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For so many months, the far right has been trying to convince America that Obama is secretly an angry radical, that Michelle holds a racial grudge against white people, that Rev. Wright hates America. How bitterly ironic, then, and how desperately sad it is that the real rage, the radicalism, the animosity...is coming from the right's supporters.
McCain's public rallies have descended into cries that Obama is a terrorist, and calls for his head to be cut off. McCain himself said nothing to correct an audience member who referred to Obama as a socialist and a hooligan. One of McCain's senior advisers referred to Obama as "some guy off the street." What we are seeing is the early stages of a blood frenzy. Old, old anxieties and resentments are being stoked, and directed against Obama the "other" as a convenient scapegoat for what ails the audience member. The (so far) sporadic calls for violence are going un-checked, which is, in itself, a form of tacit encouragement.
The country is on fire, and McCain is pissing gasoline.
Coming from the South, and being a student of her history, I can tell you that these are forces that cannot easily be contained, once unleashed. The old stories of blacks usurping white power during Reconstruction have not gone away, nor have the tales of black violence during the most tumultuous phase of the Civil Rights Movement. These resentments have been out there, covered by a thin coat of anti-welfare rhetoric (and now the effort to blame the mortgage crisis on poor black people who had the nerve to buy houses).
They never went away, they just became the subtext for much of our political discourse. Only now, they are less and less a matter of subtext. They are being brought to the forefront, and inflamed. To all those thinking that somehow America had "transcended race" via Obama's nomination, here is your undenaible proof that no such transcendance has taken place. For all of the Benetton ads, Cosby Shows, and "Yes We Can" videos, we have not excised the emotional cancer of our collective past. At most, it has only ever been in remission, waiting for the chance to grow again.
In a way, I think that Ta-Nehisi may be a little too kind in his appraisal of McCain's actions:
They have no idea of the forces they are toying with? With respect to TC, there's just no way that the Republicans don't know what they're doing. The Dixiecrats, after all, became closely intertwined with the core power structure of the GOP when they switched over from being Democrats. If any group of people has collective knowledge about the nature of these emotional forces, it's the Dixiecrats. For most of their period of ascendancy in the South (from the Tilden-Hayes Compromise onward), the Dixiecrats' hold on power was predicated on manipulating those exact emotions. There is no credible basis to assume that somehow the rest of the GOP remained ignorant of these things after they welcomed the Dixiecrats with open arms.
No, the Republicans know. They know, and they continue. There is nothing innocent in their conduct. The road that the GOP has put themselves on, the road that they want the rest of us to take, leads directly to black preachers bleeding out on hotel balconies, to small chidren blown to pieces in their own church, to presidential candidates dying in hotel kitchens. The road to Hell is paved with political intentions.
McCain's public rallies have descended into cries that Obama is a terrorist, and calls for his head to be cut off. McCain himself said nothing to correct an audience member who referred to Obama as a socialist and a hooligan. One of McCain's senior advisers referred to Obama as "some guy off the street." What we are seeing is the early stages of a blood frenzy. Old, old anxieties and resentments are being stoked, and directed against Obama the "other" as a convenient scapegoat for what ails the audience member. The (so far) sporadic calls for violence are going un-checked, which is, in itself, a form of tacit encouragement.
The country is on fire, and McCain is pissing gasoline.
Coming from the South, and being a student of her history, I can tell you that these are forces that cannot easily be contained, once unleashed. The old stories of blacks usurping white power during Reconstruction have not gone away, nor have the tales of black violence during the most tumultuous phase of the Civil Rights Movement. These resentments have been out there, covered by a thin coat of anti-welfare rhetoric (and now the effort to blame the mortgage crisis on poor black people who had the nerve to buy houses).
They never went away, they just became the subtext for much of our political discourse. Only now, they are less and less a matter of subtext. They are being brought to the forefront, and inflamed. To all those thinking that somehow America had "transcended race" via Obama's nomination, here is your undenaible proof that no such transcendance has taken place. For all of the Benetton ads, Cosby Shows, and "Yes We Can" videos, we have not excised the emotional cancer of our collective past. At most, it has only ever been in remission, waiting for the chance to grow again.
In a way, I think that Ta-Nehisi may be a little too kind in his appraisal of McCain's actions:
I've been thinking about this McCain-Palin Obama "palling around with terrorist" idea more lately. The saddest thing about many Republicans isn't just that they disagree with liberals on race--it's they are largely ignorant on race. When the McCain campaign cast the spell of diabolical jingoism, they have no idea of the forces they are toying with. We remember Martin Luther King's murder as a sad and tragic event. Less remembered is the fact that ground-work for King's murder was seeded, not simply by rank white supremacy, but by people who slandered King as a communist.
They have no idea of the forces they are toying with? With respect to TC, there's just no way that the Republicans don't know what they're doing. The Dixiecrats, after all, became closely intertwined with the core power structure of the GOP when they switched over from being Democrats. If any group of people has collective knowledge about the nature of these emotional forces, it's the Dixiecrats. For most of their period of ascendancy in the South (from the Tilden-Hayes Compromise onward), the Dixiecrats' hold on power was predicated on manipulating those exact emotions. There is no credible basis to assume that somehow the rest of the GOP remained ignorant of these things after they welcomed the Dixiecrats with open arms.
No, the Republicans know. They know, and they continue. There is nothing innocent in their conduct. The road that the GOP has put themselves on, the road that they want the rest of us to take, leads directly to black preachers bleeding out on hotel balconies, to small chidren blown to pieces in their own church, to presidential candidates dying in hotel kitchens. The road to Hell is paved with political intentions.
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