The author gives us shrewd and keen essays on the complex relationship between "the first black president" and his African-American constituency. The Persistence of the Colorline tackles hot-button issues: the nature of racial opposition to Obama; whether Obama has any special responsibility to African-Americans; the increasing irrelevance of traditional racial politics and the consequences thereof; electoral politics and cultural chauvinism; black patriotism and its antithesis (essentialism and rebellion); differences between Obama's presentation of himself to blacks and whites and the challenges posed by the dream of a post-racial society; the far from simple symbolism of Obama as leader of the Joshua generation in a country that has elected only three black senators and two black governors. Randall Kennedy, eschewing the critical excesses of both the left and the right, offers a gimlet eyed view of Obama's triumphs and travails, his strengths and weaknesses, as they pertain to the troubled history of race in America.
Content Note
The Obama inaugural -- Obama courts black America -- Obama and white America : "why can't they all be like him?" -- The race card in the campaign of 2008 -- Reverend Wright and my father : reflections on blacks and patriotism -- The racial politics of the Sotomayor confimation -- Addressing race "the Obama way" -- Obama and the future of American race relations.