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Obama vs. the Icon
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It is true, as Steele says, that Obama approaches whites with the expectation of a "core of decency" that will give him a warm response. But he is not exploiting any racial guilt feelings. Indeed, he and his wife, Michelle, have both said that they want people to see them whole and not just the color of their skin.
Second, she noted that Obama has said repeatedly that while blacks face real issues of discrimination, they also have responsibility for their own lives. Parents must turn off the TV, he says, and read to their children. Fathers must take responsibility for the children they bring into the world. That is definitely part of his message.
As to whether that message will separate Obama from the black voters he needs, his friend made a point supported by the latest Pew research: Black America is really two societies now, with a middle class whose values are far closer to those of middle-class whites than to those of the black underclass.
Obama, whose constituency is skewed to the middle class, may reflect those values better than Shelby Steele thinks.
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