dcat

More on Obama and Race

As if to augment my previous post on Obama, The Washington Post has a lengthy and dispiriting story about the racism (and general hostility) aimed at Obama and his campaign that many of his campaign staffers have experienced. It is likely only to get worse.

Labels: 2008 Election, American Politics, Barack Obama, Race, Racism

posted by dcat @ 3:08 PM 0 comments

Race Persists

We are beyond race.

That is the comfortable little myth that many of us white folks like to spew to make ourselves feel better about a history that clearly indicates that we are not at all beyond race. These people (We?) like to believe in an accelerated curve, a Whiggish and inexorable belief in improvement on the one demonstrable blotch on our national escutcheon, that has somehow innoculated us from centuries of reality. The candidacy of Barack Obama allows even those who do not, will not, support him to claim perfectibility on the one issue about which Americans have been sadly, tragically, imperfect.

Unfortunately there are times when reality kicks us in the teeth, or at least ought to. What to make, after all, in this supposedly color-blind society, about the fact that our misguided drug wars disproportionately effect African Americans? What does this tell us about our racial myths, and more importantly, how we deal with them?

Many of us are wary of decisions, supposedly race-neutral, on, say, voting rights in light of America's still demonstrably not race-neutral policies. Many of us are wary of claims that we live in a time when race is no longer a factor, because of the relative successes of Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell, Clarence Thomas and Barack Obama. Indeed, we are wary precisely because of the facile ways in which we allow the prominence of a miniscule number of black Americans to substitute for a real discussion of the country's racial past.

Conservatives call such concerns "race hustling," a phrase notable only for its cynicism, vacuousness, and, yes, racism. And yet how many other issues in American history actually manage to sustain as relevant without actually being relevant? Issues that do not matter fade into obsolescence. This one continues to vex precisely because it matters. Would that we had an honest discussion about it, as Obama has done more honestly, and more frontally, than any American in the country's history has undertaken.

We can pretend that it does not matter. In fact nothing has ever mattered more.

[Crossposted at the Foreign policy Association's Africa Blog and South Africa Blog.]

Labels: 2008 Election, American Politics, Barack Obama, Race

posted by dcat @ 1:35 AM 0 comments

McCain's Little Deal

According to The Washington Post:

Sen. John McCain championed legislation that will let an Arizona rancher trade remote grassland and ponderosa pine forest [in Arizona] for acres of valuable federally owned property that is ready for development, a land swap that now stands to directly benefit one of his top presidential campaign fundraisers

The last few months have utterly shredded the lie of the liberal media given that the coverage McCain has received could not have been more cuddly had it been swathed in fleece blankets and surrounded by teddy bears. It looks like maybe the campaign has begun in earnest. In case you're wondering: Yeah, this should be a bigger story than the Jeremiah Wright silliness by a factor of about a hundred. Whether it will be remains to be seen. I tend to doubt that it will.

Labels: 2008 Election, John McCain

posted by dcat @ 12:15 PM 0 comments

A Good Old-Fashioned Take Down

If you want to read a blistering take on Edward Said's concept of Orientalism (and you know you do) I would highly recommend this Robert Irwin essay from the latest Times Literary Supplement. While presenting an effective review of two books (themselves damning) on Said and Orientalism, Irwin uses his material as a justification to let loose. here is the first paragraph:

So many academics want the arguments presented in Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978) to be true. It encourages the reading of novels at an oblique angle in order to discover hidden colonialist subtexts. It promotes a hypercritical version of British and, more generally, of Western achievements. It discourages any kind of critical approach to Islam in Middle Eastern studies. Above all, Orientalism licenses those academics who are so minded to think of their research and teaching as political activities. The drudgery of teaching is thus transformed into something much more exciting, namely “speaking truth to power”.

Irwin doesn't pull punches as the essay progresses. Between his observations and the apparently critiques of Said from the books in question Said's vision of Orientalism emerges battered beyond redemption.

Labels: Academic Politics, Criticism, Critics, Edward Said, Orientalism

posted by dcat @ 1:15 PM 5 comments

Looking Back, Looking Forward

The New Republic has pulled together its archive of articles on John McCain and, tipping their hand for what they will believe will be the outcome of the Democratic contest, Barack Obama. You also might want to check out this blistering George Will column on Hillary Clinton, titled, to my delight, "Go Home Yankee Fan."

