An associate of mine who I have grown sincere admiration and respect for and a friend used twitter yesterday to foster a discussion regarding President Obama and why people would or would not decide to support him during the 2012 election. What I noticed was that people, in particular African Americans have a real strong conviction and evince such with passion. In addition, I also noticed that it was frequent that people would challenge individuals to “check their facts” or charge “racism” if one disagreed with the President or ANY of his policies.As you may or may not know, I am a free thinker and a habitual call-it-like-I-think-it-err. Just stating this because regardless of race or political affiliation, or rather one is a racist or a punk (synonymous in my purview) - I call them as I see them. I was reminded of this when a fellow blogger called in on my radio show and indicated that it was funny to him how when I was writing about George W. Bush, my post obtained anywhere from 80 to 100 comments daily but that when I held Obama to the same critical standard, they dropped to less than 5 comments a post.
Getting back to my associate, the results of his forum indicated just how much as a populous we 1] neglect significance in being politically astute, 2] how defensive we get when the person (especially if he is black) is the politician we support and 3] how quick all logic is disregarded when the information or point of contention has a negative impact on African Americans in particular and is accurate.
For example, for me to openly criticize the economic approach of President Obama is tantamount to being an uncle tom, racist or something even worse. Albeit it has nothing to do with the person, his race and/or political affiliation, and more a dissonance with Keynesian economic philosophy, because I am an African American my position is untenable and unreasonable.
Even if I state what I agree with and approve of that the President has implemented thus far, I am still considered against the President just because I am in disagreement with a single policy. I was supportive of the administration’s efforts to implement tougher regulations that would have reduced the amount of federal financial aid flowing to for-profit colleges that prey on mainly low income African Americans. However, I eventually became disappointed when his administration caved to the industry’s lobbyists and their campaign against the Obama administration. I was able to applaud the first bill he signed into law on approving legislation that expands workers' rights to sue over discrimination and the fact that so far he is setting records for the number of women and minorities nominated to lifetime appointments at the level of the Federal Courts. Nearly half of the 73 candidates he has tapped for the bench have been women. In all, 25% have been African Americans, 10% Hispanics and 11% Asian Americans. He is the first president who hasn't selected a majority of white males for lifetime judgeships, far exceeding the percentages in the two-term administrations of Bill Clinton (48.1 percent) and George W. Bush (32.9 percent).
I was also supportive of President Obama’s $1.15 billion measure to fund a settlement for African American farmers reached more than a decade ago via the 1997 Pigford v. Glickman case against the U.S. Agriculture Department over claims of discrimination. This made it possible for approximately 70,000 African American farmers to receive cash payments and debt relief from the federal government. However when I question the decision to pander to #ocupywallstreet protesters and the same night attend an upper East Side DNC $35,800 a plate fundraiser resulting in $2.4 million added to his rer-election campaign from Wall Street financiers and call it hypocrisy, my position was vilified. When I spoke out against the President’s policy decision to ask Congress to make it easier for private debt collectors to call the cellphones of consumers delinquent on student loans and other debt owed the federal government using robo calls I was condemned.
If I speak out and say I disagree with the Obama’s administration decision to waive legally mandated penalties for countries that use child soldiers and provide those countries U.S. military assistance, just like he did last year I am a hatter. The White House will issue a series of waivers for the Child Soldiers Protection Act, a 2008 law that is meant to stop the United States from giving military aid to countries that recruit soldiers under the age of 15 and use them to fight wars, for Yemen, South Sudan, Chad, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Last year, the White House didn't even tell Congress when it ended the Child Soldiers Prevention Act penalties. Their rational was suspect at best.
The truth is that I have problems with the policies and not the man. I would have had the same problems if they were implemented by a man or woman, republican or democrat of any race and ethnicity. The problem is to be an African American and voice these concerns means accepting the vilification asserted in the opening paragraphs. Unfortunately, like politicians the people who support selected candidates do not use binary decision to make responses that respond to logic gates like computers and tend to ignore transient memory for better or for worse. As in football, they will accept a holding called missed by a referee if their team scores but scorn and excoriate the same referee that misses the same call on the other team.
This is the world of the astute and adroit individual of color who examines the etiology of the political actions (especially if they pertain to President Obama). For being objectives means we can examine and understand this dystopian political frontier as the malicious state it is. It portends a dark future in which all power is concentrated in the hands of a few turning our nation into an oppressive state. The sad reality is that the voting populous and pundits in their sciolism do not have a clue that for us it is “Nec Spe, Nec Metu” - Without hope, without fear. For we know that Bacillus cannot live with antibodies.
