Barack Obama isn't our "Magical Negro"

[StarfishSaver]

Magical Negro (n) = stereotype that serves as a plot device to help the white (usually male) protagonist get out of trouble, typically through helping the white character recognize his own faults and overcome them and teaching them to be a better person.

In his landmark 2008 speech on race:[Barack Obama said]: “I can no more disown him [Rev. Jeremiah Wright] than I can my white grandmother — a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.”
...
One of the stranger developments in [the discussion of Vice President Biden's opposition to busing for desegregation] is the injection of President Obama into the conversation, with some claiming Obama's choice of Biden as his vice president somehow makes Biden's civil rights record off limits for criticism.

However, being tapped as the running mate for the first black president in no way releases Biden from an obligation to explain his civil rights record - any more than it erases any other part of his history with which Obama may not have agreed (such as his Iraq war vote). Obama picked him DESPITE his record on civil rights, not because of it. Or possibly it was a combination of the two, since Obama no doubt considered that Biden’s anti-busing views and attempts to undermine desegregation efforts in Delaware and across the country (including the voluntary busing plans he now says he supported) may have been a factor in his selection. After all, how better to show skeptical moderate and conservative white Democrats that Obama wasn’t some kind of a black radical than to bring Scranton Joe into the fold?
...
But Obama’s selection of Biden should not be seen as an absolution of his civil rights history ... Just as having a problematic history on civil rights doesn’t make Biden a racist, being Obama’s vice president doesn’t release Biden from the obligation to explain his own views and record on civil rights. Biden is running to be President of the United States and, if he wants that job, he must address his entire record, not just the parts he’s proud of. And that means he has some explaining to do about his positions and actions on civil rights, in general, and busing and desegregation, in particular. If he’s the man I think he is, he’ll be willing and able to do that, openly, honestly and undefensively. But he must do it in his own voice and from his own heart, and not hide behind Barack Obama, who may be one of Biden’s best friends, but is not his "Magical Negro."

http://www.stephaniejones.com/barack-obama-isnt-joe-bidens-magical-negro/

[LibFarmer]

1. Barack Obama is revered by people of all races

and the fact that he is (half) black makes no difference.

He is just an articulate, intelligent, thoughtful and visionary guy - period.

His choice for VP and his vetting should be respected by ALL. Such articles shedding doubt do a disservice to Obama the man and the POTUS.

[StarfishSaver]

2. It sounds like you didn't read any of my OP since it doesn't by any stretch of the imagination

shed doubt on Obama's selection of Biden as his VP.

[Vegas Roller]

8. ...

However, being tapped as the running mate for the first black president in no way releases Biden from an obligation to explain his civil rights record - any more than it erases any other part of his history with which Obama may not have agreed (such as his Iraq war vote)

I rest my case.

[StarfishSaver]

9. How is that in any way critical of Obama's selection of Biden as VP

I suggest you actually read the piece.

[emmaverybo]

4. 👏 Bravo. Biden-bashing and countering any Biden positives now knows no limitations. Taking

down Obama with Biden, if needed, is expedient, but WRONG.

[pnwmom]

10. The article isn't about taking down Obama, which makes me think you didn't bother to read it.

It's just stating a fact -- Biden is not some sort of replicate of Obama. Biden is his own man -- just like Lyndon Johnson wasn't a clone of JFK. He was chosen to BALANCE the ticket, not to be a clone.

[Celerity]

23. +10000

[guillaumeb]

26. Excellently said.

And neither is the perfect candidate.

[pnwmom]

5. It doesn't sound like you read the article, because you completely missed the point.

[pnwmom]

3. Yes -- Obama picked Biden not because he agreed with everything in Biden's past

but because he wanted a certain balance in the ticket. He wanted Biden because Biden could appeal to more conservative white voters than Obama could -- not because he and Biden were political clones (in different colors). And Obama knew it wouldn't matter, as VP, if Biden had been more conservative than Obama -- because Obama, as President, would be the one setting the agenda. And Biden could be counted on to carry it out.

As another example, no one thought JFK and Lyndon Johnson were clones, but together they made a strong ticket.

So now we have to consider Biden on his own, without Obama. Because that's how he'd be taking office.

He did take a good step today, I think, apologizing about the Eastland/Talmadge thing.

[emmaverybo]

12. Johnson and Kennedy never became friends or worked side by side. Kennedy never trusted

Johnson and Jackie and Bobby hated hm. Kennedy had he lived would not have given Johnson any
medals, let me tell you.

It is perfectly appropriate for Biden to point to his record as VP. He was one of the most active in decades and had a particularly close association with President Obama, regardless of the initial
reasons Obama picked him.

As well his strong eight year record was not made nearly fifty years ago, but recently.

[StarfishSaver]

13. So the fact that Obama's his friend means that no one can question Biden's civil rights record?

No. It doesn't.

[Skya Rhen]

36. It means that Obama would never call a racist his "brother" (as he refers to Joe). I trust

Obama's judgement over any of the current candidates that tries to insinuate that Joe is one.

[StarfishSaver]

37. So either someone has a perfect civil rights record that merits no scrutiny or criticism

or they're a racist?

