Add to bookbag

Title:	The Keyes-Obama Debates: Africans and African Americans
Publication info:	Ann Arbor, Michigan: MPublishing, University of Michigan Library passages December 2004
Rights/Permissions:	This work is protected by copyright and may be linked to without seeking permission. Permission must be received for subsequent distribution in print or electronically. Please contact [email protected] for more information.
Source:	The Keyes-Obama Debates: Africans and African Americans no. ns 1, December 2004
URL:	http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.4761530.0009.002

THE KEYES-OBAMA DEBATES: AFRICANS AND AFRICAN AMERICANS

Editor's Note: During the 2004 campaign for the open U.S. Senate seat representing the State of Illinois, the candidates for the Republican and Democratic parties—Alan Keyes and Barack Obama respectively—debated questions regarding the meaning and inclusiveness/exclusiveness of the African American referent, mirroring a discussion that had been underway more broadly in the U.S for some months. The subject was not taken up in the candidates' first face-to-face debate but it was in the second, a televised debate October 21, 2004. [See http://www.renewamerica.us/archives/media/debates/04_10_21debate2.htm ] It was raised earlier in a segment of the ABC television program "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," August 15, 2004. The following is a transcript of that first discussion, down-loaded here from the Alan Keyes Archives: http://www.renewamerica.us/archives/media/interviews/04_08_15thisweek.htm .

One may credit linguistics Prof. John McWhorter for pushing this debate into the public arena months before Keyes challenged Obama on the question of who qualifies as an African American. See McWhorter's web-site for a list of his own publications which reflect his shifting thinking on the values and utilities of the African American designation [http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/_]. And, see his recent declaration, "Why I'm Black, Not African American." The Los Angeles Times, September 8, 2004 [http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/_latimes-why_im_black.htm] But also see, for a view in greater historical depth, James H. Meriwether. 2002. Proudly We Can Be Africans: Black Americans and Africa, 1935-1961. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

The Keyes-Obama arguments were noted in the August 29, 2004 New York Times by Rachel L. Swarns [see "African Americans: divided over semantics." http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002019062_africanamer29.htmlAugust ]

See, more recently, Richard Thompson Ford, Name Games: The folly in the attempts to define "African-American." SLATE. Posted Thursday, Sept. 16, 2004, at 3:21 AM PT. [ http://www.slate.com/id/2106753/ ]

This Week with George Stephanopoulos (ABC)

Alan Keyes and Barack Obama

August 15, 2004

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, HOST: When Alan Keyes moved from Maryland to Illinois this week, he guaranteed the next year's Senate would have only its third black member since reconstruction, and guaranteed a few more months of sensational headlines for a Senate race that's already had more than its share.

CLIP, ALAN KEYES: ". . . That's a surrender of state sovereignty . . ."

STEPHANOPOULOS: Of course, the conservative firebrand is better at getting attention than votes. In two losing Senate races and two losing presidential campaigns, his most memorable moment was this leap into a mosh pit after a the debate in 2000.

And the cameras are sure to follow him this time around because of the man he's taking on.

CLIP, ALAN KEYES: "Barack Obama is not, is not a rising star. He is a fading phony!"

CLIP, BARACK OBAMA SUPPORTERS: "Obama, Obama, Obama, Obama, Obama."

STEPHANOPOULOS: Barack Obama. The son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas, who lit up the Democratic Convention last month.

Only a state senator now, Obama convinced a lot of those delegates that he's got the makings of a future president.

But when I caught up with both candidates in Chicago this week, Obama showed that he's not taking anything for granted.

[begin taped interview with Barack Obama]

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, when I heard that Alan Keyes got in the race, I tried to put myself in your shoes, and I imagined two very different reactions, either, "I can't be this lucky," or, "I can't believe this is happening to me." What was yours?

