I was pumping gas the other day, and saw a fellow-customer doing the same. She had a more generous helping of melanin than I. On noting the obvious I thought, truly sadly, "Here's the thing: just looking at you, if every poll on the subject is to be trusted, I have a good guess at who you voted for in the last Presidential election, if you voted. But looking at me, you have no idea. What is wrong with that picture?"
To answer my own question, everything is wrong with that picture.
Worse still, we all know that in many cases skin-color trumped Christian conviction. I know of one Christ-loving, Bible-preaching church, some of whose members' cars sported Obama stickers, even though Obama's distinctive values and goals were (and are) at loggerheads with Biblical values and goals.
Now, all my cards are already all over the table for God and everyone to see, so let's say it again: I am happy that a black* man won the Presidency. I am unhappy that this particular black man won the presidency. I have zero issue with his skin-color. I have truckloads of issues with his ideology and worldview.
One last, before I move on: I have never in my life even considered skin-color as a deciding factor in formulating my voting selection. God forbid I ever do. The Christian perspective is that God "made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place" (Acts 17:26). We all share the same Creator, and the same great-great-great grampa.
What is more (and, if possible, more important) God fundamentally only sees two humanities. They have nothing whatever to do with skin-color or place of origin. They have everything to do with representative heads (Romans 5:12-21).
So here's Henry Alford, who is president and CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce, blasting Obama's policies as Marxist, admitting that he voted for Obama because he was black, and saying it was the worst decision he ever made in his life. Alford is not an across-the-board conservative, but his eyes appear to have opened, and the aroma of coffee has brushed across his olfactory senses.
(My focus starts about 3:50, ends about 6:16)
May Alford's tribe increase exponentially and rapidly. Our nation depends on it.
Content of character and, in this case, ideology, folks. Not color of skin.
*To remind you: Obama is as white as he is black. He decided to throw his white mother under the bus for political expediency. Nice. Me, I wish he'd trashed the skin-color issue, and made it a non-issue. Could have done America a great favor. But Barack Obama has never really been about doing America any favors. As a liberal it worked better for Obama to make a lot of it, because liberals tend to be racists.
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22 comments:
Oh so true!!!!
I'll add some logs to the fire and say that I believe that it is correct for Christians to have the litmus test of the positions on abortion and homosexuality when deciding who to vote for. And it is clear to see that Obama is on the wrong side of both of these issues. I am sure that many brothers and sisters in Christ made allowances in these areas in voting for Obama.
Dan,
I'm not informed enough to write about politics on my own blog, but I'll say here that I completely agree with you.
I don't dislike Obama and what he's doing because of his skin color. Good grief. The man is a train wreck.
I have zero issue with his skin-color. I have truckloads of issues with his ideology and worldview.
Do you find it ironic that so many people were blind to the fact that pure unadulterated racism played such a significant role in the last election cycle? Because, you know, voting for a man because he is of a certain skin color "proves" we're not a "racist" nation.. Isn't that actually the most racist thing one could possibly do?
Well done, Dan.
As an aside to the Star Trek episode, I would be much happier with Frank Gorshin in the White House.
"I'll add some logs to the fire and say that I believe that it is correct for Christians to have the litmus test of the positions on abortion and homosexuality when deciding who to vote for."
I second this.
Not only that, I'm already aware of LibProts and Secular Liberals calling these items "Wedge Issues" and that Christians who affirm these Wedge Issues are divisive and polarizing, not to mention stooges for the evil political conservatives.
"He decided to throw his white mother under the bus for political expediency."
Ouch...although I have to admit, it was a laugh-out-loud ouch.
Did he really throw her under the bus, though? I mean, not completely, right?
If he says he's "black," period, what's that make "white" mom? Chopped liver? Non-entity.
Well, Dan, I guess I was thinking about how he tried to portray himself as a multi-cultural candidate (his white grandmother and all that). I suppose calling himself black isn't exactly wrong, since one often identifies his descent with one's father's. However, he certainly did use it to his advantage.
Susan,
Remember, he also threw his white grandmother under the bus by basically announcing that she was a racist who had "confessed" that she had been fearful of black men that met her on the street and who was known to utter racial and ethnic stereotypes.
Now, this then begs the question if he is so bold as to publicly humiliate the grandmother who raised him by calling her out as a racist, would he be so bold as to call out the racists that he does not even know that voted for him strictly because of his skin color? Absolutely not, and probably because he has fallen for the liberal lie that only white people can be racist and only protected minority groups can be victimized by racism.
Thanks for handling the Memory Division work Eric; I remember that now. Great point, as is your follow-up.
As an aside, Blacks vote almost entirely as a block for Democrats no matter who they throw up as a candidate.
As another aside, I noticed the blatant self-segregation at work by blacks. They hang out together, go to lunch (excluding others) together, and generally go to events together. All that civil rights work so they can segregate themselves. And they are the only group that does this. Otherwise, the groups tend to be very diverse.
Obama had no choice but to play the race card. What was he going to say?
