Newspaper front pages from Huffpo:

http://tinyurl.com/64fs59

Reactions around the country:

William Grieder in Alternet

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We are inheritors of this momentous victory, but it was not ours. The laurels properly belong to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and all of the other martyrs who died for civil rights. And to millions more before them who struggled across centuries and fell short of winning their freedom. And to those rare politicians like Lyndon B. Johnson, who stood up bravely in a decisive time, knowing how much it would cost his political party for years to come. We owe all of them for this moment.

Whatever happens next, Barack Obama has already changed this nation profoundly. Like King before him, the man is a great and brave teacher. Obama developed out of his life experiences a different understanding of the country, and he had the courage to run for president by offering this vision.

For many Americans, it seemed too much to believe, yet he turned out to be right about us. Against all odds, he persuaded a majority of Americans to believe in their own better natures and, by electing him, the people helped make it true. There is mysterious music in democracy when people decide to believe in themselves.

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[ 05 November 2008: Message edited by: CMOT Dibbler ]

A small point as well, if he was an immigrant straight from the old sod he would never have been able to run in the first place.

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I honestly don't think that any candidate who scorned suits would have much of chance no matter who they are so I'm not sure that argument works here.

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Originally posted by Slumberjack:
Trust me, it's hard to get in anywhere while wearing a robe and sandals.

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Originally posted by G. Pie:

True. And Jesus would probably ride a bike to work so there'd be the chain grease problem, too.

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Heck not just the chain grease. Trust me getting a skirt/robe caught in the gears is not a good scene. Superman!

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Originally posted by djelimon:

I agree. Layton wears a suit, Tommy Douglas wore a suit, MLK wore a suit. I bet Jesus would wear a suit today if he ran for office.

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what about this guy?

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Originally posted by G. Pie:
True. And Jesus would probably ride a bike to work so there'd be the chain grease problem, too.

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Originally posted by CMOT Dibbler:

It's was the same with Kennedy, if he had been from Southie or an immigrant fresh from the old sod, he would never gained power, but since he was rich, the man was a shoe in.

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Yes I agree, no working-class Catholic has ever become US president - being a Catholic was enough of a handicap for Kennedy with all his connections.

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Originally posted by brookmere:
Oh OK I wasn't familiar with that term.

Yes I agree, no working-class Catholic has ever become US president - being a Catholic was enough of a handicap for Kennedy with all his connections.

Of course lots of them have gone places in the House and Senate. One of them, Joe Biden, will become the first Catholic VP to the best of my knowlege.

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Yep pretty sure he is the first VP. I've read it quite a few times though it's really just as more an aside. It's lost it's 'it's a big deal' status.

To understand the scope of the anti-catholic sentiment of the time I just have to look to my own families lore. Mom is rife with stories of her Grandparents anti-catholic sentiments. She said they treated POC better then the catholics in the community. They absolutely refused to buy anything from a catholic and would cross over to the other side of the street when one of 'those people' made an appearance. She wrote the town gossip column and Mom said that the Catholics in town got the brunt of the mean gossip where the 'good' people just got the more innocuous lighter fare.

When Kennedy got elected Mom says that 'Grandma' locked herself in her room for two days, convinced that the world was coming to an end and that the punishment of God was going to start reigning down upon them at any moment.

I ask this because a babbler actually made that assertion in another thread yesterday.

Have white males now lost control of the Democratic Party, and is the United States soon to follow?

What else, if anything, do babblers think Barack O-bomb-a is a threat to? The power of the military-industrial complex? Israel? Evangelical Christianity? The Cuban exile community in Florida? The oil, gas, and coal industry? The NRA? Neo-liberal "free trade"? The death penalty? Big Pharma? Islamophobia? The war on drugs? The PATRIOT Act? The defence industry? The nuclear industry? The ethanol industry? The welfare bums of Wall Street? The Taft-Hartley Act?

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Are the right-wing bloggers and forum posters correct in their apocalyptic predictions of how Obama will soon make Amurrica unrecognizable?

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We live in hope!

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Originally posted by George Victor:

We live in hope!

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LOL. I thought many a time, gee it would be great if some of these things that they're accusing him of being were true.

The "OMG he was a member of the socialist/marxist New Party circa 1995ish" was one.

Here
Here
and Here

With this one I actually do think there is a kernel of truth, that there was some sort of loose support in an election but not a membership.

