Obama's Sister Souljah Moment: Is He Using Blacks?

Barack Obama is garnering praise for upbraiding black fathers. With his Father's Day speech, Obama is being hailed "as a centrist voice of moral authority, a position that resonates, not just in the African-American community, but among voters at large."

Fact is, Obama follows a long line of African Americans who have spoken honestly about black father absence. Black organizations, including the National Urban League, have called attention to black fatherlessness; in 1999 Morehouse College convened a Conference on African American Fathers. ...
In 2003, Rep. Danny K. Davis launched a year-long dialogue on the "State of the African American Male." I attended the kickoff event in DC, where hundreds of black elected officials, community leaders, academics, activists and concerned citizens came together to strategize and propose solutions to, among other things, the decline in the marriage rate and father absence.

And lest we forget, more than a million black men stood on the National Mall and pledged to improve themselves "spiritually, morally, mentally, socially, politically and economically" for the benefit of themselves and their family.

So the black community has not been M.I.A. or AWOL in addressing this critical issue.

Truth be told, the congregants of Apostolic Church of God were not the intended audience. Obama used their pulpit to reach out to white voters:

White America can't resist liking him for his words. For them, such a message was deeply satisfying to hear. It took them off the hot spot, even if only for a minute. It was an echo of all they hope is true -- that any man, no matter the odds against him, can pull his socks up and get with the program. It was a respite from helplessness.

At yesterday's forum at the Paley Center for Media, I asked Dr. Ronald Walters, a senior staffer with Rev. Jesse Jackson's 1984 and 1988 presidential campaigns, whether it was fair to characterize Obama's speech as a Sister Souljah moment. His response in a word, yes.

Dr. Walters told me Obama "uses the black community every now and then as a way to deal with another constituency." He added:

I'm sick and tired of Obama using the black community as a way of deflecting his real interest in conservative evangelicals by focusing on moral responsibility instead of dealing with corrective public policy.

If he's going to be that specific about one side of the equation, where is the specificity about the other side of the equation, the public policy side? Where is the black agenda?

Good question.