'Oh, you do something nice for us and then your wife gets to have the presidency?'

[BeyondGeography]

A Civil Rights Divide Over Obama

Though just one of the 25 Super Tuesday states, Georgia Democrats are likely to be particularly conflicted by their choices on that primary day. The state is the historic heart of the civil rights movement and veterans of that struggle are finding themselves deeply divided over the contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama — a division complicated by the Illinois Senator's appeal among younger African Americans.

Prominent black leaders such as former Atlanta mayor Andrew Young and Georgia congressman John Lewis, both onetime associates of Martin Luther King Jr., have endorsed Clinton. But other civil rights movement veterans in Georgia like the Rev. Joseph Lowery and local leaders like Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin have come out for Obama because they believe he shares King's inclusive beliefs. It is a contentious divide. Young, for his part, has said Obama is too young to be President and should wait until 2016 to run, while Lowery has said that blacks who doubt Obama could do so because of a "slave mentality."

"No matter how much education they have, they never graduated from the slave mentality," Lowery told a largely black audience in mid-January. "The slave mentality compels us to say 'We can't win. We can't do.' Martin said the people who were saying 'later' were really saying 'never.' But the time to do right is always right now."

And while the division among the veterans is dramatic, the generational divide is even more stark. Just ask William Jelani Cobb, an associate professor of history at Spelman College in Atlanta. Shortly after Obama's resounding victory in the South Carolina primary, he asked his African-American history class what it thought about the presidential election. Of the 26 students in his class, he said 25 supported Obama and one was undecided. "When I pointed out what the Clintons had done vis-a-vis black issues, one of my students said 'Oh, you do something nice for us and then your wife gets to have the presidency?'" Cobb said...

...There remains substantial hesitation among older African American voters. "People with high crossover appeal like Obama are viewed with great skepticism , because people aren't sure whether a candidate like that would come through for them," says Andra Gillespie, an assistant professor of political science at Emory University. "If Obama were President of the U.S. and had to deal with a Jena 6 or Hurricane Katrina, people wouldn't be sure whether he could identify the 800-pound gorilla in the room. It's not a valid critique, but maybe they think he hasn't been as forceful an advocate for black issues as they'd like."

With Obama's chances at winning the Democratic nomination as yet uncertain, Gillespie says there will still be skepticism among black leaders. "If he had a 75 or 80% chance, I think more people would fall in line," she says.

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1708862,00.html

[mediaman007]

1. Isn't the term "fall in line" a bit presumptuous?

[aquart]

5. "Fall in line."

Resistance is futile.

[mediaman007]

7. Why is their position considered "resistance?"

One could consider it a racist comment, by thinking that these leaders could not look at information and come to a different conclusion. Because Obama is Black, does he earn all Black votes? Does Clinton earn all female votes? What is a Black female to do?

[Metric System]

2. No comment.

[ursi]

3. Unless we walk more than a mile in their shoes ...we can't truly understand ...

[rodeodance]

4. I am trying to think of this comment:

.....'Oh, you do something nice for us and then your wife gets to have the presidency?'" Cobb said......

[aquart]

6. White people are not the only racists on the planet.

All it takes is one group thinking it is better than another for WHATEVER REASON.