BARACK OBAMA: You know, I actually felt that, with his announcement, that our fate is in our own hands, and so, you know, there are going to be some trying moments. You know, Mr. Keyes is voluble and he's opinionated, and so there's going to be a healthy discussion as a consequence of this, but what I'm absolutely certain of is that if you compare his vision and my vision that, you know, the voters I think are a lot more interested in the things I have to say than they are in his stuff.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Why do you think the state party did this?

OBAMA: Well, you know, it's hard for me to gauge. I mean, they've got 12 million people to choose from, and even assuming that only 5 million of them are potential Republicans, that's still a pretty big pool.

I think that their sense was that none of the local electeds could win the race, and that Mr. Keyes might not be able to win the race, but at least could, um, ah . . .

STEPHANOPOULOS: Bloody you up?

OBAMA: Bloody me up a little bit before I got to Washington.

Now, having said that, I think that, you know, he's not somebody we take lightly.

[end taped interview]

STEPHANOPOULOS: The next morning, I spoke with Keyes, who takes nothing lightly.

[start taped interview with Alan Keyes]

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, you rented out an apartment in Calumet City yesterday. How long is the lease?

ALAN KEYES: Actually, we're doing it from month to month. I've made it very clear that this is a first temporary choice, kind of transitional. I think by being in Cal City, I'm going to have the best instructors in the world: people in Illinois who are facing the everyday challenge of working life and will be able to give me a sense of how that is affected by a lot of the issues that I'm dealing with.

STEPHANOPOULOS: You know, that sounds a lot like what Hillary Clinton did when she went to New York. She went all around the state on a listening tour to learn more about the New York. Now, I know you've seen this, but back then when she was running, you said, "I deeply resent the destruction of federalism represented by Hillary Clinton's willingness to go into a state she doesn't even live in and pretend to represent the people there, so I certainly wouldn't imitate it."

Aren't you imitating Hillary Clinton in this respect?

KEYES: Thankfully, not in the least way. Hillary Clinton's campaign . . .

STEPHANOPOULOS: Oh, come on.

KEYES: Well, Hillary Clinton's campaign was a studied and calculated quest of personal ambition. That's all it was. I had no . . .

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, what is it? If this is not about personal ambition, will you renounce the seat if you win?

KEYES: Of course not. But that's not the point. The point is that she went to New York—she actually studied, as I understand it, several different states to see which one would be the best platform for her personal agenda. I had no thought whatsoever of coming to Illinois. I was happily enjoying my role this time as politics as a spectator's sport—Alan, watching while other people danced on the hot coals—and would not have gotten involved except that the Illinois state party approached me, said there was an urgent need that I could help to address, and convinced me. And, by the way, it took some convincing . . .

STEPHANOPOULOS: Here's how one of the state senators who came to you described it. He said, "We"—the Republicans, and it's State Senator Stephen Rauschenberger. He said, "We needed to find another Harvard-educated African American who had some experience on the national political scene. We need that because the Democrats have made an icon out of Barack Obama, and the only way to fight back is to find your own icon—and that is not an easy thing to do."

What are you an icon for?

KEYES: Well, I didn't use the word, so I don't have to explain it. You should asked Senator Rauschenberger.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Do you think they would have come to you if you weren't black?

KEYES: I don't know. And, frankly, it's not by business to explain.

STEPHANOPOULOS: You've accused the Republican Party of acting in a racial manner in the past. You don't think you're being used here because of your race?

KEYES: Well, frankly, I think that because of my race, race is no longer on the table.

A matter of fact, I think it's kind of strange—it's one of those things that shows that sometimes people don't think things through. Barack Obama and I have the same race—that is, physical characteristics. We are not from the same heritage. And it's about time people started to realize that there's something racist about not looking at the specific heritage of individuals, but only looking at their skin color.

My ancestors toiled in slavery in this country. They were people who were directly a part of the oppression of slavery in this country. My consciousness, who I am as a person, has been deeply shaped by my struggle—deeply emotional and deeply painful—with the reality of that heritage and what it says about humanity, what it says about conscience, what it says about the terrible possibilities of human wickedness and injustice.

