Mike Meginnis suggests there's an element of anti-racist signaling to the sudden elite affection for Obama:
it's hard to adopt any low-cost behaviors that signify such anti-racist perspectives without causing awkwardness. We all feel sort of weird around that white guy who spends every waking minute talking about civil wars in Africa, blood diamonds, his appreciation for the music of Bob Marley, and so forth. He means well enough but we don't know how to read him — to what extent is his conspicuous demonstration of virtue an endearing flirtation with genuinely progressive politics, and to what extent is it all just a cover?
Obama support offers people a chance to symbolically demonstrate their enlightenment at no cost. I've heard and read a number of times now about racist white people developing a strange attachment to Obama. They don't normally like Democrats but this kid seems alright. It doesn't hurt that he uses language designed to help him buddy up with those who are, more or less, afraid of black people — he is, in some ways, professionally a nonthreatening black man. I don't mean that as a criticism. To an extent this highlights the expert way in which he has navigated this country's complicated and often awful relationship with race, but ultimately it doesn't mean much for his chances come election day. People are brilliant in this country at finding ways to vote conservative when everything they know tells them not to. My mother knew Bush was a disaster and she voted for him anyway not because Kerry would do anything to make abortion more common but because he approved of it. They'll find something or other like that come election day if Obama gets the nod.
What do you guys think?
