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Pulitzer Prize winner Clarence Page began his career in journalism as editor for the Middletown Journal and Cincinnati Inquirer, and received his ...
Read more about By Clarence Page, Tribune Media Services.
Pulitzer Prize winner Clarence Page began his career in journalism as editor for the Middletown Journal and Cincinnati Inquirer, and received his ...
Read more about By Clarence Page, Tribune Media Services.
Obama's Country Vs. Palin's Nation
By Clarence Page, Tribune Media Services
I understand why President Obama didn't want reporters to tell the
world that he thought Kanye West behaved like a "jackass" at this
year's "MTV Video Music Awards." After all, politicians get in trouble
when they tell the truth.
It was double-plus un-good for the hip-hop star to snatch the microphone from sweet Taylor Swift's hands as the 19-year-old country music star was accepting her first VMA award.
Then he announced that he thought the award should have gone to Beyonce Knowles, who cameras caught with a look of shock and awe as the audience erupted in boos and jeers for Kanye. Well deserved.
Bless Beyonce, who received another award, for later saving the evening. She called a grateful Swift back on stage to finish her rudely interrupted acceptance speech. What a relief. In a program that historically erupts with weird scene-stealers, there was at least one grown-up in the room.
It was ironic, then, that Obama could not have taken a more public stand. Even in this age of culture wars and polarized politics, Americans of good will can stand together in our contempt for West's mirror-kissing narcissism.
The same can be said regarding tennis start Serena Williams' profanity-laden eruption against a line judge's call. Both West's and Williams' exercises in incivility happened to come a few days after South Carolina Republican Rep. Joe Wilson's "You lie" outcry interrupted Obama's health care speech to Congress. A door was opened wide for Obama to stand tall for better manners in these raucous times. But he passed. He even tried to persuade the nearby pool of White House reporters that the remark about West was "off the record," according to reports that leaked out anyway.
Reporters should cut the president "some slack," the president said, since "I've got a lot of other stuff on my plate." Right. The last thing Obama wanted was to step on his own health care momentum, as he did in his last prime-time news conference with off-the-cuff allegations of racial profiling.
This time, even when talking about health care, Team Obama dodged persistent questions about how much racism might be playing a role in the raging anger, fears, suspicions and resentments expressed by some opponents of his policies across the nation.
The White House left it to the likes of former President Jimmy Carter, who continued his tradition of saying things that cause consternation to sitting presidents of both parties.
On Kanye, Carter said West's behavior was "completely uncalled-for." He then cleverly declared that West's "punishment was to appear on the new Jay Leno show." Good one, Jimmy.
On race, the great peace negotiator was not nearly as sanguine. "I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African American," Carter said, recalling the nation's long, sad history of racial segregation, particularly in his native south.
I'm old enough to have experienced some of the discrimination that he was talking about. Yet I disagree that race is "an overwhelming portion" of Obama's opposition. There are plenty of legitimate reasons for people to oppose Obama's policies, whether I agree with them or not, without racism having much, if anything, to do with it.
After all, political and culture clashes between what I call "Obama Country" and "Sarah Palin's Nation" have a long tradition in America. Palin thrills the Republican base by extolling the virtues of "small towns" in much the way past populists and progressives traditionally have railed on behalf of "ordinary people" against "fat cats" and educated "elites." It is an odd sign of progress that a black man can rouse so much "anti-elitist" fervor.
Sometimes asking to be treated like every other president doesn't really ask for as much as one might think it does. Even the more vulgar politically incorrect signs at Town Hall and Tea Party demonstrations hark back to days when Abraham Lincoln was portrayed as an ape. After moving aggressively to tackle problems ranging from economy to global warming to health care, Obama was bound to bring on a backlash even if he were a full-blooded Caucasian.
What matters as we navigate these age-old differences now is our sense of civility, that ultimately we are in this mess together. Whether we come from the worlds that produced the music of Kanye West or Taylor Swift, we share problems in common that beg for us to come together as Americans. Let Beyonce be our guide.
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E-mail Clarence Page at cpage(at)tribune.com, or write to him c/o Tribune Media Services, 2225 Kenmore Ave., Suite 114, Buffalo, NY 14207.
(c) 2008 CLARENCE PAGE DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
This news arrived on: 09/20/2009
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Posted Comments:
10-16-2009 07:56
Geoff wrote:
Animosity comment
It continues to surprise me that almost all columnists and commentators misstate and misconstrue Carter's comment. He said ""I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African American". He did not say animosity towards the President's polices, he said animosity towards him. Big Difference. Many disagree with some of his policies and initiatives, but much of the reaction that we see is personal. Animosity towards him.
09-23-2009 00:57
JCE wrote:
A point not much discussed by the racists on either side is the fact that not all slaves were black. While Indians owned Indians captured in battle, more often as not they were adopted into the tribe out of necessity. When whites tried to enslave Indians, they sat and died. They refused to be slaves to the whites. Blacks owned slaves, both here in the US, but around the world, and most slaves that ended up in the Americas were bought from blacks, already in chains. Blacks accepted slavery, and held up well in the heat. Whites also were brought to the Americas as slaves, only, because they were white, the slavers didn't like to call them slaves. So they called them indentured servants. Irish, Scot, English and German came in huge numbers. Over half of all white immigrants to North America in the 17 and 18th century may have been indentured. Some owed money, some accused of crimes, some actually guilty, some were shanghaied, and some indentured themselves, to get here. These were the redemptioners, who had it worse because they could only negotiate after arrival, and were broke. While they were supposed to be a fixed contract, they were often kept beyond by the good Christian masters, and while whites had some legal rights, they were, for all intents and purposes, treated like slaves. Some escaped, hard to tell a free white from an non free. Another reason blacks were considered so valuable.
09-23-2009 00:57
JCE wrote:
It was all about energy, and labor, as it is today. The abuse, corruption and dishonesty was as bad or worse than it is today. The English did have a few more rights. More than half of 18 and 19 century Germans were redemptioners, treated just like slaves. The women and children had it worse. In the 1600s a woman who had a child had 2 more years tacked on, and had to serve the church as slaves. Many died in passage, and families were held liable for for the dead. Many started as paying passengers, got robbed, and became redemptioners. People were shanghaied, and as slavery ended, indentured became more valuable. Guilt over the treatment of whites came much more quickly, than guilt over non whites, if it came at all.
09-22-2009 20:50
Dick from Chaska wrote:
Redneck
Again you say Obama lied and again for the 17 time I am asking you to show where he lied.
09-22-2009 14:51
casey42 wrote:
The repugnants lie so often that they think everyone lies like they do. Obama was not lying about illegals not being given health care benefits by the reform bill before congress, he was not lying about there being no death panel included in the bill, he was not lying about the bill forcing people to accept the public option, he was not lying about the bill not putting the government between a person and his/her doctor, those are all thiungs that the RNC has been spreading outright bald faced lies about and their little lemmings have been accepting as the truth.
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