That inescapable issue

In the wake of Obama's much-touted momentous sermon on race in America, there is no end of discussion around the blogosphere about the content of the speech. The reactions are falling along predictable lines, both in the old media outlets where things must be expressed in a very guarded fashion, and in the somewhat more freewheeling blogosphere. As I expected, those who are not Obamatons (as someone dubbed them) think the speech was a snow job or a lot of glib obfuscation, while the Obamatons are lauding the speech and the speaker, and praising him for his honesty and his 'refreshing' perspective. But the real cult followers, the groupies, are in transports of bliss after hearing their idol holding forth.

I have also noticed that there is somewhat of an army of zealots from the Obama camp descending on any blog which criticizes Obama; these people are the usual multicultists preaching the usual sermons on race and unity and diversity and tolerance. Either these people are being dispatched by the campaign to google the blogs for negative comments about Obama, or they are such fervent followers that they are doing so spontaneously. Either way, they seem to be all over many blogs. We need to counter their nonsense where possible.

David Yeagley as usual has written some of the most honest and truly refreshing things about Obama and 'the speech'; in fact he wrote this
accurate assessment of The Speech even without hearing it.

''It's all about race, again. I have not heard the speech of Barak Hussein Obama about race. He hasn't given it yet. But I already know what he's going to say. He's going to 'equalize' all things. Everyone is basically black. And blacks are like everyone else--meaning they are white. Everyone is the same. Then he will shift over into defense. He will justify the black complaint.

It will only be another example of the psychological greed of the black race. They think they own race, and all things racial. They are the king of race. Barak Hussein Obama will do nothing but exalt the Negro, and equalize all other races into blackness. In one way or another, he will identify with any and all social complaints in the world, and picture the black race as the epitome of discontent, and will encourage every plainiff in the world to identify with the black race.

It is a very weak, slavish approach to racial reality, and a hackneyed attempt to change the leapard's spots.

The apparent truth is that black people are inevitably uncomfortable around white people. That's all it is. And they believe they are superior to all other persons of color. They think they are the guide for all other non-white people.
And they think they are arbiter of thought and principle when it comes to talking about race. This is the history of black thought in America.

This is a hideous presumption, but one that the American Negro has adopted for two centuries. He is encouraged in this presumption by white people who simply do not understand their own conscience, nor their own history, nor their own place in the world.

Barak Hussein Obama will invite everyone to share the black view, and they will discover that, yes, they feel like black people feel! It will be a grand love fest, based on pity, erroneous association, and perverted empathy. It will be a psychological Houdini, whereby the world will become Negro.''

Read the rest at BadEagle.com.

The important thing here, really, is not Barack Hussein Obama and his 'story', which is as atypical an 'American story' we could possibly find, but the real issue, and the one which is being brought to the forefront by his candidacy, just as I knew it would, is the racial question.

This is THE issue of our time; as I've said, and as many others have also said, race is at the heart of most of the pressing issues of our time, foremost among them the immigration crisis, which is really part of the larger, behind-the-scenes clash between the old ideas of nationhood and the globalist agenda. The racial struggles of the last half-century and more have led us to this present crisis, as we have recently been schooled to feel deeply guilty about 'racial oppression' and discrimination. Our penance has involved being lowered to a subservient status in our own country and now being dispossessed by strangers -- and our racial guilt is being used to render us helpless and resigned to our loss of status.

David Yeagley is right, I think, to identify the dynamic between black and white as being a kind of role reversal: blacks will apparently not be mollified by anything less than superiority over whites. We have already made blacks our superiors in many senses; they are absolved from responsibility for their own failures and crimes; it's our fault in each and every case. They are considered always and everywhere to be perpetual victims, perpetually suffering saints who are always wronged but never in the wrong. They have become a special and protected group of people, who must be spoken of in near-reverential terms, never criticized much less insulted. We idolize them as entertainers, athletes, politicians. A mediocre performance from them is praised and lauded more than a brilliant performance from anyone else; look at the fawning praise lavished on every prominent black from Oprah to Condi Rice to Obama himself. Would any of the aforementioned people be considered noteworthy had they been born white? We judge them by a much more lenient standard, a lower standard. We defend them should any of our own people make a 'racist' comment. I know it happens; I did it in my liberal past, and most whites do it.

But I think all this coddling and near-idolatry is still not enough. Obviously it is not enough; it has only whetted appetites for more. The more ground we give, the more is demanded of us, and the darker the denunciations if we refuse to play the game.

Yeagley is saying that the logical next step is for blacks to obtain supremacy over us; to hold the whip hand. And apparently there are many masochistic whites who are eager for this; nothing will lighten their load of guilt short of being placed in subjection to blacks or nonwhites in general. They will be happy when they are under the heel of nonwhite peoples. They will suffer gladly and even more gladly, welcome the suffering of their fellow whites, who are no doubt guilty of 'bigotry' and 'racism.'

