Sununu's Head

Maybe the race-baiting John Sununu should model a mask for the Halloween holiday. Certainly the man's visage, like his soul, is ugly to the bone. His latest TV charge is that Colin Powell endorsed President Obama because both men are black. Black people are, in Sununu's view, robots who vote as a unit on the basis of race. Let's look at the facts.

Three prominent black leaders ran for President before Obama. Shirley Chisholm, the first elected black woman in the House, ran and drew little support from black voters. Carol Moseley Braun, the first elected black woman in the Senate, ran and drew little support from black voters. You might say that they were guilty of running while being female. Jesse Jackson ran and did better with the voters but lost in key primaries at the end.  None achieved anything like the 95% or better support from black voters that Obama gets today. Obama does better because he more fully represents an ideology, and he does it with grace. The United States is divided between voters who prefer authoritarian leadership, mostly white and male, and those who respond to discussion, reasoning and compromise. President Obama leads the second group.

When JFK became President, my family, which was about half Irish Catholic, was delighted. But they never supported Joe McCarthy for anything, because McCarthy was a drunken destructive irresponsible liar, not as bad a person as Sununu but close enough. It is true that race has become a growing factor in elections--polls show white racism on the rise--but the claim that black people vote for Obama because he is half black is mendacious, echoing from deep inside Sununu's bowel system, into which he has inserted his astonishingly ugly head.