Something has shocked me.

[aquart]

If it's flamebait, please lock and delete. I'm trying to reason it out, and my reaction to it, but it's late and I may be seeing what isn't there.

But to me it is both naked and unconscious racism. It was in a post. This is what the poster said, re: Bill Clinton:

"i don't appreciate his comparing obama to jesse jackson. jesse jackson ran as a black man. obama is running as a man who just happens to be half black and half white."

I'm not easy to shock. Even here. But this has me literally reeling. Did I read it right? Obama can't be compared to Jesse Jackson because Jackson isn't white enough?

<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4281173&mesg_id=4281534>

[trumad]

1. link

[aquart]

4. Updated on the main post. Thanks for reminding me.

[polichick]

2. Once again, you're shocked at nothing...

You're the same poster who read my compliment to Hillary last night as sexism ~ are you on meds???

[MiniMe]

3. Thats why we have an alert button. And you just retyped it so it is on the board

twice.

[Adelante]

5. Bill Clinton, Obama, and Jesse Jackson

If Bill had compared Barack to John Edwards who won the 2004 primary, there would have been no criticism, imo. Comparing a candidate to a candidate in the same era would have been viewed without regard to race. His reaching back two decades to find the black candidate who won in the same state is the main objection. Jesse Jackson was running a movement campaign to bring minorities into the political process (running as a black candidate). Obama, too, is running a movement campaign to bring new voters into the process, but it is not one specifically for minorities (who are well into it, largely in thanks to Jesse Jackson), but for citizens across the board, regardless of race (not running as a black candidate). But Bill Clinton wasn't making a new voter comparison. He chose a candidate who won South Carolina, and he chose a black one, rather than a more available white one, for his own reasons, which, in my judgment, had to do with casting Barack as the "Black Candidate" going forward.

Bubba: Obama Is Just Like Jesse Jackson

January 26, 2008 8:18 PM

Said Bill Clinton today in Columbia, SC: "Jesse Jackson won South Carolina in '84 and '88. Jackson ran a good campaign. And Obama ran a good campaign here."

This was in response to a question from ABC News' David Wright about it taking "two Clintons to beat" Obama. Jackson had not been mentioned.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/01/bubba-obama-is.html


This isn't racism, to my mind, although it is racial politics, but it was deliberately constructed. Clinton knew what he was saying and where he was going with it. Barack Obama could have been compared to Jesse Jackson in a different context, but in the context quoted above -- "two Clintons to beat" -- Edwards, as one who'd won the state's most recent primary in the same historical era as Barack, and as a candidate in the current year's state primary himself with "two Clintons to beat" -- was far more likely to come to mind than Jesse Jackson unless some other purpose was being served: to fortify an Obama image as the "Black Candidate" rather than the non-racial candidate. This is what the poster in your OP appears to me to have been getting at.