He cannot highlight the possibility of becoming the first Black president without seeming too Black or defined as a president just for Black people. The first woman is acceptable as a universal achievement and is to be applauded. The first Black is seen as too limited and ghettoized. The recently published Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II by Douglas A. Blackmon reinforces the case that the post-slavery exploitations of Blacks and the continued racial subjugation has not brought the races closer together.
Much work still needs to be undertaken on the critical issue of race in America. Whether Barack Obama is Black enough or White enough should not be the question. The questions to ask are whether he is intelligent, whether he is a man of integrity with a historical knowledge of America and the world, and whether he is psychologically and physiologically equipped to make good decisions and to handle the rigor and demands of our country’s highest office?
Haki R Madhubuti is a poet, founder and publisher of Third World Press, and University Distinguished Professor and Director of the MFA program at Chicago State University. His latest book is YellowBlack: The First Twenty-One Years of a Poet’s Life.
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