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Originally posted by oldgoat:
I've been looking in on a website that I really prefer not to link to, or even refer to for that matter, but there is a considerable constituency which believes that Obama is the antichrist, or at least his minion, that he represents the opening of the seventh seal, and that the end time have pretty much started. I should say that these people see themselves as the real voice of mainstream conservativism. Principled even.

We may wish to consider stocking up on drinking water, canned goods, and ammo.

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I know that exact post!

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
This is why babblers who talk about Obomba representing the end of old-fashioned racism in Amerika are just peddling B.S. Racism is alive and well, and getting a big shot in the arm.

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[ 06 November 2008: Message edited by: ElizaQ ]

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
This is why babblers who talk about Obomba representing the end of old-fashioned racism in Amerika are just peddling B.S. Racism is alive and well, and getting a big shot in the arm.

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Funny, I thought people were actually arguing the fact that it represents black empowerment, and represents the fact that barriers were now coming down, in the minds of those who had thought they would forever be oppressed, and thought of as less than. Of course there will be racist shits like Ralph Nader for a long time yet.

Moreover, what are you suggesting by your injection the arm commentary? Are you suggesting that a black person, or any other POC, should never seek the highest office in halls of power as it will actually increase racism??

[ 06 November 2008: Message edited by: remind ]

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Slumberjack: Which babblers have made that argument?

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Originally posted by martin dufresne:

Oh, you can catch whiffs of it here and especially there.

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Are you suggesting that a black person, or any other POC, should never seek the highest office in halls of power as it will actually increase racism?

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[ 06 November 2008: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

Your posts against Steinhem's words were very indicative.

[ 06 November 2008: Message edited by: remind ]

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Originally posted by martin dufresne:
...this is what those of us who are White ought to be addressing, instead of relaying and spreading self-congratulatory discourse...

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Originally posted by Slumberjack:
Which babblers have made that argument?

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Originally posted by Slumberjack:
Who are we to tell them what they should feel about it. Isn’t that white supremacy as well?

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Read the OP in this thread, about how racism has been banished to the fringes of US society.
Also read what remind says in this thread (above) about how Obama's victory "represents black empowerment, and represents the fact that barriers were now coming down..."

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His closing comment in that OP:

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I hope so and I'd like to think so. What do you guys think?

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
There's an awful lot of white people around telling the blacks that they should rejoice now that the walls have come crashing down and that other whites should be entirely uncritical of Obama or else be accused of racism.

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One of the things that I thought was so interesting about Colin Powell's recent statement about Barak's muslimness, and its lack or relevance, was the implicit message that certain forms of anti-racist analysis can be maintained in an capitalist and imperialist environment. The US stands as an state edifice that is uniquel suited for the creation of an imperialism based in a purely national construct, and not one based in ethnic nationality.

I for one have to be entirely convinced, for example, that Rome was inhernetly racist, in the manner that European imperialism is ideologically racist, and I think it is perfectly possible for imperial power to act in a repressive manner free of racial identification. However much I think racism might serve as a tool of imperial power, I am not sure it is absolutely necessary.

To be fully enfranchised in the US means that one can fully share in its imperial process. I guess the hope is that the acceptance of people of colour into the corridors of power in the US will break open the old paradigm, and open the corridors to new ones beyond race politics.

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Originally posted by Slumberjack:
I see it as different than an absolute belief, or peddling BS as you described it.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Read the OP in this thread, about how racism has been banished to the fringes of US society.

Also read what remind says in this thread (above) about how Obama's victory "represents black empowerment, and represents the fact that barriers were now coming down..."

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No M.Spector, I'm sorry but that's just BS. Read that OP again. I saw speculation and then questions
about that speculation not some outright statement that it was a fact. Then I read a bunch of discussion about that speculation not outright suggestions that racism had somehow been banished.

And if you can't see how symbolically it does represent a barrier then you are seriously out of touch. This past couple of days I have read and seen on TV comments from POC who have talked about exactly that, including numerous African Americans who have been involved in the civil rights struggle their whole lives. None have said, 'Oh good it's over, all fixed, all better, no more racism, the work is over' but every single one has talked about the symbolism and the barrier and what it represents. Reminds comments are more then a fair representation of what those people are saying.

You don't even need to read anything, you can just go and look at the thousands of pictures taken from all over the US and see it in the emotion in peoples faces. It's there. It MEANS something.

I've talked with my own POC friends as well as FN's friends and it MEANS something symbolically to every single one of them that I've talked with.
Including my own husband.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
Just throwing out a wacky idea and asking people to comment on it qualifies as peddling BS in my lexicon. It doesn't need to be an "absolute belief".

