The Historicity of an Unprecedented Election in US Presidential Politics

By Innocent Chia

  With less than a week left in the race to the finish line on November 4th, campaigns are summoning their best forces and sparing no effort during this injury time. Senators McCain and Obama have been making their closing arguments why they are better qualified than the opponent.

Some of the closing methods and messages have been outright and downright negative and despicable. For the most part, these vile and dishonorable tactics of fear mongering have been deployed by Sen. McCain’s camp, the RNC, other independent groups and extremists. Our space today examines how and why the Fear / Scare Mongering narrative is finding potency or great appeal to many voters on the US political landscape.

 

 

What is the fear all about? I think it is the more appropriate question to ask those who say that they are afraid of an Obama Presidency. Yes, what is the fear all about? It is the question that I have been asking myself ever since the McCain campaign decided that it would emulate the Bush/Cheney tactic of 2004 of selling fear for cheap by telling the electorate that Democrats were weak on defense and would be unable to protect the country against another attack by Osama Bin Laden. This time around McCain camp, and Obama haters, are crystallizing fear in the minds of Americans by suggesting that Obama is a Muslim; that he pals around with terrorists; that he is a baby killer; that he is not American enough; not a patriot; he is a socialist…etc

 

Is that enough to instill fear in some? Yes. Those who have closed their eyes and ears, who would not read other sources or listen to anyone that thinks differently, are always setting up themselves to be fooled and dragged along. So any or all of those reasons may be good enough for them to be fearful of a President Barack Obama. But there is certainly more than meets the eye.

 

It is my deposition that the Caucasian American who is buying the fear rhetoric is truly afraid of the symbolism of a Black man’s ascendancy to the supreme position in the land. A Barack Obama Presidency symbolizes the unchaining or unleashing of Blacks and others of Color, including Women as a minority group. The fear of the unsettled Caucasian is that Blacks and other minorities will now aspire to play on the same level field with them! And history is on the side of those who are embracing fear over freedom, equality, growth and community. Remember professional Baseball great Jackie Robinson and Moses Fleetwood Walker 60 years before? What about the way Black athletes changed Basketball?

 

You probably remember Earl Lloyd, Chuck Cooper and Nat Clifton? Some 47 years ago they paved the way for the other Basketball greats including Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, Julius Erving, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James. Where does one begin with the famous American Football? Blacks have competently taken up the revered Quarterback (QB) role that was hitherto reserved for the Caucasian athletes.

Blacks have been excelling as individual athletes as well. Althea Gibson paved the way for the history making  William sisters (Venus and Serena), both of whom have contributed immensely in changing the way Women’s Tennis is played.  On the male side, James Blake has been impressive in his own right. As for Tiger Woods, he is an alone category without whom the sport of Golf is in a whirlwind.

 

In the media business, Blacks have owned and managed world renowned brands. The first that logically comes to mind is the late John Johnson; founder of Johnson Publishing Company, the world’s largest African-American-owned and operated publishing company. Another history making African-American in the media industry was the founder and CEO of Black Entertainment Television (BET), Robert Johnson. Does the ubiquitous Oprah Winfrey need any introducing?

 

The point of this shortlist of high achievers, even without mentioning the host of African-American science inventors, medical experts and technological geniuses, is that African-Americans have been great when presented with the opportunity. It would appear that some Caucasians have taken exception to such success as if it were coming at their own expense. A little story to point: My former landlord told me the story of her teenage grandson that was recently stabbed to death by his neighbor and friend. What was it about? My landlord’s grandson was playing in his high school team and spent much too less time with his neighbor and friend, so much so that the neighbor became jealous. On a fateful morning that the victim stepped out of their suburban home to empty their trash, his Caucasian neighbor walked up behind him and, as our victim turned around, was stabbed several times in the chest until he bled to death.

 

Senator McCain’s brand of fear is against providing any hope for African-Americans because of the results that it will procure. But much more than that, it is a brand of fear that stokes the fire of hatred against Blacks by extremist groups that have been hiding away in the woods like Osama Bin Laden in the rocky mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is a fear that is for perpetrating the stereotype that African-Americans are good for nothing and cannot be trusted with anything big and meaningful; that African-Americans are to be a subservient bunch, good for the entertainment industry.

Finally, it is important to note that an important voting block at this historic election will be the baby boomers. The baby boomers are the Caucasian Americans who questioned their parents as to why they could play with their African-American age mates but could not drink from the same fountain, piss in the same washrooms, eat together in the same restaurants and sit alongside each other in a bus ride. This is the time when they get to answer the questions that their parents may have had difficulty answering: Will you not vote for a candidate just because of the color of their skin?

 

At his First Inaugural Address Franklin D. Roosevelt famously said that “Only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. In the last hours of this record election, the McCain campaign has the responsibility to offer more than fear to the American people. It can offer the hope that there is enough room for everyone to be all they want to be in the blessed land called America. It is this message of hope that Sen. Obama has traveled far and near selling for the last 20 months. There is a better part in each one of us that can be tapped into without depriving the other. It so happens that the bearer of this message is in Black skin and that his name is Barack Obama. He comes running on the heels of Martin Luther King, who led millions to walk across the US because Rosa Parks sat in the front of that bus in Alabama.