Labels: 2008 Election, American Politics, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain

posted by dcat @ 12:58 PM 0 comments

Creating Narratives

From today's Fiver, The Guardian's daily tea-time email football newsletter, comes this stinging indictment of sports journalism:

Ah yes, here we go, another conspiracy of the inadequate. Sports hacks are a lot like those boilers who huffily insist that all models are airheads. Here's how it works: we put it about that all footballers are so stupid it's as if B-movie alien zombies have gobbled their brains, then we oink and wheeze like diseased swine the very second their utterances stray from the clichés we want them to spew. And hey presto, footballers mostly stick to the script, enabling us to churn out putrid guff and then smugly sit back and congratulate ourselves for being so much better than the folks we write about - they may be fitter, richer, better looking, more talented, more widely travelled and altogether nicer than us but, hey, they're so dumb. Ha ha ha, the no-good fools!

Not only does this self-criticism ring true, it also says something about one of the ongoing laments I have about journalism, sporting and otherwise: The unrelenting hold journalists take on the narratives they essentially establish.

We see it in sportswriting, but this tendency is every bit as entrenched, perhaps moreso, among the hard news folks and the political commentariat. Obama wins a dozen primaries and caucuses in a row, then Hillary wins Pennsylvania, still leaving her hopelessly behind, but the talking heads have asserted that a good showing in the Keystone State gets her back in the game, and so there you have it. Those same folks insist that Jeremiah Wright is a major story, so they make his rantings a story and voila, it is a story. This same approach is how in some circles Tuesday's primaries are presented as a split decision even though Obama overwhelmingly won one state, narrowly lost another, and emerged with a greater delegate lead. Or how shallow interpretations of "the working class" and "elitism" becaome so warped and misused. Journalists create these memes and then have an interest in perpetuating them.

Labels: International Sports, Journalism, Narratives, Soccer

posted by dcat @ 11:54 AM 0 comments

Horace Man, Oh, Man

In case there was any doubt, this New York magazine feature reminds us that high school students can be assholes. Add to that simple fact of nature (hey, I could be a shithead in high school and odds are so could you) a bastion of privilege such as Horace Mann High School and their rich, protective douchebag parents and you have yourself quite the tinderbox.

[Hat Tip to Sportsguy.]

Labels: High School, Misc., Privilege

posted by dcat @ 9:14 PM 0 comments

Hillary's Choice

I'd like to think that my asessments of yesterday's North Carolina and Indiana primaries were pretty reasonable. Obama took North Carolina comfortably, and Indiana was tighter than expected. And so we are left with the ubiquitous question of this election season: What's next?

In particular, what now for Hillary Clinton? Yes, she won Indiana, but that seems pretty clear to me to represent a Pyrrhic victory. Her margin was razor-thin, and her delegate take relative to Obama's negligible. Yes, she is likely to win West Virginia, and Kentucky after that, but then she is likely to lose Oregon and the remaining western states. And if Obama contests in Appalachia and if Democrats in those states get the sense that Clinton is a lost cause, the margins might not be as great as some suspect.

Reality is likely to set in if she is willing to face that reality. Superdelegates are beginning to shift toward Obama with some Hillary supporters beginning to back away from their support for her. Clinton cannot win, but she can harm the party in her zeal not to lose, and presumably enough people will need to pull her aside to reinforce these points if this race is going to be wrapped up by June. The colossal Clinton ego -- hers and his -- will need placating. She will likely need to get first shot at the Veepstakes, even if only to say no, and she will get a prominent place on the lectern in Denver. But it is time to think of November.

Clinton can, if she chooses, almost certainly play some sort of role in an Obama administration, whether as the Vice Presidential nominee or in the cabinet we do not yet know. Or she may choose to continue to grow as a lioness in the Senate, where if anything her record has been underrated. In other words, her career is far from over. At this point she can do incalculable damage not only to her party but also to herself in a Washington world where reputation is, if not everything, at least the one thing that might matter most. Most everyone in DC has lost in politics. There is no shame in that. But the District is not a place where desperation is looked upon especially favorably. It is time for Clinton to face the facts. It is time for her to drop out of the race.

Labels: 2008 Election, American Politics, Barack Obama, Democrats, Hillary Clinton

posted by dcat @ 1:47 PM 0 comments

Overrated Movies

This list of overrated movies is, like most exercises of its ilk, intended to provoke arguments. Of the ten films included here, all have rated as all-time greats by critics or awards or box office or reputation or some combination thereof, and there should be plenty to inspire debate or disagreement. Let me state that I wholeheartedly agree with the inclusion and placement of the number one (that is to say "worst") movie on this list, which I find to be categorically awful.

