PopConsumer

links for 2008-08-20

• The Education of McCain - David Brooks - NYTimes Op-Ed
  John McCain and his advisers are running a much more conventional race, the kind he used to ridicule. The inescapable fact is: It is working.
  (tags: 2008election politics mccain obama media republicans)

Racial Politics: What's The Obama Marriage Got To Do With It?

The late summer, pre-convention politics lull finds the void being filled with several deep-thinking magazine articles focused on Barack Obama and issues of race.

New York magazine recently published an issue with several pieces looking at race and politics. Notably, one article is capturing the attention of several bloggers. Vanessa Grigoriadis' article titled: Black & Blacker: The racial politics of the Obama marriage was not well received, at best.

Grigoriadis tries to draw insight into a number of issues of race and identity for both Barack and Michelle Obama and to look at issues of race and racism that affect voters. The result is an unfortunate mish-mash of previously discussed issues and interpretations and the discussion does not contain a central thesis that I can discern which relates to "the racial politics of the Obama marriage."

The author does touch on some of the specific concerns Michelle and Barack face navigating in a predominantly white world while identifying and being identified as black. Grigoriadis does touch on some of the ways in which Barack and Michelle's separate experiences intersect but she does not delve deeply into why such intersections might matter to their marriage or how their marriage might shape their identities. She also points out that the fact that Michelle is not only a strong, black woman but also darker-skinned than Barack, endears Barack to some black voters and solidifies his blackness for them:

“The fact that Barack did not choose a lighter-skinned woman sends a message to me,” says one supporter. Says another, “When I look at Michelle, Barack doesn’t have to be any blacker for me.”

One thesis in the article about Michelle seems to particularly bother many bloggers:

As much as any political campaign is an extended meditation on authenticity, the question of just how black the Obamas are has become particularly loaded. Michelle must project herself as black to one community, but she also must act white to another, whatever either adjective means nowadays.

Ultimately I think this illustrates the weakness of the article and why it angered many black women. Though it purports to be about the Obama's marriage it is actually more about issues of black identity, using Barack and Michelle Obama as meta examples and about issues of race, racism, politics and Obama's campaign specifically. One of the central themes within that discussion is an idea that Michelle has a too strong, too angry blackness which is mitigating what the author perceives as Barack's post-racial, category-transcending blackness. It is difficult to read an article from a white author that makes so many assumptions and observations about black identity that feel false and alien to actual black people and several bloggers have expressed their frustrations.

rikyrah cross-posts at Jack & Jill Politics and Mirror on America about "The Obamas as Racial Rorschach Test, Version Number 29382983." Regarding the "acting white" quote pulled above, rikyrah writes:

Well, if you don't know whatever either adjective means nowadays, why the hell did you say it? I believe I've recorded darn near every speech Michelle Obama has given on C-Span. And, I've told folks, I've never paid to hear Barack Obama, but I have paid to hear Michelle, multiple times. In front of predominantly Black audiences. I'm trying to discern this ' Black' Michelle Obama that I paid to see vs. the supposed , what ' ACTING WHITE' Michelle Obama I see on C-Span?

Um....there is no difference.

SJP shares her thoughts at Michelle Obama Watch and her personal blog, Sojourner Place and, like me, she had difficulty understanding the argument and asks:

“Acting white”? What if anything any of this has to do with the “racial politics of the Obama marriage”? Perhaps in reading the entire article, MOWers might be able to discern what the point of this article was intended to be.

And at her blog, SJP also asks:

That's the end? So what are the racial politics of the Obama marriage? Did I miss something?... Going to read it again!

What About Our Daughters thinks they may have found the message:

You have to read the ENTIRE article because it gets worse as you read along to this writer’s ultimate conclusion: “White people can’t trust Barack because he married a BLACK woman“. Because THAT’s the main idea consciously or unconsciously from this article. Don’t marry a SISTAH or she’ll bring to down!

Just a reminder, if you find the author's interpretation of Michelle misguided, Michelle speaks for herself here at BlogHer.

The race issue of New York magazine also includes The Color-Coded Campaign, by John Heilemann, which looks at the potential effect of voter racism on Obama's campaign as does Charles Blow's recent op-ed from the New York Times, Racism and the Race.

