Acting White: Senator Feinstein’s Big Stick

Obama is getting his first of many lessons in how to be president. It’s not about race, but rather about power and respect. He ignored Feinstein, Chairwoman of the Senate Rules Committee, in his announcement of Panetta for Director of the CIA, and now she wants him to know that such slights will not go unpunished.

By reversing her earlier position with her fellow Democrats and the President-elect, against seating Roland Burris as newly appointed senator from Illinois, she is sending a message to Obama, his staff, and the other Dems, that wonder-boy puts his pants on just like everyone else, one leg at a time. She has no reason to side with Burris, who belongs nowhere near the Senate behind the antics of Gov. Blagojevich, but she has a point to make.

Politically, it is good for Obama to get his first whupping early and with a soft glove. Burris is nothing. Hopefully, this is all it will take for team Obama to forget all the press clippings of his greatness, and get down to brass tacks. This country needs fixing in a hurry, and we can ill-afford the wasted time and energy of power-politics among people who profess to be on the same team.

There are many who are itching for Obama to fail: I am not one of them. But indeed he will fail if he, or the others around him, thinks that race will, in anyway, carry or shield him through the tasks ahead. For a moment the voters looked pass race, or perhaps they saw something that scares them more. Who knows. Regardless, we need to forget race. All that could have been proven about race and politics is now gone - invisible does not mean impossible. It is a contest for leaders. Whoever makes the fewest dumb mistakes, while catching whatever breaks come along, wins.

James C. Collier

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