And that's why, I believe, the slaughter of innocent life and the young is a direct challenge to me, because of my heritage—not to do, with respect to that innocent life in the womb, what others did with respect to my ancestors. That's a burden I bear. It's also a great challenge that I feel, that . . .

STEPHANOPOULOS: Have you ever been approached by other Republican Party representatives in other states to get you to run and said no?

KEYES: Yes. Actually, I have been approached with—I wouldn't call it frequency, but enough so that it was not unusual.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So, you have said no in the past. That's what I'm trying to get at. What's different this time? What is so dangerous about . . .

KEYES: I told you what's different.

STEPHANOPOULOS: . . . Barack Obama?

KEYES: Barack Obama claims an African American heritage, yet stands against the very things that were the basis for [stopping] the oppression of my ancestors.

And people were saying that this somehow represents the heritage of black Americans. I do not believe it does represent their heritage when you are willing, in contravention of the basic principles of the Declaration of Independence—that we are all created equal, and endowed, not by human choice, but by our Creator, with our unalienable rights—to stand there and say that something like abortion, a deep issue of justice, is a matter of choice.

And when somebody comes to me and says, "You have a chance to stop this from happening," I'm supposed to say no? I couldn't say no. I had a moral obligation at the end to say yes.

[Voiceover by Stephanopoulos: But as always with Alan Keyes, there's a struggle between the statesman and the showman.]

KEYES: You know, Saul called David to the king's court, in order to sing for him. David was a stranger to the court—and that's what this song says: "Saul said to David, 'Come play me a piece.'" You know, I'll sing. Do you want me to sing the rest?

STEPHANOPOULOS: Play us a piece, yeah.

KEYES: [sings]

Saul said to David, 'Come play me a piece.'
David said to me, 'How can I play
When I'm in a strange land?' 

KEYES: See that? That is actually something that I think right now. You know, I have been called upon by the state party in Illinois to come play a piece, to come play a role, if you like, that they believe is critical for the people of Illinois. Do I deny that I am now in a strange land? No. But it seems that the media and other people deny that when you're doing something like that, you have made a sacrifice—not a sacrifice of money only; not a sacrifice of some physical place where you live. You have made a sacrifice of heart, and it mattered to me. And it still does. But I think that sacrifice of heart is called for, because what is at stake in Illinois is deeply important to the people here and to the country that I love.

[end taped interview]

[begin second taped interview with Barack Obama]

STEPHANOPOULOS: Ambassador Keyes' answer to the carpetbagger argument seems to be that he's acting in the spirit of Illinois' favorite son, Abraham Lincoln. He's going to save unborn lives in the same way that Lincoln freed the slaves. Where does the analogy break down?

OBAMA: Well, it breaks down on several levels. First of all, what he's assuming is that the women of America who want to have some control over their bodies are the equivalent to slaveholders, and obviously the women in America don't feel that way. They feel that these are extraordinarily intimate issues that they've got to make decisions on, in consultation with their families and their ministers and their doctors.

The second thing is that, you know, from an African American perspective, I think that the notion that somehow African Americans are equivalent to fetuses, no matter how well developed—because Mr. Keyes' position, I think, is that life begins at conception, so . . .

STEPHANOPOULOS: You don't agree with that?

OBAMA: Well, I, as a Christian, might agree with that, but if I agree with that, it's based on a religious premise, and not one that I think is subject to scientific proof.

And so, Mr. Keyes' willingness, I think, to draw those easy equivalents is out of the mainstream, I think, of how even those who are disturbed by abortion would think about it.

STEPHANOPOULOS: He also says that the fact that he's a black man, an African American, takes race off the table. He says you and he share a race, but he adds that you don't share a heritage. He says because his ancestors were slaves here in America, he has a different kind of voice. Do you agree with that?