The invisibility of racism is covered in Patricia J. Williams piece in New York, Talking About Not Talking About Race: Why even the most well-meaning whites and blacks can't hear each other:

Since, in actuality, more is on the record about every step of Obama’s life than possibly any candidate on the planet, this particular brand of demonization has been accomplished by the insinuations of erasure: If you took away his “pretty words,” he’d be nothing. If you took away his race, he’d be nothing. If only he didn’t have a brain, he’d be nothing, nothing, nothing. It’s a circular, nonsensical mantra—magical thinking, wrapped in the fiction of “but really, I never see race.” This kind of denial masquerading as color-blind idealism cannot be our compass at this exciting and potentially transformative moment.

Matt Bai wrote a piece for the New York Times Magazine which asks the provocative question, Is Obama the End of Black Politics?

Princeton professor, Melissa Harris-Lacewell answers "No."

Before I even opened the magazine I had my answers ready: "No," "Absolutely not," "Are they kidding?" and "Has any person, even once, asked themselves if George W. Bush is the end of white politics?"

And, BlogHer CE Kim Pearson links at her personal blog, Professor Kim's News Notes, a 41-page rebuttal to the new book about Obama from widely-discredited "swift boating" author Jerome Corsi.

Cross posted at BlogHer.com

On Vox: Back To The (Shoe) Future

When my sister played around with trying on my 4 inch heels the other night, she reminded me that I had been wearing heels for years. I had pretty much stopped for a while but am back again. I saw...

» Read more on Vox

On Vox: It's Just a Saturday Night

Befriending 20-something mommy bloggers has its perks. Like they invite you to bachelorette girls night out.@VDog was taking her non-blogging friend out to celebrate her impending wedding and invited CityMama™ LaraDavid and Cat to join the bride's mom and a...

» Read more on Vox

links for 2008-08-09 [delicious.com]

• Kraft Tries to Get Its Mojo Back - Kiplinger.com
  "Rosenfeld said that in order to realize value, you have to reinvest in marketing and improve brand equity."...One apparent fan of Kraft is Warren Buffet. At last report, his Berkshire Hathaway owned 132.4 million shares, or about 8.6%, of Kraft's stock.
  (tags: business marketing)
• Paul Krugman - Know-Nothing Politics - Op-Ed - NYTimes.com
  Remember how the Iraq war was sold. The stuff about aluminum tubes and mushroom clouds was just window dressing. The main political argument was, “They attacked us, and we’re going to strike back” — and anyone who tried to point out that Saddam and Osama weren’t the same person was an effete snob who hated America, and probably looked French.
  (tags: politics republicans)

links for 2008-08-04 [delicious.com]

• Elvis Costello's Momofuku: A Portrait of Love and Lust
  Costello's neuroses and mutations have usually coincided with the end of one love affair and the beginning of a new one.
  (tags: music elviscostello)

links for 2008-08-03 [delicious.com]

• In Strangers, a Blind Centenarian Finds a Literary Lifeline - NYTimes.com
  But the casual, organic way in which this particular group came together around Ms. Goodyear is a window into the way New York can be a small town, the way strangers become a community, the way books, reading and, especially, stories bind people together.
  (tags: community books)

The $5 Challenge Bonus Round

The $5 Challenge has been rather inactive of late. Not many politicians speaking truth to power lately. But I did donate $5 (+$3.34) to a guy running for state office in Kansas. Um, "why?" you might ask. Because of this comic. And for the thank you note.

The comic strip -- at www.seantevis.com/3000 -- was first posted online July 16. Today, when he files his campaign finance forms with the Kansas secretary of state's office, Tevis will report that he has raised $95,162.76 in donations through PayPal, the online service that allows payments and money transfers via the Internet.

Sen. Barack Obama's presidential bid has transformed the way presidential candidates use the Internet to reach volunteers and donors -- particularly donors who give relatively small amounts. Now Tevis' success underscores how such online grass-roots efforts are also revolutionizing down-ticket races.

Backstory

Hat tip to @olevia, @MarilynM and Ayşe E.

On Vox: Target Women: Feeding Your F---ing Family

Sarah Haskins is a f---ing genius. A hilarious, hilarious genius.

» Read more on Vox

links for 2008-07-18

• MSNBC Has Its Eye on Rachel Maddow - NYTimes.com
  She acknowledged that the work was not exactly what she had in mind when she graduated from Stanford University with a bachelor’s degree in public policy and from Oxford University, which she attended on a Rhodes Scholarship and where she earned her doc
  (tags: media politics)