This contest is more than about Obama and his policies: it's about defining what it means to be an American. Nobody gets that upset with Hagee or Robertson or any number of white religious figures who make outrageous statements because nobody questions that they are Americans. Jeremiah Wright? A lot of us Americans have a hard time thinking of him as a real American. And Obama's association with him feeds into the doubts so many have whether in fact he is a 'real' American:
According to Smith College professor Paula Giddings, author of a new biography of Ida B. Wells, Ida: A Sword Among Lions and the Campaign Against Lynching, Wright's angry invocation of race and nation tapped into a reservoir of doubt about the very Americanness of African-Americans. "American citizenship has always been racialized as white. Who is a true American? Are African-Americans true Americans? That has been the question," she says.
In Obama's case--given his mixed-race lineage, his Kenyan father, his experiences growing up in Indonesia, his middle name (Hussein)--questions about his devotion to America carry a special potency, as xenophobia mingles with racism to create a poisonous brew. The toxicity is further heightened in this post-9/11 atmosphere, in which an image of Obama in Somali dress is understood as a slur and e-mails claiming that he is a "secret Muslim" schooled in a madrassa spread virally, along with rumors that he took the oath of office on a Koran. The madrassa and Koran canards have been thoroughly debunked, but still they persist--and few have been willing to stand up and say, So what if he was a Muslim? For her part, Clinton, asked on 60 Minutes whether Obama was a Muslim, said, "There is nothing to base that on, as far as I know."
Giddings calls the Wright association a "litmus test" that Obama must pass, saying, "It will be interesting to see if a man of color, a man who's cosmopolitan, can be the quintessential symbol of America" as its President. Read more. From Betsy Reed in The Nation.
I've used that idea of a "test" in the comment section of one of my earlier posts this week. It's a test certainly for Obama, but it is a test for the American electorate as well. For we are all being tested as to what we really believe it means to be an American. Are enough of us capable of recognizing that Jeremiah Wright is an honest American with whom we may agree or disagree but has just as much right to speak his mind in the public sphere as James Dobson, John Hagee or Pat Robertson? The comparison unfairly diminishes Wright, whom I think the best man among them. But the point should be clear. There's no media frenzy about white preachers who say outrageous things because there is no question about their bona fides as Americans.
I see Wright as forcing the issue. The media have obsessed about him and his relationship with Obama precisely because of the elephant-in-the-room question: Is Obama a real American? That's why the flag pin issue is a problem for him but not for McCain or Clinton. That's why his name is a problem. That's why even the elitist tag has become a problem--because the cosmopolitanism necessary for any president who truly embraces all Americans is associated with the tolerance and broadmindedness of the cosmopolitanism associated educated urban elites. That this is a negative is facetious. That Clinton has tried to exploit this by pandering to these country folks is laughable. It's hard for me to understand anybody who has been watching her in the last two months can take her seriously anymore.
But media narratives notwithstanding, these good country folk are no more real Americans than the urbanites who attend Trinity United. They each have their own perspective. They each have their own blind spots. But they are equally Americans. And if one or the other of them is angry or bitter or resentful or whatever, it's ok. If one group is suspicious of or fears the other, maybe there's good reason for it. That's the way we humans are and we simply have to accept that as the starting point. No one should sugarcoat the problem, and Obama's honest about that in his "More Perfect Union" speech was so refreshing because he didn't sugarcoat it. It was like uncovering a festering wound to sun and fresh air in order that it might heal.
So when I hear Jeremiah Wright speak, it doesn't particularly upset me. Maybe because I agree with most of what he has to say about America's abuses of its governmental power. But that doesn't mean he's right or that I am. The point is that it's a
perspective that has been suppressed from discussion in the mainstream,
and it ought not to be. I have defended him here this past week in part because of my bias that whenever there is a media feeding frenzy like the one we've seen, it's all smoke and no fire. I have seen nothing to persuade me otherwise. Ninety percent of what we've seen about this man in the clips has been distorted by the way it feeds into white fears about the angry black man. He is angry, but he is so much more than that. And I have defended him also because I believe that being able to hear what Wright has to say is part of the airing out process. I agree with almost everything I have heard him say,
Is he wounded? Yes. Is he flawed? Yes. But we all are. Would he have had more credibility if he didn't bring the HIV and Farrakhan business into the discussion? Yes, but things are not neat, nor do they in real life follow ideal scripts. Has he hurt Obama? I don't think as much as so many fear. And if he has mortally wounded Obama, that's a test America will have failed, not Wright or Obama.
I understand that Obama had to sever his connection to Wright, but I don't want him to go away. We can't heal if we can't hear what a man like Wright has to say. Things are not neat. Reality doesn't follow anyone's ideal script, and it's just part of the test Obama has to pass if he's going to be the president for all Americans. For Jeremiah Wright is a real American--a better American than most of those in the media criticizing him. He's someone who has had made a tremendous difference for the better in so many people's lives--including Obama's and his family's. And whether we agree with him or not, whether we feel comfortable with his communication style or not, he needs to be part of the conversation--not vilified the way he has been.
And so yes this whole Rev. Wright business has not made it easier for Obama, but that's the nature of the test. It has never been a question whether race would be an issue in this election. It's been one at least since South Carolina when the Clinton campaign tried to brand Obama as the black candidate.
***
UPDATE: Moyers on the post-interview Wright:
Wright’s offensive opinions and inflammatory appearances are judged differently. He doesn’t fire a shot in anger, put a noose around anyone’s neck, call for insurrection, or plant a bomb in a church with children in Sunday school.
What he does is to speak his mind in a language and style that unsettles some people, and says some things so outlandish and ill-advised that he finally leaves Obama no choice but to end their friendship.
We’re often exposed to the corroding acid of the politics of personal destruction, but I’ve never seen anything like this – this wrenching break between pastor and parishioner played out right in front of our eyes.
Both men no doubt will carry the grief to their graves. All the rest of us should hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America, where the gluttony of the non-stop media grinder consumes us all and prevents an honest conversation on race.
It is the price we are paying for failing to heed the great historian Jacob Burckhardt, who said, “beware the terrible simplifiers.” Read more.