Is Obama Making Whites Nervous?

Though I am not and have never been a supporter of President Barack Obama because I do not agree with him on many issues and believe his record is that of a political opportunist, I was thoroughly impressed with his management of last night's press conference. It was his first public press conference as President of the United States, and I sincerely hope that it is not his last.

I can only imagine how some other white people are feeling at the moment. Even a white person wholly incapable of holding his brethren to the same standards as he holds black people could see that Mr. Obama was able to put together a longer string of intelligible words in one press conference than the former president did in a year. And this discovery would come after a bitter presidential campaign between the sharp, calculating Obama and the dull, crude McCain. As I hope you recall, Mr. McCain devoted almost the entire tail of his campaign to personal attacks, many of which were false of misleading. This was not a sign of strength and power, but of weakness and impotency. Sarah Palin's late-game entrance, despite its sparkle, only further revealed the campaign's primitive nature. The strategy seemed to be: If we can't beat 'im, just compare 'im to a terrorist (whom everyone hates). Most Americans, including many white Americans, saw how feeble these desperation tactics were and voted accordingly.

Of course there were other, mostly older white Americans who stayed with McCain to the bitter end largely because of his white skin (albeit desiccated), and I can imagine these same folks cursing the television whenever Obama brilliantly sidesteps a tough question from Helen Thomas or drives a softball question out of the park. He truly represents "change" in the sense that he gives dignity to blacks in this country who are often assumed to be dimwitted, thuggish or inarticulate before they even have a chance to open their mouths. Obama may not be Dr. King or Malcolm X, but he is a strong, confident black man (albeit half-black) who has already shown that he can easily match wits with the best of his Anglo-American presidential predecessors. I just hope my white brothers and sisters throughout this country can finally accept what they have deemed so unacceptable for so many years. I know it can be hard to step out of the box of denial, but it is truly liberating.