Politics

Somebody forgot to tell gay people that race wars are no longer in vogue. While the rest of the country has spent the last week reveling in the afterglow of Grant Park, gay America has devolved into a Sarah Palin rally. The issue is a particularly nasty California ballot initiative, Proposition 8, which passed last…

Barack Obama went to the White House Monday to begin the transition to his presidency. He arrived, protected by the Secret Service, in a chauffeured limousine, to enter the front gate as the president-elect of the United States of America. Yes, this does confirm that Nov. 4, 2008 really did happen. A black man did…

The news that Barack Obama’s confidant and transition team co-chair, Valerie Jarrett, may be the president-elect’s choice to replace him in the Senate tells you two things for certain: 1) How attractive a seat in the U. S. Senate is for anyone interested in political office. 2) How indebted Obama is to Jarrett for his…

I thought a lot on Election Day about limitations, how we as Americans agreed both explicitly and implicitly, from the nation’s founding, that a black man would never become president. Masters certainly knew it. And from the wretched status to which they were consigned, the slaves no doubt could scarcely imagine it. Yet, in a…

Now that Barack Obama has claimed the presidency, it’s natural to wonder how and with whom he will govern. To pull America out of the multiple and mounting crises that it now confronts, he needs the House and Senate to be a well-oiled legislative machine. The fresh wave of Democratic candidates that surged into Congress…

The landslide election of Barack Obama represents something extraordinary—but not just because our president-elect has brown skin. What is equally extraordinary is the rainbow-colored, mass movement that consolidated itself to catapult him into the White House. Even as we celebrate the phenomenon that is Obama, let us not lose sight of an even bigger phenomenon—that…

We all know by now that Barack Obama made history last Tuesday night.But so did Victoria Middlebrook. For all the momentous change at the top in this election year, it comes as a result of a triumphant change at the bottom. Obama rode a wave of reform created by millions of people like Middlebrook. Middlebrook,…

Did your election night party cheer or gasp when Michelle Obama strode out on stage in her bold black and red dress? Was there a collective pause among your friends and family or were people too overjoyed to care when watching history in the making? Folks across the Web have been debating the pros and…

While dodging those pigs I said would fly before a black man got elected president, I got to thinking about just who black folks had to thank for Barack Obama’s historic achievement. Obama and his brilliant staff are, of course, at the top of the list for mounting what was arguably the best presidential campaign…

A black president. Now that’s funny! So why are so many political satirists crying about how unamusing the Obama presidency will be? The standard reasoning is that, unlike Bush, McCain, Palin, the Clintons or even Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama is “too perfect” and does not provide material for good jokes. But the inability of “Saturday…