Obama: Wright Not Racist, But Grandma Is
That’s not how the incident is described in Mr. Obama’s first autobiography, “Dreams From My Father,” p 46:
I took her into the other room and asked her what had happened.“A man asked me for money yesterday. While I was waiting for the bus.”
“That’s all?”
Her lips pursed with irritation. “He was very aggressive, Barry. Very aggressive. I gave him a dollar and he kept asking. If the bus hadn’t come, I think he might have hit me over the head.”
I returned to the kitchen. Gramps was rinsing his cup, his back turned to me. “Listen,” I said, “why don’t you just let me give her a ride. She seems pretty upset.” “By a panhandler?”
“Yeah, I know — but it’s probably a little scary for her, seeing some big man block her way. It’s really no big deal.”
He turned around and I saw now that he was shaking. “It is a big deal. It’s a big deal to me. She’s been bothered by men before. You know why she’s so scared this time? I’ll tell you why. Before you came in, she told me the fella was black.” He whispered the word. “That’s the real reason why she’s bothered. And I just don’t think that’s right.”
The words were like a fist in my stomach, and I wobbled to regain my composure. In my steadiest voice, I told him that such an attitude bothered me, too, but assured him that Toot’s fears would pass and that we should give her a ride in the meantime. Gramps slumped into a chair in the living room and said he was sorry he had told me. Before my eyes, he grew small and old and very sad. I put my hand on his shoulder and told him that it was all right, I understood.
We remained like that for several minutes, in painful silence. Finally he insisted that he drive Toot after all, and struggled up from his seat to get dressed. After they left, I sat on the edge of my bed and thought about my grandparents. They had sacrificed again and again for me. They had poured all their lingering hopes into my success. Never had they given me reason to doubt their love; I doubted if they ever would. And yet I knew that men who might easily have been my brothers could still inspire their rawest fears.
This is a weird anecdote on several levels. At the very least it is hard to see how Mrs. Dunham’s fears were not justified.
Moreover, Obama puts the charge of racism in the mouth of his now deceased grandfather, who in the book seemed to delight in discovering racism in everyone.
Meanwhile, his grandmother is being carefully sequestered from the media.
But isn’t it amazing that Mr. Obama is happy to call his sainted grandmother who raised him a racist, but he still can’t bring himself to say that Mr. Wright is one? Weren’t Mr. Wright’s racist comments also “a fist in his stomach”? Isn’t Mr. Obama half white?
Isn’t he an American?
Obviously his grandfather did an awesome job rearing his daughter who married a muslim foreigner who abandoned her and her child and then she leaves the child at age 10. I’ll look into muslim foreigners for my sons to marry. Makes for a nice life.
She was supposed to ACCEPT the behavior of the aggressive panhandler, BECAUSE HE WAS BLACK.
Just as we are to accept antisocial behavior today from young black kids, because of all the past wrongs “we” have committed.
Since we now know Obama to be a craven liar, we should bear in mind we only have his word that the incident ever occurred.
I think he wrote his biography in such a way as to create his own bona fides as a poor put-upon black man in racist America. Only he knows for sure if there's a shred of truth in anything he wrote in that book.
The lesson from all of this is not either of those things.
“Isn’t Mr. Obama half white?”
Which addresses an even deeper point: WHY is he considered and referred to by the media as “black” or “African-American”?
He is no more black than he is white. He’s just as white as he is black.
So is it merely on the basis of his physical appearance that he’s labeled one rather than the other?
An older lady isn’t allow to be afraid of an aggressive male if he’s black? It’s only okay if he’s white?
I cross the street no matter what the color of a strange man.
This is a gender issue. It doesn’t have anything to do with color. It has to do with inbred fear in women of men who can do them harm.