Basic Black; 4002; 2008 Post Election Roundtable

You look at president elect barack obama's historic win next on a special post election edition of basic black hi i'm cali crossley over 63

million voters for senator barack obama reveled in his historic landslide victory over senator john mccain in his acceptance speech america's first black president elect declared to millions of tv viewers and a crowd of 240 ,000 supporters in chicago this is our moment tonight we'll discuss the reaction from around the world how the media has covered race during the election and the challenges facing an obama administration joining me for this conversation is a distinguished panel of guests state representative linda dorsina forry howard manly executive editor of the base state banner dr paniel joseph associate professor of african and afro -american studies at brandy's university and carol simpson leader in residence at emerson college okay before we get to some of the tough questions let me just ask you to respond briefly did you ever imagine that this would happen in your lifetime no no that's very brief yes

yes you did believe really why okay so i could elaborate okay very good okay no i did i think obama again was someone who was able to bring together a coalition of people and really spoke to the idea of america and i think that really resounded with folks absolutely i always thought that as soon as he announced his run he was the kind of candidate that could bring together that multiracial coalition and also his candidacy he was always talking about universal issues and universal themes and saying that even though he was proud to be black that wasn't going to be the centerpiece of his candidate not that long ago so to see a barack obama use the things that everybody has said will work to actually achieve what everybody said could happen in my lifetime that's just absolutely incredible paniel racial consciousness america understand this well yeah i think it's a watershed historical moment i think

the positives are the fact that the nation has elected its first black president he's got the most popular votes in american history and there is a kind of acceptance that a black person can achieve anything in this society i think the potential negative and what people have to be vigilant about like how we're just saying is this notion that obama's presidency means that racism is over in the united states i think we can't have that kind of unearned celebration or victory but at the same time this is a monumental moment in american and world history galley i wanted to say that as happy as i was that obama won and that the first african -american will sit in the white house as leader of the free world as as momentous as that is what i am most happy about is america is what i i went to my class the day after the election and put on a little demonstration i dressed in red white and blue i carried my little flag and i went

around my room going this is my country land of my birth they thought i was crazy but i was so proud of america that america could reach down into whatever and cast a vote for a black man it's just i'm just thrilled to be an american i'm thrilled at what america has said to the world and i think it's a new day for us all over the planet let me follow up with you because you said did you never thought you could imagine this and ran the what they are calling one of the best political campaigns in recent history just makes me so proud and and so now i do have hope and i have great hope for the country and great for hope for an obama presidency linda what did you think about that i mean i thought you know in terms of senator barack obama i think he embodies like i

said america but he's a composition of that he is the first black president did fear of hope did make african -americans not be afraid of hope now i don't think african -americans are afraid of hope i mean i don't think it's dash that i think that you know having him as president it's now going to hold people you know hold their feet to the fire i don't think racism is something that's now disappeared i think race will always be a factor it's just not going to be the number one factor and i think with him as a candidate you know he embodies everything for the simple fact that he's not just the first black president but his mother is white you know it's like my family we're my my young boys you know they're biracial you know their grandparents my parents came here from Haiti you know my in -laws are irish -american and so here it is he embodies everything and that's why people are able to celebrate it but you're right carol in terms of it speaks to america that we're able to go past the color of his skin and realize what he's going to do for us and not just him doing it but he's holding everyone responsible and in his speech he said that it's everyone has to take responsibility and he's going to have tough choices to make we're not going to be happy all the time but we have an opportunity

to move this country forward so paniel are the stakes higher for him because as they they have been for a lot of black leaders are you know are we as there more on him a higher hill to climb if you will certainly expectations are are hugely high he's received the most votes in american history and you got a sense of that and that victory speech the somber there was almost a mournful tone to that speech and I think in a way he really is inspired by Abraham Lincoln and it's very lincoln -esque in terms about that is that black people have always been disciplined yet the nation has always viewed black people as some of the most undisciplined people on the planet and so he has to remain as disciplined as he's been his whole life and throughout the campaign so that there really aren't the kind of distractions that that another presidency or other presidencies have had because people are going to be examining him michelle obama those kids with with a finer tooth comb than any president in american history so anything he says what he eats at the white house got

