Letters to the Editor
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Context, nitpicking, and let it go already please
So there's the substantive part regrading your question which is this: He meant "this isn't unusual behavior, many white people have these fears". It's the most reasonable way to interpret the phrase you and Fox and others have plucked out of context, especially when you look at what was clearly the overall message of the speech, which isn't race-baiting but precisely its opposite. He obviously meant to soften the picture of his grandmother by saying "now, I know she's not alone in this."
Then there's the other part, which is this: Why are you going around asking this inane question along with Fox News and others who clearly have A) missed the point of the speech entirely and B) done so intentionally?
Your statement that "I hope Obama moves beyond this" followed and surrounded by a column that clearly tries to keep the ginned-up controversy alive is one of the most disineguous things I've ever read in Salon, and yes, that's saying a lot.
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We are heading for a precipice in war and in wealth, get over this.
Let's refocus....there are very serious tremours in our financial system that is off the Cheney radar scope (his gold is held by friends in the Gulf) and is on his scope in Iraq (at behest of his money holders). A disaster of this size is without colour and race is only the competition to the bottom!
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Grandma story version one
The problem with Senator Obama is that he has so many versions of every story that one begins to doubt his honesty and who
he really is after a while. The Retzko story has changed and changed and now the grandma story has several versions. In his
first book, he tells about his grandma's fear being caused by
having a black man try to get money from her on the bus. She
didn't mention it to him but told Grandpa of her fear and
he told Obama. If you add this to 20 years in Wright's church, you have to wonder what he really does harbor deep inside in racial feelings. Once again, we really don't know Mr. speech guy from the real guy. Who is the real Barack Obama? What you see doesnot seem to be what you always get.
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Let's see, how can I get myself in trouble today.......
First of all, the whole grandmother thing, including both the original statement and the "typical" comment, is being discussed in just about every media outlet on and off line. For Joan and/or Salon to ignore it would be downright negligent. It is really interesting how people think that being given the ability to post a comment online somehow makes them qualified as journalism critics.
@ Uncle Fester
And a lot of your readers are concerned about bias and a suspected undertow against Obama. Sharing any legitimate fear, uncertainty or doubt is not likely to be well received at this time.
So are you suggesting that Joan just shut up about Obama? No questioning allowed, no analysis, if it isn't gushing praise then it doesn't belong in the pages of Salon! Are Obama supporters in such a fragile psychological state that the mere hint of uncertainty is likely to push them over the edge? Maybe you're right.
@David L.
it is THEY that are the bitter old foggies trying to rain on the younger voters' parade to the White House. Yes, shame on us for not being cynical about politics like THEM...
Enjoy your parade now. Give it time. You'll learn it's just a bunch of hot air in those balloons.
@ weeping for brunnhilde
Obama was speaking of his grandmother's racism in a neutral, almost sociological way. It wasn't a fucking accusation, for Christ's sake. As a black person who lives in an Ivy League world and has lived almost exclusively around white people and has married a European, all I can say is, for the love of Christ, get over yourselves, white people!
A serious question for you with all due respect. If I said that your statement was that of a typical black person, would you be offended?
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Finally, while it may be interesting and perhaps even useful to discuss race relations in America and whether Jeremiah Wright's comments were justified or hateful, I agree with those who argue that this election is not about Rev. Wright. It is about Barack Obama. The criticism of Obama has essentially been (try to stay calm everyone) that he is all words, beautiful and inspiring words, but no action.
So, in Sen. Obama's own words, Rev. Wright's positions were "divisive and counter-productive" and he presented a "profoundly distorted view of this country". So, after the magnificent speech, the question remains, if he truly felt that way, what did he try to do about it? Did he think it was adequate to sit quietly by for 20 years without voicing any concern? Did he spend time trying to convince his pastor that this rhetoric was not productive? Did he meet with other members of the church to persuade them to join him in speaking to the pastor? And finally, how can he justify the judgment of subjecting his young, impressionable children to what he himself considered divisive, distorted and counter-productive?
If he did not exercise the judgment and leadership to move his dear, close "uncle" and his spiritual community one step closer to reconciliation, how are we to believe he can move an entire nation? The criticism of Obama has been that he gives great speeches, but hasn't shown the actions and judgment to back them up. To me this seems like just one more example.
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It is time to grow up!
Goodness, I have read too many posts on Salon, Huffington, and NYT among others. I am reading too many posts that do not possess an ounce of nuance and instead pounds of vitriol.
What continues to amaze me in this so-called "discussion" of race is the ongoing need to boil statements down to their basest elements, stripped of context, into a viscous gruel of bile and rage. I begin to feel like if I want a complex discussion of major issues I should just watch "Battlestar Galactica" DVD's.
We miss important points along the way to the present. Has anyone dared to posit that perhaps, just PERHAPS what is astounding about Barack is that, despite growing up without a father, despite having any inherent privileges, and DESPITE finding a good church with a flawed paster, he manages to conduct a balanced, race-free campaign for several months before being dragged into the mud pit by those on the left and the right?
Barack has put his faith into action, by believing that we can come together, and forgiving his pastor's excessive commentary. Why are so many of us unable to do the same? I cannot consider myself a Christian, lacking faith in the bodily resurrection of Jesus, but to put faith into practice in such a real, consistent, and yet progressive way warms my heart.
I am just another over-educated East Coast effete latte-sipping liberal, but one from a family so poor in my youth that we lived on canned mackerel and crackers for several months. I had a child far too young, and through an odd series of events, found myself married and in a poor minority neighborhood outside of Boston. I HAD thought I had overcome adversity. I never dealt with the obstacles that the children there, typically Black and Hispanic, saw on a daily basis. I didn't spend my youth dodging drug dealers, muggings, and car jackings. How could anyone succeed with so much thrown their way?
But someone did. And it wasn't Hillary Clinton. What is very interesting, and something lost in our rants here, is that Bill Clinton's story has much in common with Barack's. Bill was compelling for some of the very same reasons. But in the end, he was a white boy and didn't have to face the trials by fire that we see now.
This is a poorly-organized post, but I want to leave on last thought: I had many relatives with the "typical white person" reaction to race. I had a great-aunt who once told my now ex-wife that Hispanics working under poor conditions in an egg processing plant should be happy to have any job, since they should all be back in Mexico with "their kind" anyway. It took all but physical effort to keep my wife at time from striking her.
This is a good case of "hate the sin, love the sinner." If we toss out everyone with a racist thought or reaction, ostracize those with inherent contradiction in their thoughts and actions, we'll have all the world be a prison with only the wind as our guards.