Commentary: Barack Obama Can’t Win as Long as He Continues to Play That Tired, Dog-Eared Race Card

By: Joseph C. Phillips

In spite of fawning media coverage, an unpopular Republican president and economic challenges, Democrat Barack Obama has not managed to build a very substantive lead over his Republican rival John McCain. Recent polls show McCain closing the distance in key states, and one national poll even had the Republican candidate with a slight lead.

There are those that have, of late, attributed Obama’s lackluster polling to race. It happens that they are correct. But Obama’s presidential run has always been about race. It has not, however, been about race as we most often envision it, as part and parcel of race-“ism”. Most Americans are tired of race and are looking to move beyond it in a concrete way.

Obama’s polling numbers have not stalled because he has hit the glass ceiling of white supremacy. He has struggled because Americans no longer view him as a candidate that can transcend race. Many have, in fact, come to see him as ardently willing to manipulate race in order to gain a political advantage. Rather than representing a different kind of politician, he then appears to be not so different from any number of liberal black politicians who have graced the stage.

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