The Obama Generation

There’s been some debate about the implications of Obama’s campaign–and, potentially, his presidency–on racial politics. Matt Bai paraphrases the argument of some black politicians in his excellent NYTimes Magazine piece from two weeks ago:

[A]n Obama presidency might actually leave black Americans less well represented in Washington rather than more so — that, in fact, the end of black politics, if that is what we are witnessing, might also mean the precipitous decline of black influence. . . . The argument here is that a President Obama, closely watched for signs of parochialism or racial resentment, would have less maneuvering room to champion spending on the urban poor, say, or to challenge racial injustice.

To be a nationally tenable black politician, you’ve got to move away from traditionally black issues. “I’ve not figured out a black or white way to fill a pothole,” as Mayor Nutter says in the article. And any argument that points out systematic racism will be countered with the fact that “Obama made it to the White House, so how bad can it be?”.

The central question is whether black politicians are making this move too soon. As Bai states at one point, even if there is only one way to fill a pothole, there are a lot more potholes in the black neighborhoods–and more poverty, more crime, more struggling schools.

The problem here is the lack of apparent solutions; there’s far less discriminatory legislation to be struck down. Bai points out that older black politicians saw their role as largely advocating for black Americans; a younger set of politicians, well-educated and middle class, find themselves advocating to them. Just as I argued in terms of education, they see a change be necessary from within the community.

As John McWhorter writes in a column in New York Magazine I read this morning, “The Obama Generation would grow up with a younger and less grouchy version of Bill Cosby in the White House”:

Not only would an Obama Generation see a black man occupying the highest office in the land, but its members would be suckled from toddlerhood on a widened conception of black authenticity. The tacit idea that the blackest is the streetest, or that black people in high places inevitably stop being “really black,” will fade.

He makes a powerful argument that it’s time to set aside “pessimism and fatalism” as virtues of progressive racial politics, and extend the progress that’s been made. Rather than say that Obama would be a black president too soon, he believes he “could take us the final yards to where we need to go, instead of pretending that we have barely gone anywhere”–bringing us to a place where the post-racial politics of Michale Nutter make sense.

It’s worth a read.