"I get so frustrated when people raise an issue that's of so little consequence; I'd much rather be running on my accomplishments, experience and philosophy of limited government, free markets and free people."?
Uh huh.
@ Rachael,
HA HA HA HA HA!
Dan, are you familiar with Herman Cain at all? I've been doing research on him the past couple days, and he seems like he's got potential.
He's apparently the 2nd favorite now among Republicans for the 2012 campaign, after Chris Christie (who insists he's not running - probably a good thing). http://www.zogby.com/news/2011/05/10/ibope-zogby-poll-cain-now-second-christie-top-choice-gop-primary-voters-/
Cain seems to be part of the tea party movement (I think?) and apparently had a great performance at the South Carolina debate a week or so back, and a good speech at CPAC recently, too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZDkacOveF0
National Review today published the most glowing profile I've seen from them in a long time: http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/print/267029
He's also apparently a former minister at this church: http://www.antiochnorth.org/antiochnorth.htm Unfortunately no doctrinal statement there, except that they're part of the National Baptist Convention, which does have a statement of beliefs: http://nationalbaptist.com/index.php?s=au&nid=144039 I don't see any immediate red flags (rainbow ribbons, female pastors, liberation theology, etc), other than the fact that I wish black churches in the U.S. wouldn't voluntarily segregate themselves in this way.
It would be amusing to see Obama debate someone who is a much better public speaker than him, much smarter, much more accomplished, etc.
Oh, and Cain actually is black, period. He even prefers the label "black" over "African-American". And he's from Atlanta, not Honolulu. What would really be fun is if Cain and Haley Barbour ran together on a ticket. On the 150th anniversary of the civil war, inaugurating a black guy with a cadence and dialect straight out of an Atlanta pulpit, and a southern white guy with a drawl as thick as Mississippi mud. It practically writes itself, and it'd drive liberals crazy (or crazier, anyway).
Andy,
I heard Herman Cain on the radio a couple of weeks ago talking about his ideas for economic policy and I was very impressed. He sounds very articulate and knowledgable. I hope that he can get his name out there and become recognized before the run up to the primaries.
To piggy-back off of Andy and Robert's comments, below are some comments made by Herman Cain.
“I believe that life begins at conception, period. And that means that I will have to see enough evidence that someone I would appoint shares that same view.
I believe that the current Supreme Court is leaning too much to the liberal side,” he said. “I’m a Christian, I’ve been a Christian all my life. I’ve been a believer in the Bible since I was 10 years old. I’m very active in my church,
and there is no way I would compromise my religious beliefs about the sanctity of life. And so it starts with, will they have demonstrated in their career, in
some of their other rulings, if they come from the federal judge bench, whether or not they also share that.”
“I absolutely would defund Planned Parenthood — not because I don’t believe in planning parenthood, [but because] Planned Parenthood as an organization is an absolute farce on the American people...”
“You probably don’t hear a lot of people talking about this,” Cain said. “When Margaret Sanger – check my history – started Planned Parenthood, the objective was to put these centers in primarily black communities so they could help kill black babies before they came into the world.”
“It’s planned genocide. It’s carrying out its original mission.”
Enumerating by race, educating by race, hiring by race - our country is saturated with it. It's embedded into both state and federal laws. Our children are trained from an early age in the public schools that they should embrace and celebrate diversity. All of these laws and regulations mandate divisions and perpetuate racism.
Somehow, I don't think it's what Dr. King had in mind when he wanted people to judge a man by the content of his character.
Regarding Herman Cain: He has a lot of good things to say and says it well. However, he lost me at last week's Fox debate when he basically had NO policy on Iraq and Afghanistan. His plan is to wait until he gets elected and has all the intelligence available to him. Then he will consult with experts and decide what's best.
Basically, you have to elect him before you find out what he'll do. Very Nancy Pelosi-like. And it's not like he didn't anticipate that question would come up and didn't prepare for it.
This has little to do with the topic, but do you realize that we had 16-18 comments on this post yesterday, but now there are only 8? The Blogger monster ate them, apparently.
my first thought was people think having a black president will really show there is no racism....but the very fact that skin color was even mentioned or made a deal of show how racist this world is. Who cares what the color of a given president is? And I think its sad how many people voted for him for his color. It saddened me greatly to see so many of my family members rooting for him.
Treating people equally regardless of race is racist. Categorizing people by race and giving different treatment accordingly is non-racist enlightenment. Ah, the wonders of liberalism!
I must say, whenever I feel the urge to comment on your blog, it's always generally after the party ended ;)
As someone who is black/white, I myself called out the racial politics Obama played. However, it cannot be said enough that they would have been played regardless of whether or not he played up his "blackness". Unless you're someone that knows me well, you're going to look at me and call me a black person before you even know I have a white father. Even my wife says I'm black every now and then. "Black" is most often a label people apply to me, whether I apply it to myself or not (I don't).
Sometimes voting "skin-color" is unconscious. Other times it's not. And that goes both ways (donkeys and elephants, that is).
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