The White House Doesn’t Fear Racism

Over the course of this week the White House has been trying to avoid the thorny subject. But today the president was due to appear on 5 different political programs – something that has never been done in presidential history – to rule out the idea that the harsh criticisms that he is receiving for his attempt at reforming health care are based on racial motives. On Friday night, in an excerpt of an interview for CNN due to air today, Obama asked, “Do I think that there are some people here that are not happy with this reform because of racial reasons?” The president stated “I’m sure that it is true, but it’s not the main factor in this case.”

According to Obama, 48 years-old and the first black president in the history of the United States, the attacks that he is suffering have to do with the intense debate about the government’s role in the lives of U.S citizens. Not just one or two, but many reporters from the major networks such as ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN and Univision today will ask in their programs with the president how much of the hostility in the debate about the health care reform is due to underlying racism in American society, as stated this very week by the ex-President Jimmy Carter. Undoubtedly, the head of state will say there is no relation, that race has nothing to do with it.

In his interview with NBC, Obama accepted that of course “there are people who still think in terms of race when they try to evaluate me and my candidacy.” He argued “some people voted for me for because I was black and some didn’t vote for me for that same reason.” However, according to the president, the big debate is: “the argument that has gone on since the beginning of the republic is: what is the correct role of the state?” He goes on, “How do we balance freedom with the need to care for one another? This isn’t a new argument and always raises passion.”

With his TV marathon today, Barack Obama will make it clear that he does not agree with Carter. Nor does he believe that tensions between citizens of one or other thinking are growing or that politicians are going through a special period of disconnect. On CNN he assures “this is the same debate that has been happening for a long time, although it often appears much more fierce during periods of transitions, or when the presidents try to achieve reform. I believe that this is probably the main reason for some of this aggressiveness.”

In a look back through history, which in his opinion discredits the racial motives, Obama declares: “Many of the things that were said about FDR [Franklin Delano Roosevelt] are very similar to those that were said about me – that I was a communist or that I was a socialist.” He adds “Many things that they said about Ronald Reagan when he tried to revert some programs of the New Deal they were also very nasty.”

The common element of all of these criticisms is the role of the state in society, a subject about which Obama tries not to express a definite or very ideological position. In the negotiations about health reform, for example, he seems ready to accept a law that does not include a public health insurance option.