Posted by
Crispian on Thursday, September 17, 2009 4:48:00 PM
There is a narrative that the Republican Party is the "party of no," wishing to blindly oppose anything Obama does. Opponents of Obama's policies have been characterized by the loudest and least sophisticated voices at town hall meetings. Sarah Palin's blunt expressions of policy preferences have become the measure of conservatives' intellectual depth. Rush Limbaugh's sharp rhetoric has become the standard for judging conservatives' intellectual honesty and openness. Joe Wilson's outburst suddenly became the measure of all conservatives' civility.
But then it got worse. Unable to make sense of all the vehement opposition, liberals decided to call the opposition "racist." That pot had been simmering for some time but boiled over after Wilson's yell, with a slew of columns and commenters (including former President Carter) making the derogatory claim.
Michelle Goldberg at "The American Prospect" offers her rambling revisionist
review of history. Joe Klein at "Time" asserts that racism is at work but it's
"complicated." Klein makes the most revealing argument about the "racist" nature of dissent saying, "I tried to make it clear that I wasn't talking about classic white-black racism."
If not "classic white-black racism," then what kind of racism are we talking about? According to Klein, it is a fear of that which is foreign:
Barack Obama is the apotheosis of all they fear. He is a child of what
used to be called miscegenation--a mixed marriage. His father was a
Muslim, his mother was sort of a hippy. She raised him in Hawaii, which
is just barely American and in Indonesia (which is very
suspicious). He is a liberal (even if a prohibitively moderate one).
Worse, he's a completely urban sort. There is nothing resembling a log
cabin in his background. We've had elite Presidents--the Roosevelts,
the Bushes--but we have never really had an urban one.
I think Klein has a point. Ignoring for a moment the color of Obama's skin, these factors would exist and would cause concern for a good number of people (however subconsciously). People do fear that which is unfamiliar and with which they do not feel an association. It was the color of Obama's skin, however, that contributed to those factors fading into the background. A white man would have been mercilessly critiqued for such an atypical life.
But this is not a racial fear based on the history and experience of our nation. It is not in the same family as slavery, segregation, and Los Angeles race riots. And I think Klein overstates his case. The dissent is not based on anxiety of foreignness because of Obama - conservatives fear what they see as an extremist liberal agenda. Honest dissent may fuel anxiety related to Obama's background, but that doesn't mean the dissent must stop.
G.W. Bush was attacked as a draft dodger, as a son seeking revenge against Saddam, as little more than a stooge for neocons who pulled all the strings. In the election of 2004, John Kerry was portrayed as a dependant on his wealthy wife, a fraudulent war hero, and an out-of-touch snob. Questions about John McCain's eligibility to be president were raised due to the fact he was born on a military base outside our borders. Sarah Palin's detractors were appalled by her own foreignness, she coming from the backward state of Alaska with moose and snow-machine racing, shaking feminists to their core (see a
column by Courtney E. Martin for a fair analysis of Palin's impact).
Obama's background IS living in a foreign nation, having a foreign father, having an unusually free-spirited mother, living halfway to Japan in what seems a tropical paradise of Hawaii to most of us on the mainland. But his background was never politicized on the same scale that every other candidate's background has been. Early in his bid for office, there were assertions that Obama wasn't 'really black.' Again, it was fear of foreignness - then by blacks. It was about life experience. It is not about judging Obama by the color of his skin.
So why call it racism? There are two reasons. The first is the hope for political profit by those who make claims of racism. The second reason - the rationale behind the more intellectual claims of a Joe Klein - is related to the first but is more complex. As our society has progressed, those dedicated to civil rights causes have had less influence, less grist. The feminist movement is the clearest example of this phenomenon - now in it's
"third wave." A
deconstruction occurs in which old labels are applied to new intellectual paradigms. The feminist movement is no longer about women's rights - but rather gender roles and norms (which are to be deconstructed). George Will writes about the deconstruction phenomenon in the
arts, where every expression (including "dinner-table arrangements") is "art."
By calling opponents of Obama's policies "racist," the liberal racism argument can survive and can continue to exert influence, where it would otherwise flounder. But as Klein admits, it's not really "racism." In fact, it's normal politics - which has become unacceptable when the President of the United States is black.
Update: What real racism in politics looks like.