Looking at Obama

Tuesday, 18th November 2008

Do British media pundits know anything about the race issue? Marbury assembles the case for the prosecution. [Via Norm] Some tone-deaf contributions there. That said, two of the best pieces I've seen were published at Pickled Politics, where Shariq wrote a very sensible mini-essay comparing the British and American experiences, while Rumbold considered the basic definitions of ethnic minorities (with particular reference to Benjamin Disraeli).

Personally, I'm not convinced by the more triumphalist American claims that Obama's victory could only happen in the US. It's all too easy to make glib comparisons. Over at The Corner, where sensible voices are increasingly in short supply, Richard Brookhiser adds historical perspective:

Interestingly, Obama himself is a marginal black man — half white, half Kenyan — but that is often the way ethnic gains are made in American politics. The first Irish and Italian mayors of New York, Richard Croker and Fiorello LaGuardia, were Protestants. And Harry Golden said of Barry Goldwater, that he always knew the first Jew to be president would be Episcopalian.

PS: I can't resist taking the opportunity to remind you that Dave Chappelle's glorious sketch wins the prize for the best Obama-era satire, so far anyway.