Today, America’s continuing entanglements in Iraq and Afghanistan provoke anger, but while Clinton reduced defense spending, covert military operations were standard practice during his administration. In terms of criminal justice, Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act, which decreased judicial disparities in punishment; by contrast, federal incarceration grew exponentially under Clinton. Many argue that Obama is an ineffective leader, but the legislative record for his first two years outpaces Clinton’s first two years. Both men came into power with a Democratically controlled Congress, but both saw a sharp decline in their ability to pass their own legislative agendas once GOP majorities took over one or both chambers.
These comparisons are neither an attack on the Clinton administration nor an apology for the Obama administration. They are comparisons of two centrist Democratic presidents who faced hostile Republican majorities in the second half of their first terms, forcing a number of political compromises. One president is white. The other is black.
In 1996 President Clinton was re-elected with a coalition more robust and a general election result more favorable than his first win. His vote share among women increased from 46 to 53 percent, among blacks from 83 to 84 percent, among independents from 38 to 42 percent, and among whites from 39 to 43 percent.
President Obama has experienced a swift and steep decline in support among white Americans—from 61 percent in 2009 to 33 percent now. I believe much of that decline can be attributed to their disappointment that choosing a black man for president did not prove to be salvific for them or the nation. His record is, at the very least, comparable to that of President Clinton, who was enthusiastically re-elected. The 2012 election is a test of whether Obama will be held to standards never before imposed on an incumbent. If he is, it may be possible to read that result as the triumph of a more subtle form of racism.
Now whether or not you agree with Harris-Perry is actually almost beside the point, the truth of the matter is that if there's one group of Americans that doesn't want to have an honest conversation about race in America more than conservative Republicans, it's liberal Democrats.
Judging from the comments at the Nation article, the Left doesn't even want to entertain the possibility that there may be a racial component to the precipitous drop in support for the President among some groups. Liberals like myself pride themselves on being open-minded and willing to ask questions, to search for answers, and to discuss and analyze these answer from multiple points of view, it's what being classically liberal means.
But when it comes to race and the Left, there are times when this question should be asked and discussed. I seriously doubt given the statements by many of the Republicans in this country that anything approaching true racial equality exists in 2011, but even the act of discussing that among liberals, the same way that we as liberals should question and investigate LGBT equality, gender equality, and socioeconomic equality among liberals (a state that is largely accepted) is taboo.
There are lifelong Democrats that have a problem with women in politics, with the LGBT movement, with economic equality. But to even suggest that there are Democrats and even Liberals who may have issues with race is clearly out of bounds. I've said time and again that the main reason that Republicans will never address the issue of race in their party is that they can't get past the notion that some of their social mores might be offensive, that racism has to have a deliberate intent to it in order to be racism.
But as many African-Americans such as myself can attest to, or members of the LGBT community, or women, those of various religious persuasions (or those without religious persuasions at all) can attest to as well, intent is not necessary in order to offend. Republicans at this point dismiss the argument as unwinnable and stomp off in a huff, claiming that there's nothing they can do in order to be perceived as not racist, so that the real issue is that minority groups simply have to learn to be less sensitive. The issues don't get discussed.
Sadly, judging by the comments section of Melissa Harris-Perry's article, there's a depressingly similar intractability on the left as well, maybe not in breadth or depth as in the right, but it's still there. When you pride yourself on being open-minded, one often forgets that the state of open-mindedness means that you must always continue to have your beliefs questioned and explored as new information is received and processed.
So yes, kudos for the question being asked. Now, as a whole, we must continue to explore it.
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