama had to appear non-violent and conciliatory in all confrontations, while also appearing to maintain faith U.S. system of justice. He did not appear angry, frustrated, but almost apologetic in that he acted as a racial gatekeeper meant to diffuse possible violence. He simply accepted the verdict and avoided referring to it as a miscarriage of justice. He in a sense is trying to project or rather maintain the appearance of Black America's faith in the judicial system, while also appealing to a white voter base who may have seen no problem with the ruling. He avoided addressing the underlying class and race issues that create these recurring incidents. He espouses "change," but in the end, Obama's statement reflects a man comfortable with the status quo, instead of a man dedicated to change. He may believe he can change the system from within, but to avoid discussing the underlying issues or expressing any displeasure with the ruling will lose him a considerable number of black voters.

In Obama's response to Rev. Wright, he states:

"When he states and then amplifies such ridiculous propositions as the U.S. government somehow being involved in AIDS; when he suggests Minister Farrakhan somehow represents one of the greatest voices of the 20th and 21st centuries; when he equates the United States's wartime efforts with terrorism; there are no excuses. They offend me. They rightly offend all Americans."

Margaret Sanger's Negro Project, the Tuskegee Experiment, and the government funded MKNAOMI, HIV programs (See Horowitz's Emerging Virsus) are evidence of the pattern that Rev. Wright was referencing when discussing the tradition of racism and the subsequent programs implemented with the intent to at least decrease the Black American population. Obama's statement dismisses this well documented and strong pattern of racism as ridiculous and conspiratorial. He's insinuating that such things could not happened in America, yet there is strong evidence to the contrary. 

This puts him in a catch-22, if he validates the concerns and frustrations of Black Americans he will at the same time alienate white American's who cannot look honestly at the American tradition. Obama is also having problems garnering votes from white blue-collar votes, whom seem to see Obama as elitist, but at the end of the day, also black. He's lost creditability with black voters and disrupted the comfort zone of white voters through his association with Rev. Wright. From this point on, Obama's run for president will slowly disintegrate because neither he, nor the majority of the American population can honestly look itself in the mirror and assess its problems with both race and history.