October 31, 2008

Race in the race


Race matters.

We'd be fools to think otherwise.

John McCain and Barrack Obama are - as are we all - sum totals of every aspect of who they are. Obama wouldn't be who he is if he weren't black, and John McCain wouldn't be the same if he weren't white.

Their races aren't helps any more than they are hinderances, and to think otherwise would be foolish.

NPR recently asked the people of York, PA - where their reporters have been visiting off and on throughout the summer - what their hopes and fears were for what happens after this coming election, and race came up very strongly.

Here are a few quotes, but I recommend reading the full story...
"I don't want to sound racist, and I'm not racist," Moreland says. "But I feel if we put Obama in the White House, there will be chaos. I feel a lot of black people are going to feel it's payback time. And I made the statement, I said, 'You know, at one time the black man had to step off the sidewalk when a white person came down the sidewalk.' And I feel it's going to be somewhat reversed. I really feel it's going to get somewhat nasty."

...

"I think there's more fear if you're really afraid of something bad happening. I hate to say this, but let [Obama] not win," Weary says.

And there is another set of fears for Weary: He says that he's "more afraid of the Joe Six-Packs looking for payback after Barack Obama wins the presidential election."

3 comments:

joey said...

For fall break I drove home down 75 while Obama (and Palin) was in Dayton that morning, only to leave for a rally in Cinci the same day.

After that trip down 75, I'm convinced that it would take a screw up of Pearl Harbor-esque proportions (political correctness be damned) for someone to even get on the same stage as Obama without authorization, let along be within a mile radius with a gun

achilles3 said...

i heard this series too and was blown away by the honesty. great stuff.

PHSChemGuy said...

I drove back from Louisville to Cincy a couple of years ago and was on I75 in Northern Kentucky when I noticed a cop car blocking the on ramp on the opposite side of the highway. I didn't see any traffic coming the other way, so I assumed there was a wreck a bit further forward.

Then I saw - across the tall barrier between the lanes - the top of a black limousine. Until that moment, I'd forgotten that Bush was in town for a fund raiser.

It was amazing to see the coordination of the police, secret service, and limo driver even for that one blink of vision. They had everything under control as a rolling fleet.

Lakes - NPR is a godsend.