Obama Gatherings Debunk Myths About Supporters (801 hits)
By Gwen Richardson
On Saturday, Obama supporters held more than 4,000 house parties and other "Unite for Change" events across the nation. These gatherings launched the Obama campaign's 50-state voter registration drive, whose goal is to register millions of new voters for the November election.
I attended one of these house parties in Houston on Saturday and was struck by the sheer diversity of the approximately 30 people who were present. The event attracted people -- strangers to me and each other -- who found the event and registered for it online. The Obama campaign is truly a grassroots effort and his supporters are willing to take what could be perceived as a risk by opening their homes to complete strangers.
In terms of ethnicity, about half the attendees were White, about 40 percent were Black and there was one Hispanic couple. The age range was college students to senior citizens.
A Black couple hosted the event in a middle-class subdivision in Northwest Houston. The wife was a lovely woman who works for a major oil and gas company. The husband was an American citizen who, in the early '80s, immigrated from Kenya, the native country of Obama's father. He is actually a member of the elder Obama's same tribe, the Luo tribe, and from the same region in Kenya. Both said they had never worked in a political campaign nor contributed financially to one before, a sentiment that was voiced by nearly everyone who attended.
The highlight of the event was the one-hour session when each person talked about why he/she supported Obama. Generally, the Black people who were there said that Obama inspired them and represented a historic change for a better America. I expected this response based upon the 95 percent level of support Obama has in the Black community and the pride associated with his candidacy.
One Black woman had been a former Hillary supporter who believed it was time for a woman president. Her husband, who was an Obama supporter from the start, had been trying to persuade her for months. Her mind was changed after she listened to one of Obama's speeches in its entirety and she actually traveled to North Carolina to volunteer during that state's primary. One Black gentleman, originally from Costa Rica, had been an American citizen for many years. He said he had always voted, but Obama inspired him to get involved in the political process.
I was particularly intrigued by the responses from the White people who attended. One woman was a Canadian citizen, married to an American, who said that Obama was extremely popular among Canadians and represented a new direction in American domestic and foreign policy. Several of the attendees shared reflections on President John F. Kennedy and said they remembered the hope the nation felt when Kennedy was elected, as well as the devastation they felt following his assassination. All who mentioned Kennedy mentioned Obama in the same breath, saying he gave them the same kind of hope – something that had been missing in American politics for the past 40 years.
One gentleman who was American born said he had lived overseas for much of the past 30 years, in both South America and the Middle East, that he had seen the devastating effects of American foreign policy on the poor, indigenous populations, and that Obama could bring a new approach to the international front. Another gentleman worked in corporate America, frequently traveled overseas, and said that America used to be admired by other nations and that Obama could restore that sense of admiration from others around the world.
One woman brought her 20-something daughter with her to the meeting. The mother mentioned that her son, who had moved from Houston to Chicago, had called her a few years ago when Obama ran for the Senate to tell her how much he admired the Illinois politician and believed he was going places politically. The son called last year to tell her he was going to Iowa to volunteer for the Obama campaign, once the Senator announced his presidential bid.
The daughter, who is a schoolteacher in one of Oakland, California's worst schools, said that her students were from underprivileged backgrounds, but that she liked Obama's policies regarding paying teachers what they are worth. She also said that his presidency could lift her students' ambitions and make them dream bigger dreams for themselves.
Everyone was universally against the war in Iraq and several mentioned the tragedy of the thousands who have died as a result of the lies that had been told to American citizens preceding the Iraqi occupation.
Despite the myths promoted by the media that Obama succeeded in his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination largely as a result of his Black support, or that the only White people supporting him are college students and so-called "latte' drinking liberals," the folks at the house party on Saturday debunked those myths and represented a broad spectrum of America.
In fact, the media has promoted racial strife so much over the past 30 years that I, and millions of other Black people, didn't believe there were enough open-minded White people to make the election of Obama, or any Black presidential candidate, possible. I'm glad I was wrong about that.
Gwen Richardson is an entrepreneur and author based in Houston, Texas. Her new book is titled: Why African Americans Can't Get Ahead: And How We Can Solve It With Group Economics. Richardson is currently writing a book about the 2008 presidential election.