I see.

The world you live in must be a really weird place.

[pnwmom]

14. Biden and Obama's relationship is complicated. They were not clones.

Though Obama urged Hillary in 2016 to run, he has remained neutral with regard to 2020 (in which his Cabinet Secretary Julian Castro is also running).

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/05/joe-biden-and-barack-obamas-one-sided-embrace.html

Early on the April morning when Joe Biden announced his latest presidential run, Barack Obama’s spokeswoman issued a rare statement. The message praised the former vice-president’s “knowledge, insight, and judgment,” and highlighted the pair’s “special bond.” But it stopped short of endorsing Biden’s campaign. Just a few days earlier, Biden had responded to a reporter’s question about his ideology by categorizing himself as an “Obama-Biden Democrat, man,” and when he launched his campaign, his political team — having discussed the plan with Obama’s staff to lean on this message and imagery — posted a photo to Instagram of Biden laughing with Obama and plastered Facebook with ads featuring the former president.

Just as those ads were surfacing, however, members of Obama’s inner circle were quietly insisting to anyone who asked that the ex-president — who’s among the most popular public figures in the country, who’s not eager to turn back into a political football, and who’s also long been loath to publicly wade into intra-Democratic Party fights — was highly unlikely to pick sides in the primary at all, let alone so early in a process overflowing with candidates.

One month into Biden’s bid, the uncomfortable sense that his wholehearted embrace of his beloved former boss is not entirely reciprocated has only intensified, and is now a central unspoken psychological drama of the early Democratic primary as the former vice-president invokes “Barack” daily and the former president remains silent. No one doubts that the two men remain extremely close, but their relationship has also always been personally, politically, and philosophically tangled. (One former senior Obama aide whom I asked about it sighed and said, “The relationship is steeped in complication. They’re obviously close, and there’s trust. But it’s complicated.”) And while Obama’s insistence on neutrality is consistent with his commitment to sticking to post–White House tradition, it inevitably hits his sidekick of eight years harder than anyone else in the race — the former vice-president’s implausible, and uncorroborated, claim that he asked Obama to stay out notwithstanding.

People close to Obama often note that he only rarely weighs in on Democratic primaries at any level, being genuinely wary of overtly handpicking winners. We know, though, what it looks like for him to try and steer a race toward a given candidate from behind the scenes. In public, Obama remained mostly quiet about the buildup to the 2016 election, but late in 2014 he called Hillary Clinton for a talk that’s seldom mentioned, and little known, even among leading Democrats now. The pair had already started discussing the upcoming race that spring, but now he had a message for the former secretary of State, according to four senior Democrats briefed on the conversation at the time. You should, at this point, really think seriously about running, he told her. And you should let me know what you’re thinking, because you’re Democrats’ best bet at keeping the White House. Meanwhile, Obama’s political brain trust was following the president’s lead — that fall, his top political adviser David Plouffe visited Clinton’s D.C. home, privately briefing her on what it would take.

SNIP

[Cha]

17. Nobody said EVER that they were "clones".. that's your

Freaking word.

[tritsofme]

40. Biden no doubt enjoyed a friendly relationship with Obama, but did have more power or was he more

influential than Cheney, Gore, or Bush? I don’t really think so, and that is not necessarily a bad thing either, Obama was a strong enough leader that the major power centers were in his office.

[loyalsister]

6. I am interested to know if Biden has read

Michelle Alexander's book. If he can talk about his support for the crime bill and welfare "reform" without defending them, that would impress me.
Using Obama as a political alibi is no more convincing than when Mitch McConnell talks about how he marched for Civil Rights.

[Cha]

7. I never thought he was.. in fact it was

said many times on here, that he wasn't, during the years Obama was President.. when there were those who acted like they expected him to be.

[demmiblue]

11. Pretty presumptuous for the author to know what was in the mind of President Obama.

"Obama picked him DESPITE his record on civil rights, not because of it."

That stood out as I scanned the thread... didn't bother to then read it in depth or click the link.

Trash thread.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

15. K&R for an important read.

[58Sunliner]

16. Your post is actually offensively racist.

The author is using a racist term and attaching it to Biden by proxy.

[StarfishSaver]

24. Do you know the origin or common usage of the term?

Nothing racist about it.

And not "attached to Biden by proxy" in any way.

[bluewater]

18. K&R

Thanks for the post StarfishSaver.

[Galraedia]

19. This is stupid. All because he voted against the federal government forcing 'busing'?

"Obama picked him DESPITE his record on civil rights, not because of it."

To use the failed policy of busing to diminish his entire record on civil rights is stupid.

Polls said Harris bounced up and Biden slid down as the public reacted to what was considered the most dramatic event in the worrisome jibber-jabber of wannabe presidents. After the week’s final show was done, Harris’s staff said she favored returning the nation to busing. It would not hurt if she studied some additional polls, these taken when busing was going on. Neither whites nor blacks liked children being told to leave their schools for a ride to a place where they often felt lost and bothered to little educational avail.

