Letter From America
Racism stalks Obama
STUDIES have shown that the first thing people notice about a person is not gender, but race. Comfort level is higher within one's racial group. People talk differently within their racial group than in a mixed racial company.
Racism has been stalking Barack Obama just below the surface. As he becomes the favourite to win the Democratic nomination and the US presidency, racial opposition to Obama is intensifying.
The primary in West Virginia primary on May 13, when Hillary trounced Obama by 41% (67% to 26%; it would have been worse if John Edwards, still on the ballot, had not siphoned away 7%), was only the milder, electoral version of the racial polarization.
Education and wealth strips off racism. West Virginia is 95% white. It ranks near the bottom in education and income. Its working class whites overwhelmingly chose Hillary Clinton. While some of Hillary's support is attributable to her better connection with the working class, the exit polls divulged a lot more.
Over 22% of the voters said that race was important in their decision: 80% of those voted for Hillary. About 50% of the white voters said that Obama shares Rev. Wright's views, even though he has denounced and repudiated those.
People understand what someone from their own race says, but attribute the worst motives to those of another race. White Americans understand that Senator McCain does not share the opinions of Rev. John Hagee, whose endorsement he sought, and who has denounced the Catholics and blamed the sinners for hurricane Katrina. However, many white remain adamant that Obama shares Rev. Wright's beliefs.
Many people do not like to think or find things out for themselves. They would rather listen to their favourite talk radio host or television commentators, many of whom are right-wingers. These "ditto-heads" take their cue from what radio's Rush Limbaugh and Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity have to say about "Barack Hussein Obama." Limbaugh successfully asked Republicans to vote for Hillary in the open primaries so that she, rather than Obama, is the Democratic nominee, calculating that Hillary is more beatable in November.
Ever since Sean Hannity aired the Rev. Wright tapes in March, that's all he has been running on his show. He single-handedly wants to destroy Obama's candidacy by linking him with Wright, and thus painting Obama as anti-American, anti-white, anti-Semite, unpatriotic and a friend of the terrorists. Such hate-mongering is beginning to have results.
As Obama was pumping flesh in a diner in Indiana, a white man waived him off and told reporters that he did not want to shake the hands of a Muslim. Prior to the primary in every state, Obama campaign found that rumours were being circulating in that state through the internet that Obama is a Muslim Consequently, 13% of Americans believe that Obama is a Muslim.
The Washington Post chronicled more episodes: "For all the hope and excitement Obama's candidacy is generating, some of his field workers, phone-bank volunteers and campaign surrogates are encountering a raw racism and hostility that have gone largely unnoticed -- and unreported -- this election season. Doors have been slammed in their faces. They've been called racially derogatory names. And they've endured malicious rants and ugly stereotyping from people who can't fathom that the senator from Illinois could become the first African-American president."
Victoria Switzer, a retired social studies teacher, was on phone-bank duty one night during the Pennsylvania primary campaign. One night was all she could take: "It wasn't pretty." She made 60 calls to prospective voters in Susquehanna County, her home county, which is 98 percent white. The responses were dispiriting. One caller, Switzer remembers, said he couldn't possibly vote for Obama and concluded: "Hang that darky from a tree!"
Documentary filmmaker Rory Kennedy, the daughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy, said she, too, came across "a lot of racism" when campaigning for Obama in Pennsylvania. One Pittsburgh union organiser told her he would not vote for Obama because he is black, and a white voter said: "White people look out for white people, and black people look out for black people."
In Vincennes, the Obama campaign office was vandalized at 2 a.m. on the eve of the primary. A large plate-glass window was smashed, an American flag stolen. Other windows were spray-painted with political messages: "Hamas votes BHO" and "We don't cling to guns or religion. Goddamn Wright."
Gillian Bergeron, 23, was in charge of a five-county regional operation in northeastern Pennsylvania. At Scranton's annual Saint Patrick's Day parade some of the green Obama signs distributed by staffers were burned along the parade route.
Tunkhannock Borough Mayor Norm published a letter in a local paper: "Barack Hussein Obama and all of his talk will do nothing for our country. There is so much that people don't know about his upbringing in the Muslim world. His stepfather was a radical Muslim and the ranting of his minister against the white America, you can't convince me that some of that didn't rub off on him. "No, I want a president that will salute our flag, and put their hand on the Bible when they take the oath of office."
Karen Seifert, a volunteer from New York, was outside of the largest polling location in Lackawanna County, Pa., on primary day when she was pressed by a Clinton volunteer to explain her backing of Obama. "I trust him," Seifert replied. According to Seifert, the woman pointed to Obama's face on Seifert's T-shirt and said: "He's a half-breed and he's a Muslim. How can you trust that?"
On May 16, former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee made a bizarre joke during his speech at the National Rifle Association conference. Explaining an unexpected noise, Huckabee said (I paraphrase): It is the sound of Barack Obama hitting the ground when he thought someone shot at him.
The Secret Service has done an excellent job of protecting Barack Obama so far. Race-baiting by the likes of Sean Hannity may inspire some crazies to act out their racism. If Barack Obama were to be assassinated by a white man, America may be in for a race war.
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