How's This for Prejudice?

How's this for prejudice?

"We've been taught that a president should come from right here, born, raised, bred, fed in America. To go outside and bring somebody in from another nationality, now that doesn't feel right to some people."

So says Calvin Lanier of Washington, DC, explaining why, as a black voter, he's not sure he will support Barack Obama. A man who was born, raised, bred, fed in America -- but whose father was not. It's from from this piece by Rachel Swarns.

It's great that Americans are coming up on an election in which ethnic voting blocks are not taken for granted. Why should anyone assume that black people would automatically vote for a black guy, or Hispanics for the Hispanic candidate? It's idiotic to assume that ethnicity has, or should have, a zombie grip on the minds of voters.

Consider, though, today's knock on Obama -- from Stanley Crouch and Debra Dickerson, among others. Yes, it's an expression of resentment at the way white Americans want to pat themselves on the back for accepting a black man who is not typical of most African-Americans. Fine. But implied in such statements is the idea that these writers, like Lanier, would be happier with a black candidate whose ancestors had been here for generations. Which is pretty close to the nativist bigotry evoked by Loretta Lynn back in 1988, when she said she couldn't support Michael Dukakis because she couldn't even pronounce his weird-ass foreign name.

What's worse than suggesting that voters should, like zombies, vote for someone because of his skin color? Suggesting that, like zombies, they won't vote for a damn furriner.

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