YOU ARE WRONG

In Prospect Magazine, Trevor Phillips the chairman of the the Equality and Human Rights Commission (former Commission for racial equality), wrote an article about Barack Obama. For Mr Phillips, Barack Obama is just a charismatic, capable and ruthless politician. At first I would be delighted if Trevor Phillips could give us the name of a single politician at this level who is uncharismatic, incapable and gentle or a choirboy.

For Phillips, Barack Obama is a “bargainer”. According to the African-American conservative author Shelby Steele (A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited about Obama and Why He Can't Win) they are two kind of black leaders in America, the bargainers and the challengers. Basically for the challengers, they very often consider Whites as racist until they prove otherwise. And the bargainers; their motto is “I will not use America's horrible history of white racism against you, if you will promise not to use my race against me”.

Challengers are people such as Malcolm X or Jesse Jackson. The bargainers are people like Oprah Winfrey or Sydney Poitier. Phillips, who does not think that Barack Obama will get the nomination, says that if he gets it and wins the presidency, nothing basically will change in America concerning race relations. For Shelby Steeles if Obama wins, he will fulfil the hopes of Whites therefore he will disappoint Blacks or vice versa. I don’t agree. As a matter of fact if Barack Obama is elected President and turns the economy around, creates jobs and reduces the deficit I do think that Americans whatever the colour of their skin will benefit as a nation from that.

Phillips makes another mistake about Obama; and I am pretty sure that he has not read enough about him.
For example he takes Bill Cosby as a counter example. Phillips writes that the actor who the last years “has toured the country emphasising the theme of black responsibility” is isolated within the Black Community and Obama ignores it and does not want to talk about Blacks responsibilities in their own destiny. Wrong. Bill Cosby is still a revered personality amongst African –Americans and even amongst all Americans. He wrote a book with the professor of psychiatry Alvin Toussaint who teaches at the Harvard Medical School, called “Come on People, on the path from victims to victors”. They were on the NBC's “Meet the Press", interviewed by Tim Russert : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhZve73KQpQ

The excellent New York Times’ Bob Herbert wrote an excellent column about it, make up your mind: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/opinion/16herbert.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

But Bob Herbert is for sure better informed than Trevor Phillips. Mister Chairman should know that Barack Obama made several speeches in his church in Chicago but also before black audiences on the campaign trail about their own responsibilities to study as long as they can or about the fact that they can improve their lives on a daily basis.

Another point I disagree with is the use of words such as bargainers or challengers. For example the word “bargainer” sounds to me like a modern version of Uncle Tom. I find very stupid to say that a great man like Sydney Poitier is a “bargainer” (pronounce Uncle Tom) just because he is a good actor and appeals to people whatever the colour of their skin. Can we just say that Sydney Poitier is a human being and a good actor who happened to be Black? That Jesse Jackson is not a challenger; he is just a human being and a good politician who built the rainbow coalition, who fought against inequalities from Selma (Alabama, 1965) to Jena (Louisiana 2007) and who happened to be black?
Doctor Martin Luther King said once that he dreamt that his four little children would one day live in a nation where they would not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. Well Mister Phillips as a chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission it might be the time for you and your conservative friend to stop judging people by the color of their skin and stop putting them into boxes.

And by the way since you believe in such stupid theories, are you a bargainer or a challenger?