Since the election, there has been a sudden surge in the MSM to the effect that our president elect is an African-American. They gush over the historic nature of this turn of events. They are bringing out black poets, black philosophers, black historians. At the moment of victory, we saw Jesse Jackson in tears. We saw more African American faces smiling and waving than at any time in the previous year of media coverage. Why are we shown these images only after the election? Is there something going on under the surface?
Our president-elect ran a campaign which steadfastly avoided race as an issue. He continually beat the drum of unity. "There is no black America, there is no white America, there is no Hispanic, Asian, or Native America, there is only the United States of America." That is what he said over, and over again. The brilliance of this is to prevail over the "divide and conquer" culture that has evicerated liberals for decades.
The liberal agenda between 1980 and 2006 was squashed by too-numerous narrow-interest agenda. Gays for gays. Hispanics for Hispanics, and disabled for disabled. Meanwhile, the power, influence, and money flowed freely to the power elite. Sen. Obama brought us all back together into the real interest group that we always truly were: The people. Obama was never a black candidate. He is the unifier. We didn't know it, but we have been waiting for such a candidate for 30 years. Only in unity can we prevail over the most powerful and richest people on earth. He knew this, and made it work.
So why, in the last two days, everytime I read a mainstream paper, or watch a mainstream newscast, do I see relics of our divided past. Pundits analyzing the triumph of the civil rights movement. Some news anchor analyzing the senator's acceptance speech and promoting the notion that he was talking to the African American experience when he said, "Our People". Kenyans claiming they now may get their U.S. visas they've been hoping for. African-Americans tearfully partying in L.A. Black urban churches (Yeah, THOSE urban churches) dancing in the throes of ecstacy. I'm questioning these editorial choices, NOT the events themselves.
I saw the faces on the wingnuts who said, "I'm just afraid he'll work for the blacks" The racists in this country are afraid of a black "uprising." They have lost, and they are afraid, and they are angry and somebody in their midst is dangerous.
An African-American being elected president is, of course, a worthy news story, But there is no "black uprising." Of course blacks all across this land WILL celebrate. WILL be uplifted. There WILL be a new generation of kids, who will form a new AA culture, who WILL reject the black seperatism that has prevailed for 20 years. Hip-Hop DOES seem out of date. Gangsta culture was a real and appropriate response to the thugs in power, but can you imagine a 10 year-old black kid admiring the pimpish outlaw buffoon Snoop Dog when he sees the president on TV every day? All this WILL be celebrated by all ethnicities and our culture will be profoundly affected in the best ways by the addition of talent and energy brought by African-American boys and girls and their parents who were previously divided and cynical.
This is a time of soaring optimism amongst the people. As a 56-year-old man, I can warn: soaring optimism amongst the people is NOT a time for provoking the angry and the fearful. They are the low-information tools of the terrorist elite.
I know where I was when Martin Luther King was shot. I know where I was when Bobby Kennedy was shot.
Tonight, united, we are all cheering. We don't need CBS, CNN, NPR, and Fox News to show us that African-Americans are gonna be running the country now. First, because its not remotely true, and second, because its a reckless, provocative editorial mistake.