Re: By Dissing Palin, Oprah Hurts Obama

In the past, Oprah has had presidential hopefuls on her show like Al Gore and George Bush during their 2000 bid. By having both candidates on her show, Oprah not only appeared bipartisan, she also catered to her audience, comprised of both Bush Republicans and Gore Democrats.

When Oprah endorsed Barack Obama, I was excited to see her publicly take a stance politically, something she had never done before. And the historic nature of this presidential election, in my opinion, demands one from all Americans.

In sharing my elation about Oprah publicly endorsing Obama and going on the campaign trail with his friends, both white and black, male and female, I stated that she helps racialize Barack’s candidacy, especially in light of Obama presenting himself as a post-racial candidate. While I debated back and forth with friends that it makes sense she would endorse him, irrespective of his color, simply because he’s her hometown senator, bringing something fresh to the ticket. Many of my friends felt so, too, was Hillary’s run historical, as the first female to run for this position on the Democratic ticket.

I was quickly told by dissenting voices that Obama’s race played a profound role, not only in Oprah’s choice for president, but also in using her crossover influence to win him voters.

I penned, “By Dissing Palin, Oprah Hurts Obama” to provoke thoughts about the intersection of race and gender. And how political pundits have espoused that white women might very well decided the presidential race.

Has anyone cared to poll how African American women are voting? And how my demographic electorate might, too, decide the race?

Or is it that women and blacks are categorized in such a way that pollsters as well as political pundits assume that all women are white and all blacks are male?

An irate reader, ignoring the gender issue in my piece, sent me this missive:

Sarah Palin on McCain’s ticket no doubt excites Republican women. And just as women for Hillary can arguably assert that their candidate is a first, so too, can Palin’s. But invisible in this grab for female voters are black women, an important segment of the electorate in this campaign but one that seems to be a non-issue.

Oprah endorsing Obama and not inviting both Hillary and Palin to her TV couch is no doubt her prerogative. But we cannot ignore how her endorsement of Obama has ignited a storm, in my opinion, of angry white women and men, both of whom, out of a sense of white privilege, feel Oprah owes them because of her success.

How much weight do TV celebs really have in endorsing candidates? Are we putting a lot of weight on Oprah solely because of her influence? Or are we putting extra weight on Oprah because both she and Obama are black and her endorsement conjures up fear in some folks, like my neighbor who said, “Blacks are now taking over!”

An African American male wrote me applauding Oprah’s stance for not having Palin on her show but he misunderstood mine for raising the issue.

I don’t!

However, by Oprah closing off her TV couch to all the candidates, once she publicly endorsed Obama, might impact her ratings. But the real question for me is, do white fear, anger and unease about Obama get transferred onto Oprah because she endorsed him?