Jun
26
Source: Boston.com
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Ralph Nader, the independent candidate for president, has decided to take a shot at Obama in a statement that was published yesterday. Two quotes from that article stand out to me as worth raising an eyebrow over. The first:
I mean, first of all, the number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency should be [doing] is to candidly describe the plight of the poor, especially in the inner cities and the rural areas. . . . Haven’t heard a thing.
What? Are we applying racial obligations now? Just because Obama is an African American, he has to emphasize the fight against poverty? Obama must cater to everyone and appeal to everyone; he cannot just jump to serve the African American citizens of the country. Nader also says:
He wants to show that he is not . . . another politically threatening African-American politician. He wants to appeal to white guilt. You appeal to white guilt not by coming on as, ‘black is beautiful, black is powerful.’ Basically he’s coming on as someone who is not going to threaten the white power structure, whether it’s corporate or whether it’s simply oligarchic. And they love it. Whites just eat it up.
Where is this man from, the sixties? Who said that African Americans necessarily come to threaten the white power structure? Who said this election had anything to do with “white guilt”? Why would African Americans be “politically threatening”? Obama has said that Nader is just “trying to get attention,” and the Obama campaign’s communication director Robert Gibbs called Nader’s comments “delusional.” Nader refuses to take his statement back, even after the eyebrows were raised.
At first, I had nothing against Nader, but now I completely dislike him.
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