Obama or the duty to be perfect
05 November 2008 à 16h59
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“What if Barack Obama finished fifth from the bottom of his graduating class and John McCain was a former president of the Harvard Law Review?
What if Mc Cain had only married once, and Obama was divorced?
What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker and Obama couldn’t read from a teleprompter?”
Here are the pointed questions asked on the Blog “Black women for Obama”. Pointed but pertinent questions.
Obama won the election. But his victory is not only the victory of the best candidate, the most capable to address American issues. Obama hadn’t to be only the best. He had to be perfect. This was the condition sine qua non in order to become the first black President of the United States of America.
Nobody can deny the color of his skin was his biggest handicap. Until the very last moment, until California results were released late in the evening, and despite very favorable polls, the fear of a bad surprise, the fear many whites would change their mind, unable to vote for an African-American, has been preying on every single mind.
Because he’s black, Obama has taken up the highest challenge a candidate for the presidency ever had to take up. And he did it with success. Rarely had a man lead such a perfect campaign. A campaign without mistakes. According to The New York Times, “the story of Mr. Obama’s journey to the pinnacle of American politics is the story of a campaign that was, even in the view of many rivals, almost flawless.” Even in material matters, the Illinois Senator managed to raise more funds than any other candidate in American history. He organized a revolutionary way of collecting money and mobilizing people thanks to the Internet.
He had to avoid a lot of traps, but each obstacle was the opportunity to make him surpass himself. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” wrote Nietzsche. In Obama’s case, what didn’t knock him down revealed to Americans the breadth of his talent. When on January 8th, despite the polls saying he was the big favorite, he lost the primary in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton, his defeat permitted him to put forward, in a speech full of hope, his new slogan, the one which would hit the bull’s eye : « Yes we can ».
When he was cornered by the polemic the incendiary sermons of the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. created, he delivered a historical speech about race in America. A speech immediately considered as the most important speech about this question since Martin Luther King’s.
You can have an appointment with history and miss it, like Ségolène Royal did in France. A defeat of the black candidate would have likely postponed the election of an African-American for decades. But Obama was equal to the situation. He is one of these few people who had the honor to have an appointment with history. And didn’t waste it.
What if Mc Cain had only married once, and Obama was divorced?
What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker and Obama couldn’t read from a teleprompter?”
Here are the pointed questions asked on the Blog “Black women for Obama”. Pointed but pertinent questions.
Obama won the election. But his victory is not only the victory of the best candidate, the most capable to address American issues. Obama hadn’t to be only the best. He had to be perfect. This was the condition sine qua non in order to become the first black President of the United States of America.
Nobody can deny the color of his skin was his biggest handicap. Until the very last moment, until California results were released late in the evening, and despite very favorable polls, the fear of a bad surprise, the fear many whites would change their mind, unable to vote for an African-American, has been preying on every single mind.
Because he’s black, Obama has taken up the highest challenge a candidate for the presidency ever had to take up. And he did it with success. Rarely had a man lead such a perfect campaign. A campaign without mistakes. According to The New York Times, “the story of Mr. Obama’s journey to the pinnacle of American politics is the story of a campaign that was, even in the view of many rivals, almost flawless.” Even in material matters, the Illinois Senator managed to raise more funds than any other candidate in American history. He organized a revolutionary way of collecting money and mobilizing people thanks to the Internet.
He had to avoid a lot of traps, but each obstacle was the opportunity to make him surpass himself. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” wrote Nietzsche. In Obama’s case, what didn’t knock him down revealed to Americans the breadth of his talent. When on January 8th, despite the polls saying he was the big favorite, he lost the primary in New Hampshire against Hillary Clinton, his defeat permitted him to put forward, in a speech full of hope, his new slogan, the one which would hit the bull’s eye : « Yes we can ».
When he was cornered by the polemic the incendiary sermons of the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. created, he delivered a historical speech about race in America. A speech immediately considered as the most important speech about this question since Martin Luther King’s.
You can have an appointment with history and miss it, like Ségolène Royal did in France. A defeat of the black candidate would have likely postponed the election of an African-American for decades. But Obama was equal to the situation. He is one of these few people who had the honor to have an appointment with history. And didn’t waste it.
