White women have, in the most inopportune moments, been the ambitious politician’s kryptonite for some time.
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And with the release of “Barack Obama: The Story” by Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post writer David Maraniss, where a White ex-girlfriend of Barack Obama describes his “sexual warmth,” we now have to wonder if this will make enough on-the-fence White voters cast their ballots for the Republican with that “weird,” “un-Christian” religion over that Black man whose arm they can’t quite see around their young daughter’s shoulder.
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It is not a question to take lightly. Obama has been labeled everything from a Muslim, a socialist, and an illegal immigrant. Add to that the inclusion of detailed, intimate accounts of a White woman describing her past relationship with the President.
No matter how innocuous, now we have a cocktail that can potentially make this year’s Presidential election the most racially divisive ever.
Ask former U.S Representative Harold Ford Jr. from Tennessee. The young African American organized a robust campaign for one of Tennessee’s U.S. Senate seats against his White Republican contender Bob Cooker during the 2006 election cycle. Given Tennessee’s history with race, no one gave the young congressman from Memphis much of a shot. But he made Cooker, then-mayor of Tennessee’s fourth largest city, Chattanooga, sweat. Until, that is, Republicans put together an ad depicting a blond, White woman, saying that she met him at the Playboy Mansion.
(Ford, who was single at the time, denied ever being at the mansion.)
At the end of the ad, the blonde sensually asks Harold to “call me.” This ad is widely considered responsible for derailing any hopes of him being the first Black Senator elected to D.C. since Reconstruction; Ford Jr. narrowly lost to Cooker 48-51 percent.
WATCH the “Call Me” Ad Below:
Though passages in a book are not nearly as racially explosive as a nationally televised TV ad, we cannot under-estimate the damage such passages can cause, given our current political climate. Genevieve Cook, his ex-girlfriend, says she was in love with the former President, but he did not envision her being his future first lady.
Here is a snippet of Cook’s thoughts, as reported by CBS News:
Early in their relationship, Obama confessed to Cook how he searched for the “perfect ideal woman…at the expense of hooking up with available girls.” In her journal, Cook wrote: “I can’t help thinking that what he would really want, be powerfully drawn to, was a woman, very strong, very upright, a fighter, a laugher, well-experienced – a Black woman I keep seeing her as.”
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