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Barack attack
By Steve Lewis
slewis42@mscd.edu

As if there weren’t enough information to pore through when analyzing the crowded field of Democratic presidential hopefuls, a column by Stanley Crouch in the New York Daily News has added an unhelpful and outrageously racist component.

In a column devoted to Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, Crouch, apparently the supreme and self-appointed arbiter of what constitutes “blackness,” concludes that Obama, the black candidate, isn’t really black, or at least not black enough. Crouch states that because Obama is the son of a white mother and a Kenyan father and because he does not share the common heritage of slave ancestry, he is not African-American in the truest sense. Although he may be called African and/or American, he cannot be called African-American and therefore, according to Crouch, has no claim to being the black candidate. Such pedantry reveals as much about American society and its nervous and confused approach to race as it does about reverse racists like Crouch.

That there is a female candidate, a black candidate and a Hispanic candidate in addition to the typical “clean and articulate” Biden-esque white candidates is a great testament to this country, if somewhat overdue. Real democrats, small-d democrats, are for the broadening and deepening of the democratic experience in this, the last great hope for humankind. So now, when we finally have a broader slate of candidates from various backgrounds, out crawls the irresponsible Crouch with his toxic notions of ethnic purity. Crouch’s dubious nomenclature must not define these candidates, and no question of just how black or female or Hispanic a candidate is should affect our judgment. For better or for worse, the proof of the pudding must be in their policies.

Both the effect and intention of such identity parsing are clearly to distract the candidate involved. When one’s race or gender becomes the issue du jour, then the candidate and his or her policies are sidelined. If Obama is not black enough for Crouch, just how feminine is Hillary, and does it matter? The successes of Margaret Thatcher or Golda Meir were down to native wit and force of character rather than any feminine wiles or charm, and Hillary is certainly not as easy on the eye as her counterpart in the French presidential election, Segolene Royal. But remember, it is an election and not a beauty pageant.

In Crouch’s world does Bill Richardson need a more Hispanic name to be a real Hispanic? Is John Edwards’ accent southern enough for him? Does Mitt Romney believe the Garden of Eden really is in Missouri? Is Giuliani’s big-city swagger justified? Does there have to be an authentically Catholic or Jewish candidate? The answers don’t matter and neither should these ludicrous questions.

When dangerous and divisive columnists like Crouch try to distract us by introducing selective criteria to authenticate minority status, we should focus on the real issue: Who would make the best president?