Unlike Pols in Other Places, Brooklyn Reps Make Pres Race Seem Boring

Below the surface, in blogs and on the streets, there's talk all over about the race to be Democratic nominee for President.

It's one of the liveliest and most socially meaningful presidential contests in recent memory (we say this despite our creeping senility), and it seems to get more tense with the passing weeks.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton -- one moment growling at each other like angry pit bulls, another moment smiling and talking about how much alike they are -- are on a history-making ride.

And in Brooklyn you'd think the race would be especially rumbling. After all, that's where two members of Congress, Yvette Clarke [photo, left] and Ed (Edolphus) Towns [photo, right], are continuing to back Clinton even though their respective Congressional districts voted decisively for Obama.

But the representaives have been issuing only platitudes about their desire to stay with state's senator (Clinton) and declare they will have nothing much more to say for the immediate future.

Both Clarke and Towns are African Americans, like the majority of their constituents.

In Missouri, by contrast, black Congressman Emmanuel Cleaver [photo]-- a Clinton backer like Towns and Clarke -- is making rolling waves with his comments about the presidential candidates.

Even while continuing to officially support Clinton, Cleaver was quoted on Canadian public radio as saying Obama looks like he's going to be the winner.

"If I had to make a prediction right now, I'd say Barack Obama is going to be the next president," Cleaver said this week. "I will be stunned if he's not the next president of the United States."

But Cleaver goes on to diss Obama by saying strange things like offering his opinion that while Obama "is articulate. In the black tradition, he would probably be mediocre."

"For White Americans," Cleaver continues, referring Obama, "it's like, this guy can speak. . . [But] if you put him on a level with a lot of other African-American public speakers, he may not even measure up."

In mouthing off so freely, Cleaver has been putting his Missouri on the national political map. He's acknowledged that he's been called an Uncle Tom and all kinds of things by African Americans who freely declare themselves upset with his choice of Clinton and his decision to stick with her.

This all recalls the experiences of black Ohio politicians, some of whom have been sticking with Clinton as Cleaver does, but some of whom actually switched from Clinton to Obama saying they grew tired of catcalls and insults when they showed up at public gatherings.

One possibility, of course, the Brooklyn way, would be not to show up at too many public gatherings!

Comments

[Richard Rodriguez]

Here's the interview with Emmanuel Cleaver:
http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/