Back in the days of busy busing, I had friends who moved into a house they could barely afford in a well-to-do suburb near Louisville, Ky. The purpose was for their children to go to some of the most highly ranked schools in the area. Then they learned their kids would spend a long time every day going back and forth to schools among the lowest ranked in the area. These people are not racists. They have spent years trying to help black people, but they did not like being ordered about by a federal government unconstitutionally deciding that skin color was basis enough to wreck their best laid plans for loved ones.

Busing didn’t work. People moved out of cities where they were subject to its familial intrusions, and more and more sent their children to private schools. Just as Biden was sneakily portrayed as a racist, they were called racists, but surveys suggest otherwise. Largely because so many whites and blacks still live in different neighborhoods, schools are not well-integrated, but all kinds of rescues, such as charter schools, have been devised. Going back to busing would mean our society had shamefully been fooled not just once, but twice.

Read more: https://www.newsday.com/opinion/commentary/ambrose-harris-biden-2020-election-1.33334243

[EffieBlack]

21. Strawman ... The OP isn't about busing

[Galraedia]

32. Bullsh*t. The OP brought it up

One of the stranger developments in [the discussion of Vice President Biden's opposition to busing for desegregation]
....since Obama no doubt considered that Biden’s anti-busing views and attempts to undermine desegregation

He didn't support the federal government mandating busing children away from their local school, she ignores the rest of his record on civil rights and claims that he was against desegregation. That is simply NOT true. Biden supported school integration. He didn't support the federal government forcing children miles away from their local schools.

[StarfishSaver]

33. The OP also mentioned Biden's Iraq War vote, but that doesn't make the OP about the Iraq War

Nor is another argument about the substantive merits of busing relevant to my point.

And, nowhere does the OP claim that Biden was "against desegregation" - and since he himself referred to his "anti-busing legislation," I'm not sure why you're so worked up because anyone used the same language he used to describe his position.

But you do you.

[Galraedia]

35. WTF does the Iraq war have to do with his civil rights record? Biden's own son served in Iraq.

The author herself claims that Biden was against desegregation by being against federal mandated busing.

Biden’s anti-busing views and attempts to undermine desegregation

Being against busing doesn't mean you're against desegregation. Biden supported integration. He did not support forcing children out of their local schools.

[Politicub]

31. "[Using] the failed policy of busing to diminish his entire record on civil rights is stupid."

Indeed, that would be pretty stupid. I haven’t seen anyone do that.

The busing legislation was in the national news when it was signed. Biden was quoted speaking about it.

The reason why this is so complicated is because it *is* complicated. His did a great job today giving context.

[Galraedia]

20. Also, I find the author trying to paint Joe as the token white guy offensive.

"After all, how better to show skeptical moderate and conservative white Democrats that Obama wasn’t some kind of a black radical than to bring in Scranton Joe into the fold?"

Obviously this person knows nothing of the Democratic Party or Joe Biden. He's moderate, but he sure as hell isn't conservative. Also, I've never seen a conservative Democrat. That's an oxymoron these days.

[EffieBlack]

22. Another strawman

[Galraedia]

34. Obviously you have no idea what that word means.

After all, how better to show skeptical moderate and conservative white Democrats that Obama wasn’t some kind of a black radical than to bring in Scranton Joe into the fold?

Tell me that the author did not just use the equivalent of Uncle Tom in saying that Obama only selected Scranton Joe because he was white. Also, the author is clearly a dumbass in assuming that all white males are somehow conservative. How is anyone suppose to take the author seriously when she doesn't know the difference between a left-leaning moderate and a conservative? Please tell me when exactly conservatives were in favor of things like gay marriage.

[pnwmom]

25. He was chosen to balance the ticket, not because Obama thought they twins. nt

[guillaumeb]

27. Recommended.

[stonecutter357]

28. desperation !

[stonecutter357]

29. let's go Joe !

[oasis]

38. The Obamas will be on the campaign trail w/Joe immediately

following the Democratic National Convention. You won't have to look very hard for Barack and Michele at Biden's inaguration because they'll have prominent front row seats.

[Politicub]

30. Interesting idea

But the trope is not needed to support the idea that appealing to Obama selecting Biden as VP should somehow make his history off limits.

I think the concept of agency does apply, though. Biden had and has agency. He acted independently and made his own free choices when he worked on legislation within the societal structure of the senate. He has agency now because he freely decides what he says, examples he uses, etc.

Biden using his vetting by Obama as a point of proof doesn’t cause Biden’s agency to vanish. It just means Obama felt he was the right choice to be his VP.

That’s a long way of me saying that Biden’s legislative record is important. It’s a public artifact. Invoking Obama is a powerful rhetorical device but it is not a substitute for examining Biden’s record should a voter feel that it is important.

Even if Obama endorses Biden, his record still will show what decisions he made when he had political power to do so. I think this is a positive thing for him because he has the opportunity to enrich his persona as a presidential candidate.

I believe his speech today was a positive action. He acted unlike most politicians. That’s exactly what he should be doing to differentiate himself from the other candidates. Should he lose his position as polling front runner, the argument about topping polls as a measure of electability will no longer apply as a strength. He has a rich legislative history - he and supporters should keep using it.

[StarfishSaver]

39. +1