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Is affirmative action really no longer necessary or justifiable when we jsut elected a black graduate of Columbia and harvard to the most powerful job in the world? Should Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton find a new line of work?

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Originally posted by ElizaQ:
I've talked with my own POC friends as well as FN's friends and it MEANS something symbolically to every single one of them that I've talked with.
Including my own husband.

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Originally posted by M. Spector:
There's an awful lot of white people around telling the blacks that they should rejoice now that the walls have come crashing down and that other whites should be entirely uncritical of Obama or else be accused of racism.

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Originally posted by wage zombie:
That's what's going on? There's an awful lot of white people around telling the blacks that they should rejoice?

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If that isn't telling black people they should be rejoicing, I don't know what is.

Then check out this passage from a major Canadian newspaper column:

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I'm proud, too, proud and profoundly moved, that black Americans who haven't bothered to vote in years are voting today. I see them and I cry. The racial conversation will never end, but it will be different. The bitter narrative of oppression and grievance is over. The narrative of possibility - of Martin Luther King - can begin again.

I'm under no illusion that Americans will start holding hands tomorrow and sing Kumbaya. I have no idea whether Barack Obama will be able to succeed, or even muddle through, with the nasty hand he's been dealt. But I do know that what's happening today is a fresh start, and a relief, and even redemptive. - Guess who

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[ 07 November 2008: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

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Letter from American author and feminist Alice Walker to President Barack Obama:

Alice Walker on expectations, responsibilities and a new reality that is almost more
than the heart can bear.

Nov. 5, 2008
Dear Brother Obama,

You have no idea, really, of how profound this moment is for us. Us being the black people of the Southern United States. You think you know, because you are thoughtful, and you have studied our history. But seeing you deliver the torch so many others before you carried, year after year, decade after decade, century after century, only to be struck down before igniting the flame of justice and of law, is almost more than the heart can bear. And yet, this observation is not intended to burden you, for you are of a different time, and, indeed, because of all the relay runners before you, North America is a different place. It is really only to say: Well done. We knew, through all the generations, that you were with us, in us, the best of the spirit of Africa and of the Americas. Knowing this, that you would actually appear, someday, was part of our strength. Seeing you take your rightful place, based solely on your wisdom,
stamina and character, is a balm for the weary warriors of hope, previously only sung about.

I would advise you to remember that you did not create the disaster that the world is experiencing, and you alone are not responsible for bringing the world back to balance.
A primary responsibility that you do have, however, is to cultivate happiness in your own life. To make a schedule that permits sufficient time of rest and play with your gorgeous wife and lovely daughters. And so on. One gathers that your family is large.
We are used to seeing men in the White House soon become juiceless and as white-haired as the building; we notice their wives and children looking strained and stressed. They soon have smiles so lacking in joy that they remind us of scissors. This is no way to lead. Nor does your family deserve this fate. One way of thinking about all this is: It is so bad now that there is no excuse not to relax. From your happy, relaxed state, you can model real success, which is all that so many people in the world really want. They may buy endless cars and houses and furs and gobble up all the attention and space they can manage, or barely manage, but this is because it is not yet clear to them that success is truly an inside job. That it is within the reach of almost everyone.

I would further advise you not to take on other people's enemies. Most damage that others do to us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or racial devotion. We must learn actually not to have enemies, but only confused adversaries who are ourselves in disguise. It is understood by all that you are commander in chief of the United States and are sworn to protect our beloved country; this we understand, completely. However, as my mother used to say, quoting a Bible with which I often fought, "hate the sin, but love the sinner." There must be no more crushing of whole communities, no more torture, no more dehumanizing as a means of ruling a people's spirit. This has already happened to people of color, poor people, women, children. We see where this leads, where it has led.

A good model of how to "work with the enemy" internally is presented by the Dalai Lama, in his endless caretaking of his soul as he confronts the Chinese government that invaded Tibet. Because, finally, it is the soul that must be preserved, if one is to remain a credible leader. All else might be lost; but when the soul dies, the connection to earth, to peoples, to animals, to rivers, to mountain ranges, purple and majestic, also dies. And your smile, with which we watch you do gracious battle with unjust characterizations, distortions and lies, is that expression of healthy self-worth, spirit and soul, that, kept happy and free and relaxed, can find an answering smile in all of us, lighting our way, and brightening the world.

We are the ones we have been waiting for.

