"...if they don't kill him first"
 

My wife is completely enthralled by the political season, watches MSNBC, Fox, et al, getting the latest analysis, predictions, etc.

We both support Obama, of course, but the wife has a really dark qualifier when speaking of Obama, tempering her enthusiam: he'd make a good national leader, a good president "if they don't kill him first". I understand the concern but really, how likely is this? I just wrote this off as the wife being guarded in her optimism at the prospect of an African American president.

But I asked a couple of black guys at work what they thought of Obama, and they (separately) responded the same way, really a kind of resigned acceptance of what is seen as a real possibility, maybe even a likelihood, that Obama will be assassinated before he would be allowed to be President.

I have a hard time relating to this one, to be honest with you. My gut response to this concern is that it's really sort of weird, if understandable - but when you consider Obama's early Secret Service protection dating back to last year, it's clear there's a deeper vein of discord of antipathy and fear in our society.

Weird, and disappointing. Regardless if Obama is elected or not, I hope as a nation we can keep progressing on the issue of race. I believe things are better, but I'm reminded that objective progress is tempered by subjective fear & doubt, on the part of those who've historically been on the short end of the stick.

Nonetheless, I enjoy the above-board analysis, dicussion & debate we have on this board, irrespective of the race issue, a refreshing indication that Dr. King's dream is alive & increasingly manifested in our society. At the same time, I can understand the context somebody like Rev Wright (essentially) lives in, but this reflexively defensive position is nearly completely lost on the wider society.

anytime you are in a situation where the Clintons would benefit from your death, watch out. We know how this goes.

--MW

There are wacko nuts out there. Any minority type candidate would probably attract some nuts. A black candidate of course, a muslim, a Jew, a mormon. While it is a legitimate concern I hope the media doesn't talk about it a lot. It might wake up the nut case tendency in someone.

It's hard to speak for what any one of 300+ million people are willing to do.

(this really is Farrah this time)

An acquaintance here in Dallas was making calls for the Obama campaign early this year. She had many people tell her on the phone that Obama had better up his security and "watch his back". She did not know if this threat was real, or if it was fear-motivated campaign tactic for Democrats to vote for another candidate.

Hasn't Colin Powell stated that he will not run for President, for fear of harm coming to him and his family?

I'm surprised there aren't more people attributing Obama's inability to win rural, less-educated, predominantly white areas to racism. There aren't, in my opinion, enough platform differences between Obama and Clinton to account for the lopsided voting tallies in places like West Virginia and rural Pennsylvania.

There is also an issue of Hispanic - African-American racial tensions as well. e.g. Los Angeles: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedi...a-news-comment

Any more than "they" want to kill George W. Bush?

Every President's life is at risk, round the clock, for the duration of his Presidency. Will Obama's race draw a disproportionate share of nutcases? Who knows.

Focusing on that seems an exercise in paranoia to me.

We all know that the only reason Bush is still alive because of the JimBob rednecks and their sawed-offs that were solidly behind him. Now that he's gone...

I'm with Mike here. If that ever happened to Obama, my first suspect would be someone connected to the Clintons.

How many of those who think this are black?
 

The black community has a tendency to be the most die hard of all conspiracy theorists? They have a huge belief that "the man" is out to get them at every turn. Does this happen soemtimes? Sure. But not nearly as much as a lot of them tend to think it does.

Yes that is a gross generalization. Take it in that spirit please.