I'm getting more than a little sick of the way black folks get talked about like we're exotic foreigners in our own country-- like there are all of these strange secret customs we have or something-- oh, and anything one prominent black person does is suddenly a "black thing." You see, I don't know anything about "fist bumps" but, I could could tell it was just some cute little thing Obama and his wife do. Is it just me, or is the over analysis of "the bump" as something exotic and foreign something that we would never see for a similar moment between white people? Oh-- and it's fine to call black women "baby momma" since I think some random black person said that once and so that's how we all like to think of ourselves. Yeah.

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Todays exit polls had great news for Obama. Obama is improving his standing with white voters, older voters and Jewish voters. It's important for any democratic nominee to work to appeal to all Americans, so when a candidate lags behind with one demographic group we naturally ask "what can they do to catch up?" Since Obama has not done as well with these groups in states like Ohio it's reasonable to have that conversation. And it looks like Obama has been working to fix this gap --and he's making progress.

I've noticed, however, that when the demographic group is black voters the nature of the question changes. Instead of asking "What has Clinton done to appeal to black voters?" or asking "Why can'tblindClinton get more of the black vote?" the question is framed more along the lines of: "Why do black people vote for Obama so much?"

Whoever is the next president of the United States will have their hands full. For example, the price of gas is not going to come down. It won't come down if we leave Iraq or if we stay there, I think that some people think that when we leave Iraq the price will fall. It won't. High prices are a a result of hard realities of supply and demand and have very little to do with the war. Obama  will not be able to fix this, (no one can fix it) and I worry people will get angry when the price just keeps going up even after we exit Iraq. People will say the price is going up because we left-- just as some people have mistakenly said it is high because we are there-- that's not the real issue here. It's supply and demand.

I have been trying to understand why McCain would choose to apologize for not supporting MLK day on the anniversary of his death, rather than on the holiday itself, why he'd choose to do it in the rain, why he'd do it in a culturally sensitive location, with a hostile mostly black crowd, and why he'd do such a bad job of explaining his error. People booed him. And the more I think about it, the more I think that was his goal.

It's still going on, but some people are speaking out. I wrote this back in December, before I joined this site:

My husband and I were on our way home from a warm and happy holiday with my family in Cleveland. We took the train, which passed trough Erie, PA. Then a strange thing happened. US Border Patrol got on the train and started asking everyone if they were from the US. If you said "no" or if you had an accent they asked for a passport.

I enjoy reading and learning about history, but I think there is a real danger in drawing too many parallels between the present and the past. I have no idea what it was like to be alive in the late 60s, my parents never talk about that time, and I get the impression that it was really scary. I get the impression some of the time that there are old grudges and old scores that were never settled that date all the way back to that time that have suddenly resurfaced as the subtext of some of the dialogues we're having today.

In a few of the news stories I've read, I've seen the images of Obama bowling (badly) in Altoona, PA juxtaposed with his comments that Clinton has every right to stay in the race. Even as he lost a bowling game, Obama seems to exude grace, sportsmanship... and lightheartedness. I hope this little event gets talked about in PA. It makes him seem much less threatening... it helps break the ice.