it okay so howard with that in mind is failure an option for him your failure is always an option and it could possibly happen but again this guy this man is a phenomenon he is a man that took the u .s constitution and in those words to say e pluribus unum out of many one he's been able overnight to link the world together in this struggle for humanity we're not weak because we are looking at other countries sovereignty and want to help them do the things they need to do obama gets that and what that does for race relations is that there is another way to think about things it is doesn't have to come through the u .s military and the might and the bullying tactics of a george bush or the republican party this is a thing that obama has that's called compassion it also has cost effectiveness it also has management it has the best and the brightest i mean when people like this russian come out the day after and talk about we're going to put this here and

this extension of the cold war policy all that's over it is going to be a whole new world policy and that happened overnight okay carol said african -americans expect more of him ninety five percent of them supported him is that fair it is not fair and if i may speak to black people if i dare to speak to them it's that they've got to settle back a little bit we have problems that are so enormous he has got to tackle this economy it may take him the first term to get things back and of course if the economy is no good nobody's doing well anywhere and so black people should not be asking for reparations we're saying that we want affirmative action restored those kinds of things we really should act as a nation that is under siege from so many problems and let the man do the work to help the country

not one group over another group but all of us and i think that's what he said he's going to do panil some would say and you may be one of that listen his very victory is really a combination of all of the sacrifice of the civil rights movement so following up what carol has just said is it fair for african -americans to want more from him they expect more from him should they well i think african -americans don't expect more but the whole notion of favoring one group over another throughout american history blacks have just been denied their civil rights their human rights their citizenship rights so if obama as president enacts a new new deal like many people are clamoring for if this new deal is applied fairly then african -americans are going to be happy they don't have to demand anything extra they're asking for what dr king asked for in one of his last speeches he said be true to what you put on paper he was talking about the constitution and so african -americans what's interesting about the obama

presidency or president -elect is that this is perhaps a chance to allow the constitution and the full powers of the federal government to be applied broadly and equally and if that's the case african -americans in terms of all these negative social economic indicators where they reside now we're going to see a huge empirical jump in an obama presidency not because he's restoring affirmative action or he's singling out black people for special help or reparations but because the full extent of the society's abundance is applied fairly now while i have you what about the international response you're one that looks broadly looking in the context what do you think what should be the international community's expectation of him and what should he be giving in that way well internationally i think we've seen a resounding approval except for the new russian president who sort of sounded a cold war echo internationally we're thinking about diplomacy we're going

to see in a way what's interesting is obama's notion of diplomacy harkens back to another error where the united states led but did not dominate and when we think about that that kind of diplomacy is also fiscally responsible because if the united states leads diplomatically other countries are more receptive to join the united states on crusades that are for human rights and also the geopolitics of the globe in terms of national security but also things like aids hiv it's going to be interesting to see what his africa policy is right it's going to be interesting to see what's the policy in the middle east is it a policy of reconciliation less belligerence and what are the reverberations and that international community's response so far well i think the international community response has always has already been overwhelming and i think at the bottom of all this is trade and what can be done to keep the money flowing throughout the world and in the business communities that do set up shops that export and import and all that but more

importantly i think is the domestic question about what the american people can expect out of a barack obama's presidency and that goes back to the new frontier with kennedy stop asking the government to be your daddy start doing something for the government stop always coming up to the government with a problem you know can you come up with a solution even in your own life can you so that attitude has to shift why do you want to keep burdening the man you know he's going to be looking don't ask what you can do we got your point but howard i think when you talk about whether people are going to ask for handouts i think right now people don't want handouts but the government hasn't built the kind of jobs and infrastructure that we saw during the new deal and even the johnson's great society so i don't think anybody's asking for a return to a welfare state but really an employment state i think when howard is saying he just wants a new attitude in general we don't want that economic building like what they've done here in massachusetts where's the

industry going and this gets to the heart of the it's been kind of down it's been listening and i feel us like going down now we were in the green room before this and we were howling we were laughing we were howling we were and we came on set and we got so serious ok michelle obama what was that dress about the dress her image in general what does it mean for african -american women what an image when he came on the stage with his wife and his two kids a beautiful image this is america and it was just it's going to be incredible in terms of their leadership in the white house over the next four years and hopefully another term as well when he runs again it's an amazing day it was quite moving to see definitely barack but to have michelle by his side and their beautiful kids and then when they came on stage and biden came on and they

bought the grandparents to the front the women, the grandmothers, know michelle's mother biden's mother and they bought them to the front and said this is what you've worked for you've worked so hard for this you've went through so much struggle but yet I'm able to stand here because of all the sacrifices that have gone before me it was just an amazing amazing thing to watch I think they're going to have the effect that the bill cosby show had in the 80s there were people in america that didn't believe there were black people that could be married that were a lawyer and a doctor and had cool kids and all that kind of thing i think america will see a great american family two of the cutest little girls i've ever seen now he promised them the puppy which was a wonderful that you've earned that puppy and we're going to take it to the white house and now i was listening to tv all day and people are

