That's the question Jon Stewart asked Brian Williams recently about Williams' views on the upcoming election. Williams' answer wasn't nearly as interesting as the question itself; certainly it seems difficult to express reasons why you dislike one of the democratic contenders without, at least, arousing mild suspicions that you might be a closeted ***ist. Even voicing your approval for one candidate seems to raise the defenses of people in the other's camp.
It's a nice problem to have, in some respects, because no matter who wins the democratic nomination, it's a first for the country. A tarnished national image in a global community cannot be salvaged by anything less than an unequivocal brand overhaul. Because he is young and black, Barack certainly looks the part. Because she is female, Hillary does too.
Geraldine Ferraro expressed a similar sentiment last week in a speech in California: "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And, if he was a woman of any color, he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept." Later in her speech, referring to her own VP campaign, Ferraro added, "In 1984 if my name had been Gerald Ferraro, not Geraldine, I would never have gotten nominated."
Credit to the Obama camp for stopping short of labeling Ferraro a racist in their rebuke. "I’m always hesitant to throw around words like ‘racist,’ ” he said. “I don’t think she intended them in that way." And credit Hillary's camp for not immediately firing Ferraro from her Finance Committee (she resigned yesterday anyway). Major credit to Ferraro for speaking her mind and not bowing to pressures to retract the statement. She resigned from Hillary's campaign so that she could continue to speak her mind without fear of hurting the candidate she still vows to [work to] support.
I don't think Ferraro is suggesting black people have it cushier than white people in this country, as many sophomoric articles suggest, but I do think she is [a tad crudely] calling attention to the fact that this democratic candidate is certainly novel. She is right. And what's wrong with that? It's no different than when a struggling Nike rolled the dice with a kid named Jordan out of UNC in the same year of Ferraro's campaign. We're rebranding the country, and a new, very different pitchperson is certainly in order.
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2 comments:
Acrid. What do you think of yesterday's speech by Senator Obama? Obviously some feel it was a speech of historical significance.
I thought it was an astonishingly accurate snapshot of a multi-pronged issue that, in less capable hands, would be disastrous to a campaign. That he addressed it all shows a ton of moxie and validates his claims on running a different kind of campaign.
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