An excellent post.  If Obama had entered the race being the white junior Senator from Illinois, he would already have gone the way of Dennis Kucinich and Joe Biden.

Race accounts for 90%+ of Obama’s appeal to white liberals. There is nothing about his policies remarkable enough to explain the support his candidacy has generated. He makes nothing but grandiose promises about “hope” and “change” without detailing specifics.

Obama is so attractive to progressives because he presents himself as the herald of the liberal rapture — the fantasy colorblind utopia — which we have been hearing about ad nauseum since the 1960s. If Obama does win the presidency, he is likely to be a tragic figure. He’s a charlatan who will disappoint after riding to power on a wave of wildly inflated expectations.

Black political power has been tried all over America in our inner cities. It has been tried in Haiti and throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Is that “change we can believe in”? Unfortunately, facts have never been allowed to stand in the way of millenarianism.

Ironically, Obama’s public appeal couldn’t be farther from the private man (see Steve Sailer’s Obama articles). He is the most race-obsessed serious candidate for the presidency in memory.

I, first of all, really like the picture of Hitchens with the beer in his hand--it so sums up the man.

I agree with many of the points made in the post, but I frankly think the white liberals might be right that if Obama gets to the presidency it will significantly improve race relations. For better or worse, an Obama presidency will be viewed as a big milestone in race relations at home and abroad..Moreover, how easy will it be for a race hustler like say Al Sharpton to scream about “white racism” when Obama holds the highest office in the land? I agree Obama probably will be immune from criticism from white liberals, but I don’t see white, brown, yellow, black, or red rightwingers being inhibited at all. In fact, the right has been taking shots at Obama all along in his presidential race (including the above post).This will continue and expand undoubtedly if Obama is the Democratic nominee--and certainly if Obama gains the presidency.

You are correct in asserting that Obama gets a free ride on the issues---or in his case, lack of concrete positions on any issues--because he is black.

Obama is disturbingly “Kennedy-esque”, not only because of his flowery rhetoric, but because it hides some creepy personal attributes that would make him a disaster as a president.

At one time, I would have described him as the black candidate that didn’t offend of scare white people, but after Steve Sailor’s analysis, the truth is he would be the scariest of “black” politicans.

If we can find anything positive about him, is that he’s replacing Jesse Jackson as the Democrat Party/Liberal “token negro”. Which is good.

OBAMA’S APPEAL TO WHITE AMERICANS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH POLICY OR IDEOLOGY.  HE IS A RATHER CONVENTIONAL LIBERAL.  WHITE SUPPORT FOR OBAMA IS A MARK OF HIGH SOCIAL STATUS.  IT IS A WAY FOR HIGHLY-EDUCATED WHITES ON BOTH THE ESTABLISHMENT LEFT AND RIGHT TO DISTANCE THEMSELVES FROM WORKING-CLASS WHITE VALUES.  ON A HOST OF ISSUES SUCH AS AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, CRIME, IMMIGRATION, WHITES SHOW HOW “ENLIGHTENED” THEY ARE COMPARED TO RACIST, NATIVIST, XENOPHOBIC WHITES.

@ johnt: I would disagree that he is a conventional liberal. He is talking about tax cuts and seems definitely more skeptical of big government programs to address poverty than Hillary Clinton. I would also point out that one of the advantages of an Obama presidency from your perspective would be the shoe would be on the other foot as far as race relations goes. Obama will be challenged continually to appeal to white voters of lower, middle, and upper class who distrust him on the issue of race and make up the overwhelming majority of voters. There also will be pressure on a President Obama take advantage of his unique status to begin to bring closure on some the most racially divisive issues between Whites and so-called minority groups like affirmative action.

Apropos Clinton and Blacks. Except for NPR I have not come across Ambassador/Mayor/Reverend Andy Young’s heartflet tribute that Clinton is more of a black man than Obama since he has slept with more black women.

It says it all!

GM sed: There also will be pressure on a President Obama take advantage of his unique status to begin to bring closure on some the most racially divisive issues between Whites and so-called minority groups like affirmative action.

Obama has made several comments about affirmative action that indicates he understands white working class resentment against affirmative action, as really a class warfare, of the rich against the middle class.

Yeah, affirmative action does nothing to address the injustice where a C-minus student like Bush2 could get into Harvard, while working class and middle class whites have to compete with blacks and browns for whatever is left after the rich get first pick.

However, I attribute comments like this to his “Kennedy-esque” rhetoric, and don’t take it very seriously. Wall Street however might want Obama in to project an non-Imperalist “front” for US interventionism on behalf of Wall Street and gthe IMF?World Bank/Export-Import Bank/Fed system of finance capitalism.

I don’t see anything in Africa to prove that Blacks are less oppressive or anti-populist then anything that we see in the Republican Paerty.

GM:

“He is talking about tax cuts and seems definitely more skeptical of big government programs to address poverty than Hillary Clinton”

(almost) repeating your reply to Raimondo’s earlier post, I do not know what Barrack Obama you are paying attention to.  Certainly, there are few people who share that name (if any).  No, the Obama I know of is all for gigantic spending increases.  In fact, if you look at this graph, you will see he has proposed more spending increases than anyone else running. http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/spendingntu-thumb.jpg

While you seem to have been fooled by Obama’s paltry ‘tax cut’ propaganda, and propose such nonsense of a ‘libertarian rightwing case’ that no one else but you can see, dont try to fool the other posters here.

Is Hitchens ever sober?

If anyone thinks Barack Obama will end affirmative action or in any way oppose black racism, then I have a bridge in Brooklyn I’d like to see you.

He will not be the Democratic nominee anyway. He only gets the black vote and the rich white liberal vote. His only attribute is his race(ism).

People are worried about government spending and they think cutting taxes reduces that spending.

Cowplop.

Tax cuts create more debt and inflation which debases the dollar and reduces the buying power of the dollar. In fact, we are borrowing from China.

Obamas mother is white.

I think his slogan “Change we can believe in” is appropriate because he is proposing absolutely no change at all, which is certainly something we can all believe in, but we’d rather not.

The other appeal to the masses for Obama is his age.  They never talk about it but I believe that he is the youngest candidate running.  So that about sums him up.  Black and young proposing change of some kind although unexplained.  His slogan is I believe aimed at Ron Paul who is of course proposing real change but that of course is supposed to be change we can’t believe in.  So in a backhand sort of way he has at least acknowledged that Ron Paul is change we would like to believe in.

On another topic altogether I want to know how Huckabee intends to stay in this until the bitter end with no money and no grassroots support to speak of.

If there was ever a year where a third party candidate could win an election it is this year.  After canvassing for Ron Paul I have found that people are mortified at the prospect of voting for the “top tier candidates”