Bargainers and challengers

Denise Oppenhagen
Published: July 12, 2008

Generally the summer is a slow news time, especially for politics. It’s a chance for us to get a break from the campaigns and politicians and a chance for the campaigns and politicians to regroup.
Because of this, even the smallest piece of news (or controversy) becomes a leading news item and gets dissected on the morning news and talk shows. 

Such is the case with Barack Obama and Jesse Jackson. If you haven’t heard — which is likely if you have taken the summer off from reading newspapers or watching television news — Jesse Jackson
made snide comments about Obama talking down to Black Americans in churches.  He went further and mentioned a surgical procedure that he would like to perform on Obama.

It’s been interesting to read the different opinions on why Jackson made the comments. Could it be that he’s jealous of Obama’s success? Or that he realizes he is about to be made inconsequential,
again by Obama’s success? 

One suggestion makes a lot of sense to me: it’s a philosophy difference.  The UK Times Online on July 10 phrased the difference in two words: challenger versus bargainer. According to this theory,
Jackson is a challenger. He made his career basing his work on an underlying assumption that all white people are racist until proven otherwise. He sowed the seeds of distrust between Black Americans
and White Americans that still have to heal. Barack Obama, on the other hand, is a bargainer. The bargain is a matter of Blacks not holding Whites responsible for slavery and Whites not discriminating
against Blacks for their skin color. 

Challengers are important because there are still some unresolved racial issues in our country.  But challengers were most useful during the fight for Civil Rights when, indeed, many (most?) Whites were
racist. The only way to get a message across or to get action was to challenge the status quo. Jackson was nonviolent.  He followed King’s example and organized boycotts and protests that got him
what he wanted.

But Jackson’s constituency is no longer solidly with him. It’s interesting that Jackson’s son is a co-chair of Obama’s national campaign and has condemned his father’s comments. There are some young
Blacks who do not understand the fight their elders went through to get things that they take for granted — the right to vote, the right to an equal education, the right to live wherever you want, to work at
whatever job you want, and to date whomever you want.  They hear the word racism but don’t understand what it means.  They call anyone who disagrees with them a racist. But many more of these
young men and women understand the legacy they have inherited from those who survived and died during the Civil Rights movement. They work hard to be successful and believe that everyone is on
equal footing. They are idealists, yes, but in a good way.  And they want to see this country change and become united. They are people like Barack Obama. 

I’m not sure how much influence Jackson has on Democratic politics or the Black community any more.  Back in the 1960’s and 1970’s, he was an inspirational leader. His speeches were exciting and
motivating. His Quixotic quest for the presidency in 1984 and 1988 broke barriers that Obama is now able to take advantage of.

But now the time has come to pass the torch to the next generation, to move past the divisive challenges to authority that marked the 1970’s, ‘80’s and ‘90’s in the direction of unity. The political issues
our country faces right now — the Iraq war, a bad economy, national security — are issues for all Americans, not just some. We need to work together — to bargain with each other — to solve them so
everyone wins. 

Denise Oppenhagen is a longtime resident of Prince William County and can be reached at .