Del.icio.us
Digg
Reddit
Facebook
StumbleUpon
TwitThisNot Black Enough
His appeal to the Democratic base is obvious, yet he trails Hillary Clinton in national polling by a wide margin. Obama’s prospects seem to hinge on the electorate’s reaction to two basic facts: He is seeking to become the first African American President, and he is relatively inexperienced. Plenty of observers say this is a one-two punch that will doom his candidacy. Maybe. But there are others who believe that these supposed hurdles will prove to be Obama’s ultimate assets.Start with a most curious charge: Obama is not black enough. Grumblings of this sort have percolated in the African American community, and they stem from the Senator’s uncommon background.
His genes are a mix of two starkly different worlds: Kansas and Kenya. Obama’s father, also named Barack, was born into Kenya’s Luo tribe and raised a Muslim, while his mother, Ann, was a white middle-class Midwesterner. The two met at the University of Hawaii in 1960, and Barack was born a year later. His father abandoned the family when Barack was only two, and not long after, Ann married again—this time a man from Indonesia who moved the family to Jakarta. After four years there, Barack was sent back to Hawaii to live with his grandparents so the nine-year-old could attend the highly regarded Punahou Academy. He continued on an elite course, graduating from Columbia University and earning a law degree from Harvard (where Obama became the first black president of the Harvard Law Review).
This is a powerful narrative for a politician—a triumph over racial and cultural divides, not to mention a fractured family. Add to it Obama’s three-year stint, between college and law school, as a street-level organizer in Chicago’s poor, black neighborhoods, and you have a candidate with a strong claim on minority voters.
Except that a recent poll shows Hillary Clinton neck and neck with Obama among black voters. Almost certainly, this reflects an enduring affection for former President Bill Clinton, but it also suggests mixed feelings about Obama. Is he really one of them? Can a guy who was raised mainly by white grandparents, whose black heritage has nothing to do with slavery, and whose education is Ivy elite, relate to their problems?
Obama’s supporters, such as his law school friend Cassandra Butts, insist this wariness will vanish as the Senator becomes better known. Now a senior vice president at the Center for American Progress, Butts says there was “a similar pattern when he ran for the Senate. As people got to know him, support for him skyrocketed. African Americans will embrace him as they learn about his strong record of support for issues that are important to them.”
But Obama has to excite and inspire fellow blacks while not allowing race to define his candidacy. “It wasn’t about race when he ran for the U.S. Senate,” says Obama’s wife, Michelle, an executive at the University of Chicago Medical Center. “Barack spoke to everyone’s hopes and dreams, and he won in the urban North and the rural South. His appeal is based on his ability to connect with people in a way that cuts across race, gender and political affiliation.”
Connecting with voters across the spectrum may not even be his biggest challenge. What about concerns that he’s too green to be handed the reins of power? “Naive” is the way Hillary Clinton characterized a recent remark by Obama that he’d be willing to meet unconditionally with the leaders of rogue states, like Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and North Korea’s Kim Jong-il. Clinton has pounced on other statements as well, implying that her opponent is not prepared to become Commander in Chief at a time of global threats to America.
Advertisement 
