February 29, 2008

Meanwhile, Back in RealityLand, Bill Maxwell Slaps Obamamaniacs Upside the Head With the Iron-Hard Truth Stick

Don’t like it? Complain to the author, not me.

The Haloed One

. . .

There are those who suggest, only half-jokingly, that Obamamania has become something of a cult. Of course it is a cult, manifesting what writer James Wolcott refers to as “salvational fervor” and “pure euphoria.” Listen to what the Anointed One said in South Carolina at one of his rallies, which he alludes to as tent revivals: “At some point in the evening, a light is going to shine down and you will have an epiphany and you’ll say, ‘I have to vote for Barack!’ ” Something insidious is happening beneath this rapture. Because of the halo effect, too many people are afraid to sincerely criticize Obama for fear of being attacked and otherwise humiliated.

Many white Democrats who do not support Obama are keeping their heads down and their mouths shut. They do not want to be denounced as racists for preferring Hillary Rodham Clinton for reasons that have nothing to do with race.

. . .

Predictably, the people most negatively affected by Obamamania are blacks who have resisted the new, emerging black monolith by supporting Clinton. These poor souls are being excoriated by other blacks and sometimes labeled as self-loathing Uncle Toms.

. . .

Now the tables have turned. Obama is on top, with the overwhelming majority of blacks zealously supporting him. That support is the new litmus test for being “authentically” black.

One young man, clad in hip-hop duds, offered this insight to a black magazine: “Backing or not backing Barack shows how developed your racial consciousness is. You ain’t black if you don’t support Barack.” During the 1960s, blacks used the expression “blacker than thou” to refer to the chosen few who set the standard for blackness. Those who did not measure up were dissed for not thinking “black enough.” The other expression during the 1960s was “black three-hundred-and-sixty degrees,” meaning you were profoundly black in a psychological sense.

. . .

During a recent interview with National Public Radio’s Melissa Block, Missouri Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, said he and some other members are being pressured and threatened by their constituents to vote for Obama. He said that Georgia Rep. John Lewis, an early Clinton supporter who has worked tirelessly for black causes since assuming office in 1987, had become the victim of “robo-calls” and that some of the callers said “very, very derogatory things about him.”

. . .

Here is why I said Obama’s halo will tarnish if the Illinois senator is elected president: It will give him an indefinite honeymoon. We will be reluctant to challenge him, fearing that the albatross of racism and its attendant pathology, the blame and counterblame and old hatreds, will come crashing down on us.

I fear we are about to elect an untouchable president, just as George W. Bush was until his incompetence and mendacity snatched us back into reality.

And yet those of us who refuse to drink the Kool-Aid have been hammered mercilessly by Obama supporters who tell us “Obama transcends race,” while simultaneously telling us we are racists for refusing to fall in line no matter how much we disagree with Obama’s positions, and telling us “It’s time to elect America’s first black president,” and telling us “You can’t understand any of this unless you’re black.”

You can’t have it all three ways, Obama supporters.

Not if you want to retain any shred of credibility whatsoever.

Now go read the entire piece.

Posted by: Sapphocrat

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