Labels: Criticism, Critics, Lists, Movies

posted by dcat @ 12:23 AM 8 comments

Nixon Rises

At The Boston Globe Alex beam has an article on the seeming ubiquitousness of Richard Nixon in today's popular and intellectual culture. Nixon was a phoenix in his lifetime, constantly rising from the ashes of ignominious defeat. As in life, so too in death, I guess. As a historian I am especially interested in reading Rick Perlstein's new book, Nixonland.

Labels: Historians, History, Richard Nixon

posted by dcat @ 4:12 PM 0 comments

Stupid is as Stupid Does

This story about Saddam hussein's bizarre fears regarding catching STD's while in US custody had a much better headline when it arrived in my inbox from South Africa's Independent Online, which consolidates stories from a dozen or so South African newspapers: "Was Saddam Stupid."

Speaking of stupidity, leave it to a Yankees fan to give the Sox-Yanks rivalry an ugly twist.

(And since the C's-Cavs series starts tonight, I may as well get the proceedings off on the right foot: Tom, Don, the Cavs and their fans are poopieheads. C's in six, despite the reality that LeBron is likely to score 200 points in the series.)

Labels: Boston Sports, Celtics, Idiocy Alert, Misc., NBA Playoffs, Red Sox, Rivalries, Saddam Hussein, Yankees Suck

posted by dcat @ 2:06 PM 2 comments

Hoosiers and Tar Heels (And Guam)! Oh My!

At the incomparable Washington Post politics blog The Fix, Chris Cilizza has expert views on several developments to watch for in today's Indiana and North Carolina primaries.

My own prediction is that we will again be dealing with dueling narratives after today. Both races are likely to be close, with North Carolina looking like it will give Obama a 5-10% win and with Indiana increasingly looking like a dead heat. Clinton will almost certainly spin anything less than a 10-point loss in Carolina as a moral victory. If Obama wins both states, it may well close the door on Clinton even though the extension in his delegate lead will be marginal at best. But the perception is that he cannot close the door and that he cannot win big states. An Obama victory in North Carolina coupled with a win in Indiana, however slight, (and don't forget his seven-vote caucus victory in Guam!) will likely reinvigorate calls for Clinton to bow out of the race. A split likely results in status quo ante, and if Clinton pulls out an improbably double win the race will be tossed into its greatest state of chaos yet.

Labels: 2008 Election, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Primaries

posted by dcat @ 1:50 PM 0 comments

NBCC Recommends

The National Book Critics Circle (of which I am a member) has posted its quarterly Good Reads Lists of new and recommended books at the NBCC blog Critical Mass. Naturally such lists inspire a great deal of debate, as the comments section indicates. And the nature of these lists is that the point is to highlight books recently published, so that the list is compressed -- certain kinds of books take longer to get reviewed, especially independent or academic presses, and reviewers based in the academy often operate with longer timetables. Nonetheless, any time we focus on good books, whatever the limits of that focus, is fine as far as I am concerned.

Labels: Books, Critics, National Book Critics Circle, Reading

posted by dcat @ 1:38 PM 0 comments

Happy Cinco de Mayo

Cinco de Mayo probably reonates more with those of us who live in border states such as Texas than elsewhere. But even here the holiday seems to represent an excuse to drink than it does an homage to cultural heritage. Like many other holidays, Cinco de Mayo has largely become comodified, or, as The New York Times explained in an op-ed today, "For this north-of-the-border success, we have to thank the persuasive powers of beer. Cinco de Mayo is probably Corona’s biggest day." As Homer Simpson might say: "Beer. Is there anything it can't do?"

Labels: Holidays, Texas

posted by dcat @ 4:21 PM 0 comments

Defying Belief

Recent revelations that Nelson Mandela is still on the United States' terrorist watch list (a list he never belonged on in the first place) does not exactly inspire confidence in America's handling of its foreign policy, its approach to terrorism, or its grasp of African policy, does it?

[Crossposted at the Foreign Policy Association's South Africa Blog.]

Labels: Africa, Foreign Policy, Nelson Mandela, South Africa, South Africa Blog, Terrorism

posted by dcat @ 2:05 PM 0 comments

Preacher Problems Abound

Let's not forget, amidst the hubbub surrounding Jeremiah Wright, that John McCain actively sought and embraced the endorsement of John Hagee and Jerry Falwell. It would be nice if we could get past the various candidates' so-called "preacher problems" and return a modicum of substance into the discussion. But that is not in the interest of the media, and it is not, apparently, in the interest of Hillary Clinton, and it is not in the interest of the attack machine that seems to so control American political life. And to think, it will only get worse between now and November. [Sigh.]

Labels: 2008 Election, American Politics, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Hypocrisy Watch, John McCain

posted by dcat @ 1:48 PM 0 comments