The older generations in their blunt way sometimes said, when blacks demanded to be called by some new label (as when the term 'colored' was discarded in favor of the term 'Negro', and later when 'Negro' gave way to 'black') -- "they won't be happy until we call them master." I once thought this was rather an exaggerated assessment, but now it seems quite plausible, as Yeagley also indicates. Nothing will suffice except that we exchange places and accept the shackles their ancestors supposedly wore. And we are halfway there, or two-thirds of the way, judging by the conduct of the servile white liberals I see everywhere. And I include many Republicans in that number, not just Democrats.

I see two conflicting patterns here: the old media, the controlled media, and their Obama-olatry, accompanied by many young white liberals worshipping at the Obama altar. And I see on the other side a still-small, but growing contingent of people who have had enough of being accused of racism, enough of being guilt-tripped about the 'original sin' of our ancestors (to use Obama's objectionable phrase) and enough of being shaken down.

Unfortunately I see that most of the latter group, the "hadenoughs", are the older generations. Much as everybody enjoys dumping on Baby-Boomers, we are the last generation to have lived under the old dispensation, before political correctness. We are the latest generation to witness the changeover. We remember what it was like. Our parents' generation is all but gone, with only a few very old people left who are still lucid and active. We, along with some members of the 'silent generation' which preceded us, are all that's left of old America. The younger generations, despite some claims that they are more politically incorrect, are much more 'tolerant', and I don't say that as a compliment. I say this, though, acknowledging that there are some realists among the younger people too.

Still, if things continue as they are, in another generation or less, old America will be a memory -- or not even that, if the revisionists continue their dirty work. And the 'new America' will be a third-worldized, Brazilianized America, in which a small minority of indoctrinated white people will be marginalized or completely assimilated into the mixed multitude, the all-sorts America of the future.

As I watch the mesmerized reaction of many Americans (and many from other countries) to Obama, I see this as the end result of decades of white guilt and brainwashing about race. Some of the more perceptive people of the past could see this coming: people like Carleton Putnam, for example, but they were, ultimately, voices crying in the wilderness. The egalitarian zealots won out, and now we are reaping the consequences.

This debate about race that is ongoing, stunted though it may be by a controlled media and by the self-censorship -- and 'democratic peer censorship' -- of political correctness, can potentially be a turning point. It might possibly cause the most somnolent among us to start thinking about the whole vexed question of race, and to even regard the civil rights coup with a critical eye. Or, alternatively, the discussion will just fizzle out into the usual race-baiting and lies and name-calling, and eventually the status quo will go on unchallenged. And it may be that, should the latter happen, Obama will be our next president. Some (foolishly, I think) believe that a McCain or Hillary presidency would be worse, or at least equally bad. I disagree. I beg those of you who think an Obama presidency would be better than a Clinton II administration, or a McCain administration, to reconsider. Think: is it a good thing to elect a president from a group which is placed in a privileged position, above criticism? A president from a group which is traditionally the most alienated and bitter group of people with the deepest grievances against traditional America, against our ancestors and what they stood for? What would be the symbolic significance of electing such a candidate? Would it not be seen as a symbolic dethroning of white leadership or dominance? Would it not bee seen as in a sense repudiating America's past, and its very founding?

Would electing nonwhite candidates, in the future, then be seen as de rigueur, in order to affirm our devotion to 'diversity' and 'non-racism'?

Again, Obama's personal charisma (which eludes me, but I am a rather charisma-resistant person) is a big, big negative. Anytime we elevate a person with a cult following to a position of authority, that is a bad thing, especially in a representative system. 'Charismatic' people are more likely to foster servility on the part of the populace and a tendency to a fierce defense of the revered leader whenever he or she is criticized. We saw that on a much milder scale with Bill Clinton. A charismatic leader, unless he is a one-in-a-million highly principled leader, can be dangerous. Charismatic leaders plus servile, ignorant followers lead to an easily-led and easily manipulated nation, a nation which is easily led down the wrong paths.

A leader like McCain or Hillary would be far less dangerous; neither of them inspire blind, stupefied loyalty or idolatry like Obama does. And then there's that little issue of race: I've said it before, but race insulates Obama from the kind of criticism other leaders would meet. He will instead have more than his quota of yes-men and yes-women, lickspittles and lapdogs. A leader absolutely needs people around him who can be candid, and who will keep the leader honest.

Now is not the right time to elect a person 'of color' to the highest office in our land. I realize the President is not dictator or king, but the race issue will pervade everything should we elect a black president right now. If we really had a 'colorblind society', which I doubt even exists or can exist, it might be feasible. But we have no colorblind society, and it's futile to pretend that we do -- and even more futile and dishonest to assume, without evidence, that colorblindness is possible.

Now is not the time. Until such a time as both sides of the 'race issue' can be fully and honestly examined and aired, without any politically correct taboos, we cannot settle the 'race question.'