Some observations about President-elect Barack Hussein Obama:
He is the first Democratic president from a Northern state [Illinois] to win since 1960. John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts accomplished that 48 years ago. Before JFK it was Harry S Truman of Missouri in 1948, then patrician Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York in 1932, 1936, 1940 and 1944.
And yes, John McCain did not pull off the Truman-like upset of 1948, and Obama did not make Thomas Dewey’s tactical mistakes. He kept his supporters motivated and played offense rather than run out the clock. Obama even had the audacity to campaign in Arizona, McCain’s home state, during the final days of the campaign.
Americans gain Obama as president-elect, but the country loses the lone black U.S. Senator and it remains overwhelmingly male at 87 percent. Who will, who can step up and diversify that chamber? Does Harold Ford of Tennessee have another run in him? Who else will come forward?
Obama’s rise was meteoric, but not a fluke. After he gave the electrifying we’re not red states-blue states but the United States speech at the Democratic National Convention four years ago, the new U.S. Senator became a powerful fund-raiser for many Democratic candidates. He was the fresh face many successful candidates of the 2006 takeover of the House of Representatives wanted by their side when they campaigned.
Furthermore, Obama's disciplined and resolute staff and volunteers blew up the Electoral College. He won in states that Democrats have conceded to Republicans for more than a generation.
Take my adopted state Virginia. Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964 was the last Democrat to win here. That time was the final days of the Byrd era in which Southern Democrats effectively eliminated black voting rights with poll taxes, literacy tests and other schemes. This was the state notorious for “massive resistance,” government rebellion toward civil rights. Norfolk closed its schools 50 years ago rather than integrate and include blacks, per the Brown vs. Board of Education decision.
Yesterday, Norfolk citizens delivered the city to Obama. So did Hampton Roads cities Hampton, Newport News, and Portsmouth. McCain won Hampton Roads and the commonwealth’s biggest city, Virginia Beach, plus boomtown Chesapeake, yet Obama squeezed out a close win in this military-oriented community where McCain once served.
When Richard Nixon and the GOP won the White House in 1968, the new president launched a “Southern strategy” that attracted conservative and yes, racially hostile whites to the Republican side. The Southern strategy suffered a mortal blow this decade when Trent Lott of Mississippi at a tribute for Strom Thurmond of South Carolina said America might have been better off had the former Dixiecrat been elected president 60 years ago. Thurmond, 100, died in 2003 and Lott was pushed out of the GOP leadership after the embarrassing statement.
While questions remain about Obama’s leadership, questions also remain about the health of the GOP. It just got smoked, served, winged [choose any urban lingo for routed]. Does the party have the fortitude to remake itself as a conservative, small government, entrepreneurial, and racially inclusive alternative to the Democrats? Time will tell.
Obama is not only the first black president; he is the first American Mosaic candidate.
Of course he’s black. He is biracial too and embraces the white half of his ancestry. Obama’s sister is Asian-American; she was the daughter from mom’s second marriage. A secret weapon for Obama was Asian-American support. Many of them identified with the native Hawaiian. The island state, by the way, is where 20 percent of the population claims two or more races.
In 2008, can we bury the “melting pot” metaphor once and for all? It actually died in the 1960s when the last of the white ethnics – Irish, Jews, Italians and Eastern Europeans – absorbed into Anglo-cized Americans.
However, Americans of color don’t melt, but their spicy culture and heritage has reshaped America for generations. “Melting pot” is so 1908 in 2008. Let the term R.I.P., OK?
