Ellen Goodman: Obama’s Mama

[babylonsister]

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080508_obamas_mama/

Obama’s Mama
Ellen Goodman


snip//

The rest of the story is known: a divorce, a marriage to an Indonesian, a second divorce. She was a mother who kept her children focused as well as fed. But what’s less known is the woman in her own right, the one who became an anthropologist, the woman who spent years as the respected head of research for Women’s World Banking, bringing micro-financing to poor people in Indonesia.

Nancy Barry, who was the head of Women’s World Banking and knew Ann well, has been bewildered by the way she’s been reduced to a stick figure. “She was stubborn, hard core, decisive, convincing, deep-thinking, rigorous in her analysis,” says Barry. “When I hear Barack talking about how we are not red states, blue states but the United States, I think he gets that from his mother. The other core capability he gets from her is the desire for healing.”

Indeed, the Obama we see may be the offspring of “Dreams From My Mother.”

If Ann were alive today she would be the age of Hillary Clinton’s most devoted demographic. She would be among those women who have gone through enormous transitions, making and remaking the female script. Dreaming big.

I am not suggesting Obama drag out his mama as a prop. But he’s staked his case for the presidency on his ability to bridge racial, cultural, party divides, to lead a postpartisan America. He’s described how the root of this desire is in his DNA. Now he’s faced with another divide: women who identified their success with Hillary’s and who are unsure they will vote for him.

What better way to begin reaching out, holding the “gender conversation,” showing women he “gets it,” than by sharing the dreams he inherited and the dreams he understands. The dreams from his mother. A girl named Stanley.

[madokie]

1. The more I read about Obama the better I like him and his vision for America

[boobooday]

2. She sounds like a fascinating person

He does seem to be protecting her in a way from the garbage that is thrown at everyone in this kind of campaign. I saw him make a lovely statement about her to Wolf Blitzer the other day. Then he added something lovely about Michelle.

I believe his respect for women is clear, especially when he speaks of the women in his life. Perhaps Ellen Goodman is right, that he should make it more explicit for those who "don't do nuance."

[aquart]

3. This is the woman who parked her son with her parents?

And took off to do good works with his little sister? Let's be clear. Her son was completely abandoned by his father. She remarried. Had another child. Put son in spectacular school. Took the other child and left to do good works. REALLY good works.

She took her daughter. She left her son.

I understand she gave him the choice of coming along. Nice choice: Education or mother.

Is that the "nuance" of which you speak?

[boobooday]

4. You are very judgmental

What an evil woman, doing good works and making sure her son is in a loving home, and getting a good education!

If her son doesn't resent her for it, which he doesn't seem to, why do you? He seems to respect her as a parent, and as a human being. He seems to have felt loved, and encouraged, and self-confident.

Hillary obviously had a career, and was very busy, but she managed to raise Chelsea to be a lovely young woman. How is it different?

But I won't try to explain nuance to you. That seems futile.

[Igel]

5. His staying was billed as his decision.

However, the entire "my mother was a grad student, so I know what typical American poverty is like" spiel is a bit tiresome.

I was a grad student. I lived on next to nothing. But it wasn't because I had the humiliation of not finding a job, it was because I had the "humiliation" of working for my doctorate in a dept. in the humanities. So while I know something about living on next to nothing, there are other aspects that I know nothing about. To claim that I know what a person living in poverty really undergoes would be to insult that person.

A neighbor in my apt. complex was a grad student in the sciences, and 3 years before defending his dissertation he bought a new car (I scrounged to buy a new bicycle); earlier in the year he defended his dissertation he bought a condo. He went on vacations during summer break; I stayed home, read library books, and occasionally biked or walked the 5 miles to the beach to save on bus fare. People that dropped out of my program usually got good jobs. My poverty was strictly goal-driven and, in a sense, self-imposed.

Some fellow students/single parents had kids. They got some sort of government aid--state or federal, I don't know which. But their kids home lives were dramatically different from the typical unemployed slum dweller's, and to merge them would be to insult their mothers.

[noel711]

6. Isn't it misogynistic to blame Ann for 'leaving' her son?

I would hope that we'd be beyond blaming women who seek career or education!

True feminists see beyond the usual stereotypes of motherhood.

I left my daughter too.. left her in daycare to work because I had to work.
Was I a bad mother? I didn't give her a choice, I had none.

I left her in the care of her father when I went to graduate school.
Was I a bad mother? I didn't give her a choice there either.

I would have loved to have given her a choice to come with me or not.
NOt all women have those choices. I would have loved to have left her in the
care of her grandparents...

I thought feminism was about being good role models for our children by being
the people we were made to be, and being the best we could be.
I thought this was a progressive board...

[MmeG]

7. It was a family decision.

The Dunham family decided to give Obama the best education available by sending him to Punahou School in Honolulu, where he was a scholarship student. He entered in 5th grade and stayed on to graduate from there in 1979. This is hardly 'parking him' on the grand parents. I am sure it was a difficult decision, but to characterize the mother as gallivanting around while leaving the son behind is patently false.

Yes the family had a choice, unlike some who have to make difficult arrangements, but it was surely not taken lightly.