‘Do You Want To Speak To My Gun?’
Martin A. Parlett, Demonizing a President: The 'Foreignization' of Barack Obama
Praeger, 253pp, £30.00, ISBN 9781440830556
reviewed by Stephen Lee Naish
Even before reading Martin A. Parlett's well-researched and fascinating book, Demonizing a President: The ‘Foreignization’ of Barack Obama, I often wondered if it would be possible for the racial conflicts that so permeate America's collective narrative to be alleviated by simply having a non-white candidate in one of the most influential and powerful positions in the world. If Parlett's book is anything to go by, the answer to this question must be a resounding no. The events surrounding the shooting of Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida, Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and just recently Vonderrit Myers in St. Louis, highlight the ongoing mistrust of the African American populations in white America, a mistrust which has been fed by an intense political hatred for Obama by a minority of white right-wing Americans. Parlett, who canvassed for Obama in the 2008 campaign, personally witnessed the paranoia against an Obama-presidency. After knocking on the door of a potential voter and explaining for whom he was canvassing, Parlett was bluntly asked, ‘do you want to speak to my gun?’ This type of militant attitude has helped to reverse America's progress in race relations, leading to such movements as The Tea Party, and re-instigated, amongst specific politicians, publications, and other media, a racially encoded vernacular when referring to Barack Obama and his presidency. Accordingly, it must be acknowledged that regardless of what one might believe of his policy victories, misfires, and approach to his presidential duties, his time in office has been undermined by having to endure and respond to fictitious and exaggerated allegations.
The 'Foreignization' of Parlett's title does not just refer to the Birther movement, which has dogged Obama's presidency since before he even took office, though it does feature prominently. Rather, it denotes the distancing of Obama from any, if not all, American value systems. Thus, according to Parlett, Obama has been variously disparaged as a ‘radical Muslim, socialist, European, terrorist, fascist, closet homosexual,’ to name but a few on an ever-growing list. As long as he is a something ‘other’ than truly American his legitimacy as President is relentlessly in question, his power is attenuated and made inconsequential. Parlett paints this affliction in colours of history and psychology. The slurring of Obama is perhaps the most explicit example of ‘othering’, but it is certainly not the first in America's political history. The book offers extraordinary examples of past (and one should add white) presidential candidates own battles with proving their heritage in order to serve. As far back as the early 1800s, President Martin Van Buren (1837–1841) was alleged to be Danish, due to his first language being Dutch. President James Garfield's successor Chester A. Arthur (1881–85) was rumoured to be British. Mitt Romney's father George Rommey's candidacy in the 1968 campaign was also in question as his birth took place in a Mormon colony in Mexico. Interestingly, even Obama’s Republican rival John McCain's has had his Americanness questioned - in the run-up to the 2008 elections - because he was born on an American naval base on the Panama Canal. This however, did not stop the McCain team fanning the flames of Obama's 'othering'. Obama's distancing by Republican rivals, the right-wing press, and the conspiracy-makers is undoubtedly race-related. The tone, language, implications, and sometimes all out racist comments by these organisations and individuals has planted a kernel in the American mind, and re-legitimised race-based assumptions and labelling not overtly represented in mainstream American media for decades. Thus the psychological aspect kicks in: American paranoia about foreign influence dates back to independence and the break from England; it reared its ugly head during McCarthyism with the fear of communist infiltration, and again post-9/11 amid the concern over extremist Islam. The fear of foreign takeover has never dissipated.
It is a credit to Parlett that he manages to decipher and disentangle the numerous charges aimed at Obama in a manner that is comprehensible and comprehensive; his book’s argument is laid out clearly for academic and layman alike. Of note, a quick search on Amazon.com using the keywords 'Obama books' throws up a booklist more interested in the spectacle of political machinate than factual truths. Parlett's scholarly account must compete with a more popular climate of fabrication that surrounds Obama. And indeed, this will be the book's main challenge, to defend and dispel in a convincing fashion the hyperbole of those on the attack. Parlett's personal account of canvassing at the door of an unreceptive, and unshakable potential voter acts like a cataclysm for the book, and also the argument it presents. Opinions fall on deaf ears, and a percentage of the American population are simply unwilling to change perspective, however persuasive the evidence. Some would prefer to take up arms. Yet in the end, the clear and sensible tone is what makes this book a triumph of reason over ignorance.
The 'Foreignization' of Parlett's title does not just refer to the Birther movement, which has dogged Obama's presidency since before he even took office, though it does feature prominently. Rather, it denotes the distancing of Obama from any, if not all, American value systems. Thus, according to Parlett, Obama has been variously disparaged as a ‘radical Muslim, socialist, European, terrorist, fascist, closet homosexual,’ to name but a few on an ever-growing list. As long as he is a something ‘other’ than truly American his legitimacy as President is relentlessly in question, his power is attenuated and made inconsequential. Parlett paints this affliction in colours of history and psychology. The slurring of Obama is perhaps the most explicit example of ‘othering’, but it is certainly not the first in America's political history. The book offers extraordinary examples of past (and one should add white) presidential candidates own battles with proving their heritage in order to serve. As far back as the early 1800s, President Martin Van Buren (1837–1841) was alleged to be Danish, due to his first language being Dutch. President James Garfield's successor Chester A. Arthur (1881–85) was rumoured to be British. Mitt Romney's father George Rommey's candidacy in the 1968 campaign was also in question as his birth took place in a Mormon colony in Mexico. Interestingly, even Obama’s Republican rival John McCain's has had his Americanness questioned - in the run-up to the 2008 elections - because he was born on an American naval base on the Panama Canal. This however, did not stop the McCain team fanning the flames of Obama's 'othering'. Obama's distancing by Republican rivals, the right-wing press, and the conspiracy-makers is undoubtedly race-related. The tone, language, implications, and sometimes all out racist comments by these organisations and individuals has planted a kernel in the American mind, and re-legitimised race-based assumptions and labelling not overtly represented in mainstream American media for decades. Thus the psychological aspect kicks in: American paranoia about foreign influence dates back to independence and the break from England; it reared its ugly head during McCarthyism with the fear of communist infiltration, and again post-9/11 amid the concern over extremist Islam. The fear of foreign takeover has never dissipated.
It is a credit to Parlett that he manages to decipher and disentangle the numerous charges aimed at Obama in a manner that is comprehensible and comprehensive; his book’s argument is laid out clearly for academic and layman alike. Of note, a quick search on Amazon.com using the keywords 'Obama books' throws up a booklist more interested in the spectacle of political machinate than factual truths. Parlett's scholarly account must compete with a more popular climate of fabrication that surrounds Obama. And indeed, this will be the book's main challenge, to defend and dispel in a convincing fashion the hyperbole of those on the attack. Parlett's personal account of canvassing at the door of an unreceptive, and unshakable potential voter acts like a cataclysm for the book, and also the argument it presents. Opinions fall on deaf ears, and a percentage of the American population are simply unwilling to change perspective, however persuasive the evidence. Some would prefer to take up arms. Yet in the end, the clear and sensible tone is what makes this book a triumph of reason over ignorance.