By: MICHAEL ERIC DYSON
Professor, Georgetown University

Race Has Affected the 2008 Presidential Election

There is little question that race has affected the 2008 presidential election, though often through inference and innuendo.

Initially, Barack Obama’s historic quest for the highest political office in the land was rife with suspicion from white and black quarters.

Eventually, millions of black voters signed on to his campaign after relinquishing skepticism about his being black enough and after he proved in Iowa that he could win over white voters.

Educated white voters followed suit, though Obama has had a far more difficult time effectively wooing working class white voters.

That has to do in large part with the effective, if cynical, effort of conservative activists to falsely paint Obama as an unpatriotic figure who pals around with terrorists because he is secretly a Muslim.

The manipulation of the public image of Obama as a subversive presence who hates the nation rests on racially coded inferences about unreliable blackness as it tinges the face of American politics.

Few quarters in American life have been tolerant of the complex black identities that constitute African American communities.

Republicans — Backward, Bigoted, Racist and Nativist FILTH of America

As a result, a punishing and narrow range of stereotypes have obscured the fact that black struggle for social equality and racial justice was never antithetical to the best interests of the nation.

Because black people loved the nation so much, they fought hard to make sure that it lived up to the true meaning of its creed, as Martin Luther King said.

Barack Obama represents both the maturing of black American politics, and the increased willingness of significant portions of the white population to embrace a worthy black presidential candidate.

Whether that is sufficient to propel Obama to the presidency remains to be seen. Still I am cautiously hopeful that it is.

[Enlarge] About The Author: Michael Eric Dyson (born October 23, 1958, in Detroit, Michigan) is an American writer, radio host, and professor at Georgetown University. Dyson has a Ph.D. in religion from Princeton University. He is an ordained Baptist minister. Dyson taught at DePaul University, Chicago Theological Seminary, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Columbia University and Brown University, before going to the University of Pennsylvania in 2003. There he was the Avalon Professor of Humanities. Since 2007, Dyson has been University Professor of Sociology at Georgetown University, teaching courses in theology, English, and African American studies. A University Professorship is said to be the highest position that a faculty member can have at Georgetown. From January 2006 to February 2007 Dyson was the host of a daily syndicated talk radio program, The Michael Eric Dyson Show, which aired on weekdays from 10AM to 1PM (EST) on the Syndication One Radio Network (owned and operated by Radio One). He is also a regular commentator on National Public Radio, CNN, and the HBO TV program Real Time with Bill Maher. Dyson is best known for his commentary on American culture, particularly as it pertains to African Americans. Dyson uses the terms “Afristocracy” and “Ghettocracy” to describe a bifurcation in American black society. He is also a leading scholar on hip-hop music and the culture that surrounds it, as well as its roots in African and African-American cultures and influence on American popular culture. Dyson is well known to repeat his famous line, “Go Ahead. Axe me a question.”