A Referendum on Race and Prejudice Also
By: dsvabeachdems
Published On: 10/21/2008 11:53:12 AM
Sad to say, race is the wildcard two weeks from today. American politics is about to be turned topsy-turvy. By any measure, Obama's march through the nomination process to the election has demonstrated grand strategic acumen. But his success's greatest challenge is the human Achilles heel: prejudice.
My idealized view of the world has been brought to heel often enough that I stand ever ready for the other shoe to drop. A most dramatic lesson occurred on a milk stop flight from DC to Shreveport three decades ago. Armed with Fred Harris presidential campaign documents, I was beavering away on a college economics paper when a man joined me in the next seat during boarding. I was focused on issues of wealth and the economy and the materials were rich. During a break from my effort, he asked what I was working on. The leader of the Mississippi NAACP and I shared the next few hours in a discussion that changed the way I understood prejudice and looked at the world; a discussion that affects my view of this election.
Raised in Arkansas during the period between Central High School and the eventual eventful integration of my own high school in 1969; raised in a middle class family, I measured the glass of racial progress half full and rising. Context and perspective, I have learned, are what shape our lens. I was talking with the son of sharecroppers, who had attended college on the GI Bill. Almost all we had in common was hope and aspirations for America and Americans.
Aaron Henry, as it turned out, had been in the Ambassador Hotel on K Street at the same time as I that day. While I was discussing economics and populism with members of Gary Wasserman's national issues team, Henry had been coming to terms with the prospects for Senator Harris's campaign under Jim Hightower's folksy direction. While I was excited by the tone of Harris's philosophy of social equity, it was clear that Mr. Henry was looking for more emphasis on matters of racial equality; and that he was unsettled on any candidate at that moment.
During our exploration, I averred that significant progress had been made in race relations. Aaron Henry looked me in the eyes and told me, "The gains of the '60s have almost all been abrogated by the Nixon and Ford Administrations." His look conveyed at once firmness and visible sadness. I have never forgotten that moment, those words, nor the immediate sense of despair I felt. I wanted never to demonstrate such naivety again. In an instant I accepted that progress was stalled; in the next, I realized that all that energy of the last decade had dissipated and that history was outpacing progress. A sudden synthesis of information and experience occurred and I took from that moment that what you see depends upon where you stand.
It was a lesson that served me well in many different contexts from the Marine Corps to the United Nations; from the Far East to the Near East to Africa. It was a lesson that informs me that the code words, the innuendo, the appeal to the vilest aspect of human nature and American culture is affecting this election's outcome. The present day Father Coughlins are acting as purveyors of conservative and family values while making veiled, indirect and direct attacks on Obama's character. The McCain campaign is ramping up the rhetoric. There will be surprise after disappointment through November 4th. I believe that Obama will be elected. But I also believe that this election will be a watershed from which the runoff will not be altogether cleansing, thanks in great part to this "conservative" subterfuge.
Cross posted at VBDems - Blogging our way to Democratic wins in Virginia Beach! Go RK!
Comments
My idealized view of the world has been brought to heel often enough that I stand ever ready for the other shoe to drop. A most dramatic lesson occurred on a milk stop flight from DC to Shreveport three decades ago. Armed with Fred Harris presidential campaign documents, I was beavering away on a college economics paper when a man joined me in the next seat during boarding. I was focused on issues of wealth and the economy and the materials were rich. During a break from my effort, he asked what I was working on. The leader of the Mississippi NAACP and I shared the next few hours in a discussion that changed the way I understood prejudice and looked at the world; a discussion that affects my view of this election.