The Help: Obama Promises to Work as Butler to Republicans If Re-elected
by Yvette Carnell
For years in this country, the only jobs available to black people were as “the help”. We could clean white folks homes, mow their yards, and even tend
their animals and children, but the realm of our opportunities didn’t extend far beyond that.
But throughout it all, African-Americans have worked steadfastly to demonstrate that we are equals in this country, and on this planet, second to no man – or woman.
The road to overcoming these entrenched disparities has been rocky; slavery, the Civil War, Jim Crow, affirmative action, and intellectual battles which need not be re-fought here (see: The Bell Curve). We’re not home yet, though. Pattern matching is real. Meritocracy is a myth.
But probably the greatest blow to white supremacy has been the interruption of the steady flow of white presidents, which, at least symbolically, provides black youth with an ideal that is worlds away from washing someone’s car, walking someone’s dog, or cleaning someone’s home. And just as black people are celebrating our success at diligently removing the inscriptions of white supremacy from public and private American life, what does Obama do?
Would you like to be my maid?
In a radio interview, President Obama, leader of the free world, volunteered to work as house help for Republicans if they just go along with him on a budget plan.
“I’ll wash John Boehner’s car, I’ll walk Mitch McConnell’s dog,” Mr. Obama said to radio host Michael Smerconish, referring to the Republican Speaker and Senate minority leader, respectively.
Even as I watch with utter disdain as conservatives fail to moderate their proclivity toward racial instigation, I recoil at Obama’s almost instinctual need to please the powerful white elite in Washington, even at the expense of his own dignity.
When all else fails, resort to your archetypal role, I guess. And this belies my unyielding criticism of Barack Obama. He’s all things to all people. If black people need him to be MLK, he’ll mimic Malcolm’s cadence and MLK’s oratory. But if white folks need him to take out the trash, while they laugh and point, he’ll do that too. He has no real sense of being, no real sense of his place in this world, or how to maneuver within it.
Yvette Carnell is a former Capitol Hill and campaign staffer turned writer. She is currently an editor and contributor to Yourblackworld. You can reach Yvette via Twitter @YvetteDC or on Facebook.
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I agree this is bothersome. I know he was probably joking but some things I just can’t play with and I refuse to let anyone think that I am going to clean anything for them especially someone who is white…I just can’t do it!
Surely he was being sarcastic –…knowing that none of those TEA-PUBLICANS are going to go along…even if Obama became their lawn jockey. They want him out — they have said so…fought him for 4 yrs. — and he knows it. Why he said this?…well someone should ask Pres. Obama why.
I DON’T TRUST YVETTE CARNELL. YOU CAN’T BELIEVE EVERYTHING THAT COMES OUT OF HER MOUTH!!!!
The President left off the most important thng required of him from them. He must kiss their as*es job one.
Yvette Carnell has Obama pegged to the “T”. Obama just recently did an interview and said he is ready to make a grand bargain with the Republicans on budget cuts. You black people in Obamaland are going to finally discover that you’ve been hoodwinked if Obama gets reelected.
This talk of a “grand bargain” is not new. When they had that last fiasco over the Debt Ceiling…it was discussed. They have to do something to bring the budget under control…but the REPUBLICANS in Congress are not willing to work with Pres. Obama on this…as they don’t want to raise the taxes on the rich folks one dollar. It’s not going to happen. If we have the same MAKE UP…in Congress where the House is mostly rightwing nuts…. IT’S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN.
Ms. Carnell, you’ll get a lot of criticism on your statements, but they need to be said. When our esteemed leaders, role models, etc., feel they must deviate from the principles and the appropriateness of the position, such as “doing the dougie” and using “street language” (ex. “Bull s–ter), plays right into the hands of those who feel we are not suited for these positions. You don’t help someone “wallowing in the dirt” by wallowing with them you help them by lifting themselves up. Keep on speaking the truth, our young people need to hear this……
This stupid b***h, knows that Obama was being sarcastic, but her hatred of him blinds her. This b***h, should get off of her a*s, and find a job. Yes, that includes cleaning anyone’s house. No wonder why some of us are unemployed, we now won’t work at any job, unless it pays top dollar, and they won’t get dirty. How are you going to get a high paying job, if you don’t have the education, or the skills? Our grand parents, worked at any job, to feed our families, but our people today, would rather collect welfare, than to get their hands dirty.
MERITOCRACY is not a myth. A meritocracy that is based on talent, and not on privilege and wealth is obtainable, for with an intellect and superior talent(s), Our Nation can rise again.!
If you really think that President Obama is going to be some white person’s flunky, then you must be retarded. I surely doublt that President Obama has lost his mind. I, in fact, know d**n well he’s using his smarts. Get a rip!
THE REAL PROBLEM WE NEED TO FOCUS ON IS…. Mitt Romney… Whatever Obama has or has not done — he is a head above any of the other PRESIDENTS that we have had in many years. He does work to help working people, the elderly, students, and all of us who are not rich.
Check out what BILL MAHER says about what could happen if we put those nuts in the White House –
http://youtu.be/5Y0aydhFHNE
First of all the President wasn’t serious but you Negroes out there are so brainwashed and would love to get Romeny in so Massa can whip your a*s some more! You Negroes are nothing more than slaves and the writer of this story is probably some uneducated black female who hates herself and is married to a white man who probably calls her every racist name imaginable! it’s all right to criticize but when you have hatered in your tone it really shows that we as a whole black nation are still in fact modern day slaves!
Barack Obama is what I call a Mulatto president, because he surely is not a 100 percent black person. For there is a serious difference in a black person who has some small degree of white blood in them from years in the past, and a man such as he who is born of a PURE black father and PURE white mother. Be it not only Obama but any of these other men and women, chldren, etc., who are directly of a parent who is white and one who is black. And don’t start with that old line about black dominated white, because no matter who started that, the person born in this case is both WHITE and BLACK. It’s as simple as that, So this guy cannot be truthfully classified as a black man. And I have been long asking for his birth certificate to be made public, to see if it actually lists what race his mother and white grandparents listed him as, if the certificate so states. But, clearly, we cannot really make him to be a BLACK perosn, only. — Rev. George Brooks
What gibberish is this?
Secondly, what I was getting at was that Obama is playing a game here, by pretending one minute to be black when among black folks, and then next over on the other side of the tracks, or at the White House, being totally white. And when blacks try to tie him down, be won’t fall it. Now will he? Has he ever really and specifically said that he is a BLACK MAN ? Or said “I am a black person.” Period! End of the conversation! I don’t think so, and do not believe that he will say it that way. And I would not blame him, IF he was not out here trying to make fools out of us black folks, as if he really regards himself as a black person, ONLY. Now go and put the question to him black journalists, without any laugher or willingness to allow him to make with the “shuck and jive,” as Palin has accused him of. How about it Yvette Carnell? —
Rev.. George Brooks
Hey Rev, what the h**l are you talking about? apparently you don’t understand that any black Americans are mixed(through slavery and selective breeding) this is also with Africans who conquered many sections of Asia and Europe so most people around the world especially Americans are mixed. A drop of black blood is still black! Learn and educate yourself one good book for you ignorant people out there who knows nothing of race is called “s*x and Races” by J.A. Rodgers please educate yourself before you open your mouth!