In Peace and Joy,
Alice Walker

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[ 06 November 2008: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]

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The day following Obama's victory, the following discussion – or better: exchange – took place. Reflecting much of what Ethiopian Israelis are concerned about (racism, voluntary vs. imposed seclusion, etc.), as well as the analogies and associations Obama arouses and their limits, it is reproduced here in an almost unedited translation.

A: Herzl said, "if you want, it's not a legend". Yes we can, too.

B: Of course Yes we can, too, but Obama did not segregate himself but rather connected to the American society and made it to become president. Whoever segregates himself cannot win support of all ranks of society.

C: Bravo to the Americans! How did people who had voted for Bush make such a change and elect someone like Obama?! I am really surprised that so many whites voted for him, but it's very good also for the future of the Ethiopians in Israel.

D: How can you compare the blacks in the USA to the Ethiopians in Israel? The blacks in the US might feel racism occasionally, but they are very well integrated in the society, hold high posts etc. In Israel, even seeing an Ethiopian in an exercise club seems strange. There's no similarity between the two societies. Not that I support it – on the contrary. We have created this state of affairs ourselves, by thinking we are better than others. Why did we encourage Aliya in the first place?!

E: There is room for comparison, and in Israel it should even be easier. First, because in Israel there never was a situation of "slaves and masters". Second, because here there have already been precedents of people of "weaker" communities in high positions, so there's no reason why it shouldn't happen with the Ethiopian community as well. I don't see any reason why we won't see more and more Ethiopians in very high positions in Israel.

D: All you say is theoretically true, but in fact very remote from reality. Go to every town in Israel and see the complete separation between normal neighborhoods and those where Ethiopians live. The Ethiopians have been living in Israel for almost 30 years, but they still feel like newcomers. So there's still a long way to go. And as for "slaves and masters": we are the most class-oriented society of all. It's a bit naïve of you to claim otherwise, while there's a clear division in every possible area.

F: This separation emerged out of Ethiopians' own will to live within their community, like everybody else. The problem is that it eventually harms them; had they wanted, they would have tried to assimilate into the general society.

G: You are absolutely right in what you say about the Ethiopians, and Israeli society here not being ready yet to let the black man integrate. Even the tiniest things, like going to an exercise club or walking with a dog on the street, still arouse negative feelings. Yes! A black person can just walk with a dog on the street, but it looks strange to the observer. But before we black people accuse the "whites" of their racism towards us, we should check ourselves and find out who the real racist is, and it's no secret that we hate and envy the success of others within the community, and that granting others' their success is utterly unknown among us.

C: Racism and chauvinism in Israel are much greater than in the US. Even the Americans needed more than a hundred years to elect a black president – and don't forget he's mixed. Israel is one of the most racist states on earth, it would take us quite a while to see an eastern Jew as president here.

H: Wake up man, we've already had an eastern president, Moshe Katzav!

I: A president in Israel is a just symbolic and not an operative post, it has no impact on life here, unlike Prime Minister.

J: Soon in Israel too: an Israeli Ethiopian for head of state. Obama is a man who inspires and gives hope to many black all over the world, and proves that in spite of the white man's racism and arrogance towards non-whites, one can still break ahead and bring about change. Obama did it in America, and the Ethio-Israeli [can do it] in Israel.

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The issue of whether Obama is pure enough or not is irrelevant. A monumental change has occured in America. I am proud to have cast an absentee ballot for Obama. Change starts one little action at a time. Rosa Parks in 1955 did not know that she would help to ignite the modern civil rights movement over the position she sat on that bus. Sure she hoped it would get bigger, but she herself said she did not forsee the change it begot. Remember there were many who criticized MLK jr, for not being radical enough.

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Luckily, we can listen to Black people themselves, such as Alice Walker, author of, among other masterpieces, "The Color Purple".

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I don't dispute the historical significance of Obama's election. And I confess to being elated at his election. And I would like to believe, I would dearly like to believe, in the possibility his presidency could represent. But I can't.

I can't because he doesn't want to end war, but to refocus it. When given he opportunity, he didn't stand with the oppressed, but with the oppressors. Among those with whom he has surrounded himself are the very same people who are the architects of all that threatens not just our prosperity, but our planet.

Today, Obama is meeting with economists and among them are those who planned the deregulation and policies that targeted African American families for subprime mortgages that now has left so many broke and homeless or on the verge of being broke and homeless. And around the table is not one of those people. Not one.

How does he make change for them when they are not even party to the discussion?

[ 07 November 2008: Message edited by: Frustrated Mess ]