OBAMA: Well, first of all, I think both he and the Republican Party make a mistake in thinking that race was in the equation. I haven't run a race-based campaign, and if you look at the coalition that I put together in the primary, it wasn't based on any kind of racial ideology. It was based entirely on my position on jobs and education and healthcare—things that cut across racial boundaries and geographic boundaries. And, you know, so I think that the Republican Party has mistook the reason why we've been doing well in this campaign. They've perhaps seen it through a racial lens, but that's not a perspective that I viewed it in.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But what about this issue that you, as a son of an African father have a different perspective from he, the grandson, great-grandson of slaves?

OBAMA: Well, keep in mind, first of all, that my grandfather in Africa was a domestic servant for the British and carried a pass book around. I don't know whether the point he was trying to make is that on the hierarchy of victim-hood, that somehow, you know, he is more qualified to speak for the oppressed. I'm—you know, so that's something that we would have to explore further. That's not, I don't think, a particularly relevant criteria by which we're going to make a decision about who's the best United States Senator from Illinois.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Your book, "Dreams of My Father," which you wrote almost ten years ago now is being re-released now that you're in the Senate campaign, and I was struck by a passage where you were writing about when you were a teenager. Very, very, candid. You said, you talked about yourself, and you said pot had helped and booze—maybe a little blow when you could afford it. "Junkie. Pothead. That's where I'd been headed: the final, fatal role of the young would-be black man." Now that you're running for Senate do you regret being that open?

OBAMA: No, not at all—because I think that the point that I was trying to make was that, as a young African American, even considering my exotic background growing up in Hawaii, I think I was still vulnerable to a whole set of stereotypes that young African Americans are still vulnerable to.

I mean, so there's the ah, sort of rebellion against authority, strain of anti-academic achievement, a belief that, you know, in macho sort of behavior. And I think that I fell prey to that for much of my high school years. The nice thing is, is that I had this underpinning of values that I think reasserted themselves as I got older, and I was able to pull myself out of this.

STEPHANOPOULOS: One of the biggest divides, electoral divides, in recent elections has been the break between regular church-goers and those who don't go to church regularly—the single biggest gap between the parties. If you go to church every Sunday, you're by 20 points more likely to vote Republican. It seemed to me, in your convention speech, that you were trying to reclaim that ground for the Democratic Party.

OBAMA: Absolutely. Yeah.

STEPHANOPOULOS: How did the party lose its way?

OBAMA: You know, I think that, um—I think we made a mistake when we bought into the notion that only secularism could express tolerance, and I think that's a mistake. I think that, you know, I'm a Christian. I attend church regularly with my family, and that faith informs what I do.

But I think what we have to do is argue about the nature of our faith in a pluralistic society. You know, my faith is one that admits some doubt, that says that I believe in Jesus Christ and I believe in God, but I also recognize that part of my job as a Christian is to recognize that I may not always be right, that God doesn't speak to me alone, and that the only way that I could live effectively with people who have different beliefs and different faiths is if we have a civil society that is, in fact, civil. And, you know, that's—really is a central difference between myself and Mr. Keyes. On a lot of these issues, whether it's abortion or gay rights, you know, Mr. Keyes, I think, feels the certainty of a prophet—you know, somebody who's got a direct line into what God thinks.

And I guess I think to myself, you know, I have to struggle a little bit more and admit that certain human fallibility, and not assert my unyielding confidence that I always know the truth.

STEPHANOPOULOS: He's not afraid to show his faith. He closed our interview singing a spiritual, "Little David." Care to join him?

OBAMA: Well, listen, the—you know, my singing voice I'm not sure is as good as Mr. Keyes', but if you catch me in church sometime, you'll hear me doing my best.

[end taped interview]

STEPHANOPOULOS: Actually, a source close to Obama told me he thinks he can match Keyes in the singing department. We'll be right back.

passages | http://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/passages/