weighing in what kind of puppy they need to have in the white house so people are all excited about and children want to know what kind of puppy are they going to use here i to get the men in here on this carol because if barack and barack calls michelle the rock of his life so black men what does michelle obama mean michelle obama is the rock of that man's life in the sense that she will be an outstanding partner as first lady there is a business component to this and it was michelle obama who predicted way back when if he didn't win iowa it was over it was michelle obama who raised the question of how smart is she this woman is someone who is going to go out not since elna roosevelt or hillary clinton is there a woman that comes out in her own right she went to harvard law school too she is very smart and she can go out all around the world and do the right thing and i know all the women that went to spelman are just

happy i think michelle obama is extraordinary and i think what michelle and barack's relationship is really important because it really transforms the aesthetic of american democracy and really for the black community so often we talk about black men and black women and dysfunctional relationships and that's a very very functional relationship but when you read obama's autobiography in his books what you see is that when he was in his early 30's and they were initially married he was a little listless to the extent that he wanted to be this great person and great figure but it's really michelle who was the main breadwinner in the family and she was getting a little frustrated and we see a lot of that in relationships between black men and black women where a black man seems to not have the kind of direction that his partner wants this is overall positive but the silver lining here is that michelle stood by him what i'm saying is that michelle stood by him and actually really his dreams became her dreams and we see a real partnership there where

instead of so often when we think about black men and black women in the black community so often when a black man has a dream a lot of times in terms of that partner there's not an ability to convey and articulate how you can get from A to B okay i'm gonna let you get the mail on that paneel i'm cutting you off no what's interesting about this is that michelle actually when you read the reason he calls her his rock is that michelle actually believed in him and the only reason he was he could run for senate was because of michelle the only reason he could run for president i black women out there but i'm not gonna go there with you right now alright i need a quick hit from all of you the media how did it traditional media and also non -traditional media the blogs and everything how did they cover race and senator obama or president elect obama specifically rate them rate it rate the media c plus i think the question of race as it's covered in the media has always been problematic from a number of different perspectives but the question that still comes out in my mind that was

just horrible and it was done in the new york times the question of is barack obama black enough that was not the question could black people only 13 % of the population that question should have been flipped around the other thing that they continue to do is what does this mean for black leadership never is the question turned around what does this mean for overall politicians throughout the country okay briefly carole i think c i think they were wrong on a lot of things i think there was too much focus on the frivolous and not enough on the substantive the cable channels were okay alright that's enough linda i mean i thought it was a good coverage i think one of the things is give me a grade okay i would say b plus she's an elected official alright i would say b plus i mean i do think though there were points in the coverage where they kept on saying okay well the black the white people you know it was a whole breakdown of that electorate like there were white folks 35 to 40 who didn't vote for

the black man or they kept on bringing it up over and over again and i thought again we know he's a black man he's going to do everything he can you know to address the issues so i thought it was going to be quick i'd say a d the media tried to turn race into an albatross even though the candidate specifically said he was running as this universal multicultural multiracial united for the most part they didn't get it and even up until the last week of the election they tried to bring up the specter of the bradley effect and again in this country the more you talk about race the more it's problem alright i'm not letting y go on with that because i want to end this way because we have a few minutes left and that is what does he need to accomplish president elect obama by the end of his first term to be considered a success and we just have a brief amount of time paniel it's going to be jobs health care energy and an honorable resolution to iraq definitely it's going to be the economy job creation health care and definitely iraq i agree i'm going to give him only two things to work on i'm going to think that we can get the

health care issue that quickly i think he needs to make moves to get us out of iraq and solve the economy and i mean that may take four years to do that you gave us a wonderful poem the last time you were here carol as you reflect on his actually being president is it more meaningful oh it is oh my goodness the poem was close this out howard what will his first term look like his first term will be rocky there are some variables in the mix internationally that could throw a monkey wrench into a plan of stability that he could have in restoring the faith in government in instituting policies that will trigger an economic revival that's where it starts with the money and domestic policy and do can it happen oh it can definitely happen because he has the will and he has the voice of the american

people behind him and he's surrounding himself with good people back team i'm calla crossley and thank you for joining us you

you