Identity politics and the Clinton-Obama feud

David Brooks:

Both Clinton and Obama have eagerly donned the mantle of identity politics. A Clinton victory wouldn’t just be a victory for one woman, it would be a victory for little girls everywhere. An Obama victory would be about completing the dream, keeping the dream alive, and so on.

Fair enough. The problem is that both the feminist movement Clinton rides and the civil rights rhetoric Obama uses were constructed at a time when the enemy was the reactionary white male establishment. Today, they are not facing the white male establishment. They are facing each other.

All the rhetorical devices that have been a staple of identity politics are now being exploited by the Clinton and Obama campaigns against each other. They are competing to play the victim. They are both accusing each other of insensitivity. They are both deliberately misinterpreting each other’s comments in order to somehow imply that the other is morally retrograde.

All the habits of verbal thuggery that have long been used against critics of affirmative action, like Ward Churchill [Connerly? -ed.] and Thomas Sowell, and critics of the radical feminism, like Christina Hoff Summers, are now being turned inward by the Democratic front-runners. ...

[T]his whole show seems stale and deranged to the younger set, as Obama and Clinton seemed to recognize when they damped down the feud yesterday afternoon. The interesting split is not between the feminist and civil rights Old Bulls, it’s between the establishments of both movements, who emphasize top-down change, and the younger dissenters, who don’t.

(Hat tip: InstaPundit.)

Brooks also mentions that, presumably before yesterday's detente, "Obama's campaign drew up a memo delineating all of the Clintons’ supposed racial outrages." That's the first I've heard of that. Does anyone know anything else about this supposed memo? Is it online somewhere? Was it actually released, or just "drawn up" and then discarded when Obama decided to declare a truce?

Comments

[anonamom]

Drawing up a memo isn't out of order. What you do with the information is--and Senator Obamam has shown he can walk the talk on this one.

But looking at a series of things that have happened, and putting them under the topic of racism for consideration, is absolutely not out of order when dealing with the Clintons, no matter what their history is on the subject. They have long shown that in their minds, the ends justifies the means.

Anyone thinking that is an overstatement must recall how they, especially the First Lady, demonized all of the women who were the recipients of BC's "attentions."

If there is any group of people who should support Senator Clinton's campaign, it is the college-educated women from age 35-60. We've lived her life--including setting aside career achievements for family reasons.
And the fact that we as a grouop do not support her is significant, in that our votes have determined the outcome of the past four presidential elections.
Many of us voted for her, via him, before. It won't happen this time around.

She is not electable--and it's certainly not misogyny--it's about her, as an individual.

(Well, unless Huckabee gets the GOP nomination...)

[Derek]

Is that right? Ward Churchill, not Ward Connerly?

[Brendan Loy]

That's what the article says, but it looks like the New York Times made an error... hahaha.

[Alasdair]

Hey - I'm pretty sure that Churchill would be a strong and outspoken opponenet of "affirmative action" (meaning quotas) ... Sir Winston would be in full support of outreach programs which bring kids up to speed where they have the ability and foundation and can handle the pace and the pressure ...

Ward Connerly is (was?) the UC Regent who fought (and, as far as I know, still fights) quotas ...

[Brendan Loy]

Yup... hahaha.

http://volokh.com/posts/1200411528.shtml

http://thedrunkablog.blogspot.com/2008/01/wrong-man.html

http://rjwaldmann.blogspot.com/2008/01/two-errors-in-one-sentence-in-new-york.html

Multiple Layers of Fact-Checkers strike again! Perhaps my wife Robbie and my dog Becky will jointly draft a letter requesting a correction. :)

[Alasdair]

Brendan - perhaps it was just Brooks' innocent homage to President Bush - another Bushism to entertain the masses ?